 They knew
Breaking habit, wind & my waistline
June 30, 2003
The Iranian
The final holiday as a couple without kids is an important one.
Varinder, pregnant with our twins, is fast approaching her 30th
week after which she won't be allowed to fly on any airline.
So the holiday was going to be a special one. We booked the Formentor
which is a beautiful hotel at the very Northern tip of the Spanish
island of Mallorca. I won't bore you by going through every
detail of that trip, instead, here are a few highlights:
***
I couldn't help looking at all the topless women on our beach,
particularly the Danish lady a few feet away, like a 'gedaa
goshne'. Varinder finally lost her patience with me.
"If you stare at her breasts one more time her husband is going
to come over and kick the living daylights out of you."
"Whose breasts? I'm not staring at any breasts!" I protested.
"The Danish blonde behind you to the left."
"I'm looking at the view behind her..."
"There is no view behind her, idiot - it's a car park.
If he does come and beat you up, I won't be able to jump
on his back to protect you... (she
was very
heavy with twins)
instead I'll come over and kick you a couple of times for
good measure."
I finally succeeded in breaking my staring habit.
***
On day three I humiliated myself to an extent that still makes
me cringe when I think about it. While lying on the sun-lounger
reading my book, a wasp began buzzing around me. I tried to shoo
it away with my book but only succeeded in drawing attention to
myself.
I continued to flap my book around before the wasp seemed to decide
it was going to try and sting me. Suddenly, it was buzzing only
an inch or two from my nose. I panicked and rolled myself as fast
as I could off the sun-lounger. As I hit the sand, I gave out a
very loud, in involuntary, fart which sounded like a short trumpet
sound and resonated to a few hundred yards radius of my bottom.
I crawled over to Varinder who was already in paroxysms of laughter
before joining her. When I laugh extremely hard, I sound like I
am crying. Nobody on the beach could work out what was happening
to me. I laughed, wept and snorted for a full five minutes before
I finally regained my composure.
***
On days seven, eight and nine Varinder complained of a faint
sewage smell emanating from our bedroom.
***
On day ten I realised that my spare swimming trunks were missing.
After a quick search I found them rolled up inside a plastic bag
next to the bin under the writing table. I pulled them out and
noticing they were damp decided to smell them. The first sniff
was quite sweet, so I took a deeper sniff and covered my entire
face with the trunks. I immediately realised I was smelling human
or animal SHIT.
As I pulled it away from my face, bits of something
moist stuck to my cheek, forehead and chin. I spent 15 minutes
in the shower scrubbing my face extremely hard with a nail brush.
This did not stop Varinder from refusing to kiss me for the duration
of our holiday and christening me, 'shit face' and 'shit
head'.
To this day, the 23rd of June 2003, I have no idea how shit came
to be smeared on the outside front of my trunks. It is a complete
mystery. Perhaps out maid had a grudge against is... who knows.
***
Our last two days were spent at a hotel in Palma, the capital
of Mallorca. We enjoyed our final evening at a beautiful restaurant
by the harbour.
Varinder nudged me half way through our meal.
"What?" I asked
"Sssshhhh! Don't look now but those people on the table in
the far corner are Iranian."
I looked around and saw two couples eating, laughing and joking
together - in what sounded like English. But I couldn't hear them
properly. They were
middle aged and their dress sense was stylish but very Gucci (which is fine if
you like that sort of thing). I strained to listen to their conversation again
but couldn't hear anything.
"The second couple aren't Iranian at all. The guy is so fair skinned he
looks German," I told Varinder.
"But he is the one who speaks English with a strong Iranian accent. I just
heard
him say, 'Tanks god I have ess-tocks and shares'... that's
exactly how your mum speaks!"
In the taxi back to our hotel Varinder told me that each couple had taken it
in turn to discreetly stare at us just as we had stared at them. Being too busy
negotiating a large paella for two I had not noticed.
"They knew you were Iranian," she told me.
To our amazement, the following morning at breakfast we saw the same group having
breakfast a few tables away from us.
"Don't you dare go and say hello... why do you always think other Iranians
want to know us?"
Too late, I was already half way to their table. I reached it, stopped, smiled
and introduced myself explaining that we had sat across from each other at the
restaurant the night before and that I, too was Iranian.
The Iranian looking couple looked up at me for a few seconds before the husband
said somewhat coldly, "Yes?"
"I just wanted to say hello," I smiled; trying hard not sound like
the wind
had been taken from my sails.
The second, fairer looking couple immediately got up and shook my hand before
asking what I did for a living, what my family name was and where I lived. I
discovered that the first couple were residents of LA and the second couple (only
the husband was Iranian, his wife was Belgian) lived in Brussels. This is why
they had all spoken in English over dinner the night before.
***
I so crave Iranian company. Which is why today I went to an Iranian
restaurant in Chicago called, Reza. Let me rewind: I am writing
this as I sit in my hotel
room near Chicago's O'Hare airport. I am in the US for a week of
work and meetings. My taxi driver from the airport looked so Iranian that I couldn't
resist asking him if he was. He turned out to be Syrian. We spoke at length about
Iraq.
"Why do you think Bush senior stopped short of helping the Iraqi's oust
Saddam during the last conflict?" he asked me.
I looked quizzically back at him through his rear view mirror. He continued.
"Because if Saddam had been removed back then the Arabs would no longer have needed
an American presence on their soil. Bush needed Saudi Arabia and Kuwait to be
dependent on a US presence. That's why he let Saddam stay in power."
I asked him if he knew any good Iranian restaurants which is how I ended
up at Reza's in downtown Chicago. My first disappointment came when I spent
a full minute speaking to a waiter and a waitress in Farsi before realising they
were both Mexican. I looked around the vast space which made up Reza's
restaurant and did not spot a single Iranian member of staff.
My next disappointment came when I ordered a Chelo Kabab-e-Soltani. I asked the
very pleasant Indian waiter for an egg yolk to mix in with my rice.
"I am sorry sir but we don't do egg yolk."
"What!"
"I am very sorry sir."
"But I can't eat this without an egg yolk."
"We are not allowed to serve it sir." He continued.
I had a very dry tasting Chelo Kabab which left me stuffed but dissatisfied.
From Reza's, which was on Ontario, I resolved to walk the five or so blocks
up to Michigan to find a GAP store. It was hot, humid and my stomach was fully
stretched. The reason for visiting GAP was that every single pair of trousers
I own (40W30L) has lost its top button.
 I found a store and was delighted
to find that I could buy 42W30L trousers. So I bought 5 pairs. I can now conduct
the rest of my meetings confident that if
I point to something high up on a chart, colleagues won't see my undone
trousers and hairy stomach.
I fly home on Friday and can't wait to see the beautiful mother to be of
our twins. I have missed her badly and can't bare the thought that in just
3 weeks I will fly away (again) to India for ten whole days of meetings. It will
be my last trip before we become parents. I will report back from Bangalore -
the
Silicone Valley of India.
* Send
this page to your friends
* Printer
friendly
|
