On Dining with Jordanians

Busy weekend!

My roommate, Minna, is half Palestinian and has some family here in Amman, so on Friday, we headed over to her great aunt and uncle's for lunch. A seven hour lunch mind you. Quite the experience. I'm well read on Arab culture, so I knew the lunch wouldn't be quick, but I had no idea it would encompass my entire Friday.

We were picked up at 11, and our day started with a chat in their fabulous sitting room.
They own a pharmacy and are obviously pretty well off.

Minna's aunt does these amazing cross stitched patterns that she hangs on all the walls. This is one of them. Apparently they're traditional Palestinian designs. The detail was amazing.

So, we sit and talk for awhile. We bumble around in our stilted Arabic, they laugh. Their English is really good, so there isn't any communication barriers, but they want us to learn . . . at noon, Minna's uncle goes to mosque, and we head into the kitchen, to learn how to make Shishburek. Shishburek is a traditional Palestinian dish, composed of small balls of dough with meat inside, grilled and then covered in a warm yogurt sauce, seasoned with garlic and cardamom. Minna's aunt has also made a dish called Koussa (hollowed out zucchini, filled with meat, and eaten with the same yogurt sauce) and the best chicken curry I've ever had.


The Shishburek is at the top, and the Koussa is to the left. Mind you, we didn't get to eat this food until almost 2. She gave us all Shishburek first, which I didn't hate, but the whole warm, sour yogurt thing is something I haven't quite adjusted to yet. But I loved the chicken curry. Especially since I didn't expect to get any awesome Indian food while here. So we eat, and clean up and head back into the sitting room. Here, Minna's aunt tells us she is very tired and is going to take a nap, but then after we'll have dessert and take a drive around the city. This is at 2:30. They nap until 5:00. We watched Ghandi in it's entirety. I understand, they're in their late 60s yet still work full time in their pharmacy six days a week. I'm sure they're exhausted. It felt super silly though. They finally wake up though, and she brings us the cutest fruit plates ever. We each got one of these. I like the whole fruit as dessert concept here. It totally works. Which reminds me - Minna's uncle told us that American's were all fat because they ate too much ice cream. We got a good laugh out of that one.


We eat our fruit, and then we take a drive around Abdoun, which is the swankiest neighborhood in Amman. I'm talking gorgeous villas. And the amazingly ostentatious US Embassy; walled and guarded by tanks and Jordanian guards with automatics. Of course that's what our embassy looks like. Surprise, surprise.

Overall, a really great experience. I'm so lucky to have a roommate with family here. It made me love Amman just a little bit more. A love that seems to grow day after day. Who would have thought I would be so enchanted by all the dirt, pollution, traffic, and harassment that is Amman? Ha. For every negative thing, there's twice as much positive, and I just look at all the negatives as differences, not negatives. America is the exception, not the standard. This is the rest of the world. Accept it or hate life are my only choices.