Foodways in Southern Oman 9780367859558, 9781003015987

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Foodways in Southern Oman

Foodways in Southern Oman examines the objects, practices and beliefs relating to producing, obtaining, cooking, eating and disposing of food in the Dhofar region of southern Oman. The chapters consider food preparation, who makes what kind of food, and how and when meals are eaten. Marielle Risse connects what is consumed to themes such as land usage, gender, age, purity, privacy and generosity. She also discusses how foodways are related to issues of morality, safety, religion and tourism. The volume is a result of 14 years of collecting data and insights in Dhofar, covering topics such as catching fish, herding camels, growing fruits, designing kitchens, cooking meals and setting leftovers out for animals. It will be of interest to scholars from a range of disciplines, including anthropology, sociology, food studies, Middle Eastern studies and Islamic studies.

Marielle Risse is an Associate Professor at Dhofar University in Salalah, Oman. She has taught literature, education and cultural studies on the Arabian Peninsula for a number of years and is author of Community and Autonomy in Southern Oman (Palgrave Macmillan, 2019).

Foodways in Southern Oman Marielle Risse

First published 2021 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2021 Marielle Risse The right of Marielle Risse to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record has been requested for this book ISBN: 978-0-367-85955-8 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-003-01598-7 (ebk) Typeset in Times New Roman SPi Global, India

To the Dhofari women who cooked for and ate with me, the “research guys” and all the Omanis who told me stories. The Cranfordians had that kindly esprit de corps which made them overlook all deficiencies in success… When Mrs. Forrester, for instance, gave a party in her babyhouse of a dwelling, and the little maiden disturbed the ladies on the sofa by a request that she might get the tea-tray out from underneath, everyone took this novel proceeding as the most natural thing in the world, and talked on about household forms and ceremonies as if we all believed that our hostess had a regular servants’ hall, second table, with housekeeper and steward, instead of the one little charity-school maiden …[and she] now sat in state, pretending not to know what cakes were sent up, though she knew, and we knew, and she knew that we knew, and we knew that she knew that we knew, she had been busy all the morning making tea-bread and sponge-cakes. Elizabeth Gaskell, Cranford (1853)

Contents

Acknowledgments x Preface xii 1

Culture, research and methodology Introduction: the non-importance of food  1 Situating Dhofar and Gibalis  3 Researching foodways in Dhofar  8 Research overview  19 Notes 27 References 28

2

Procuring foodstuffs: raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying Food and geography/ land use  35 The food year  38 Crops  42 Bee-keeping  44 Domesticated animals  45 Sea fauna  50 Economics of procuring food  55 Wildlife  57 Receiving  60 Buying  61 Economics of receiving and buying food  62 Notes 63 References 68

1

35

viii  Contents 3 Cooking Overview of past foodways  71 Cooking at home  74 Pragmatics of when and what to eat  84 Notes 93 References 96

71

4

Special meals and special foods Special meals  99 Special foods  107 Notes 110 References 112

99

5

Eating and location How to eat  114 Restaurants  118 Cafés  123 Picnics  124 Eating–location, purpose and sociability  127 Notes 128 References 129

114

6

Lifestages, power and gender Foodways and lifestages  131 Foodways and power  133 Foodways and gender  136 Notes 142 References 145

131

7

Purity, privacy and danger Introduction  146 Foodways and purity  147 Foodways and privacy  152 Avoiding dangerous foods  159 Notes 161 References 163

146

8 Generosity Introduction  165 Importance of being generous, but always hiding generosity  166 Types of generosity  168 Food generosity while hosting, guesting and eating  171

165

Contents  ix Food generosity while sharing and disposing of food  174 The tacit benefits of generosity  176 Notes 179 References 180 9

Changes in foodways Introduction  182 Changes: cooking  182 Changes: in-home help  183 Changes: food choices and tourism  184 Changes: food presentation and showing off  186 Changes: diets, disease and nutrition  187 Changes: monetizing food  188 Coda – July 2020: a brief overview of foodways in Dhofar during the Corona pandemic  190 Envoi  192 Notes 192 References 194

182

Index 196

Acknowledgments

This book is dedicated to all the Omanis who trusted me with their stories and shared their lives. I would like to thank three amazing Dhofari photographers: Salwa Hubais, Hussein BaOmar and M. A. Al Awaid who have allowed me to use their beautiful photos for my website: https://mariellerisse.com/ I would also like to thank everyone at Dhofar University for their kindness and support. I would also like to thank the home team who cooked so I could read and took me out to eat so I could talk, especially Anthony and Joel who took me to so many good restaurants but never expected me to eat the vegetables; Barby (who once greeted me at the door with mini-Reubens), Drew, Alex, Danny, Nick; Becky (sugar cookies, Konditorei and Diet Coke), Brad, Claire and Kory, Drew, JD; June and Peter (watercress and the right way to make tea); Keye (mango with coconut sticky rice, Burdicks, and eating whatever I made); Michael Beard and Joe DeFilippo for Friday coffee and a lot of advice; Mouse (the joy of a Wisconsin cheese ball) and Neil; Sara and Donavan (who let me buy pies to eat for breakfast); Teresa (queen of adventure), Beatrice and Lindsay; Traci, Steve and Henry (movie popcorn, Diet Coke and Traci 7s); Yashika and Angel (your mom’s potato sandwiches and all the Mexican places you took me to). To my parents who bought the mill ruins. Mom (born and raised in Wisconsin, but gave us pita bread, hummus, tabouli and baba ganouj in the 1970s) and Dick (thanks for all the steaks!); Dad (dried apricots and pistachio ice cream) and Linda; my sister (everything healthy), Chuck (THE CHEF!), Charlie, Michael, Henry and Maeve; my brother (elk, salmon, and Charlie Trotters), Kathy, Bunker, Kate and Lauren. Aunt Sara (Christmas bread, raspberry jam, Krusteaz muffin mix and Almond Roca), Ed, and all my Northwest cousins, Aunt Laurie, Uncle Bill and the memories of Aunt Alice and Uncle Bob and to all my Wisconsin cousins who taught me by example to always respect the people who grow the food you eat. All the Omani women who shook my hand and smiled at weddings; all the Omani men who were so gracious at C. When you are the only woman in a cafe with 75 men, politeness is a great kindness. I could not have had my “third space” without your courteousness. And I would like to thank the people who make my everyday so much easier: Ashik and Nizar at work, Malie and Kumari at home,

Acknowledgments  xi Dr. Elke Heitz and her wonderful staff at Al Qurum Veterinary Clinic and Ali, world’s best landlord. I would like to thank all my friends who know/ knew the joys of B, B, C and the beach: Steve, Trygve (Queen of Frankincense), Sandrine and family, Alexia and Edo, Chris and Sanda, Helen and Ed, Samantha and Chris, Sophie and Margie. Special thanks to Fran for so much listening, talking, teaching, advising, translating and helping through many, many “Salalah mornings” – I miss you! Thanks to the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the University of North Dakota. Thanks for all the good meals at the porch table at BHP; Schwessie’s beautifully decorated table; Mom’s Scan table; Urban Stampede in Grand Forks, ND; the Windmill Café in Kingston, Ontario; the Palm Court at the Balmoral, Edinburgh; Henrietta’s Table in Cambridge, MA; and the Lime Tree Cafe in Dubai. Thanks to Kid Rock (for the slow songs, not the politics, not the rap), Pink, Toby Keith and all the songs picked by Steve Nathans-Kelly which got me through a lot of long drives late at night on dark roads. Please note: The views expressed in this book are mine alone and are not necessarily shared by anyone connected to the university where I teach.

