Secret Asian Man- What About All That Bread?!?

An addendum if you will to last week’s entry on trash.  I got lots of questions wondering, “What about all that bread?”

Okay. That’s fake news.  I didn’t hear anything like that, but I thought it interesting enough to talk about.  

Watch this video:

https://YouTube.be/wlfZo_rTg68https://youtu.be/wIfZo_rTg6. 

This is pita bread being made. Presumably it is made in the basement by elves. It bakes then conveys up to the second floor and plops on the counter for bagging.

Falling from the ceiling at a local bakery. It is bread at its most basic. Flour, water, salt. No preservatives, no yeast, no riboflavin, no nothing. 

If Americans are, per Michael Polland, “Children of Corn”, then Jordanians are “Seeds of Wheat” such is bread’s importance here.  It is eaten with every meal.  Often pita, but other forms as well.

Pita, for the longest time, was subsidized at a rate of about 35 cents for a kilogram stack.  A large family can eat a couple of kilos in no time.  About 6 months ago, the government raised the price to almost 50 cents. There are daily protests in the streets still, over this and other price hikes. It is a big deal.  

So, it’s one thing for a large family of 6 or 8 to buy a couple of kilograms of bread, but if you’re a smaller group, it becomes cumbersome.  There is just so much of it. We asked if we could buy just a few slices, but no go.  It’s a full loaf kilo or nothing.

And because there are no preservatives, the bread starts to get stale by the time you walk up the hill to your home. Once the heat dissipates, it gets more and more chewy and stiff. Great with hummous or a salad.  By the next day, it is a cracker.  It moulds quickly. 

For a while, we were freezing it, but then we found we just had freezer full of crackers.  You know what makes thawed out pita taste better?  Nothing.  Nothing can help this man-made, organic dessicant.

So we threw a ton of it away. Then we found out what Jordanians do.  They bag up the old bread and take it to the dumpsters or the curb and they hang it somewhere, like the photo above. Then bedouins come by and collect it and they feed it to their goats.  Goats, as you may know will eat anything and during a festival, the price of goats can soar. 

So, the government pays for the bread, we throw ¾ of it away and the bedouins feed their stock for near free and make a pretty nice profit.

Like pitas from heaven.

Secret Asian Man- Trash in(g) Amman

Long time readers may recall this writer’s infatuation with trash and how it gets where it’s going.  I feel like I’ve spoken about it a lot. From looking out my front window, this is my thoughts about how garbage is handled in Amman once we generate it and leave it outside of our front door. .All of this is based on hearsay and observation.

Sulieman our boab, (house elf) , makes a couple of rounds per day to all the units in our building collecting garbage and taking it to a set of dumpsters in the vacant lot next door. This is combined with trash from 8 or 10 other buildings.  Dumpsters are dispersed every 500 feet or so on the main roads.  Back streets have a bit longer walk to throw things away.

A standard city garbage truck swings by and empties dumpsters 4 or more times per week.  I don’t see them on Fridays, but they can show up most days usually just before dawn, and just before my alarm is set to ring.  

In between collections, a variety of other visitors happen by the dumpster.  It starts with the cats.  I don’t know where they go when the dumpsters are empty, but when full each dumpster generally has 2 or 3 felines per dumpster. Balanced along the rim or deep inside the garbage. Sustained on a diet of plastic bags and food scraps. I haven’t seen a lot of rats, but certainly there must be some.  

Bedouins or refugees make the rounds of the neighborhood.  Typically, they have a rusty white pick up or other utility vehicle that leans to one side, is lacking a muffler and most functioning forms of illumination. The driver stops, hops out and grabs a nearby rock to throw under the front wheel to save him having to chase his car down the hill.  

He proceeds to pull plastic bags out of the dumpster and throw the contents on the ground, taking what he needs. Usually metal, but also cardboard, cloth and other scraps.  The remainder is scattered to the winds.  The plastic bags take flight. Jordanians call plastic bags, their national bird.

Glass is not recycled. And after nearly 2 years of wondering why, I finally learned the answer.

The areas around dumpsters are strewn with broken glass. I wondered for a while, why glass wasn’t more valued.  We tried for a while to gather glass separately, but it would be taken to the dumpster and then thrown on the ground.  

It turns out that the closest glass recycling plant was in Syria. After the troubles there, the border shut down and no one could get the used glass up there, so the market crashed and no one wanted glass.  Another consequence of the ongoing conflict there.

The ground around the dumpster, as you can imagine, becomes a bit of a toxic mess of glass, food scraps and other detritus.  Bin Men circulate and sweep and scoop things up and try and keep things manageable. 

Once a month, a front-end loader drives by and either scoops up trash or grades over it with a thin layer of dirt and rock and for a week or so, things look rather tidy.

