http://www.thestar.com/life/food_wine/f ... style.html
By: Corey Mintz Food, Published on Thu Mar 12 2015
Hospitality is serious business for the man from Djibouti.
In the small, hot nation on the east coast of Africa, it’s traditional to welcome unknown travellers into your house, to give them lodging and feed them the best food you have.
“First, you don’t ask who he is. He’s a traveller,” says my host, Abdirahman Daher Iltire, “Abi” to friends. “You have to give him water and welcome him. When he eats, you can ask him who he is, which family he is. Unless there’s a war.”
My work doesn’t permit such manners. Walking through the door of Abi’s apartment, a rose scent rising above the prepared feast, I’m introduced to a dozen people — Abi; his wife Nasra Mohamed Abdillahi; their four children Willsan, Soubagleh, Zakaria and Idman; a couple family friends; a nephew; a cousin; Salvator Cusimano, who works at Romero House, the refugee resettlement residence where the family lived before this; his girlfriend Alison Sharp — and I have to ask for everyone’s name twice. After handing over a gift of candied almonds and walnuts, right away we’re talking about Djiboutian cooking, culture and politics. If I don’t bust out my microphone and notepad I’ll drown in forgotten details.
I can’t write quick enough or spell anything right, while tasting Nasra’s delicious bagiya (lightly fried chickpea fritters) and sambusas (mini samosas of handmade dough, tightly wrapped around beef, garlic and green chili), dipping them in a sauce of tamarind, tomatoes and peppers. And who knows what my recorder is picking up, in the tumult of so many conversations, cooking, children playing with electronic gadgets and the hypnotic Djiboutian string music wafting from the stereo.
Abdirahman Daher Iltire, his wife Nasra Mohamed Abdillahi and their four children host Corey Mintz and other guests to a feast of their native Djiboutian food. Abdirahman Daher Iltire, his wife Nasra Mohamed Abdillahi and their four children host Corey Mintz and other guests to a feast of their native Djiboutian food.
Abi laughs when I ask if Djibouti is a democracy. On top of that, he is a minority, a Madhiban, viewed as an inferior caste, economically marginalized and discriminated against.
“We are considered as a nothing. Due to my background, I couldn’t even dream.”
But foreign companies didn’t care about their caste system. Speaking French, Somali, Afar, Arabic and Amharic, Abi found work as a translator for an American military contractor. For three years, without a day off, he stayed after hours to learn English, becoming a safety inspector, then trainer.
When a job came up in Afghanistan, he leapt at it.
“After three months in Afghanistan I come back home. From the airport I went directly to the jail.”
His expertise made him a valuable safety manager, travelling for work, in construction, then mining. But the police persecution, harassment for being Madhiban, held for a day or two and released for a bribe, never ceased.
“When I land, I don’t know, am I going to go home or to jail? I was so happy to see my family. But I was always scared.”
In 2013, he left with his wife and children, first to France, then Canada.
His first mission, while living in a shelter in downtown Toronto, was to enrol his children in school. Soon they landed in Romero House, which focuses on immigrants still awaiting refugee status.
“They welcomed us, offered us dignity,” says Abi. “They knew what we needed, without even asking.” Salvator was their companion, living on site, walking them through the process of government forms, settling, finding homes and jobs.
After eight months, Abi secured work with a copper mining company, mostly based in Mauritania and Zambia. He is as passionate about safety — training, education, surprise inspections — as any chef is about food.
Tonight is his last at home before he ships out for six weeks. It is quite a send-off.
Settling in at the cramped table, spilling out into the living room, where I can tell they’ve given me more legroom than anyone else, we move on to salad, then a tureen of soup. After that Nasra floods the table with a mix of rice and fried onions, spaghetti and Bolognese sauce, slow-cooked lamb shanks, creamy potatoes with lots of turmeric, a dish of vermicelli baked with raisins and cinnamon (adriad), identical in flavour to my grandmother’s kugel (minus the cottage cheese) and bowls of sweet hot sauce.
In Djibouti they make a flatbread similar to Ethiopian injera. But it’s smaller and they don’t use it to pick up the food. Nasra eschews cutlery, eating with her hands. I consider going local, but Abi and the children all use forks and spoons, hopefully not just to make me feel comfortable.
Their hospitality doesn’t end with dinner, during which various guests come and go. At the door they ply me with leftovers and insist on driving me home, refusing to take no for an answer.
I’m overwhelmed, by food and by the people. Nasra and her cousin have been cooking since yesterday. Abi’s upward mobility comes from working 100 times harder than me.
I see family as a hassle, people to call once a year on their birthdays. Abi is the eldest of 22 siblings. Every month he sends money back home.
“As Madhiban, everybody puts you down. In our family, you have to survive,” says Abi. “To be somebody you have to be more than anybody else. You have to learn while the others are sleeping.”