Preface

Introduction and overview of methodology This book examines the practices, objects and beliefs pertaining to producing, obtaining, cooking, eating and disposing of food in the Dhofar region in southern Oman. Over the past 14 years, I have been collecting data and insights about different foodways, from catching fish to herding camels to growing bananas to designing kitchens to putting leftovers out for animals. This book will show what people eat and how, connecting what is consumed to topics such as land usage, lifestages, purity and generosity. I do ethnographic research with members of one group of tribes, hakli, who speak an unwritten Southern Arabian language called Gibali (Jebbali/ Shahri), in addition to Arabic. My first projects were exploring Gibali concepts of self-respect and self-control, then I expanded to look at various aspects of Gibali cultures including beliefs about masculinity and femininity, fairy and folk tales, the absence of honor killing, and practices and perceptions relating to gift-giving and receiving. I am one of the last people on earth who should be writing a book about food. I don’t like to cook, don’t watch cooking shows, don’t own any cookbooks except Joy of Cooking, and can only make some basics like apple pie. But when I started to do research on foodways in the southern region of Dhofar, I realized that I am the right person to write this book about food because, despite many cultural differences, Gibalis and I have many of the same attitudes towards eating. First of all, there should be food. We are not quite hobbits, but we think there should be breakfast, lunch and dinner, with snacks in-between. Secondly, the food should be fresh, clean and served at the right temperature and you should eat enough to be full. In someone’s house, the host does everything but on a picnic everyone should help in some way. Most significantly, food is a good thing, however one should not pay too much attention to it. In 14 years of living in Dhofar, I have never had a discussion about a recipe with any Omani. One takes the first bite with slight apprehension as there is a small chance there might be too much salt or spice. After that, one eats until one is done with little or no conversation, and certainly no discussion of the food. There is no “is that a hint of cardamom I detect?” A female Dhofari once talked excitedly to me about a new dessert she had found. As it was rare to talk about food, I asked several questions to understand

Preface  xiii what exactly she was referring to. It turns out one of the grocery stores had started to carry a cheesecake mix that had the graham cracker crust, cake base and a strawberry topping for about $3. As she was saying how delicious and easy this new cake was, I thought, “these are my people.” Cake from a box is fine by me; the important thing is who you are eating it with. For the Muslim, Arab, tribal Omanis in my research group, food is for assuaging hunger and performing sociability and solidarity. The focus is on who is eating, not what is eaten. For example, if an Omani friend and I decide to have a meal together, she will usually come even if she is sick and unable to eat. The point is to chat, not to eat. If I am sick and some of the men in my research group come to check on me, they will never ask “what can I bring?” and it would be rude for me to make a culinary request, as it would be rude to refuse to eat whatever they bring. They are demonstrating camaraderie; showing up is vital, dinner is secondary. I know Gibali men and women who are good cooks, but that is a talent among many possible talents, not a paramount achievement; I also know Gibali men and women who don’t know how to cook. Another similarity between me and them is that there is little control over who eats what or how much. A lot is written about Arab hospitality and the issue of pushing strangers to eat a lot, but the pressure is easy to dodge. You can accept a piece of cake, take a small bite, push the slice over on its side, smush it a little with your fork, and set it on a table. When the host presses you, you point at the slice and proclaim loudly that you have eaten it all. The host performs hospitality, you perform gratitude. Affability is key, not the amount ingested. Further, as I will explain, among family members and friends there is little or no policing. Two other traits that are consistent with my outlook towards foodways are, firstly, that generosity and speed are more important than the cost, presentation or originality of the food. Lipton tea with store-bought biscuits which are served quickly are more valued than an expensive tea blend served with a decorated cake that takes longer to appear. Secondly, all meat and fish is well cooked. The shame of my childhood was ordering a medium well-done cheeseburger in a family of “rare” meat eaters and a father who subscribed to the view of “cut it from the living cow and walk it through a room that has a lit candle.” When you eat with Gibalis, you can be assured of “well-done,” if not actual carbonization. Of course there are many differences; Gibalis do not eat “old” food – announcing that I ate cold pizza for breakfast created a strong, negative reaction. Discussions about this difference opened a door to long talks about decision trees for what to do with leftover prepared food. Thus my research often proceeds from abductive reasoning, reflecting on what seemed familiar or unfamiliar, and why, during and after the hundreds of meals I have eaten with Dhofaris. I do both sustained, formal interviews and many spot-checks with Dhofari friends and informants who are fully informed about my research and know that their quotes (without names) would appear in my writing. From sharing their food and asking questions about food for over ten years, I am building up a general picture of Dhofari foodways, with the understanding that there are elements I am missing and that there is a wide variety of practices between households.1

xiv  Preface Besides the main topic of foodways, this book is about the slings and arrows of doing research in the place where you live: balancing trying to get information with trying to be a good friend, neighbor and citizen. I also comment on issues related to doing research as a single, Christian (Methodist), American female on the Arabian Peninsula.

Impetus for writing This book is the first systematic study of foodways in southern Arabia. I bring two kinds of unique insights; first, I regularly have meals with female Gibalis, have enjoyed over 300 picnics with men-only groups, and have had over 75 family dinners in Omani houses, so I combine academic research and formal interviews with numerous authentic culinary experiences with men, women and in family settings. Second, I have lived in Salalah, the main city in Dhofar, for 14 years, so I have a longterm perspective of how the gastronomic landscape has changed over time. I moved to Dhofar before the first large grocery store opened, before the McDonalds arrived; I have watched, like flotsam and jetsam being brought in by the tide, as sushi, Mexican food, brownies, (virgin) mojitos and Thai food have appeared. I started this research wanting to document what choices people had in terms of what to eat, when, where and how. I was specifically interested in how food was used in social situations and how people shared foodstuffs and prepared food. The constant movement of food is a unique aspect of the culinary landscape in Dhofar as the less-populated mountain, coast and desert areas are, at this point, still tightly intertwined with the city of Salalah. For example, a Gibali family which lives in the mountains will distribute cow milk and samn (clarified butter) free of charge to relatives and neighbors. This will be done over years, without any attempt to figure out the worth of what is given or expecting any kind of repayment. If there is repayment, it may come unsystematically in the form of a bottle of local honey; good quality frankincense; meat from a slaughtered goat, cow or camel; prepared food; freshly caught fish, sardines, squid or lobster; abalone; fruit such as bananas or limes; vegetables such as sweet potatoes. In addition, many Gibalis have “kitchen literacy”; they know exactly where most of their food comes from, e.g. on which plantation the mangos were grown, which areas the camels grazed on, whose farm produced the melons and where to find mushrooms in the khareef (monsoon season). This knowledge extends to geographical knowledge of watersheds and water courses, e.g. if it rains in X location, the runoff will go to Y location and there will be good grazing for A kind of animal after B number of days. Yet Dhofar is very connected to the world economy, as everyday necessities, such as tea and rice, are not grown in Dhofar and have to be imported. When the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten published cartoons containing representation of the prophet Mohammed, many Salalah stores posted signs “We do not carry Danish products,” even stores which had never carried the two main Danish imports, Lurpak butter and Royal Dansk cookies. A person with a coffee capsule machine who offers you a caramel macchiato can joint a goat and cook it on rocks heated by a wood fire.

