Food

It is traditional in my uncle's company that whenever someone gets a visit from home, they smuggle some food and drink in to treat the his fellow workers. So we had a feast. A feast, I say, because, whenever the subject of edibles comes up, my aunt flies into a cooking frenzy. Kitchen berserker. So when we started carrying into my uncle's office tray upon tray of ham, bacon, cheese, olives, cooked ham, sausage slices, bread and four different varieties of sweets, people were asking us where the bride and groom were, to congratulate them on the happy occasion.

The three of us young'uns didn't want to stay with the score of my uncle's co-workers, partly because they weren't our co-workers, but largely because we have just come from the place where such food is normal daily nutriment. I mean, every caterer will make exactly the same trays, albeit somewhat less homemade, and more evenly cut. Oh, and they probably wouldn't include the bacon, but as it's a very low-priority target for me, meh. So we opted out from the Croatian stuff-fest, having spent twenty minutes convincing my uncle that he does not need to leave the party to drive us back to our apartment. Come on, wait a bit more with the walking about, you don't yet know your way, what if you get lost, let me show you around some more first, fret, fret, fret... I mean, I'm thankful that he cares so much, but I am not really helpless, and neither is Nisha. I don't know about Nina, she claimed that she'd be lost in a second, but him and me have rather good orientation skills, and we have one of Gord's maps, which knows Damascus really really well. It should: we bought it a day after it was published.

So we convinced him we'd be fine, and escaped from the office building into a fine drizzle. Which reminds me! Last night we went to the office to try to send some pictures by mail, and it was blocked — company policy. The mail, not the office. As is my blog. So I'm stuck with the crappy connection from the apartment. Sigh. Anyway, what I wanted to describe is the Syrian method of cleaning floors: 1) get a pail of water, 2) go to the top floor, 3) spill the pail on the staircase. We were entering the building, and noticed a small stream on the steps, steadily widening as we got higher. Then my uncle explained about the cleaners.

Back to the topic. We got out, and realised all the catering we did made us really hungry by then, so we went to look for the place where my uncle said had these great local quasipizzas. Each one is the size of a spread palm, and each one costs 10 syrian pounds. Now: a hundred syrian pounds is about eleven Croatian kunas, or a bit less than 2 USD, which means each one is about 1 Kn.

People tell us most locals speak English or French, but not in my experience so far. Some people understand enough English to say "No speak English", but some adopt the default answer "Yes" for whatever they detect is a question in English. Which explains some of Nisha's conversations:

"ﻋﺮﺑﻲ ﻋﺮﺑﻲ ﻋﺮﺑﻲ"

"I'm sorry, do you speak English?"

"Yes!"

"How much is this?"

"ﻋﺮﺑﻲ ﻋﺮﺑﻲ ﻋﺮﺑﻲ"

So I'm making do with my meager store of Arabic expressions. At the quasipizza store, it was like:

"ﺗﺘﮑﻠﻢ ﺇﻧﺠﻠﻴﺰﻱ؟"

"ﻻ"

"ﺗﺘﮑﻠﻢ ﻓﺮﻧﺴﻰ؟"

"ﻻ — espanol little him"

Then I gave up and just said one of each in Arabic. So we got a mixed bag full of pizzoids and calzonoids, and one little doughy package noone was sure about. The little package turned out to be the best of the lot, and probably cheapest too. We are still not sure what it was stuffed with, but our bet is on sour vine leaves. Not a very high bet, I'm not going high stakes on a piece of Syrian pastry, but still. Then we turned around and spotted some pancakes in a little shop on the other side of the street. We managed to gather from another foreign language learning opponent that they were filled with walnuts, so we bought three. He opened a valve and fired up a stove which I did not even notice until then because it was right behind me, almost singing my coat, and dropped the three little crêpe bundles into the hot oil inside. I had my reservations, but it was fingerlickingly delicious! The quasipizzas were a disappointment, I must say, after my uncle's propaganda, being way too greasy. The pancake, although containing more oil than a sunflower field, was too sweet for me to care: a little honey heaven.