Pistachios

Pistachios are delicious. I have been craving them for days and have finally got a bag of them. They're just so good!

Although Arizona claims to be the world capitol of Pistachios, Iran exports 50,000 tons more than the US each year. Take that Arizona.

The word "pistachio" is actually a Persian word.


Thank you wikipedia.

Saqib the French Waiter: Student by day, French Waiter by night

Thats right, I've been working as a waiter at a fancy french restaurant called "Le Bistro Latin." During the day I go to classes at the language institute and in the evenings, I stroll through tables carrying dishes of delicious french cuisine, talking to customers and learning about french culture. I wear all black, comb my hair and (i thought this part would be impossible) remain clean shaven for weeks at a time! I've been working there 5 nights a week, for nearly 2 months now and I really enjoy it.

upstairs

Downstairs

The restaurant is small, 20 tables spread across 2 floors, with just 2 of us working as serveurs (waiters). Monday through Wednesday it can be a bit quiet (thankfully) but thursdays through the weekend are usually completely packed. Each table is filled by people from around the world, speaking a myriad of languages all coming to eat at the place their guidebooks laude as being "one of the best restaurants in the South of France." Candles placed around the restaurant and soft lights on the tables give the place a cozy and relaxing glow. In the background I'm usually playing mixes of Miles Davis, Coltrane, Nina Simone, Herbie Hancock, Ray Charles or other favorites. There is always a wonderful aroma coming from the kitchen where the Chef (who is part of the hip couple that own/run the restaurant) creates traditional and modern provencal French dishes. Each dish is a work of art in itself with the Chef paying just as much attention to the presentation of the dish as he does to it's taste. Also in the cuisine (kitchen) is a 17 year old who is apprenticing as a Sous Chef (what an awesome job to have at 17!)

Guillaume et moi.

The other serveur: Guillaume, a 2o-something graphic artist, who has been slowly teaching me everything i need to know about French cuisinary culture and correcting my grammar when i make mistakes. On the slow nights, we get into long discussions on topics ranging from art styles to racism in France. He's patient when i get lost speaking french and our conversations are usually half filled with us asking the definitions and translations of certain words in our respective languages. Between the waves of clients, we often will draw behind the bar, filling up sketch pads with our doodles.

The patrons (owners of the restaurant): They took it over a couple years ago after working there for quite a few years. The husband is the chef and the wife (also a chef) manages the front of the house and also is a serveur on the weekends when it gets really rushed. They're fairly young, speak fluent english (they did their studies in the UK, where they met) and are hip. The husband wears Chucks and the wife wears Birkenstocks. Looking through their cd collection and picking something to play is one of my favorite things to do between clients. They kite surf and take boxing lessons. They took me wine tasting at a local vineyard (who's wines we serve) to try their new wines. They're definitely strict, but only when they need to be and they don't go overboard. They definitely keep me on my feet.

Le Chef!

sauces being made

delicious desserts!- Entremet Chocolats from one of the best chocolatiers in France.

The clients: 60% french, 40% tourists/travellers. The majority of the clients are regulars and those that aren't will atleast visit a handful of times. Most of the tourists read about the restaurant in their travel guides and come in for a taste of traditonal french cuisine. It's the tourists that i like the most as clients because they are eager to share their travel stories with me while i take their orders and they leave tips. French people don't leave tips. it's not part of the culture. Sometimes they'll leave a euro or two but that's more a gesture than anything else. I love watching the couples from around the world that eat at the restaurant. The italian and french couples are the most romantic. They lean close over the tables talking in a way that their words will only reach the ears of their lover across from them. They hold each other's hands near the candle on top of the table and rarely pull their eyes away from each other. They kiss across the tables romantically and i always feel like im interrupting (i usually am, it's impossible not to be) when i try to give them their menus or dishes. Old couples eat at the restaurant and they speak less, usually because they don't need to say much to each other. They usually have the most expensive fixed menu and will sit with their wine enjoying each other's company. A few days ago an older french couple came in that was celebrating their 30th wedding anniversary. They must have been in their late 50's and they were writing love notes to each other on the napkins and kissing each other over the candle just like their younger counterparts. It was really nice. When the husband left for the bathroom, the wife leaned to me while i cleared the plates and said "Doesnt he look handsome? i love it when he wears that hat." Other interesting clients have included boxing champs, barons/baronesses, old Portuguese poets, and militant Israelies (with heavy NY accents).