Preface  xv As I researched, new avenues of interest opened up. One was how Omani kitchens and dining areas are designed, using works such as Gallagher’s House Thinking (2007). I looked at work on Qatari houses by Nagy (1998, 2006), Sobh and Belk (2011a, 2011b) and Sobh, Belk and Wilson (2013) to compare Omani houses with Qatari norms. This led to thinking about how and when privacy was (and sometimes was not) practiced while Gibalis are cooking and eating. I also found productive insights from works in the field of family studies including books such as Alsharekh’s collection The Gulf Family (2007) and Joseph’s Arab Family Studies: Critical Reviews (2018). Further, I became interested in changes in foodways, particularly changes in women’s and men’s knowledge. One generalization is that in the past, men and women had similar, wide-ranging knowledge of plants and cooking. While some men and women continue to spend a lot of time outdoors and have preserved some knowledge of plants, now fewer people know about local plants. While some men and women still know how to cook on an open fire, some don’t; on the other hand, some women have become more involved in cooking as a way to make money, selling prepared food either at road-side stands or via Instagram. This has an add-on effect in that brothers and sons become involved in selling or delivering either for pocket money or as a job. Another part of the changing culinary landscape is the addition of expat female workers who live-in, male expat workers who come to the house to cook or clean for a few hours and new restaurants with male expat workers cooking either their own or foreign cuisines.2 This work connects to my other research topics, in that I want to document the present moment in one group of Muslim, Arab, tribal cultures in the Middle East. So much of what is written about Muslim societies focuses on either places of political break-down or social, financial, artistic, religious, military or academic elites. I want to show how people navigate ordinary life: not torn by war, poverty, political struggles or religious upheaval and not the highly privileged. I am interested in the often not-seen, not-discussed topics of how everyday food is procured, produced, cooked, eaten, shared and disposed of by people who have neither an insufficiency nor a super-abundance of food.3 Thus I look at food from many angles, for example whether food is performative and how consumption is related to issues of morality, safety, religion, identity politics and tourism. I studied what Gibalis typically eat in different seasons and how plants such as melons, findal (sweet potato), bananas, herbs and coconuts are planted, grown, harvested, sold and eaten. I trace how goats, cows and camels are raised, slaughtered, distributed and cooked, as well as how fish are caught, sold and cooked. I look at how food was connected to human life-cycles, what is prepared for and eaten by pregnant women, babies, children, and older people, as well as what foods are appropriate for religious holidays, celebrations, sickrooms and condolences. I investigate gathering mushrooms and bulbs, collecting mussels, diving for abalone and gathering honey. In addition I compare Dhofari food practices with other cultures. For example, some Yemeni cultures display the tactic of using food for fighting, e.g. women cooking or serving badly to show anger, men coming to an adversary’s house and eating a lot of food. This is not done by Gibalis.

xvi  Preface

Overview of this book These topics are organized into nine chapters. The first gives a short outline of Dhofari cultures, my work as an ethnographer and a concise bibliography. The next four chapters give the nuts and bolts of procuring, cooking and eating food; they contain descriptions of the objects and practices of foodways in Dhofar. Chapter 6 looks at foodways from the perspective of lifestages (what is eaten at different times in one’s life), power (who controls food) and gender (differences between male and female foodways), with a section on how I navigate as a female, foreign researcher. Chapter 7 focuses on three areas of potential problems relating to foodways: how to keep the locations of eating clean, how to eat modestly and how to make sure the food consumed meets social and religious requirements. This chapter discusses how bodies and rooms in Dhofari houses are seen as being in either a clean or dirty state and the battle to ensure that food odors are always replaced with perfume, oud (wood with scented oils) or luban (frankincense). Next, the chapter reviews how houses, restaurants and cafes are designed to insure privacy while eating. Lastly, the practices of choosing “safe” food is clarified. Chapter 8 connects foodways to my previous work, Community and Autonomy in Southern Arabia (2019), on how Dhofaris work to maintain individuality while living in houses with 30 or more people and within a tribal system. First, the importance of both being generous and hiding generosity is explicated. Then the pragmatics of generosity are discussed, including how to give and receive foodstuffs and prepared foods to minimize indebtedness, how to be a good host and a good guest, and how to dispose of leftovers. The last chapter discusses changes in foodways in the last two decades in terms of cooking methods, who helps with cooking chores, the expanding selection of food choices, food presentation and increasing health consciousness. Lastly, women using social media to create small home-catering businesses is explained. I have tried to cover as many aspects of foodways as possible, but there are inevitable lacunae. This book is based primarily on research and interviews with Gibali-speaking, middle-aged, middle-class informants and friends. I have had a lot of meals with children but didn’t interview anyone under 20 or over 55 years old. I have no data about the foodways of the extremely wealthy, and while there might be Omanis who live in Dhofar with food security issues, I have not heard of or interviewed anyone who was unsure where their next meal would come from or who went hungry. I am missing some food-related experiences; for example, I have never seen animals being butchered. I have had the opportunity but never the courage. Also, I do not include recipes as I do not have the fortitude to wade into the battle of “what is the right way to make kabsa.” I mention, but do not go into depth about, foodways prior to the end of the Dhofar War (1965–1975) when herd size was predicated on access to water. When peace was established and wells were drilled, herd size expanded, resulting in environmental degradation as discussed in Janzen (1986, 2000).

Preface  xvii This book reflects over ten years of sustained interactions with many Gibalis but no-one can know or express all of a culture. I have tried to describe this moment when traditional methods of cooking and sharing food are still being used in conjunction with new types of food products, preparations, and methods of eating. This book is inevitably a partial portrait of foodways in Dhofar and I hope other people, especially Gibalis, will come along and add to my ideas. I would also like to acknowledge that there is an occasional repetition of facts and citations, as well as comments such as “I will discuss this point further in Chapter X.” As this book will be sold online by chapter, I needed to mention important references more than once and point out where further information could be found for readers who may only have one chapter.

Notes 1 When I write “Dhofari,” I am referring to Omanis who were born, raised and live in Dhofar, although there are many Omanis who are not from this region, as well as people from different countries who live in Dhofar with their own food traditions. 2 I use “expat” to mean any non-Omani visiting Oman for tourism or research purposes or living in Oman voluntarily to work, find work or be with a family member who works, not “a relatively affluent economic migrant, usually of Caucasian ethnicity, who is temporarily resident in a foreign country, who intends to return ‘home’, and who has little or no engagement with the place in which he currently lives” (Lanchester 2020: 36). The majority of expats in Oman are from India, see Hendawy (2015). 3 Most writing and visuals about food in the Middle East concentrate on one of four topics:

• food memories connected to loss (e.g. cookbook memoirs of displaced people) • food scarcity (in areas of war/ poverty) • elite food (extravagant meals, gourmet cuisine, social media photos) • sharing food at Ramadan (photos of giving away food and communal Iftar at mosques)

For example, Yamani (2000) has an excellent article on hospitality and food preparation, choice, presentation and generosity in Mecca among the merchant elite.

References For a full bibliography, list of food terms and several short essays on foodways, please see my webpage: Come From Away, https://mariellerisse.com Alsharekh, Alanoud, ed. 2007. The Gulf Family: Kinship Policies and Modernity (SOAS Middle East Issues). London: Saqi. Gallagher, Winifred. 2007. House Thinking: A Room-by-room Look at How We Live. New York: HarperCollins. Hendawy, Gamal. 2015. “Socio-Demographic Characteristics of Indian Immigrants in the Sultanate of Oman (1993–2010).” Athens: ATINER's Conference Paper Series, No. DEM 2015-1514. 1–27. Hendawy, Gamal. 1986. Nomads in the Sultanate of Oman: Tradition and Development in Dhofar. London: Westview Press.

xviii  Preface Janzen, Jorg. 2000. “The Destruction of Resources among the Mountain Nomads of Dhofar,” in The Transformation of Nomadic Society in the Arab East, University of Cambridge Oriental publications 58. Martha Mundy and Basim Musallam, eds. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 160–75. Joseph, Suad, ed. 2018. Arab Family Studies: Critical Reviews (Gender, Culture, and Politics in the Middle East). Syracuse: Syracuse University Press. Lanchester, John. 2020. “Diary: A Whiff of Tear Gas.” London Review of Books 41(24): 36–7. Lanchester, John. 1998. “Social Diversity and Changes in the Form and Appearance of the Qatari House.” Visual Anthropology 10.2: 281–304. Nagy, Sharon. 2006. “Making Room for Migrants, Making Sense of Difference: Spatial and Ideological Expressions of Social Diversity in Urban Qatar.” Urban Studies 43(1): 119–37. Risse, Marielle. 2019. Community and Autonomy in Southern Oman. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan. Sobh, Rana and Russell Belk. 2011a. “Domains of Privacy and Hospitality in Arab Gulf Homes.” Journal of Islamic Marketing 2(2): 125–37. Sobh, Rana. 2011b. “Privacy and Gendered Spaces in Arab Gulf Homes.” Home Cultures 8(3): 317–40. Sobh, Rana, Russell Belk, and Jonathan Wilson. 2013. “Islamic Arab Hospitality and Multiculturalism.” Marketing Theory 13(4): 443–63. Yamani, Mai. 2000. “‘You Are What You Cook.’ Cuisine and Class in Mecca,” in A Taste of Thyme: Culinary Cultures of the Middle East. Sami Zubaida and Richard Tapper, eds. New York: I.B. Tauris Publishers. 159–72.

