Absolutely amazing experiences Leila. I really admire people who can speak foreign languages, especially ‘difficult’ ones like Arabic and it must be fantastic to be able to converse fluently.
It might be hard to believe but I once had a good collection of Arabic words and phrases. This was way back in the day when I was at Uni on my teacher training course. For some reason the Uni put me in a Hall of Residence that was populated almost entirely of foreign students with the majority seemingly from Algeria. I used to feel sorry for them because for most of them one of the main reasons for choosing to come to England to study was to meet English people, instead they were holed up in a block like a United Nations convention. Mind you there was also Graham, he was from Croydon, a Crystal palace fan and he had a Scouse girlfriend who you might guess was a Liverpool fan, but Graham had the most fabulous looking car, a bright yellow Austin Allegro complete with black roof. I was so jealous of that car, because I didn’t even have a rusty push bike to my name and I therefore had to rely on the tiny Norwich buses that seemed take forever to get anywhere, they would visit every bus stop in the city, before finally stopping at the one I wanted.
We had a good laugh with our foreign friends, and of course during our long sessions of banter in the kitchen the common denominator was swear words which we exchanged and learnt. So, my once impressive collection of Arabic words cannot really be repeated on this forum, suffice to say that I think that they have more swear words than us. I have also got a similar collection of Dutch swear words but that’s a different story.
Graham was a good friend, and it gives me great pleasure now to think how happy he must be wherever he is with Palace having just won the cup. He helped me to stay sane and on the straight & narrow, as I really struggled under the daily strain and the stress of teacher training, I was living on the edge of my nerves, always just on the verge of snapping. One day I was coming back to base on the bus after yet another long miserable hard day teaching and I was very happy with the thought that I’d soon be tucking into my tea which was going to be half of the delicious roast chicken that I’d cooked for my tea the day before. As I sat there, I was consumed by the very thought of it. But then when I got back, I entered the kitchen, I opened the kitchen door and all I could find in the fridge were the remains of just a few meagre bare chicken bones. The thieving little greedy bassards!!!!!
I was absolutely fuming; there must have been smoke streaming out of my ears quite literally. I reached for a black marker pen, and writing on the fridge door in big bold letters I explained in precise detail what was going to happen when I find out which little scroat had eaten my chicken. With that done I wandered off to my room to blast out some Led Zep and to chill. What my blood pressure must have been like in those days!
Now, please don’t get the wrong idea, I am a very reasonable, tolerable and nice person, and as such of course I would never ever get violent over a bit of chicken. Putting up that notice actually gave me “karma”, and I managed to regain my composure quite quickly. Then as the record stop playing, I could hear the slightest faint ‘knock, knock, knock’ at my door. Not knowing what or who to expect I went to open the door to find that there kneeling on the floor with his head bowed muttering a thousand pardons and begging profusely for forgiveness was Mustafa. His arm was outstretched holding out a carrier bag containing a replacement chicken. I felt a real $hit.
It turns out that it was all an innocent mistake. Mustafa had found my chicken in the fridge and assumed that it had been prepared for him by one of his friends. It wasn’t unreasonable as I could see that they did share their food regularly as a matter of course. In fact, they were always cooking, using all the ovens and hobs at all times of the day, which meant that I would have to muscle in each time just to cook my Yorkshire puddings.
You can understand, therefore how much I was looking forward to Ramadan which would have meant surely that as they would all be fasting then I would have free reign over the kitchen for a whole month. Crikey, I was so naïve in those days, it just goes to show how very little I knew because when Ramadan came around the kitchen got even busier. Busier because even though they were fasting they would spend all day cooking, and then when as soon as the sun set, they would then stuff themselves silly. The one consolation for me was that their daily nocturnal feasting coincided with my return from the bar, so I was able to join in (invited of course). Consequently, I have very good memories of couscous and hot curries it was fab! Two fingers up to all the other teacher trainees who thought themselves fortunate to be all lodged together in their own Hall of Residence, their banter would have been all tea parties and ‘teacher’ talk.
We had such a good time, and these guys were real characters. My next-door neighbour, I called Yossa because I couldn’t pronounce his real name, unfortunately was a baldy, well balding to be precise. He disappeared one day and then turned up a week or so later wearing a beanie hat. He’d only gone and sneaked off to London to get a hair transplant! He lifted his beanie to show me the result, and it was an horrific sight with several raw looking tufts of hair in the middle of his head and small bare patches at the back of his head. His ambition was to be able to return home to Algeria to show his family a full head of hair. Happily, the last reports I have of him indicated that he did actually achieve a full head of flowing locks.
And I worry at the possible plight of some of my other friends of the time like the Syrian guy Younis, and what might have happened to his life given all that has happened in Syria in recent years.
So yes, anyway, apologies for another long ramble, it's Leila's fault, her tales have got me reminiscing again. I've got to say though I'm pretty sure that I would be able to keep away from licking frogs so long as there was a ready supply of beer and/or wine.
Have a good weekend all - I'm off up the allotment 😁
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