turning a blind eye

It all started when I thought, ‘Akh! That obnoxious yellow-and-green comforter makes the rest of the room look fluorescent white. The comforter has got to go.’

When I took off the green-and-yellow comforter, though, I realized that the mattress was lopsided.

And when I lifted the mattress, I discovered that the supporting board underneath had fallen to the floor.

When I propped up the mattress with my head and worked to lift the board to its proper place, I found the mattress too heavy and the board too stubborn.

When I tried to remove the mattress altogether, the frame of the bed came apart, and one of its four sides fell flat on its face.

So now I have a queen-size bed in pieces, all because I discriminated against a certain green-and-yellow comforter.

In Arabic, there’s an expression for this. ‘Ijay kahhilha ‘amaha. He came to put kohl in the eye but, in the process, blinded it.

Now the bedroom is truly an eyesore.

I could tell my aunt’s husband about this, and I know he’d spend the last day of his Eid rebuilding what I’ve broken. Or I could simply put out the harsh fluorescent lights and shut the door because, let’s face it, ever since I was little, I never found a mattress more comfortable than the bedroom floor.

revisiting the golden state

It’s not like it’s my first time seeing Arabs, and it’s not like I came half way across the world searching for them. I mean, I have only to look in the mirror to find one. And yet it’s a little unsettling how many Arabs there are here.

Now, don’t get me wrong. It’s not unsettling that there are Arabs. It’s unsettling that there are Arabs who look familiar, act familiar but to whom I am a complete stranger.

I taught Islamic Sunday School for several years and that’s like teaching a model United Nations, only with little human beings. If it weren’t for the occasional African American or Pakistani child, it could even be a mini Arab League.

I also attended the same mosque for as long as I can remember — a mosque known fondly (and sometimes begrudgingly) as “the Arab mosque in the area.” (Worry not. There are also Cambodian, African American and Desi mosques nearby. If you weren’t born lucky — i.e. Arab, Cambodian, African American or Desi — then, you could move away, start your own mosque or get an ethnicity-change.) In any case, my Arab-majority mosque saw me grow from a girl on a see-saw with a jumper and two braids into a hijabi adult who is still wondering what ever happened to that see-saw.

The mosque saw me change and I, in turn, saw it through its countless renovations: the creation of  a women’s prayer hall out of a kitchen; the conversion of a community pool into a sand then wood-chip playground; and the (possibly fire-hazardous) sealing of various doors after attempted robberies.

I was a vine that grew along the walls of that mosque, and growing alongside me were countless other leaves, many of them just barely unfurling.

That’s why, when I went to my predominantly Arab mosque — and I went often — there were always children clamboring about: young curly-haired boys who, embarrassed, ran away from their Sunday School teacher who had magically stepped out of her classroom (and her designated day of the week); little pigtailed girls who hugged my knees and made me feel like a well-loved tree; a playful infant who made it hard for me to keep a straight face at a ‘azaa (condolences service); a bold pre-pubescent boy who, thanks to a badly tailored shirt and/or a thickened waistline, asked me if I’m pregnant (Who needs marriage anyway?); and the same bold pre-pubescent boy who, on observing me with my bearded brother, asked for the name of my fiance. (I know children ask a lot of questions, but do they have to ask awkward ones? Why don’t they stick to the ‘whywhywhy?’)

In short, I befriended a lot of Arab kids.

Maybe this is because Jumpstart trained me to treat preschoolers like human beings, not stuffed animals. Maybe it’s because, as Mama says, ‘a’lik izgheer (your mind is little) and therefore I get along with like-minded little minds. Maybe it’s because I enjoy the children’s company more than I do that of the mosque’s bigger kids (i.e. parents) who play aggressively, are often poor sports and who separate into teams faster than oil and water.

Whatever the reasons, the conclusion is one. I like kids. (No, I’m not a pedophile. If I were, I’d tell you.)

Well, today I got to see an overwhelming number of kids — almost enough to compensate for one hundred years of solitude. Since it was the second day of Eid, my friend and I took her fourteen year-old cousin to an indoor theme park where, I tell you, we found more children than ants on an anthill.

The outrageous proportion of children to parents, the flagrant violations of due process (and, by that, I mean standing in line), and the faces — all were so familiar. I swear there was a boy-version of a little Libyan girl I know, and I saw one of the Sheikh’s children bouncing on a trampoline.

Of course, not one of the thousand children running about the place knew me. And of course, it was strange being there, considering I was neither a child, a sibling nor a parent. As we say in Arabic, I had no mawqi’ min al i’rab. In the sentence’s grammar, I was neither subject nor predicate.

As night stealthily crept in like the Grinch, stealing away the children’s energy, families began filing out of the crowded theme park, and my friend aptly remarked, “Isn’t it wonderful that, at that age, you get tired, and I mean dead-tired, not from studying or working, but from playing?” And I thought, darn right. The years I spent in the golden-state, kicking myself up off the ground after school on a wobbly see-saw, with no one opposite me but the wind — those were indeed the golden years.

Yes, I’m far from the poppy-flower Golden State of my childhood, but since there are countless happy, boisterous, precocious Arab children here, I really can’t be that far away. I guess, wherever I am, children have a way of bringing me back to a golden state of mind.

one large eid, coming up

Pizza. That meal transports me to the U.S. more quickly and cheaply than a jet plane ever could.

In fact, Pizza Hut served as my roundtrip ticket to the U.S. before, when I was in Cairo, but only after several unhappy dining experiences.

The most vivid of these occurred on our very first day in Um Ad-Dunya (Egypt’s nickname; literally, the Mother of the World). Baba and I had entertained this notion that, in this city of twenty-million, we could walk into any restaurant and fare well. Not so.