1 Culture, research and methodology

Introduction: the non-importance of food I would like to start explaining foodways in southern Oman with a typical example of a wedding party at which a bride was coming to live in the groom’s household, where the groom’s parents, his unmarried sisters, and his married brothers and their families live. The groom and his male relatives were sitting on mats outside the house while the groom’s female relatives had taken over the majlis (sitting room usually for the men of the house and male visitors) and salle (family sitting room). When I walked in at 7pm, I saw a long row of narrow tables lining the hallway, each covered with baskets wrapped in cellophane. Stands of lights were strung between the tables and everything was decorated with dried flowers and ribbons. I stepped towards this display to see it better, but my hostess directed me into the salle. For several hours, I sat on a sofa and chatted with other women as waitresses brought the baskets around, offering falafels, small sandwiches, fried cheese rolls, mini-pizzas, desserts, etc., as well as black tea with sugar, tea with milk, Nescafé, Arabic coffee, water, and juice. There were small tables in front of each sofa with a bowl of fruit (bananas, oranges, apples, grapes), halwa (Omani dessert) and qibqab (a thin, cracker-like bread). For the first hour or so, eyes were on me. If I looked at the halwa, one of the women would lift the clear plastic cover and pick up the spoon. But after I had eaten a few spoonfuls of halwa, taken some qibqab and a few appetizers, accepted a cup of tea, drunk a few sips, had the tea taken away and then accepted a cup of Nescafé, the women near me settled back. As the evening passed, a few times women would encourage me and other women (usually older, seldom if ever younger or the same age) to eat more, saying “this is good,” “try this,” and “you must have one of these.” The items that were highlighted were not special; in some cases the women suggesting the items had not tried them. When the bride arrived around 10pm, she was taken up to her and her husband’s room, then a few of her sisters and her mother stayed with her while her other female relatives came downstairs to the majlis and salle and greeted all the groom’s female relatives. Then round platters heaped high with rice and crowned with boiled camel meat on the bone were set on the floor on top of pieces of plastic drop-cloth. Bottles and small containers of hot sauce were distributed, as well

2  Culture, research and methodology as cans of juice and soda. Women grouped themselves around a platter and began to eat. The groom’s sisters set a box of Kleenex near each group, then walked round with a metal pot filled with meat, placing more meat on each platter. When women were done eating, they cleaned their hands, then sat up on the sofas again. More desserts were passed around by waitresses, as well as tea and coffee. Then the groom’s sisters and cousins brought a tray with bottles of perfume and vials of perfumed oil which they sprayed and wiped on all the guests. When all the women were perfumed and settled, the groom and a few close male relatives from his family and the bride’s family (brothers, nephews, etc.) walked quickly from the front door to the newlyweds’ room without looking at any of the women in the salle or hallways. In the bridal room, a female photographer took family photos. It would have been impolite to ask exactly what happened next, but normally the photographer and almost all family members leave, until there are only the newlyweds and one or two close, older relatives who say positive words about the importance of respecting the marriage, trust, etc. then leave the newlyweds alone. The public event was now over. All the bride’s relatives, any man who did not live in the house, and most female guests left. Close female friends and relatives of the groom’s family continued to visit in the salle for another hour or so. One of the recurring themes of this book is that sharing food is important in the Dhofar region of Oman, but that food per se is not. To highlight Dhofari1 customs, one can think about a bride’s connection to food at a North American or European wedding in which the bride (her mother, sisters, and friends as well as the groom) would be responsible for choosing the food which should be not only delicious but new, innovative or interesting. There would be an effort made to accommodate people’s food allergies or preferences (gluten-free, vegetarian etc.) and the food displays should coordinate with the theme or colors of the wedding. Usually there would be on display on its own table a lavish cake that had been chosen at one or more cake-tastings prior to the wedding. There is no supervising of who eats what by the bride’s or groom’s relatives; guests would bring complaints or questions directly to the waitstaff. The wedding party will have worked out an alcohol policy and there might be some concern about certain guests over-drinking, but not about a guest who did not eat much or ate a lot. Guests should mention, at the party or later, how good the food was. The most important similarity between a Dhofari and North American/ European wedding is that there should be enough food. But at a Dhofari wedding, neither the bride nor groom have any input. The groom’s sisters and mother will order or make the food and the choices are what everyone else has at their wedding: rice and meat with a selection of appetizers and sweets. Food should be the focus only when recommending that guests eat; nothing is exclaimed over, nothing is noted as missing. When I walked into the house and tried to look at the elaborate display of appetizers, I was steered immediately into the salle. Even though there were pretty baskets with flowers, looking at the food was not what a guest should be doing. And after a wedding, one talks about who was there and the clothes. No one

Culture, research and methodology  3 talks about the food; it would be like saying, “I went to a wedding and breathed oxygen.”

Situating Dhofar and Gibalis Dhofar is the largest governorate [government region] of Oman. It is 38,300 square miles, bordering Yemen, Saudi Arabia and the Indian Ocean. The main city is Salalah, which is located on a coastal plain; the long, straight beach of the Indian Ocean is the southern limit of the town. Three sets of mountains form a semi-circle behind Salalah with Jebel al Qamar to the east, Jebel al Qara directly behind (to the north) and Jebel Samhan to the west (see Zarins 2001: 23ff). There are towns and villages in the mountains, one town (Thumrayt/ Thumreit) and a few villages in the bare gravel plain on the far (northern) side of the mountains and a series of small towns strung along the coast from Dhalkut (close to Yemen) to Hasik. From Salalah to Muscat, the capital of Oman, is a 10-hour drive across a mostly barren desert plain. Thus Dhofar is quite separated from the rest of Oman.2 Dhofar shares a 187-mile border with Yemen and, given the current unrest in Yemen, there is now a strong military force on the Omani-Yemeni border and, along part of the border, a technologically enhanced fence. The language of business, government and education in the Dhofar region is Arabic, but two of the six Modern South Arabian (MSA) languages are widely spoken. The most prevalent MSA in Dhofar is Gibali (Jibali/ Jibbali) from the Arabic jebel, mountain. I use “Gibali,” as that is the closest approximation of how the word is pronounced by my informants. People who speak Gibali are likewise called Gibali; the word can also be used as an adjective, as in “a Gibali house.”3 Gibali is also known as Shahri/ Sheret. Outside of Salalah, the primary language in Dhofar is Gibali; another MSA, Mehri/ Mahri, is also spoken. Although Gibalis live in Salalah and on the coastal plain, many trace their roots back to a particular former tribal area in the mountains. Cole (2003), who has done extensive work on the Arabian Peninsula, discusses the division of badu (“desert-dwelling”) and hadr (“sedentary,” “urban”) (237). In Dhofar there is a tripartite division: residents of the desert who speak Bedu or Arabic, Omani residents of the city of Salalah who mainly speak Arabic as their first language, and residents of the coastal and mountain villages who mainly speak Gibali as a first language. They learn Arabic as a second language at school and use it for business and government purposes. Early documentation of the language includes a possible mention in Ibn al-Mujāwir’s Tarikh al-Mustabir, written 1226–30 (2008, 269). Johnstone (1972) mentions that “Sheri is an acceptable name for the language of most Dhofaris” (17), indicating that the language was more common than Arabic in the early 1970s.4 The most recent (2010) census does not differentiate by language group.5 Watson (2013) states that Sheret “has around 10,000 speakers” (96). Rubin (2015) notes, “Jibbali … also known as Shahri … is a Semitic language spoken in the coastal towns … and adjacent mountainous areas of the southwest region of Oman (Dhofar Governorate), where there are somewhere between thirty and fifty thousand speakers” (431).