The food is the part i love most about the restaurant. The carte (menu) is made up of 3 fixed menues, each with 3 or four courses. Each fixed menu is crafted by the chef so that each course compliments the course before and after it. Each course is relatively small (compared to American standards), but once people make it through their marathon meals to the dessert they are rarely hungry. The cuisine leaves you satisfied and not overly stuffed like american food sometimes does. The chef is a real artist in the kitchen, and each dish is whimsically decorated with a variety of vegetables and tapenades to compliment the dish. The desserts are magnificent. They range from Lavender and Green tea infused Creme Brulee to Molten Chocolate cake baked with a caramel in the center. Everything served in the restaurant is local. Our goat cheese comes from one of Aix's premier fromagieres (cheese producer). It is delivered each week by the producer, Guy Blanc, who is one of the few people seen around Aix with a pony tail and flannel shirts. He always has an old leather messenger bag on him and a couple earings in each ear. Our bread is made by the chef each morning and the type of bread changes each day to compliment the new dishes. All produce is bought direct from local farmers and meat is bought direct from local butchers. The wines are all from local vineyards, chosen by the owners to compliment the dishes. The Chef has been giving me cooking lessons, teaching me recipes and explaining to me the many different dishes he cooks. Lately i've been coming up with recipes of my own and sharing them with him and the sous chef.

Some of the local reds we serve

I've learned that one of the main differences between French dining and american dining is that in the US when we eat out, what happens on our table is completely under our control, because we are the clients. In french dining, almost everything that happens on the table (ie- the food served, the order which it is all eaten, the tastes experienced by the client, etc.) is controlled by the serveurs and, more importantly, the Chef. The Chef puts a lot of time and effort into creating each dining experience for the clients and the clients are completely glad to sit back and experience that which the Chef creates for them.

Working nearly every night has been tiring (especially with classes) but at the same time it's given me something constructive to do with my time here. Once again, i feel productive and am actually actively learning. I am forced to speak French for hours each night while i am completely immersed in one of the most wonderful pinnacles of France's culture: it's cuisine.

Bienvenue a Beirut- L'aventures de mon Apartement.

8h30: I was asleep on the sofa burried deep in sheets and even deeper in sleep. I was naked, warm and lost in dreams. My eyes are jerked open by a pounding at the door and some shouting in French. Im still asleep and it's too early to understand whats being said. I pull the blankets further over my head. The pounding continues and so does the french. My head hurts. I slowly stand up and shout "attends! j'arrive!" i grab the nearest clothes to me: pajama pants, a dress shirt, a grey knit cap. My face feels crusty, there is probably drool dried on it. Im still half asleep. I splash water on my face and open the door. There are 2 men standing there in coveralls and holding a jackhammer between them.

This is the story of my apartment.

at 8h45 im still trying to wake up fully and have already spoke in french for 10 mins or so (a difficult feat in itself at any hour, let alone an hour before noon). The repairmen tell me that they will be doing repairs on the building for the next 3 days. there won't be any water during the day. while one of the coverall (or raveware, depending on the setting) clad repairemen is explaining this to me, the other has started making marks on my tile floor and is readying the jackhammer. Apparently they're going to be working until thursday night. It's tuesday morning. My explanation is cut short by the violent pounding of the jackhammer against the tile floor and an explosion of dust and tile shrapnel in the air. jars start falling off my spice rack and break on the floor, adding clouds of flour and cumin to the general chaos in my apartment. The man leaning over the jackhammer doesnt notice the breaking jars and i get hit in the face by a piece of tile that rockets off the floor. Apparently there was a notice that was supposed to tell me about all this happening.


by now im awake, covered in dust and garding my face from further shrapnel attacks. i leave the apartment. I reread the notice posted in the hallway, it says that there will be work happening in a few of the apartments and that those apartments won't have water during the day. It says that the work is only going to last until wed. It doesnt say anything about dust and jackhammering, it doesnt say anything about thursday night.

The blurriness is from the dust in the air.

This work is for the whole building and im the lucky apartment owner who gets to have it all happen in his apartment. Im always the "lucky" apartment owner it seems. Here is a list of problems i have had with my apartment since moving in:

-Every month or so the septic system backs up for a couple days and im unable to use any water in the apartment. Being the i am on the ground floor, everytime somebody above me uses any water (showering, flushing toilet, washing dishes etc.) my toilet, sinks and shower gurgle angrily and eventually water starts coming out of the drains. Its not just water though- its toilet water. toilet water carrying with it everything that goes into toilets. This generally fills up the shower and toilet, a few times it overflows and seeps into the living room and into the kitchen sink. Apparently this happens due to a tartar buildup in the pipes. Every time this happens i call the landlord who calls a repairman who comes and tells me he has fixed the problem....until the poo demon returns with a vengeance the following month.

