Freej Soeleh
“You’re going to LOVE this place!” AdventureMan crowed from two continents and an ocean away. Our Kuwaiti friends’ son had just taken him and his father to eat in this restaurant, and it was a great experience.
He was right. A couple months later, he took me there, and I loved it. It was a different experience for him, too, when he went with me, because with me, he could sit upstairs in the family section. 🙂
You would never guess a place so full of homages to Kuwaiti tradition would be next door neighbors to the Marina Mall. From some of the cabinets, you look directly over to the mall.
They make their own sweets, and very fine sweets they are. His huge pot is entirely copper, and he makes wonderful candies, which you can buy and take with you, and use for gifts – made in Kuwait!
Pardon my indelicacy, but I love thoughtful decoration. This is the ladies room, and I am crazy about their huge bowl sinks – a wave to the past with the traditional sand and stone colors and materials:
We have all the privacy in the world, although we are surrounded by families. By the way, this is not a great place for an intimate, romantic dinner. Children are everywhere, clearly welcome, and bouncing off the walls. It is noisy. (We don’t mind.) When you want a waiter, you press the call button on the wall next to the little windows, which open and close.
At night – OK, this is hokey, but the truth is, I love it – they have a ceiling full of “stars”:
One thing we really love is that you can get Kuwaiti foods here. We love trying different things. One of our favorites is the Fish at the Bottom of the Pot:
Very shortly, pre-food food arrives – the beignets are light and sweet and irresistible:
As you can see, the prices are reasonable:
We have never ordered the camel milk:
To get to the Freej Soeleh coming south on Gulf Road, turn in where you see that big old Kuwaiti Style hotel, I think it is the Al-Ghanim, and then take the first right onto what my friends call Salmiyya High Street. You take the last right going toward the Marina Mall just before the mall, which will take you right into a parking area. If you look on your right, you will see the Freej Soeleh.
If you are coming South on Gulf Road, take the exit that goes in front of Marina Mall and turn right just past the valet entrance to the Mall. You will see a parking lot – and the Freej Soeleh – on your left.
You can take the elevator up to the second floor, if you are a family. If you are bachelors, you can take the escalator up to the first floor. The food is good in either place. The family section is more colorful.
If you go early – like noon for lunch, six-thirty/seven for dinner – you will walk right in. If you go later, when the Kuwaiti families stream in, you may have to wait, but they have a great waiting area, and you can watch the caramel man make candy.
Please, my western friends, if you go, dress modestly. This is a family place; most women are in abayas. I have never seen another western family here, but then we are all in cabinets, so that’s not such a surprise. It is a gem of an adventure in Kuwait.
I apologize that there are no photos of the main courses. There is always SO MUCH food. It comes, there is a frantic trying to organize the table so it has enough room for everything, and it all smells so good! You tend to just dive in.
The one jarring element is that when you are having appetizers, the tabbouleh, the muttabel, the hummus, they bring a plastic bag of bread on a plate. . . I guess I get spoiled down at the Mubarakiyya market, where the bread is always freshly made . . . I wish they had fresh hot bread, but the food itself is GOOD.
Do You Have Reservations?
AdventureMan and I read a lot, and there is a standing joke between us – there are times, like reading a detective novel set in China, when one of us just gets a craving for Chinese food. Or it could be reading James Lee Burke and we have to have some Jambalaya or shrimp. The day we went to the Arabic Early Bird, AdventureMan had been reading the latest Odd Thomas book and needed a breakfast fry-up.
So Friday, after church, when I told him I really needed to go to Tang Chow because a minor character in a book I am currently reading ate Peking duck and Tang Chow is the only place I know in Kuwait that serves Peking Duck without needing advance warning. We usually go to China Queen, but for Peking Duck – only Tang Chow will do.
So we walk in and there is not one single other customer there. The hostess says “do you have a reservation?”
The rational part of me figures some people have called ahead and requested specific tables and she is trying to ask if we are one of those. The irrepressible part of me just laughs to hear such a question when the restaurant is absolutely EMPTY!
