¿Usted habla árabe

One of the most surprising things about Colombia has been eating the most delicious Arabic food outside of the Middle East and my own kitchen. Colombia has a large population of Syrian, Lebanese and Palestinian descendants. I have met many people with Arabic names, for example, Fatima, Shadia, and Khalaf to name a few.
I was very excited to meet people of Arabic descent here and the first thing I would do when someone confirmed they were Arab was to start speaking Arabic. I would inevitably be met with a puzzled expression and the statement, "No habla, árabe, solo español." (I don't speak Arabic, only Spanish) I couldn't believe it. This is the first time in my life I am around Arabs who don't speak the language.
I did meet one person who spoke to me in my native tongue, an elderly gentlemen who was visiting his daughter. He immigrated to Colombia in the sixties and has been here for over 45 years. His daughter didn't speak Arabic, but can cook some of the best Lebanese food this side of the Sinai. It was funny, he spoke primarily Arabic with some Spanish thrown in. Sparabic, if you will.
Having grown up in the northeast of the U.S. during the seventies and eighties, every single person I knew who came from the Middle East spoke Arabic. Even if we didn't know how to read and write the language, our parents only spoke in Arabic to us at home. I realized that here the Arabs are similar to the Italians I grew up with, they may not have spoken Italian, but they still cooked phenomenal food and felt close to their heritage.
There are Arab restaurants in Cartagena the same way there are pizzerias all over New York City. I have also seen many people with tattoos of their names or phrases in Arabic, on their wrists or arms. At first, I was sure those who tattooed the language on their bodies surely spoke said language, but I was wrong. I finally don't ask people anymore if they speak Arabic. I now let people know that I speak Arabic and I figure the person who knows how to communicate that way will talk first.

Casa del Niños

Last week I had the opportunity to volunteer at the children's hospital in Cartagena, known locally as, Casa del Niños. A group of doctors, nurses and support staff, have been coming to the hospital for the past 17 years performing all sorts of surgeries on children, including cleft palate and skin grafting for burn victims. This year the doctors for the first time ever, performed surgery on a 43 year old woman who had never had her cleft palate corrected.
I coordinated volunteers and donations of juices and snacks to be given out to the parents while they waited for their children. Volunteers helped translate for the doctors. I went for three days in a row and I was overwhelmed by the needs of the hospital.
One of the local Rotary clubs coordinates the logistics of the group's visit. It was through this group that I became involved. I met one of the women earlier in the year and when she told me what she does, I immediately offered my assistance. It felt so good to be useful. While I have been having a lot of fun, I have been feeling a little useless. I have decided that although the group has left (they come each year for ten days) I will continue to help the hospital in any way I can. I am going to continue to go, maybe once every week or every other week. I need to learn more Spanish. People at the hospital kept walking up to me with questions and I felt bad not understanding them. I am more motivated than ever to learn more so I can communicate in a meaningful way.

The Effects of Constant Perfect Weather...

It has been a while since my last post. I have thought about many blog posts to write and commit to doing it, only to find that it is a beautiful, sunny and warm day outside. I then decide to swim, walk or call a friend to go for a coffee at the local cafe, writing forgotten.
It wasn't until a friend of mine who lives in Colorado wrote on my Facebook wall asking me if I blog anymore, that it hit me how long I have been neglecting my writing. I don't feel good about it. I love to write and chronicle my experiences here. I love to share the interesting comings and goings of the people of Cartagena. I hate to admit this, the truth is I have become lazy. There I said it. I have had a job since I was thirteen years old. I have never considered myself lazy. I love to work and be involved in either my children's school or my local community. For the past few months, I have been indulging in exclusively leisure activities. I have taken boat trips to islands off the coast a few times, gone on ladies' nights out, taken a tour of a US Navy frigate, had lunch, breakfast and dinner out more times than I can count. In a nutshell, I have been having lots and lots of fun. Which has also left me a bit antsy and feeling like I need to do something productive.
So, a couple of weeks ago, I started volunteering at my children's school. I taught the children how to write their own fairytale. This was one of the most fun things I have done in a while. The children's first language is Spanish and their teacher was explaining that descriptive and creative writing is difficult in English for the class. I decided that writing a fairytale would be a great way to get the creative juices flowing. The most creative and hilarious stories in the class was written by a boy from Argentina who has lived in Dubai, Venezuela and Colombia. He wrote a story about where hippies came from. The funniest aspect of his tale was the characters he included, they were, Hugo Chavez, Dr. Frankenstein, Michael Jackson and Darth Vader, just to name a few. My son decided to write a fable about how school became boring. The plot line was that school used to be fun until an evil organization made teachers a mandatory part of schooling and then all types of fun was banned.
I have volunteered to go to the school once a week and help start a newspaper in the class. I am looking forward to writing in this blog again and keeping you all posted on my adventures here in Cartagena.