How I Came to Eat Xash

My family tricked me. Seriously, I saw it coming, I knew it was happening, and they still tricked me. I have eaten xash.

Here’s how it happened. I first knew something might happen at breakfast, when my host father asked if I had eaten xash before. I could have sworn I’d already talked to them about this, and noted my distaste. Xash, for those who don’t know, is essentially boiled cow head meat. Sometimes you get the whole head, sometimes meat from the head. In Xirdalan, I had been served xash for dinner one evening; straight fatty meat in broth that brought to mind Hot Ham Soup from Arrested Development. In a pot nearby, the bones of the cow’s skull still stewed. After a few sips of the broth, I begged off and was given scrambled eggs or something equally non-threatening.

So he asked, and again I said that I didn’t like the stuff, and the conversation shifted. The hair on the back of my neck straightened a bit, but I let it go. Lunch was a normal meal that day, and I came home from classes and waited for dinner. I sat down and my bowl was already at my place. My father and brother had already started eating, so I “nush olsoon”-ed them and started eating. I knew it was a meat stew of some sort, and could tell immediately that it was a fatty meat, but not too much more fatty than other soups I’ve had. A couple bites in, I looked up and noticed them looking at me. My host mother asked if I liked what I was eating, so of course I said yes. An aside: there’s not much gray area in Azerbaijani, or at least not in my personal language skills, so I’m usually stuck with “I like it, it’s good” or “I don’t like it, it’s bad.” They started grinning and my host father then asked me if I knew what I was eating. “It’s xash, isn’t it,” I said in English.

All they needed to know was that I’d said the word xash.

Countdown to Football

Now that I’ve recovered a bit (read: slept), I can write about my journey to watch this year’s Super Bowl. When the Ravens lost to the Steelers, I knew that if the Steelers made it, I’d have to watch just to ensure a loss for Big Ben. And so I began attempting to figure out where we would be able to watch. Baku was the front-runner for a while, but in the end, several volunteers were able to organize a viewing at the Hotel Ramada in the city of Ganja.

Getting to Ganja was no simple feat, but compared to some of the other traveling here I’ve undertaken, was fairly smooth sailing. By that I mean, there is a direct bus from Ismayilli to Ganja. It just took a long time to make it, with repeated stops; to deliver goods to people and stores, to wait for passengers, to allow the driver to have smoke breaks. But we made it. We left at 8am and arrived around 12:30 or 1 pm.

15 Hours to Go

Ganja is the second-largest city in Azerbaijan, with a population of about 300,000. We walked towards the city center, where we would meet several other volunteers for lunch. The city seemed nice, clean, developed. At times the buildings reminded me of a small Pennsylvania or Maryland town, like Frederick or Hanover. Big enough to have buses but small enough for walking if need be. The streets were lined with stores and sidewalks were everywhere completed and even. We ate at the Elegance restaurant, where they served enjoyable pizza, with real-ish cheese, and had pictures on the wall of the world’s largest baklava, made in Ganja last year.

Afterwards we wandered around the city, including stopping in one of the parks, which featured swings, a small county fair-style roller coaster and a Viking ship with park benches with seat belts. Perhaps the best 60 qepik I’ve spent: bumper cars. We all piled in and proceeded to ram into each other violently, probably scared the bejeezus out of a small boy unfortunate to be bumper car-ing with us (Azeris apparently don’t bump their bumper cars as much as we do).

We soon ran out of things to do in the city, but were fortunately saved by a call from a volunteer living in Ganja, about meeting at the Mangara Restaurant (Cave), where we met also a State Department worker in the city, and were joined by several other newly arrived volunteers. The restaurant was in the basement of a building, and in keeping with the cave theme, featured stone mosaics of animals on the walls, such as a bear fighting a lion.

12 Hours to Go

We stopped at a small market en route to the State Dept worker’s home, where we would be allowed to kill time until a 7pm meeting about the softball league that PC leads in Azerbaijan. We managed to pass the time through napping, snacking, Taboo, and Pictionary.

7 Hours to Go

Finally it came time to leave for the Hotel for our softball meeting. We split up, some of our group staying at the house for a bit to go to dinner, the rest to softball. I stopped as we dressed to talk to a friend, and when I turned around, the guys going to softball had left without me, and to top it off, one of them had made off wearing my shoes. Several minutes of confusion occurred, in which I looked at the shoes several times (a pointless repetition as there were really only about six pairs of shoes in the entryway). I then squeezed my feet into the thief’s shoes (admittedly similar designs, though my shoes were a full size larger) and followed the directions I was given to reach the hotel. A walk and a bus ride later, on the other side of the city, I was reunited with my fellow volunteers, and my shoes.