We eat around 7 most nights, it’s cultural and also we don’t like to go to bed on full stomachs, we like to have some time between dinner and bedtime. We make jokes about “the American seating” and “the Kuwaiti seating,” like if you are on a ship, and there are separate dining times for the children and the parents. We eat with the children, and as we are leaving, we watch the culturally-late-diners streaming in as we are streaming out.
There are times when it is a special event, and all the tables are reserved. AdventureMan figured out that we can sometimes wheedle a table saying “We are American! We will be gone before they ever show up for their reservation! I promise!” and they will give us the table, and sure enough, we are gone before the reservers ever show up.
It’s still funny to hear that question when the entire restuarant is full of empty seats, like they are going to turn us away if we don’t have reservations.
Slaughter of the Innocents
In our Lectionary readings for today we pray for the Innocents, slaughtered by King Herod, in the land that is now Israel.
PRAYER (traditional language)
We remember this day, O God, the slaughter of the holy innocents of Bethlehem by the order of King Herod. Receive, we beseech thee, into the arms of thy mercy all innocent victims; and by thy great might frustrate the designs of evil tyrants and establish thy rule of justice, love, and peace; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
There is nothing so maddening as to be helpless to intervene in the huge crush of political events among nations. On the other hand, we have been given this very powerful weapon – prayer – and the knowledge that God can do anything, and that he listens to our prayers, especially prayers for the weak, the helpless, women and children.
We can also raise our voices where it counts – to our governments – to say “this is wrong” and “this must be stopped.”
This is wrong. This must be stopped.
It is neither good nor right for bullies to impose their will on those with less power, just because they can. (That applies also to my own country.) It is not good for the victims – but it is also not good for the health of the bully! Countries where minority rights are not considered find themselves weakened from internal disorders, like a body eaten with cancer. If minorities can be likened to bacteria – a little bacterial makes us healthier and stronger. Tolerance of diversity makes us as nations healthier and stronger.
Don’t you wonder what might be accomplished if the Palestinians and Israelis could find some way to live together in peace?
Family Crisis
The Gospel reading for today details a family crisis. We grow up with these words, we know them by heart, but it is only living in the countries near where Jesus was actually born that I have come to ponder these words in my heart, and try to imagine what it meant in Mary’s time.
Matthew 1:18-25
18 Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah* took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. 19 Her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to dismiss her quietly. 20 But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, ‘Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21 She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.’ 22 All this took place to fulfil what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet:
23 ‘Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son,
and they shall name him Emmanuel’,
which means, ‘God is with us.’ 24 When Joseph awoke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him; he took her as his wife, 25 but had no marital relations with her until she had borne a son;* and he named him Jesus.
Living in Jordan, living in the Gulf has helped me so much to understand the context in which this birth took place. In America today, it is still hoped for that women will be married when they have children, but it is not taken for granted. No one goes out and kills a daughter or sister who has had sexual relations with a man before she is married. Parents don’t disown daughters who conceive before the vows are publicly exchanged.
Even now, in the Middle East, most expect women to be virgin at marriage, and to conceive only after the formalities of marriage. There are steep penalties to be paid for varying from that route. Banishment. Death. Dishonor. A bastard child, if she lives that long. These are all things Mary was facing as she entered her earliest months of pregnancy. Joseph had decided to set her aside – not to marry her. He was a decent man, but a man of the times, he didn’t want a pregnant bride. The angel comes – he tells Joseph that this baby is special, conceived of the Holy Spirit, that Mary remains virgin. And miracle of miracles . . . Joseph listens.
What a courageous woman. What a courageous man.
Cross Cultural Eating
“And we are going to roast chestnuts!” my good friend said, and inwardly I cringed.
I remember years ago, when a French friend told me her mother was bringing marron glace to Tunisia, she was so excited, she could talk of nothing else for days.
“And when she comes,” my friend said, “you must come over and we shall eat marron glace together!” Her mother came, I was invited, and eager. Then I took my first bite of marron glace, and almost gagged. It was the flavor. It was the texture. I didn’t like them at all! Fortunately, there were other small foods, and I could push the chestnut around and hide it on my plate, and politely demur that I didn’t want to eat all her special marrons and deprive her of the pleasure.
