Matjakt i Tunisien

Peggy är väldigt ambitiös när det gäller att ta hand om de bilder vi tar på våra semestrar. I Traveljournal har hon lagt upp många bilder och även skrivet en del om vissa händelser på vårt resmål. Jag fann den här berättelsen av en slump på nätet och delar härmed med mig av den.

I motsats till vad många väljer, så tar vi i regel in på ett lägenhetshotell och lagar därför de flesta av våra måltider ”hemma”. Det betyder då också att vi därmed på sätt och vis kommer närmare den kultur vi befinner oss i. Så här kan det gå:

”The Hunt for Food
Av Peggy Sjöström
Just a few doors down from our apartment was a little grocery store that carried a fairly good assortment of general grocery and and health/beauty items. A very nice middle-aged couple ran the place, so we refered to it between ourselves as the ”mom and pop” store. ”Mom and Pop” always seemed to enjoy and appreciate our attempts att saying short phrases in Arabic. 

There were plenty of these general grocery stores in town as well as in the suburbs. They ranged in size from an office-sized alcove to the much bigger ”supermarket” (but still small, by American standards). The biggest of these is a kind of chain store called Magazin General. The only problem was that they don’t carry fresh meat, fish, or produce. The closest thing to meat you can find in these places is a tube of ”meat product” like resembles old fashioned ring balogna, but didn’t taste as good. 

Fortunately, fresh fruit and vegetable stands were literally all over the place. Tunisia is a muslim country, and therefore Arabic is the official language. However, almost everyone can speak French as a second language. But, despite our best intentions as well as a French tourist dictionary in hand, it was still tricky to communicate what we were looking for. It wasn’t until our third day in Tunisia that we finally found the local meat market, with the help of a local who, through broken English and hand gestures was able to point the way. 

We had asked for chicken ”to cook”, so imagine our surprise when we finally arrived at the meat market only to find a couple of clucking – very much alive – chickens that a farmer had for sale in his wheelbarrow just outside the market entrance! Fortunately, deeper in the market was ”real” meat, fish, and fresh produce. It was really fun to be amoung the citizens of Hammamet as they carried out their daily shopping at this very colorful market. 

We bought some fish first, and then we walked over to a meat counter with the hope of buying lamb steak. This butcher didn’t display the animal’s head, like most other butchers did, so my husband, Kalle, pointed at a nice-looking piece of meat and tried to ask what kind of meat it was. Instead of looking up the word for lamb, he just spontaniously asked ”baaaaaa?”….to which the butcher replied, ”non, Monsieur, mmooooooo!” 

A few days later during one of our long walks, we found another shopping area a few miles in the opposite direction from the main market. We decided to buy fish for dinner, and found several small alcove-like shops selling the day’s catch. We pointed at a nice-looking fish and tried to ask what kind of fish it was, because we couldn’t find it in our french dictionary. The nice young man tried his best to tell us, and he even tried to look it up himself in our french dictionary, without luck. Suddenly he noticed an older, seemingly wiser, aquaintance standing on the street, and hollered for him to come and help us. The young man stated our question to his aquaintence in Arabic, and the old wise man took a few seconds to ponder the question, pointed at the fish, and proudly answered in English, ”Fish!” We smiled broadly, thanked him profusely, bought the fish, and laughed all the way home knowing that we had a very cute story to tell.”