The meeting went well, and hopefully (inshallah) we will be starting a softball team here in Ismayilli this spring.

6 Hours to Go

The meeting over, the real waiting game began. We were allowed to stay at the Hotel Ramada’s restaurant (really the bar, but they claimed to have six sandwiches on the menu, all of which turned out to be smaller than my hand). Many of us therefore elected to seek food elsewhere, and so we embarked on an excursion to a nearby store for snacks and drinks.

One of the few seemingly universal traits of volunteers seems to be a love of games. Cards, board games, physical games, you name it, we love it, and in many cases, have brought it with us. One of our favorites is called Bananagrams, and is a more fast-paced, competitive Scabble. Another is the likewise lively Ninja, which requires people to move in single steady movements attempting to slap each other’s hands, and always seemingly ends up with someone rolling on the ground.

Some people spent the time napping, others reading, others eating and talking, but somehow finally the time passed. A few volunteers set up a spread for the game and collected small entrance fees, with escalating winnings for each quarter.

1 Hour to Go

After some worry that we’d have to watch the game in Turkish, our tech-savy volunteers figured out how to project the game onto the wall. We would be able to see the commercials, we thought excitedly. Just as the wait was creeping up on me and I was considering a brief nap, we were called in to watch Obama’s interview with Bill O’Reilly. We sure got some good laughs out of that, even at 2 in the morning.

And then it was time for the pregame show. The talking heads called for Green Bay to win, and that seemed also to be the way our group was leaning. The Steelers fans in attendance, several volunteers from Pittsburgh itself, were respectably dedicated to their team, wearing jerseys, hats, and waving their Terrible Towels. Made me wish they’d add a commercial where they showed not just armed forces but Peace Corps volunteers or similar volunteer organizations around the world watching the game.

When Lea Michele came on to sing America the Beautiful, we hit on the idea that a Glee halftime show would be absolutely amazing, and when Christina Aguillera sang to wrong words to The Star Spangled Banner, we all turned to each other at the same time, asking “That wasn’t right, was it?”

First Half

The game began with the Steelers fans at full volume, the Packers fans matching them all the way. But by halftime, it was clear one side was taking control, and the Steelers fans were on the edges of their seats, or sometimes curled on the floor. The major disappointment was the lack of commercials. Our feed was non-stop announcements for Fox Sports. The same set of commercials over and over again, for football, golf, and basketball. It was maddening, knowing that potentially brilliant commercials were being aired on the other side of the planet and we couldn’t see them. I have since watched these commercials, and while none were what I would call brilliant, there were some decent ones in the bunch. An irony while trying to watch the commercials: NFL's website made me watch an ad before they would show me the ads. Laying it on a little thick I think.

Halftime

I missed the halftime show, and boy, am I glad. I don’t normally like the Black Eyed Peas, and heard that it was all around a horrible performance, if you can call it that. I was distracted by a phone call from home and saved from the pain. The petition for Glee Halftime Show 2011 begins now.

Second Half

The second half rejuvenated their energy, and it got wonderfully competitive as Big Ben nearly led the Steelers back. Those of us who supported the Packers grimaced whenever Number 87 would drop the ball, and cheer that he’d redeemed himself when he caught the next for a big gain or a touchdown. When the final second ticked off, there were cheers, hugs and handshakes. We spilled out into the lobby, which had been empty save for the volunteers all night, and the top floors of the hotel still unlit (only the bottom four floors or show were lit).

Return Journey

It was dark when we left at 7am, the sun just beginning to peak over the horizon. We took taxis back to the SD’s home where a number of people crashed to take naps before their buses home. I had to grab my bag and go straight to the bus station, and almost jogged part of the way as the clock ticked down to 8am, when it was supposed to leave. I needn’t have worried, of course, as we sat at the station for another half an hour waiting for it to fill up.

Out of sheer exhaustion I slept fitfully in the bus, but was repeatedly awakened for short stops and deliveries. Fortunately though, we didn’t take any long breaks and we were much quicker back to Ismayilli. As I entered my front gate, my program director called and told me about a woman that I should meet with if I wanted about a young business leaders program that will be taking place in Ismayilli. The catch was, I had to be at the school in a half an hour, because she was getting ready to go to Ganja, to meet with volunteers there. Is that irony? I’m not sure, but in my sleep-deprived state, I couldn’t help chuckling at the whole thing.

Finally, I was able to return home, change into my sweat pants, and nap. As soon as dinner was over, I retreated to my room and with the lights still on and music playing, fell asleep.