We love being with this couple, and I accepted the invitation. Little did I know, as I dreaded being polite about the roasted chestnuts, that a perfectly roasted chestnut is a different food altogether! We sat outside, on a mile winter’s night in Kuwait, around a eucalyptus fire, with that fabulous aromatic smoke drifting around us, eating toasted delicious chestnuts and enjoying every bite.
Some things you just grow up knowing are wrong wrong wrong. Another friend wrinkled her nose when I told her my favorite Christmas dish was cranberry gelatin salad. In her experience, jello salads were full of horrid things like miniature marshmallows, whipped cream, cottage cheese. For her, it was inelegant, just about the worst thing you could say about any food. (To her surprise, she ended up liking the gelatin salad.)
“Oh, Harissa!” my Qatteri friend nearly swooned in bliss, when I asked her about her favorite Ramadan treat. I could hardly wait to try it, and when I did – it was the texture that stopped me cold in my tracks. I can’t even tell you how it tasted; there was a viscosity in it that deterred me from trying another bite.
When we go out with my Chinese friend for dim-sum, there are dishes she won’t even let us try. We trust her; she really knows what will be over the line for us. Chicken’s feet, for one. They bring out so many dishes, there are plenty that we like, and we never go hungry.
For my husband, a Southerner, it isn’t Thanksgiving or Christmas without cornbread dressing. I have to keep him out of the South to keep him alive; when we live in the South, he can’t resist the deep fried seafood. For me, I have to stay away from France and Germany, I love the pate´, the terrines, the cassoulet; the fatty geese, the fatty duck, the fried the vegetables and salads laced with lardons.
When we eat at one of the Japanese restaurants here, I can’t help but wonder how really Japanese the food is – when I have eaten with Japanese friends, there are odd colored things made with fruit juice, delicate morsels of unidentified meat . . . I suspect there are things common on Japanese menus in Japan that they know we won’t eat, and they don’t even bother to put on the menus in the US, or in Kuwait. When I see the cooks, I don’t think most of them are Japanese, and I wonder if Japanese people here ever ask for a truly Japanese dish, only to learn that the cook doesn’t know what it is.
One of the best things about living in another country is that you learn that the things you take for granted, you can’t take for granted. I learned that you can’t trust that every person you meet was raised eating with a fork. I learned ways to eat with my hands and not be messy. I learned that in some countries, you NEVER touch food with your fingers, you always use a utensil. I learned that in some countries, it is considered “uncultured” to drink your coffee with cream or sugar or any additive. I learned in some countries, you never smile in the market until you have agreed on a price. I learned in some countries, you can have a cup of tea while shopping and it doesn’t obligate you to buy. I’ve learned things I don’t even know I’ve learned, conquered prejudices I didn’t even know I had. I’ve stepped on toes, thinking I was behaving politely. I’ve violated customs I didn’t know existed. Some of what I have learned has been painful . . . and worth the pain.
An Eye for an Eye – Does Revenge Change Anything?
I have been following my own post with interest. The truth is, there is a huge part of me that agrees with you, agrees with Ameneh, who wants her attacker to suffer as she has suffered, to pay for the life he has stolen from her.
I used to be a lot more idealistic than I am now. I can remember the two times in my life I came face-to-face with who I am, viscerally, in my gut.
The first time, I was living in Jordan, and I awoke in the middle of the night. I heard gunfire. My husband was out of town – that happened a lot. Things like cars breaking down, heaters going out in the dead of winter, ants attacking (don’t even ask), those things always waited for my husband to be out of town. Now gunfire.
I finally called my British neighbors, who called their Security office, who said it was probably just the police shooting packs of dogs who attacked the sheep at night.
I knew, though, that night, that if I had a gun in the house, I would shoot anyone who came through the front door to protect my son. I had never thought of myself that way. I had never considered myself a killer. And I knew I could kill, without a second thought, to protect my son.