We happened upon a restaurant that looked fairly respectable, but we soon discovered that the storefront was – pardon the pun – only a façade. As soon as we walked in, we found a man at our left with rolled-up sleeves, reading a newspaper at a small foldable table, a glass of tea in front of him. He distractedly pointed us to a flight of stairs. Down we went, into a dimly-lit room the size of a college dorm, furnished with a handful well-worn tables. The curcumin- and paprika-colored walls, the steamy humidity, and the lack of windows all combined to make us feel as if we were in a pot, stewing.

Not surprisingly, we were the only customers.

I don’t remember what we ordered but, whatever it was, it consisted of a little pile of orange rice topped with bite-sized hearts, kidneys and other miscellaneous organs. Had I been forewarned about this lesson in cardiovascular anatomy, I might have found my plate less revolting.

Lucky for me, however, Baba’s always been quite in touch with his carnivorous side, so all my meats were enthusiastically transferred from my plate to his. I spent the rest of my time trying to force half-cooked rice through the closed doors of an offended appetite.

Most of my dining experiences in Cairo were a little upsetting, if not to the sensibility, then certainly to the stomach. Like most travelers unaccustomed to the food, water and air of Cairo, I promptly experienced traveling sickness — an elegant euphemism for diarrhea.

On one of the day I stayed in, apologizing to my stomach and reading Mama’s college copy of Wuthering Heights, Baba went down to grab some groceries and to simply be in Cairo. (I wasn’t in Cairo, really. My mind was wandering around the British moors just outside the coldly enchanting Heathcliff residence.)

“I’m walking up our street.” Baba told me over the phone. “I think I’m gonna get myself a shawerma sandwich. You don’t want that, do you? Yeah, I figured. Well, what do you want me to get you? You know what – I saw a Pizza Hut some blocks down. You want pizza?”

Baba probably risked his life to get me that pizza, and I certainly appreciated it.

That familiar red, white and black box magically took me away from this city dressed in plastic bags, powdered with the black soot of trains and perfumed with the intermingling scents of sultry smog and sweat.

Only one thing about this pizza distinguished it from the pizzas at home: it featured a pepperoni I could intentionally eat without sinning. (Oh, a second distinguishing feature: Arabic labeling. But, that’s a moot point, because my language-blind palate can’t tell the difference between ‘Beetza’ and ‘Pizza’.)

Now, my aunt is a good listener and, somewhere along the line, she figured that pizza is among my comfort foods. So last Thursday at 3 pm, after a long and tiresome workweek, she gave me a ring.

I was still at UJ, my last class had just ended, and I checked my silenced phone. It reported six missed calls in the last ten minutes. To me, that didn’t spell ‘let’s have pizza tonight.’ It spelled ‘emergency’. (As it turns out, her phone has an automatic redial function.)

In any case, I heaved a sigh of relief and, during my walk home, conjured up an image of my aunt and me in warm pajamas, I watching a movie on her family-room rug with my chin in my hands and she on a chair wrapped in a blanket, both waiting for the doorbell to ring.

But we didn’t wait for a doorbell to ring. Instead, we made the pajamas and movie wait, and drove down to a Pizza Hut. Unlike the predominantly delivery- or carryout-oriented Pizza Huts I’ve known, this was a full-fledged restaurant with a huge seating area and many a family to fill it.

Guess what toppings we had? None, because we didn’t have pizza! We had fettucine alfredo and ice cream sundaes. How that came to pass is beyond me.

We learned (the hard way) that Pizza Hut is not named Fettucine Alfredo Hut or Sundae Hut for a reason. Even so, I had a pretty excellent time. And why wouldn’t I? I was sitting across from one of the most adorable women I know and my favorite aunt.

After we turned a burdensome week’s worth of stories into a punching bag, boxing it and conquering it with laughter by turns, we both fell into a contemplative silence.

I looked around. Sitting at the table before us were an attentive husband, a wife with a ponytail and four children: one a darling, arm-waving little boy on a child seat, another a little girl sitting on the lap of her Southeast Asian housekeeper.

Behind us sat four hijabi girls whose features bespoke African lineage. They were giddily celebrating a birthday. Their party came complete with the flickering flashes of active cameras and a laptop DJing their favorite songs. (Batteries not included.)

This was Eid, I suddenly realized. I must have thought aloud, because my aunt quizzically asked, “Eid? How so?”

Well, many Muslim Americans ditch school and work to eat out after Eid prayers, I explained. That’s why, if I’m at a restaurant and the majority of the clientele are families, Muslim, and people of (my) color, then, well, it’s unequivocally Eid Day. (That or I’m at Mas’ Islamic Chinese Restaurant.)

Even though Eid Al-Adha is only days away, I’m not expecting it to be remarkable.

It will be unremarkable, I think, because I’m half a world away from most of the people who reciprocate my smiles.

It will also be unremarkable because, really, Eid is for children. (Yes, I’m being jaded.) When you’re a kid, you get the eidiya and your net worth increases, albeit in $2 increments. Meanwhile, when you’re an adult, you sort of graduate to giver-status, which, I suppose, could be satisfying if you happen to be an altruistic do-gooder.

In college, I learned that Eid is not a big deal. This because my ochem professor made clear to me once that Eid will come every year, but this ochem exam only happens once. (Gee, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity!)

But there’s one more reason why this Eid will be unremarkable: In Amman, I can experience Eid – as I know it – anytime. It’s only as far away as the nearest family-friendly restaurant. That’s why, for me, there’s a holiday at every street corner.

If that doesn’t make me smile and appreciate where I am, then I really ought to watch It’s a Wonderful Life. If that film doesn’t inspire in me an ebullient holiday spirit then, by golly, I don’t know what will.