-Lately i've been enjoying an infestation of small flying insects. Not flies nor mosquitos but more annoying than both. These don't bite nor fly very fast. But they do breed quickly and die in crowds around the kitchen. There large numbers and preference of commiting what i can only assume to be large cult like suicides in my kitchen and living room is what is most annoying. They die and create a squishy mess. in exploring their deplorable habits i found out that they werent being attracted by rotting fruit (as fruit flies would be) but instead were flying in and out of the vents in the walls of the building. Apparently my appartment kitchen is the best place to die en masse in the whole building

-2 times this year i had to deal with the sudden and unanounced arrival of a roomate. This roomate was already living in another part of the building and both times we met for the first time when i was returning home from a trip. I would usually find that the roomate had already made himself at home and had rummaged through everything in my kitchen, helping himself to what he pleased. Eventually i duct taped him out of the apartment and i can only assume that he returned to the basement of the building where him and the other mice have been living. At night if im real quite i can hear them scratching in the walls. Being that they're french mice, they are too evolved to fall for the mouse trap which so easily kills american mice.

-one day when returning late at night from a trip, my key wouldnt turn the lock and i found that my lock had seized up while i was gone and had broke. I spent the night at a neighbors and the next evening had to watch a "locksmith" drill through the lock and charge me 90 euros for his labor. He then wanted another 240 euros (a little more than 75,600 US dollars with the current exchange rate) to put on a new lock. He told me this after he'd already drilled through the old lock and showed me how the lock should have been replaced years ago as the insides were already broken. i called the agency who represents my landlord and yelled at them. They sent someone to install a new lock. He installed it upside down.

-In the middle of cooking for a potluck, the hotplates that serve as my stove broke suddenly and short-circuited the apartment. I went the rest of the day and that night without electricity. I had nothing to take to the potluck. It took more than a week to get somebody to bring over a new plac (stove top). The one they installed was too big and now my fridge doesn't fit properly underneath it.

-there as been a rolling set of electricity outages and short circuiting throught the year in my apartment. I keep a ready supply of candles.

-there is splotchy black and brown mold thats taking over the bathroom and area under the sink in the kitchen. Its not as bad as the mold that has been growing in my neighbors apartment. Their mold ate a hole through the wall and is fuzzy.

-chunks of the wall fall out when ever there are any vibrations (ie- loud noises in the street, a door slamming in a near by apartment, etc.) A picture frame once fell from the wall while i was sleeping. I was startled awake by the noise of it clattering against the floor, i was kept awake by the large chunk of plaster that subsequently fell of the low ceiling and broke into tiny pieces when it hit my head. These problems with the wall keep my floor in a perpetually dusty state near the walls.

-when the apartment was "renovated" the set of large single pane windows was never replaced or fixed. The glass is encased by old wood and neither of the windows close tightly because the wood has long since warped and the layers of paint used to cover the gaps, hinder more than help. The problem was solved by installing 2 space heaters under the windows, unfortunately, only one of them work. Any heat that i could get from that space heater is usually lost to the cold air that blows in through the perpetually almost-closed windows.

Look at all the dust on the bed. It's EVERYWHERE!!

12h00- returning from work i walked into the building at the time the workmen said they'd be done. They werent and instead one of them met me at the door to the building. We walked the few steps to my apartment door where he said "Bienvenue au Beirut" before opening my door.
Atleast he has a sense of humor. The inside of my apartment is a chalky white from a thick layer of dust covering everything. My apartment is split in two by a giant crevice running across the floor. The gapping scar in the middle of the tiles is marked on each side by 2 large piles of broken cement, piping, and shattered tiles. I try to say something to the repairmen but instead start coughing from the dust. While i was staring at this from the doorway the other repairman had his head in the crevice and came out pointing another part of my apartment where he proclaims the next trench will be dug tomorrow. My apartment looks like an archaeological site in the Sahara and the dust is so think on the floor that i can clearly see the tracks of the soles of my shoes in the dust. Thursday night can't come fast enough.