4  Culture, research and methodology The government structure of Oman is a monarchy led by Sultan Haitham, who acceded to the throne in January 2020 on the death of the previous leader, his uncle Sultan Qaboos bin Said, who reigned for almost 50 years. Both are members of the ruling Al Said tribe. There is a judiciary branch and a bicameral legislature which consists of the Council of State (Majlis al-Dawla) whose members are appointed and the Consultative Assembly (Majlis al-Shura) whose members are elected. All members serve four-year terms. The most important recent historical event in Dhofar is the Dhofar War (1965–1975) which began as a result of wide-spread dissatisfaction with the rule of Said bin Taimur, “characterized as a desperate attempt to keep the Fifteenth century from being contaminated by the Twentieth” (Trabulsi 1972: 5). In the early 1960s, various groups of Dhofaris, primarily from the mountains and angry at the lack of schools, clinics, electricity, etc., began to attack the Sultan’s Armed Forces (SAF). These groups coalesced into the Dhofar Liberation Front in 1964, which was then re-named the People’s Front for the Liberation of Oman and the Arabian Gulf in 1968 and “a Marxist-Leninist revolutionary program was adopted for the rebellion” (Kelly 1976: 224). Their goals included “the liberation of slaves,” “the equality of women” (which included the elimination of polygamy), “demolition of the tribal system” and “the unity of all revolutionary forces in the Gulf” (Trabulsi 9, 10). The SAF did not have enough men or equipment to cope with the insurgency, but the Sultan refused to spend money for the army, nor did he show any understanding or mercy towards the rebels’ demands. The result was that by 1970, the rebels controlled almost all of the region. In the same year, in a bloodless coup d’état, Sultan Qaboos took over control of his father’s government and immediately started a two-front counterattack. He increased the military presence, including using British troops, and initiated a hearts and minds campaign to assure the rebels that he intended to meet their demands for modernization. Soldiers who left the rebels were treated as “returning sons”; they were interviewed and immediately released, not jailed (Jeapes 1980: 37); “He [Sultan Qaboos] also emphasized that the past practices of indiscriminate reprisals against civilians on the Jebel had to end” (Ladwig 2008: 72). As firqat (civil militia) units were created with Dhofari men, British soldiers then had the experience of fighting with men who had previously fought with the rebels. Although Jeapes, who wrote one of the first books about the war, often shows his impatience with Dhofaris, he and the other foreign writers have an overall positive impression. Gardiner (2007) who fought in the war writes: “Omanis were wonderful people to live with. They were superbly honest … They were generous to a fault and … they didn’t take themselves too seriously … [they] wished to be at peace with any man who was ready to be at peace with them” (58). All Omanis in Dhofar know their families’ personal history in the war, i.e. if their parents sided with the government or rebels or switched sides, but the conflict is seldom discussed in public under the general Omani understanding of keeping communication civil at all times and not dwelling on negative events. For the purposes of this book, the war will be discussed as the watershed between

Culture, research and methodology  5 the more traditional food choices and food preparation methods of the past (foodways in the 1950s were very similar to what travelers reported in the 1830s) and current habits of shopping, cooking, eating and disposing of food. These changes will be discussed in more detail in Chapter 3, which looks at the past, and Chapter 9, which looks at the current situation. In my first book, Community and Autonomy in Southern Oman (2019a) I argued that while some people see Islam and tribes as repressive belief structures, this is not how they are viewed in Dhofar. The Sultan and most Omanis in the northern regions belong to the Ibadi school of Islam, but most Dhofaris belong to the Sunni school. All of my informants and friends are devout believers who say the profession of faith, pray five times a day, fast during Ramadan, give to the poor, and make the pilgrimage to Mecca if they are able.6 Islam is not seen as restrictive, although family (meaning both male and female older relatives) might make decisions that chafe, Islam is seen as giving and ensuring safety, respect and rights. All Omani Dhofaris are in a tribe and, like Islam, this is not seen as an oppressive institution. The general North American/ European view is that “tribal” means “unthinking loyalty” but the situation in Dhofar is far more complex. One common misunderstanding is that being in a tribe means you must accept whatever decisions are made without comment. In fact, tribe members have the right to talk to the sheikh and decisions are made in meetings in which members have the right to be speak (for example to ask for money for a medical procedure).7 Most Dhofaris see their tribe as a safety net that sustains and protects them. For example, while reading Antigone, Dhofari students believe that Antigone should not force Ismene to help her. There is general agreement both that Antigone is right, and that Ismene should be allowed to do as she wants. Members of the hakli tribes, coming from a rural background in which people in the past would have needed to make life-or-death decisions about issues such as where to herd animals, are usually taught to be self-sufficient, yet are always aware of the tribe. Of course, there is not one inviolate Gibali culture but there are actions and understandings which are seen as typical Gibali and not usual for “town” people, i.e. Omani Dhofaris who live in Salalah. Many Gibalis live in Salalah, but their behavior, as reported by themselves and townspeople and observed by myself, is distinctive; the Gibali/ town differentiation is a cultural, but not always geographical, division.8 One generalization that can be made is that Gibali culture is middle class. Although gas prices have risen in the past years, it is still relatively cheap. There are no taxes; there is universal free health care and secondary education. Many students go to university for free on government- and company-sponsored scholarships. Food is inexpensive (see Chapter 2) and there is food security, in that there are no beggars and there are many government subsidies for the elderly, widows and handicapped people. As many Gibalis still live in the mountains and coast, or have family who do, they often retain some traditional lifeways; they are often known for being “kitchen literate,” sharing freshly produced and procured food, and less rigidly separating men and women while eating. When they sit down to eat, they know

6  Culture, research and methodology who caught the fish, who slaughtered the goat, and where the limes, melons, coconuts, and papayas were grown. The constant movement of food is a notable aspect of the culinary landscape for Gibalis as the less-populated mountain, coast and desert areas are, at this point, still tightly intertwined with the city of Salalah, unlike other parts of the Arabian Peninsula with bigger cities or areas in the midst of political turmoil. For example, a Gibali family in the mountains with cows will distribute milk and samn (clarified butter) free of charge to relatives and neighbors. This will be done over years, without any attempt to figure out the worth of what is given or expecting any kind of repayment. If there is repayment, it will come unsystematically in the form of some other type of locally sourced food such as honey, squid, mushrooms or bananas; another commodity such as good quality frankincense or prepared food such as bread or a platter of rice and meat. Also, in some other groups of tribes, men can only see, talk to or eat with women who are proscribed from marriage, i.e. sisters, daughters and aunts. In the Gibali-speaking hakli tribes, the separation is not always rigidly maintained; male and female cousins, for example, can speak to each other in the majlis (male/ visitor sitting room). Gibali women can bring trays of food or drinks to male relatives and sometimes eat together at family-only dinners or on picnics. Any Gibali man or woman is welcome to eat any meal at the house of any close relative. What Gibalis eat can vary within the Dhofar region. For example, people in town eat more chicken and eggs, while those on the coast eat more seafood. However, in general, guests in a hakli house should be given meat, preferably freshly slaughtered. Fish is acceptable if the guests asked for it; guests are customarily never given chicken. A formal dinner usually has a whole animal (cow or camel male calf, or goat) placed on a platter of rice.9 I would like to make a few general points about cultural understandings: self-control, self-reliance, speech patterns, generosity and visual memory. The hallmark of Gibali cultures, especially for the hakli tribes, is self-control. Having a calm, collected appearance at all times in very important for both male and female Gibalis, to the point where there should be no shade of difference between talking to an enemy and a friend. As Gibali hide personal problems and triumphs from others; they assume others are covering their emotions. For example, Gibalis might not know if their best friend or even their parents are divorced. The parents might live separately for weeks or years, perhaps with the father taking a second wife without ever being clear if they are divorced from their first wife or not. A married woman might go to live at her father’s house because her mother is sick, her sister is depressed, her in-laws are not being good with her, she is in a fight with her husband, or she herself is sick; unless she wants to tell you, you will never know the reason. As a related issue, Gibalis are trained from childhood to be self-reliant. I have never heard a member of a hakli tribe ask for advice when they were generally puzzled or confused about to what to do. “What should I do?” means a decision has been made. Depending on the relationship, it may also be a kind of test, will the person who has been asked come up with the right answer? If someone asks

