Last night my sister and I were invited to have dinner with one of my Arab students (ok, my only Arab student--I tutor at BYU's English as a second language center, and I have been tutoring him in English all semester) and his Arab roommate. As they are both from Jordan and are both here to learn English (and thus we have a hard time communicating in both English and Arabic! Those conversations are fun...), I immediately said yes.
When we got there, I decided that it was time to practice some of my Arab culture saavy in my eating choices. When a huge dish of rice and bowl of soup was dished up for me, I ate slowly and talked a lot, realizing that if my plate ever appeared half-empty during the meal, more food would be placed on it, putting me in an awkward (and full!) position. I even put only half of the chicken and soup on my rice, leaving the other half in the bowl "to cool."
My sister, however, having just returned home from a mission not too long ago and being used to eating at each home she visited, was not so culture-saavy and dug right in.
The result? While my sister (amazingly!) made it through 3 heaping plates of rice and 4 pieces of chicken, as her plate was continually filled with food as she ate it, I got away with only 3/4 plate of rice and two pieces of chicken (which was more than enough, believe me! It was a lot of food!!).
Perhaps I am a bit more prepared to live in Jordan than I thought!
2 comments:
Ok, in my sister's defense, I didn't mean to make it sound as though I was the brilliant one and she wasn't. I personally was very impressed with her eating skills and was just thankful that I didn't have to eat so much!!
Just FYI, it took me at least two years to figure out this strategy. Good for you!
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