If you want to get rid of more valuable items, the scrap buyer circulates. A large loudspeaker mounted on the cab announces what he’s buying.  It plays and ear splitting volumes.  He cycles around twice, so when you hear him the first, you move your stuff to the curb and catch him the second time around.  

Where the collected trash goes from the dumpster, I’m not sure.  I presume to a landfill of some sort.  Some place where all the “birds’ can roost together and flap in the wind.

Secret Asian Man- This Week in Virginity

Last week we heard how Helen launched, if not a thousand ships, at least 1000 SUV and small pickup trucks.  Here’s more on why.

I had the pleasure of attending a cultural awareness conference with a Palestinian woman from the West Bank town of Nablus. The fact that she’d never been to Nablus is for another story.

During this talk we watched a video clip of the 1995 film Rob Roy, in which Rob Roy, played by Liam Neeson, talks about honor. He goes on about how men can gain honor and lose honor.  He also seems to imply that women have all the honor, but that men are the only ones who can guard it.

While we were eating lunch, I brought up the scene with her. She said that indeed women are capable of defending their honor.  She noted in her city, Nablus, the women are all very strong. Nothing happens if the women don’t agree. She rattled off a saying in Arabic.

But she went on to say, that in the Arab world, when you hear talk of honor, you should know that the speaker is referring exclusively to a woman.

“Really! Anytime. It all can be extended back to a defending a woman. And, more specifically, her virginity”

She poked out her pinky into the air. “Every woman has this, um, this, er… membrane. And that is the most important. If a woman plays soccer or does sports, she must disclose this before marriage, or it may be shameful for her family.”

“Hmm.” I asked, “What do you think of that?”

She shrugged, “It’s what is believed.”

I turned to my brownie and thought about Liam Neeson and his “very particular set of skills” and wondered if he was typecast as a defender of honor.

Anyway, that’s how it came to be that riots broke out after Helen Christos ran to her friends house. A clash of clans turned into a tribal battle over honor and shame.  

Secret Asian Man- When Two Tribes Go to War

FIRST....This an old song that was thumping through my mind whilst jotting this down.  You can find the video and music HERE. Turn it up loud. That’s what I did.  Go ahead.  I’ll wait.

Now then....Does anyone recall what the Kentucky Hatfields and McCoys were fighting over?  What about the Montagues and the Capulets?

I’m sure the answer is lost to time, but I’ll bet a dinar to a donut that it was a woman. Here’s a sketch of a Jordanian drama that culminated this week in the shutting down of a city of 86,000 people. It was told to me by some of my Jordanian co-workers. Likely embellished, as is the way with oral tradition

It seems a mother of three, a Christian woman wrote a letter and petitioned the King last year for some sort of assistance.  Let’s call her Mrs. Helen Christos. She’s married, but her husband works in the south and can’t often come home. The King wants to explore this request and passed her letter on to a staff member. His name is Izzy Al McCoy.

Izzy phones her up and asks for a meeting.  He has the most professional of intents. He’s working for his boss, the King. He is smitten, though instantly. He calls her several times under the pretense of helping her. They talk. She finds the attention refreshing. It’s a distraction.

Mrs. Christos and Izzy go out for a coffee.  They enjoy themselves.  Izzy snaps a few selfies. He calls the next day. At which time, Helen has started to worry.  She’s married. He’s nice, but he’s Muslim.  There could be a scandal. She has misgivings about going out with him again.

But Izzy has photos and he hints that they could find their way out. So, Mrs. Christos sees him reluctantly. Izzy is inflamed. He wants to be with her. He thinks about her all the time. As he’s handy with phones, he starts tracking her. One probably would call it “stalking”. He randomly appears in her life. He gets more urgent in his requests. More demanding. Until at one point he grabs her arm and tries to drag her away.  

Mrs. Christos gets fearful and distraught. She breaks free and runs to her best friend’s house.

Amiga and Amigo Al Hatfield live down the way. Amiga is her best friend. Mrs. Christos runs into the home and begs for help.  Izzy chases her and is out front now. Rather enraged. 

Now, in bedouin culture, if someone comes to you and asks for help, you are obligated to provide it.  Even if they are an enemy.

So, Amigo Al Hatfield gets up from his couch and shisha pipe and goes to the door. He lets Izzy know, that she’s going stay here and he’ll look after her. But the situation escalates.  There was a scuffle. Amigo got the best of Izzy and sent him off.  Not only that, but the Al Hatfields and Mrs. Christos let the King know what happens and Izzy is dismissed.

That was all months ago.

Things had been quiet until a week or so ago, when Amigo Al Hatfield finds himself alone against Izzy and 14 of his friends. They beat him so badly that Amigo ended up in the ICU.  Also, again, because Izzy is good with his phone, he filmed it and threw it up online. 

Another thing about Bedouins, is they stick together. Tribes are a big deal. If someone harms you, the tribe will back you.  If you do something embarrassing, you embarrass the tribe. Izzy was shamed and so he got some clansmen and had at it.