Culture, research and methodology  7 them for advice, a hakli will often try to figure out what the desired answer is and then say that, not what their own idea is. Gibalis are generous with helping others in need and expect others to provide help. In many cultures it is believed that if you are from Z country, you will want to meet others from the same country but here it is taken to a higher level because Gibali society is organized by tribes, and people from the same country are assumed to have a tribal solicitousness about compatriots. When X from the United States was coming to the my university, I was given several updates about X’s arrival and when X was finally in the office, I was immediately called by a Gibali with the implication that I would drop everything and rush over to properly greet X and offer assistance. Gibali speech patterns are predicated on making “the weather good,” i.e. to not just speak pleasantly but to say what people want to hear. “The news” is always good and Gibalis will go to great lengths to hide negative information. As Jones and Ridout state, in Oman “it is customary to order one's behavior in accordance with a code of honor that inhibits the articulation of public opinion about a person’s worth, expressed in judgments of criticism and praise, ridicule and scorn, or deference” (2005: 379). Speech is also used to entertain and create/ enhance group cohesiveness and amusement; for example friends will happily tell each other things that aren’t true (such as they are taking a second wife) or argue for a position they don’t believe in to create an entertaining atmosphere. In addition, speech can be used for testing, with a Gibali saying something to see the reaction. This can lead to serious misunderstandings with expat researchers who, fluent in Arabic but not Gibali cultures, may place an undue emphasis on what is said, instead of what is done.10 For example, one Gibali man (A) I know introduced me to another Gibali man (B) and then told him that I was miserly, a biting insult. He gave several examples, all untrue, and by gestures told me that I wasn’t allowed to defend myself. B, surprised at the stories, attempted to defend me as A laughed uproariously, “See how he defends you!” This continued on and off for over an hour, with A adding more examples of my stinginess as B gamely attempted to find justifications for my behavior. A was very pleased; B had proved himself a good man by continuing to defend a woman and a stranger. Since it is not polite to say “no” and embarrassing to say “I don’t know,” Gibalis have amazing deflection skills. For example, “You can ask anyone” is a frequent response to a question a Gibali can’t answer; it means “Neither I nor anyone I know is willing or able to answer that.” When I was sick, I asked one of the Gibali men in my research group for help and he informed me that I wasn’t sick, meaning he was not free to help but the situation had to be framed in a way that absolved him from guilt. It wasn’t that he was busy – I wasn’t sick. Often humor, instead of blunt statements, will be used to make their point. I once called in my cats using the typical American “Here kittykittykitty,” then asked one of the Gibali men who were having tea with me, “How do you call your camels in?” I knew that one of the men had spent years as a child herding his family’s camels so I expected some sort of traditional song or chant. There was silence for a moment, then one man said, “Here camelcamelcamel.”

8  Culture, research and methodology Gibalis are very generous with possessions, allowing siblings and friends to freely borrow or take cars, clothes, money etc. I will discuss this aspect in detail in terms of food, but one quick example is that on picnics with Gibali men, I often bring cookies. I used to set out an unopened box of cookies. I brought them to share, would be happy if they got eaten, but I didn’t want to open the box unless someone wanted one because it’s so hot and humid, and cookies get limp and stale quickly. But this is not correct, offering an unopened box is signaling that I am pretending to be a good person but I don’t really want to share. I should open the box myself, pull off all the protective wrap, offer them around, then leave them in the center of the mat. If no one takes a cookie, at least I have acted correctly and I can put the cookies on the rocks for the birds to eat in the morning. Lastly, Gibalis have an acute visual memory. They look carefully and remember what they see. When I went to an eye doctor because one of my eyes hurt, sitting about 12 in. from me, peering into my eyes, the eye doctor asked, “Which eye hurts?” That night, I met one of the Gibali men from my research group and, from 10 ft away, he asked with concern, “What happened to your right eye?”

Researching foodways in Dhofar Turning to ethnography, turning to food My PhD is in English literature, but my dissertation was about how travel writing is defined as a genre. I have always loved reading how people cope (or fail to) with new places. My first job was Assistant Professor at the American University of Sharjah (during its first two years); while I was living in the Emirates, I visited Oman and decided I wanted to live in Dhofar. I moved to Salalah in September 2005. Once here, I started to read whatever I could find about Dhofar and southern Arabia by anthropologists, historians, linguists, political scientists and travel writers. At first, my academic work concentrated on both travel writing and teaching literature in articles such as “Verstehen/ Einfühlen in Arabian Sands: Wilfred Thesiger as Traveler and Anthropologist” (2013b) and publications about teaching John Clare (2011), local authors (2012, 2019b), Milton (2013c), and Aurora Leigh (2013a). I eventually expanded my field of vision until I was working on one topic (Dhofari cultures) from anthropological perspectives, using the widest possible definition of anthropology as situated at the intersection of “exploring, excavating, history, folklore, literature, journalism, spying, psychoanalysis, social work, missionary work, administration and childhood/ friendship/ parenting” (Peacock 1986: 59). I have analyzed Dhofari folk tales (2019a) and did a project on gift-giving and gift-receiving in Gibali cultures because I was interested in how the topic of gifts (like the topic of food) is connected to all parts of a culture (2015). I did presentations on the absence of honor killing, the Gibali conception of self-respect, the Dhofar War (1965–1975), female travel writers about Dhofar, current publications on Oman, what was written about Dhofar by British seamen on the brig Paulinurus in the mid-1800s, and issues of femininity and masculinity in Dhofari

Culture, research and methodology  9 cultures. This work led to my book, Community and Autonomy in Southern Oman (2019a). The first draft of my book manuscript was 225,000 words. The version I turned in was 112,000 words so after I sent it to the publisher, I started thinking about which unpublished parts of the book did I want to continue to research. The answer was the sections on animals, animal husbandry and fishing. I knew I did not want to delve into animal diseases, animal breeding, land usage or fodder nutrition; however, connecting raising and herding animals, fishing and growing crops to cooking and eating practices sounded interesting. I was also motivated by a presentation I heard at a conference in 2017 about how paid actors were used to cook and serve food at Emirati festivals. This struck me because, at the Ittin Festival in Salalah held during the khareef (monsoon) season, it is local women who cook and sell traditional food, as well as packaged food such as chips and popcorn. The presentation made me consider in which ways Dhofaris were still in control of their food. There are many changes in foodways (see Chapter 9) but even with foreign restaurants opening and expats cooking in Omani houses, it is Dhofari women creating at-home catering companies via Instagram, selling their own food in booths at festivals and staffing road-side stands during Ramadan and khareef. I started my food research with a few different steps. First was reading books and articles in the area of food studies. A few issues became clear immediately. First, as Gibali is non-written, there are no publications about foodways, except very recent blogs and the data collected by Janet Watson, Miranda Morris and other researchers (Modern South Arabian Languages 2020). Reading, for example Bardenstein (2010), made me realize how important cookbooks and cookbook memoirs are in fixing in time food choices, preparation and serving methods. There is no way to resurrect what was picked, grown, cooked, and eaten aside from people’s memories and, as Ferguson states, “no society consumes more than a fraction of available edibles” (2011: 372). Luckily, there is Miller, Morris and Stuart-Smith’s comprehensive book Plants of Dhofar, the Southern Region of Oman: Traditional, Economic, and Medicinal Uses (1988) but that book, through memories and reported speech, can only push back to the late 1800s and early 1900s. Further, Ferguson (2011) argues that, “In valorizing some tastes, disparaging or simply ignoring others, cookbooks and dietary treatises articulate values and legitimate the very production of taste” (376). Dhofar does not have such gatekeepers; there are no “professional culinary writers [to] became more insistent upon the precision of the dishes they produced” (377). In the past, men and women chose what to cook and how to cook, based on what they had observed or been taught. This is changing now, with recipes available on-line and social media, but in talking about cookbooks with informants, very few had followed printed recipes or had cookbooks in their houses. My second step was going through my books of research notes to organize and codify my food experiences here, which resulted in several Excel spreadsheets detailing information about over 500 food-related events (weddings, home visits, picnics and café or restaurant meals with haklis) since January 2010.11