We all have times when we find out who we are, what we are made of. Men who go off to war and kill for a living have to live with their actions for the rest of their lives. Many, many live with regrets.
People who lived through the Invasion of Kuwait endured and suffered unimaginable horrors. Many won’t even talk about the things they saw or had to do.
Here is my problem with revenge – you have to live with the consequences.
If I had shot an intruder, even thinking it was a criminal, I would have to live with that the rest of my life. Even NOT shooting an intruder, I have to live with the thought that I would have, that I was fully prepared to kill. It still haunts me, even though I didn’t do anything, even though I just thought about it.
I like what This Lady said. I want this man punished, but if we choose to inflict the same punishment on him, don’t we lower ourselves to his level? I think life imprisonment would be worse. On another blog, dealing with the same topic, one Iranian woman wrote that if this man is blinded, some female in his family will be chosen to take care of him for the rest of his life, feeding him, preparing his meals. She, too, will be sacrificed, lose her own life to the obligation of taking care of this blinded villain for the rest of his life. Wouldn’t we all be better off if he were locked away, never to be free again?
I published the photo with the original article because I was shocked and intrigued by it. In spite of her blindness and disfigurement, this woman is laughing, and her mother is hugging her. In many ways, her life is blessed. Because God works in amazing and wonderful ways, we know that he can use this terrible act to do great things in her life, bring her peace, bring her new understanding . . . we don’t know what he can do, but we can trust that her life is not over, that he can still use her to fulfill his purpose in this world.
Reading your comments, trying to find my own response has been a challenge. As I said – if it were me, if it were my sister, God forbid – I know I would want revenge. I know that fiery outrage lives in all our hearts; the desire to take an eye for an eye. I know that dragon in my own heart.
And yet . . . I am left with this very uneasy feeling that revenge and retribution are neither deterrent, nor satisfying. I trust that if this sentence is carried out, God can even do great things with this violent assailant, that he can work in his heart and give him a new way of seeing, he can bring him to repentance, he can do great works, even in the heart of this sinner.
My greatest, gravest concern is for Ameneh. She seems to be a very stable, courageous woman. I fear that revenge can act as a poison in her soul, that the punishment, if inflicted, will eat away at all the goodness of her life. I fear for any of us who become obsessed with revenge at the cost of who we were created to be.
You have been very forceful in your expression of belief that the sentence should be imposed. Don’t you harbor any misgivings about this, no matter how small?
Islam Everywhere
As we were driving along in Pensacola, we saw a familiar sight – not familiar for Pensacola, but familiar and strange and wonderful all at the same time – it has a great playground in the back.
Books Behind the Counter
“Hey Mom, take a look” said Law and Order Man as we were about to walk out of the local Barnes and Noble. He was pointing to the selection of books by Chuck Palahniuk, all on shelves behind the counter.
I had noticed he has a collection of Chuck Palahniuk books, and I have read reviews by Kuwait bloggers, so I had asked him about the books, would he recommend them.
“You wouldn’t like them” he said. He knows me pretty well, and often recommends authors I might like. I do the same with him. If he says not to bother, I won’t bother.
“I asked the clerk why all the Chuck Palahniuk books were behind the counter, if people steal them,” my son went on, “and she wouldn’t exactly say that people walk off without paying for them, but she said that they are VERY popular books, so I assume that’s what she meant.”
Black Friday
Black Friday – the Friday after Thanksgiving – bargain hunters in the USA head to the stores. Some stores opened as early as midnight to attract bargain hunters. Many more open around 5 or 6 in the morning. Most have loss leaders – i.e. specially priced items, maybe even below cost – hoping people will come in looking for the bargains and buy something else.
Not me.
Not in a million years.
I did it one year; we had just come back to the US after living for years on Germany. I needed 110v Christmas lights, so I went to a store at 0530 and stood in line until it opened at 6 and got many packages . . . but not enough. Later in the day I went back to see if there were any of the bargain priced lights left, and there were stacks and stacks of them. I learned my lesson.
We also learned that many things go on sale a couple days before in some stores, or are still on sale and in good supply the following Monday.