Amigo’s tribe though, thought the response was a bit excessive. And his tribe descended upon the city with some 4000 of their own men in cars, with weapons firing into the air, circling around the town demanding the men in the video be arrested or turned over to them. The rioting went on for a day and into the night.  

You can find video HERE. Nothing too graphic. Just angry chaos, really.

A coworker was headed there and was stopped by police, who had sealed off the town.  They told her to go a different way. She said, “I don’t know any other way to get there. I’ll get lost!”

Police replied, “It is too dangerous. It is better to get lost than to die. Now, go!”

They eventually took the men into custody, but haven’t charged anyone.  The police often hold people for their own protection.

We all sat at lunch discussing this. I wondered how it was going to end.  

“It’s not gonna end!” said one. “It’s just gonna go on and on. OMG!”

I asked if maybe money could solve it.  

“No. They don’t want money. The only way it will get solved is when the tribal elders get together and discuss it. It may not end until the Al Hatfields get to have 15 of their guys take on Izzy”

And that’s what’s been going on in Jordan this week.  I’m sure there is a musical or play in there. Jets vs. Sharks?  Romeo and Juliet?   At the very least a country song.  It’s tribalism at its finest.  

Stop by next week for more on honor and shame. And why Liam Neeson could be the defender of virginity. 

Secret Asian Man- Finding Rocket Man

Time ticks by and we start forming lists. Lists of things to pack. Lists of things to buy.  Lists of places we want to see before we go.  Lists of the things we’ll miss. 

Missing things like the melon.  Oh my god!  The melon! First, buttery and savory, with a cool sweet finish. I will have crack-dreams for years over this melon.

Or missing things like falafel. I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to eat falafel anywhere else.  Or shwarma. Same thing.  They’re simple, delicious and darn near free. Paying 7 bucks or more back in the US seems obscene.  

Out with the Mrs. for a spring evening stroll to obtain such sandwiches. The start of the dwindling number, I’m sure. Trying to get our fill.

We came across a new place that had opened a couple months back.  It was bright and clean with decor a step above.  And they were cooking something new. It was like shwarma meat cooked on a large shield-like pan. A little oil, a little lemon juice, some secret spices.  They press some pita down on top of the stew that’s created sopping up any extra juice then they wrap it all up with some tomatoes, pickles and hot peppers and squirt on some lemon juice to finish.  Served with fries.

It looked like a shwarma, but different. I thought I’d give it a try, so I walked up to the counter and picked up the menu.  

“That is all in arabic, but don’t worry, I will explain to you everything.” said the purveyor.

In near perfect English, he explained that this was a Turkish sandwich called a Tantuni. He talked a bit about it and how long they were here.  He and all the cooks there were Jordanian, but they had a Turkish chef who was on holiday.

Chicken or beef, I opted for chicken and placed my order.

I called Mrs. S.A.M. in from her Pokemon hunting. He explained the whole process again. She exclaimed, “That looks amazing, but I’m a vegetarian. That looks like it would be great with tofu!”

The man considers this and tells us that he used to own an Italian restaurant in Guanzhou, China. He said he never had tofu until he went there and grew to love it.

“Ah, I will make a vegetarian sandwich for you that is not on the menu!”  And he proceeds to bark out orders to the guy behind the counter who responded and made some suggestions of his own.  

He throws down a pita, smears on some yogurt, takes some Arugula and tears off only the tender parts.  Seriously, at a fast food street vendor, he tore the stems out of 12-15 individual leaves of arugula and laid them out strategically for maximum coverage.  Some tomatoes, pickles, etc.

“I love arugula”, he says. “I put it anywhere I can!”

We told him the sandwich should have a name.  “I don’t know, I guess a rocket sandwich?! Ha ha!”

I offer to pay for the extra creativity, but he waves me off.  “It is my compliments!” and then after we’re sitting outside he brings out two cold yogurt drinks with froth on top.  He called it Airon(sp?) and said it is a popular dish in Turkey.  “You will drink more Airon than water there.”

Sipping our icee cold, spoiled milk, we wondered together about this man’s story. Here’s a guy with a salad-greens fetish, speaking perfect English, who’s owned an Italian restaurant in China, now importing a Turkish sandwich concept to Jordan. How does that happen?  

We figured that it must be family that drew him back. This country is full of people with postponed dreams. Men or women who went away and did interesting things, but came back to care for mom or dad or in-laws and work the family business or on the side driving Uber or guiding tours.

When I started this entry, I was going to say that people were the other thing I’d miss. Their pride and kindness and stories like these.

But then I realized there are stories and people like this everywhere. I could go to the State Fair this summer and find a fried food vendor and if I stood and listened for long enough, I’d probably find an equally kind and proud person, who just might give me extra chocolate sauce for my deep fried twinkie.