10  Culture, research and methodology Third was testing out ideas by writing short essays on my webpage about different aspects of food, such as what is typically served at weddings, what kinds of sweets are eaten, how different foods such as honey are viewed, images of food, Arabic cookbooks I read etc. After about a year, I did a presentation on Dhofari foodways. After another six months of reading, thinking about food experiences in Dhofar, conducting interviews and writing, I put together the proposal for this book. As the basic rule of eating with Gibalis is to never act or speak in a way that brings the attention of the group to you and since food is seldom, if ever, a topic of conversation, most of my research gathering was done by watching and listening. For example, I don’t ever ask “what’s for dinner,” as that can mean I want something specific or that I don’t want something that was made previously, marking me as difficult or selfish. Within a family, children, for example, might ask their mother for a special dish but for a grown person to do this repeatedly is seen as weak, a person without self-control. Questioning any aspect of cooking and eating is fraught; if I ask how a dish was made while I am eating it, this might be taken to mean I am implying it was made incorrectly. Hence I never ask what will be served or when or who made it or how it was made.12 I never look at what someone else is eating or express a preference for anything to eat or drink. If there is a problem, for example, the tea has too much sugar etc., I try to save myself in unobtrusive ways such as taking tiny sips and eating plain rusks. Most interviews were done in situations without eating or drinking, or with tea and store-bought cookies, so that nothing I asked could be misconstrued as applicable to food the informant made. I would also do lots of simple queries via WhatsApp to disconnect the question from the informant’s food choices. I also take into account local perceptions of research. For example, when going through the types of produce grown and found in Dhofar, it might have been easier to just bring the book by Miller, Morris and Stuart-Smith (1988) and show the drawings to ask Gibalis to talk about plants, but I have learned that written documentation is highly regarded in Oman. When I have shown people something published, they simply concur, often saying something along the lines of, “that is not what I know but of course the book must be right.” Many Gibalis I know have heard of Miranda Morris (some of their parents had met her) and anytime I would say, “Miranda Morris writes that…,” it was always agreed that she must be correct. So I didn’t bring or show books.13 The question comes up (from expats, never Gibalis), “How can I write about ethnography or food studies without formal training?” There are two answers. First, there is a lot of overlap between literature, anthropology, and food studies. With my students, I have to explain different objects such as pie and mead, tastes such as bitter, cultural differences in definitions of words such as “fasting.” For example, animals can have varying metaphorical meanings. Calling people “chicken” in the States means they are cowards, in Dhofar it means they go to bed early. Food and food associations are constantly discussed, for example, making clear the wine/ whine distinction and that pork means pig. How would you describe

Culture, research and methodology  11 a peach to someone who has never seen one? I can try to triangulate, as I know the Arabic words for orange and apricot but it turns out that no one in the class has seen a fresh apricot; they only know the dried ones. Getting the word “dried” straight somehow leads to talking about how raisins are dried grapes and prunes are dried plums, but no one knows plums. I try to go by colors, looking around the class to see if anyone has a peach- or plum- colored pen or notebook. Reading Antigone meant explaining why pouring wine on her dead brother was a good thing to do. Reading Peter Pan meant discussing that Mr. and Mrs. Darling were not horrible parents for leaving their children at home while they went out to eat. Reading Much Ado about Nothing meant explicating “civil as an orange”; students enjoyed “most dear actors, eat no onions or garlic, for we are to utter sweet breath” from A Midsummer Night's Dream. Reading The Importance of Being Earnest meant elucidating “cucumber sandwiches,” “sugar tongs,” and why Gwendolen’s “Cake is rarely seen at the best houses nowadays” is an insult. I have to explain that “tea” means a meal, not just a drink and I often use M. F. K. Fisher’s essays and “In Search of Our Mother’s Gardens” by Alice Walker in the non-fiction class. Even my everyday actions spark conversations, as bringing a cup of coffee with me to class and drinking it while teaching is not normal teacher behavior. The first year here, I gave a student a cough drop during the Ramadan fasting period thinking that a cough drop did not count as food – wrong. It is only because Omanis are incredibly patient and polite that I didn’t get in trouble for that rudeness. In the conversational English class I have to warn students that if someone from North America or Europe offers food and you refuse, you will not be pushed again and again to eat. I tell them the story of one Arab administrator who, when he arrived at his host family in America, was asked if he wanted dinner once and only once. As he was expecting the offer to be repeated and food to be given to him as a matter of course, he refused. The Americans did not repeat the offer and he went to bed hungry. The second answer is I am here. I certainly don’t know everything, but I have been watching people cook, buy food, talk about food, eat and clean up after meals for over a decade. I use the past tense in this book, but the “ethnographic present” is now. An additional reason for writing is to add to the general understanding of working-class life on the Arabian Peninsula in small towns and rural areas. In terms of research on Arab and Muslim cultures, Deeb and Winegar state, “The majority of anthropologists now conduct fieldwork in capital cities” (2012: 539) and specifically, “consumption is usually examined in urban middle-class communities” (547). According to them: The urban focus in the past two decades … has helped dispel the region's image as a tribal, exotic, and isolated place. Work in urban areas has enhanced our understandings of household economies, the Islamic revival, space and mobility, nationalism, cultural production, and consumption. Yet this focus has also led to capital cities becoming representative of entire countries and urban, middle-class forms and experiences of, for example,

12  Culture, research and methodology cultural production, revivalist Islam, neoliberalism, and gender formations being taken as representative of these topics more generally. (2012: 540) As most work on the Arabian Peninsula is about distressed, war-torn areas or elites (be they political, social, religious or cultural) I think it’s important that middle-class voices outside the capital areas are heard. Methodology My particular focus is on a group of 12 tribes referred to as qara or hakli. This group of tribes has historically lived in the mountains surrounding the main coastal town of Salalah and along the coast. Some tribes mainly have cows, some camels, some have both and many families have or have access to herds of goats. Their customary food was mostly milk, rain-fed agriculture during the summer monsoon season, wild honey, and game (Morris 1987: 69, 73). In the past, the hakli tribes controlled some land in the mountains and along the coast; most were herders, fishermen, traders and some emigrated to other countries for work. Although many now live in Salalah, almost all Gibalis still have extended family members who fish or own goats, cows or camels. I see them as poised between traditional and modern foodways, as many men know how to butcher and cook animals over wood fires but have also traveled overseas and tried different cuisines. My friends and informants are both male and female; all are middle-aged. At family meals I have observed interactions with children and older people, but everyone I interviewed was between 25 and 55. Like most Gibalis, they are middle-class, e.g. living in houses that they or their parents own and in families with enough money for cars, food, clothes, cell phones and daily necessities. I do not know of and have never heard of anyone who was not food secure. There is no extreme poverty, e.g. Omanis who beg for food or are homeless. Families take care of poorer relatives and there is free health care and education provided by the government. There are a few extremely wealthy families, but I do not have information about them. Over the last ten years, I have collected information about Gibalis in general and hakli in particular from formal interviews, countless social interactions, and observations which I have organized into various publications and presentations.14 The information presented in this book has been gathered from formal interviews in 2018, 2019 and 2020, as well as hundreds of picnics, family dinners and social events with Gibalis. I usually have picnic dinners, restaurant meals or at-home visits with Gibalis several times a month. Before interviews, I explain to my informants what ethnography means, what I am researching, how my work will be presented, and show copies of my book (Community and Autonomy in Southern Oman, 2019a) and other articles I have written. All quotes in quote marks are direct quotes; all quotes and stories I use were taken first-hand (either they happened to me or the person speaking) and I was given permission to use them.

