I was following a link from Wayne’s blog, and started to feel a little bad about how cheery, self-centered and irrelevant my blog is.

I did happen across an Iraqi cookbook, though, that looks very promising–I’m a sucker for authors who talk about their toothless grannies when introducing a recipe. I ordered a copy for the full effect, but there are some recipes and other excerpts that more casual browsers can check out. Chicken drumsticks baked in fig sauce sounds extra-savory…

It’s sappy, but true: if you eat something delicious from someone, you just can’t hate them. I’m thinking of the staggeringly wonderful stuff we ate in Syria–fresh blackberry juice, green walnuts, grilled eggplant with pomegranate molasses and basil, salty yogurt, the best falafel ever, hand-pumped espresso with cardamom, sumac on everything–and how that greatly contributed to my heartfelt hope that nothing bad happen to Syrians ever (though the chances of that, under the current administration, are slim).

And I don’t think I feel this way just because I studied Arabic for so long and generally like the Middle East. Peter started the trip as your standard college-educated American, not particularly attuned to the ways and politics of the Levant, saying “Gosh, whenever I see a guy in one of those checked headscarves, I can’t help but think ‘terrorist,'” but he felt equally filled with love by the end of the trip–sealed by the fact that at the border crossing back into Lebanon, where we were waiting around for a cab-mate, a man selling sodas insisted on giving them to us, because we had no Syrian money left. He also gave us his mother’s address and phone number, so we could get a good meal when we came back.

A few months ago (or geez, it might’ve been a year ago, when we first invaded), Peter said that if he’d happened to travel to Iraq instead of Syria back then, he’d surely now have the same affection for Iraqis, and feel even sicker about what they were having to go through.

I’m sure I’m preaching to the choir here, but people, please VOTE…and get a passport.