Of Olives and Dates (the historical variety)

28 October 2008

Of Olives and Dates (the historical variety)

On the table were two, large plastic tubs brimming with dirty green and purplish-green olives and beside them, a cold, orange plate of spaghetti; as hungry as I was, I was much more interested in what was happening to the olives. “Hadol zaytun min Filistine (These are olives from Palestine),” said Umm Dunia (Khatm, my host mother), as she pounded the olives individually with some sort of mallet. Realizing I was fairly gawking at her – one for having some sort of dinner available for me and secondly, for the strange olive processing - I carried my backpack to my room and returned. Umm Dunia looked up at the clock pointedly, as if to quietly rebuke me for just missing dinner, the most inconsistent of mealtimes in our family.
The metal chair scraped noisily as I pulled it away from the table to sit and stare at the process. After mechanically eating half the plate of spaghetti, I clanked my fork (I couldn’t remember the last time I had used a fork in place of the all-purpose spoon) on the plate and pushed it aside. “Mumkin (Can I)…?” I asked shoving my hand into the cool, grainy tub of olives, rolling them about in my fingers. Umm Dunia left the room, returning with a rock; she demonstrated how I should beat the olive to make the flesh split open to facilitate the soaking/seasoning process. Abu Dunia (Mohammed, my host father) joined us. Khatm gave him her mallet and procured a large-handled knife with which to beat the olives.
It had been a while since I had been included in any sort of family activity; my parents have been busy preparing another apartment (which they rent out) and helping their daughter’s family move into a new condominium; I was overjoyed to be included.
“Ah…min Filistine, sah?”
Khatm continued pounding and didn’t look up to answer, “Sah.” She thought I meant the olives.
“Aihwa, bas entoum (gesturing to her and Mohammed)…min Filistine, sah?” They looked at each other in askance.
“La,” Mohammed shook his finger at me. “Min Salt.” Salt. A city just outside Amman, maybe half an hour away. But surely they were from Palestine, as often as they commented on it in my presence: about the news we sometimes watched, about the origins of fruits and vegetables, etc. All this time I had assumed they were from Palestine, for they identified with it so often.
“Oh,” I said. “Bas, abuho (But your father)…?” I pressed on.
“La, min Salt.”
“Oh. And your grandfather?”
“Min Salt.”
At this point Khatm interjected. “Kul ei3leh min Salt (The whole family is from Salt). Jordanian. All Jordanian.”
“Oh.” We three pounded our olives in silence. I felt slightly embarrassed for having assumed they were Palestinian for so long. I don’t suppose they were insulted; they merely stressed their Jordanian heritage and then were silent.
“Bas,” Mohammed began, placing his mallet down purposefully, “Filistine balad ‘arab (Palestine is an Arab country)…” I nodded.
“Ou Israeli khod min homeh...,” he began as he launched into a rapid lecture about the conflict.
“Aihwa,” I interjected, “fi 1948.” This pleased them.
“Ta3raf ean hadha (You know about this?).
“Na’am, fi jame3ahti badros tareekh (Yes, in my university I study History)…”.
“Qweyes, Qweyes (Good, good),” Mohammed nodded vigorously, picking the mallet up again, only to shake it at me in the next sentence. “Bas, Britainiyya khod al balad min Filistine…(But Britian took the country from the Palestinians, followed by a lot of words I couldn’t quite understand)…Ball-foor…”
“Shu yaeni Ball-foor?” What kind of new Arabic word was this? I had no idea.
“Ball-foor ism (is a name)” Mohammed insisted as if I should know this. A long pause. Then I realized:
“Oh! Balfour, the Balfour Declaration!” They both nodded then clicked their tongues, saying “Ya haram (how shameful, what a shame). And I was really glad in that moment that I was not British and thus “to blame” for the mess next-door – not that being American is much better (reputation-wise). After that followed our limited discussion of the conflict – I cited historical dates as I knew them – and a brief discussion about the American political situation.
“King Obama,” Umm Dunia said. I had to suppress a laugh, because she was quite serious.
“Uh, fi amreeka, eindna ‘president’ moush malik (In America, we have a president, not a king)…” I began.
“Aihwa, bas (the Congress picks him).”
“Aihwa, bas…,” I began again. How do I explain the presidential election, especially that strange animal, the Electoral College?
“King Abdullah, Congress, fi Urdun (picks him).” Mohammed interjected. O.k. a referendum to affirm a monarch is not a democracy.
“King Clinton, qweyes, qweyes…King Bush, moush qweyes (not good),” Khatm clicked her tongue disapprovingly.
‘Bithebbi Obama (Do you like Obama)?” I asked carefully.
“Ma baeraf,” Khatm said, shaking her head and shrugging. “Mumkin Obama, mumkin McCain.” I remember one of our lecturers a few weeks ago commented on how popular Bush had been when he was elected, but the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and his silence on other Middle East issues, namely the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, were major disappointments for Jordanians. “We never know,” Khatm concluded.

Yeah, we don’t. And I felt sad for my country.