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Rakija and Meze
- University of Wisconsin Press
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94 Ra kija and Meze At sun set, my father would set down his book on the bal cony after a long after noon of read ing; this was the sign for my mother to come with a small glass of home made ra kija. My mother in tuited when my father was in the mood for just a sip of ra kija and when he wanted to eat some meze with his brandy. The lat ter was most often the case when guests ar rived, a fre quent oc cur rence. Mother was a real mas ter at tak ing lit tle bits of things and turn ing them into won der ful meze. Dur ing the years of pov erty and So cial ist col lec tiv iza tion, my mother se cretly planted some pep pers, egg plants, to ma toes, gar lic, onion, par sley, and cu cum bers in a lit tle plot of land in our gar den. She man aged to hide them so well among the roses, the car na tions, and the oblig a tory basil that al most no one knew of mother’s se cret gar den. And though they shared the earth with the flow ers, these veg e ta bles grew suc cess fully for my mother year in and year out. As the first egg plants ri pened, my father would say in jest that the earth it self loved my mother. At that time there was scarcely any such pro duce in the mar kets, and what there was quickly van ished, al most cer tain to end up on ta bles in great din ing halls, which were not open to every one. My mother made the best meze for my father and his friends when the veg e ta bles in her gar den were ripe. She made an un usual salad from finely chopped par sley and used the left overs for her yogurt dip, made from but ter milk that had, in turn, been made from the milk of our hid den goats. When my father’s friends came over, I started hang ing around just for the meze. My father and his friends did not no tice how quickly the ap pe tiz ers dis ap peared. From time to time my father shot a stern glance in my di rec tion, but to no avail. Later on, when I was a bit older and was in cluded in the con ver sa tions between my father and his 95 friends and al lowed a sip or two of brandy, I ate more, way more, than I drank. The food still dis ap peared quite quickly. But my father no longer scolded me. With time it be came ever clearer to me that between the ra kija and the meze, the time and the con ver sa tion, there was some sort of order, some mu tual con sent not easy to achieve . . . ...