Do we have this in the states? Please say no.
It was purchased from the young Turkish shopkeeper on the corner, late Thursday evening. "Do you have hummus?" I asked, piling tomatoes and toothpaste on the counter. "Sure!" He darted away, then darted back. "Oh..." I stared. "I'm from New York. We buy it refrigerated. Fresh." He explained that you could get it fresh, at the big Plus store around the corner (now closed). A guy sold hummus from the trough. "But here, you know, people don't buy it and it goes bad."
So I paid 1 Euro 69 for the can. Knowing I shouldn't. Feeling too guilty not to. I get stupid like that in stores sometimes.
I left the shop, rounding the corner, when the shopkeeper came charging after me. He was waving my mega-pack of rainbow sponges (let us not discuss the condition of the sponges my subletter left behind). He wanted to know how long I'd been here, and why my German was good. His name was Deniz, he said, with a Z. I asked him where to find good Middle Eastern food. I told him I'd had the worst falafel of my life in Prenzlauer Berg. (Imagine: A falafel without crust. Without kernels. Tahini without taste. Three balls of pure mush. Mealy tomatoes. Now bite. A man I once loved taught me the essence of a falafel. And that was not it.)
"Oh, in this neighborhood, you drink well," smiled Deniz, "that's about it." My heart sank, drinker that I am. Now I understood the Getränke stores every few meters. ("Bier & Mehr Bier" one is called, for those seeking subtlety.) And the pub-like flavor of most restaurants nearby. (Salmon fillet on a bed of dressed greens. Fried salmon. Iceberg lettuce.) I'd also tested the local Thai place: The Pad Thai was salty. Who salts Pad Thai?
"What about Kreuzberg?" I asked (the first swell of Turkish Gastarbeiter inhabited this West Berlin district in the '70s). "No." Deniz shook his head. "I'll tell you where to go: Moabit. Turmstrasse. Remember that." "Turmstrasse," I repeated. "And Plus for the hummus," he said. I nodded. "If you ever want me to take you somewhere good to eat," he continued, "or show you around, I'm happy to." I thanked him, smiling my big American smile, which might so easily be misinterpreted in this land of many straight faces, and quickly turned toward home.
The next day I found a rusty can opener. I spread the yellowish cream on a ricecake.
Prognosis: Zum kotzen*
*FYI: Make use of this so-excellent slang, and you'll wow all your German friends and fam.
But Deniz sure was nice.
So far the friendliest, most talkative folks I've encountered are the Turkish men. I'm not going to pretend this has nothing to do with me being a curvy Steckdose and them being of a more sexually aggressive ilk than their German counterparts, who are so...Northern European about the whole interaction-of-the-sexes thing (i.e., unreadable).
Of course, one woman's unreadable is another woman's relief. Just ask my mother. She always tells what a shock it was for her when she first moved to America. She and her best friend, Romi, were based in Manhattan as Mohawk Airline stewardesses. Every encounter with a man, my mother found, had a sexual undertone. Couldn't they just be friends? In Germany it's different, she told me. There's no assumption of sexual potential. Men and women easily maintain platonic friendships.
This was the Second of the Big Three things my mother felt I MUST know. She could not have slept at night had she not conveyed these golden nuggets to me before we parted ways on August 22rd. Naturally, all Big Three were things that I was perfectly aware of and had already prepared myself for psychologically. Also naturally, my attempts to graciously allow my mother these earnest efforts at softening my transition into her homeland failed entirely. I got defensive every time. "I know that," I would say. "What makes you think I wouldn't have thought of that already?"
Sigh.
The First of the Big Three was: "Don't expect friendly customer service." Here's what I love about this: I live in New York City. Hey, New York friends, when's the last time a cashier actually smiled at you? Or treated you like you were anything more than a major imposition on his/her time? Right. My mother lives in California. At the Real Foods on Union Street, every clerk grins broadly and says, "Hi, how are you?" Then he/she looks at you with such sweet unblinking eyes, you'd think you were an actual gift in his/her day. I'm like, Ack. Why are you talking to me? What do you want? Runawayrunaway!
Here in Berlin my mother and father were constantly smiling and chattering at customer service personnel. Oft with zero returns. I looked away, pained. They simply could not help themselves. This is not a problem that I have.
The Second of the Big Three (see above) led to a slight dispute between my mother and me. I tried to explain that the absence of sexual undertones actually unhinges me. It's as if the arrow got knocked off the gender compass. Not that I go around expecting, or wanting, every man to be in pursuit. Just that, in Germany, I wouldn't even know if he were. Also, my sense of my own sexuality is formed within the context of American-style male-female relations. Am I even a sexual being if never seemingly regarded as such? That is, if a tree falls in a forest...?
The Third of the Big Three boiled down to this: "I know you — don't isolate!" Again, not something I hadn't thought of, but probably the most vital of the three. She was thinking of the two-month trip I took through Europe ten years ago. By the fifth week, in Venice, I was so lonely I wanted to lean too far over the edge, slip soundlessly into a deserted canal. (I've met other lone travelers nearly undone by the city's beauty. Just ask Thomas Mann.)
Fortunately I stayed on dry ground; a fat Venetian mama brought me home for dinner. I ate pasta among people who spoke no English. After that I was willing to talk to whomever whenever wherever no matter what they might think of me. It made for a much better last three weeks.
My very social mother knows that I am inherently introverted. I far more easily scuttle into my shell than out. She'd be appalled at how much time I've spent alone since she and my father left. Not a single date with friend/friend of friend/relative.That's partly, of course, because of the fatigue-fog, which makes even simple conversation so taxing. There's also this: I like being alone. It's how I regenerate. And when else can I write but in solitude?
Still, my tolerance for hard-core isolation has dropped severely since my travels ten years ago. And the solution is so simple. Pick. Up. The. Phone. Oh wait, I don't have one yet. That's what really freaked Bobby out. Maybe she pictured me on the banks of the Spree five weeks from now. Mute and Handy-less. Ready to sink.
Don't worry, Moms, it ain't going to happen. I'm gonna seize upon every poor soul on my list of contacts. After that I will blast through the second list you are currently culling from your Tutzing friends, all nearly as thrilled as you that I have chosen to make Bobby-land my temporary home. Finally, when every friend of a friend of a friend is wrung dry (oh no, don't answer — it's that Lilan girl again!), I will walk to the corner store. "Hi Deniz with a Z," I will say and he will take me to a Turkish joint in Moabit, where I will never once expect the kind of customer service you get in California. Sitting across from him, I will feel the arrow on my gender compass suddenly swing back into its American-style spot. I will think, My God, what a relief I don't have to deal with that anymore! Then I will eat the best falafel I have ever eaten. Good enough to please even the man I once loved.
Oh, and Moms, I promise to abide by the Fourth thing of the Big Three. Just between you and me. (Don't the rest of you wish you knew.)
Recent Comments