I hate lines. I hate competitive shopping. I have seen women grab things out of one another’s hands, I have seen them race down the aisles . . . and I just ask myself “What is this all about?” I have that primitive instinct too, hunting down that elusive bargain, bagging it and getting it home – but at what cost?
Anomaly – while gas prices have dropped back to reasonable rates here, fewer Americans are traveling this year. Normally, Thanksgiving is the holiday with the highest accident rate of all the holidays because of the road traffic, but because Americans are holding tight to their purses this year, fewer are on the road or in the air.
We are packing up today and moving on to the next stop. We will stop and see good friends en route to our destination, have a meal and a good visit with them . . .
yes, yes, thank you, we had a truly wonderful and memorable Thanksgiving, a truly Southern Thanksgiving, with family, with friends, and I will share it with you as soon as I get a card-reader so I can upload to the computer. 🙂 There were three kinds of turkey – a deep fried turkey, a smoked turkey, and turkey breast pieces pan-fried in batter, like chicken nuggets only fresher, and tasty. My favorite was a big bucket of venison stew, one of the hunters had bagged a big buck up in Kentucky.
I don’t believe there was a steamed vegetable or un-sauced vegetable in sight! Lots of gelatins made with sour cream or cream cheese, macaroni and cheese, three or four different kinds of stuffings and sweet on sweet sweet potatoes . . . and then came dessert, oh my. The tables – separate stations for meats, stuffings, vegetables and salads – were groaning, but then again, there were many many people to feed. My Southern husband was in heaven, eating all the foods I don’t know how to make and never dreamed of making.
The very best part of Thankgiving was the visiting. It was like one great big diwaniyya, with people in the kitchen and living room, people way out back shucking oysters and peeling shrimp, loads of ice tea all made up, sweet, unsweet, Splenda, lemondade . . . young people playing football or running around. . . it was a very sweet family day, beautiful weather, you couldn’t order a nicer Thanksgiving, and we were so delighted to be included.
“Seriously Bad Men”
AdventureMan and I are on a beach, and enjoyed one of the most magnificent sunsets we have ever seen, absolutely painterly, and I took lots of shots to share with you only to discover I don’t have my card reader/uploader little stick, so I have to wait until I can share them with you.
AdventureMan is having so much fun he has worn himself out, and today he came down with a bad cold. He spent some time napping while I spent some time out on the balcony, enjoying the sun and the crashing waves. When it came time for dinner, we decided some nice hot soup and hot tea would help him feel a lot better. Went down to the car, and our car is blocked by a huge white SUV, left running, doors locked, no driver.
For a minute we thought we were back in Kuwait.
There were three guys standing outside the office to the hotel, smoking and chatting (think Hank Hill) and we asked them if the car was their’s, and they said “No, it is the POLICE. There are some seriously bad men they are after, with guns!”
After about fifteen minutes, a couple beefy cops came by and one moved the car and parked it legally. We went and had a very delicious dinner at a Japanese restaurant where, when we told the owner we live in Kuwait, he said “Salaam A’aleikum” which astounded me, but he said he was Canadian-Japanese, and grew up with Arab immigrant kids. I love America.
On our way home, we stopped at a Publix, a very wonderful food market, where we picked up some green tea and coffee and bananas, just a little something to have in the room, and we also picked up some Thanksgiving bundles – how cool is this? Publix puts together grocery bags of Thanksgiving foods for the poor and needy, and has them on a stand by the check-out stands. You pick them up, pay for them, drop them in a bin and some needy family gets food for the holidays. They make it so easy to donate. We have so much for which we are thankful. I love this place.
When we got back to the motel, the cops were still surrounding the room (not in our building) where the seriously bad guys were holed up, and now, a couple hours later, there are two great big slow moving helicopters patrolling the beach area with huge spotlights, evidently trying to spot them on the move or something.
One of the bad buys is “SWAT trained” we were told.
The locks on our doors are not very serious locks. I am just hoping they catch them and go home so I can listen to the crashing of the waves in peace.
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