walaa

This week has been really hard for me. I've tried to write a happy-go-lucky post, since that's what this blog is. But this week, I just can't. Walaa, a close friend of mine, committed suicide last Friday, on March 19. I found out on Sunday, from a message from his girlfriend. It came as a shock to me, since I had seen and talked to him everyday the week before. His funeral was in Cairo yesterday. I really don't know what to say, but writing has been helping me, so that's what I'm going to do. I want to share a story about him.

Walaa was really smart. A very intellectual guy. He spoke Arabic (both standard and Egyptian dialect), Spanish, English, and Italian. He had gone to college in Egypt, got a Masters in Information Technology to learn English, and was pursuing doctoral studies in the Universidad Complutense here in Madrid. He was also my Arabic teacher, but more importantly, we had become friends, since we had friends in common. But as I was saying, he was very intelligent, a great guy for serious conversations about life, religion, politics, anything you wanted to talk about. But what I really loved about Walaa was the fact that in spite of the serious studies, the serious job, the difficulty of being an immigrant away from your family and friends, he had such a silly side. He let me talk about Orientalism and gender theory in one moment, and in the next, would pretend to be an Arabic ganster rapper with me. When we learning body parts, I showed him the song "Head, shoulders, knees and toes," and not only did he not think I was completely crazy, he taught first me the words in Arabic (our version was "Head, shoulder, knee, foot"), and then our entire class. Granted, he could never get the rhythm completely right, and his rendition was much more serious than mine, but he felt no shame whatsoever singing a song meant for three-year-olds to a class of serious adults. That was not our only joint musical production. We shared a goal of becoming Arabic gansta rappers, and we practiced on the metro. And yes, had it just been Walaa, people would have been scared. But as he said, life's always easier when you've got a blonde next to you. My part went like this: "Ana fee al-bite!" (I am in the house!) And then he would say "Rookab, rookab!" (Knees, knees!) People had every right to be afraid, because we were clearly insane. Further verses include "Ana lastoo fee al bite!" (I am not in the house!) and "Hal antee fee al bite?" (Are you in the house?), with a constant refrain of "Rookab, rookab" with the occasional "Ayn odun femm amph." (Eye, ear, nose, mouth) Ay, qué risa me dabas, Walaa. Siempre te llevaré conmigo.
مع السالمة صديقي

the guiri gourmet

Over my two years here, I would like to think that I've created a niche for myself. I have an identity, you could say. And that identity revolves around baked goods. I'm, depending on the person, "la chica de las tartas," "esa, quien hace galletas," and "la chica del pastel." (translation: the girl with the pies; that one, who makes cookies; the girl with the cake) My identity depends not a bright smile or a quick wit, but rather, solely on the things that I make with my hands and put in the oven. Which in Spain, is no small feat. No only do you have to find the ingredients, but dessert, although it clearly exists, isn't really that big of a deal here. A typical dessert is a piece of fruit or a yogurt, so you can imagine the first impression a brownie makes. It's like a chocolate explosion in your mouth. Delicious. There are imitations of American baked goods, of course, but being modest, mine are better. One, I use butter, not olive oil. One bakery, Happy Day, sells overpriced plastic looking cupcakes and frisbee-like cookies. And VIPS, the popular chain with American-style food, has a brownie on the menu. Two, I know what I'm doing. I can make chocolate chip cookies in my sleep. I even made them with my third grade afterschool English class. We learned words like mix, stir in and bake. Incredibly useful in my world.