Culture, research and methodology  13 The above description of a wedding party is a good example of how I do a lot of my research. I went to the wedding as a guest and wrote up notes when I came home. Months later I realized that the moment of me trying to look at the pretty display of food and being steered away from it was a good way to start this book. A lot of time, money and care had been spent on the decorations, but as a guest, I should not go to look at the food. It was important that I greet people and make myself comfortable; examining or complimenting the food display was unnecessary and unwanted. When I decided to use this scene, I got in touch with X, who had invited me, and explained I was thinking of using that wedding experience in this book. I asked permission to write up the event and when X said “yes, of course,” I said I would give X a printout of the pages so they could see what I wrote. X vehemently declared that there was no reason to do so.15 In general, sparks of insight come from my surprise at what someone is doing, someone’s surprise at what I am doing, academic research, and interviews. In “Ethnography Is an Option,” Yadav discusses abductive reasoning, which she describes as: an iterative process of “sense-making.” Rather than beginning with a research question and testable hypothesis, abductive inquiry rests on the articulation of a puzzle, where what “makes a puzzle ‘anomalous’ is a misfit between experience and expectations.” (2018) This is good way of thinking about how I try to understand foodways and cultures, although I don’t always get to “sense-making.” Sometimes I end up still confused as I try to catch and hold onto those moments in which my expectations are not met; sometimes a new level of understanding opens up. A week or so after I moved into a villa, I heard loud thuds and rustling from outside my window. I forced myself to open the curtain and look – there was nothing in my yard, but the sound was loud and frightening. I decided the safest thing was to go up on the roof, so I could look down at whatever it was. It was a herd of donkeys eating the grass on the other side of my garden wall. Once I saw them, the sounds which were discordant and scary coalesced into stamping, breathing, tearing grass and rubbing against the wall. So when those moments of perplexity come, I need to stop and reflect. Seeing a video of a man cooking meat while sitting in a chair startled me. Cooking in a chair? How odd. Then I had to process my surprise – why is it odd to see a man cook while sitting? A partial answer is in what is cooked and how. In Dhofar, most food I have seen prepared is in a time-, but not labor-, intensive manner. Fish or lobster, for example, can be wrapped in foil, placed in coals and left to cook. Curries require a lot of cutting and then stirring for a few moments, but then can be left to simmer. Cooking meat on heated rocks (madhbi) requires that the cook be next to the rocks, sitting in a chair would be too far away. But visitors in khareef often cook 1) on gas rings or with small metal BBQs, not a fire, and 2) foods which need careful watching such as pancakes, scrambled eggs, and meat kebabs.

14  Culture, research and methodology In the same way, I try to catch Gibalis’ surprise at something I am doing, for example, my eating a delivery pizza at my desk is seen as distinctly odd and foreign. Even worse is admitting to eating “old,” cold pizza for breakfast. Making a cup of coffee last an hour, eating while reading or walking, not being able to make rice – I have a long list of food sins. And worst of all, I can’t make tea. It’s only hot water, sugar and a tea bag, but the result is so disastrous, no Gibali has ever taken more than two sips of tea I have made. Academic research is somewhat difficult, as there is no English language bookstore in Dhofar and my university does not have resources in my area. I pay for the books and articles I use, as well as all expense for conferences I have attended in the last five years. Reading articles and books leads to reflections about how foodways are organized here and I either write out notes about comparisons or add questions to my on-going list. When I have a set of 10–15 questions, I set up a formal interview, but I am constantly doing informal verifications such as sending off a WhatsApp message when I want to double-check something like the spelling or ingredients of a dish or when there is a photo on Instagram that doesn’t make sense to me. Many of my questions are based on what I have read or what someone told me, e.g. “Someone told me that all chutney is cooked, do you agree?” I get some background information from teaching although I never explicitly ask students for information. Food-related issues come up often, such as students asking why western people need all that silverware and all those glasses on table settings which they see in movies. Explaining a reference to Persephone led to my telling the story of Demeter/Ceres, which led to a discussion about cereals. Who eats what for lunch in Katherine Mansfield’s The Doll’s House, the social niceties of who speaks to whom at dinner in the beginning of Room with a View, the apples and fish scene in Tawfiq Al Hakim’s Princess Sunshine, and Elizabeth Gaskell’s magnificent Cranford with its details of how to eat an orange, arrange a tea party, manage your cook and take care of your cow – all start insightful conversations. Thus I have layers of data from a lot of different directions. For example, I have never had breakfast in an Omani house, but I know what happens, not just from interview questions but from countless remarks from friends such as, “Let’s hurry and order because I didn’t have breakfast,” or “No, I won’t eat with you, I had a big breakfast, I ate … .” I have ideas from students’ reactions to the breakfast scene in Thornton Wilder’s Our Town that the confusion of mothers’ trying to get children fed is similar to their homes. I have seen what men eat in the morning on camping trips: Lebanese (pita) bread with processed cheese, honey or jam. Representation, reciprocation and research with Gibalis “Research guys” is the term I use for the Gibali men who I know – it covers close friends, acquaintances and informants. There is no cultural understanding of men and women, especially a foreign woman and a local man, being “friends”; to use the term in Dhofar would imply that we were lovers. If we meet in a public place like the mall, I bring a stack of books and set them on the table to show that we

Culture, research and methodology  15 are working, even if we are just chatting. On picnics, long drives and camping, I am introduced to other men as “Professora” or “Doctora,” and my professional status is emphasized. I have been part of three different groups of men. Two groups of men are the result of being introduced to one man who gradually got to know me, then the initial man introduced me slowly to his circle of friends, one of whom then introduced me to his circle. The third group I met on my own at an educational venue; none of the men are associated with my university. All are informed about what I am working on; I have done formal interviews with some, but not all, of them. I bring copies of my work sometimes when we meet and will occasionally throw out small questions about cultural issues now and then to reaffirm my status as researcher. Some of the men and I are friends, but the word doesn’t match with an American understanding of what friendship entails. For example, the best thing you can do to show your friendship is to offer unsolicited information or assistance, to give X before asked for X. If someone asks a question about a person, object or place, you should say as much as you know, staying positive and sticking only to facts you can verify, without asking why the person wants to know. The men in my research group are extremely generous, but on their terms. Once when camping with expats, despite my repeated protests, the people I was with burned all the firewood within an hour of sunset. We were far from town and, given that there are hyenas and wolves in Dhofar, I have been repeatedly warned by the research guys to keep a fire going all night in unpopulated areas. I called one of the research guys to ask if I should drive back to town to buy wood; he and a friend drove out with some. It was the night before Eid when the men would have to get up early to slaughter animals the next morning. When I thanked them, they shrugged off the effort of getting wood and driving an hour each way to save my peace of mind. On the other hand, several times other expats, knowing that I know Omani men, have made requests which would be normal within American parameters – can you ask the research guys to do X or tell me about Y? I usually make up an excuse because it is too difficult to explain how help is predicated on a Gibali having free time. My request for help with buying tires might mean that we will go that instant to get new ones, I will get a phone call after a week saying that now is the time to get tires or an “Anyone can help you” (meaning “I won’t”) and that the three answers are equally valid “friendly” responses. For both men and women, close friends can disappear for weeks or months without damaging the friendship and unless the person wants to explain, you should not ask about the reason. No communication for a year does not break, or even affect, a relationship. The main difference between male and female Gibali friends and informants is the locations for meetings. I meet women in cafes, restaurants and their houses; I meet men usually on beaches for picnics, sometimes for long car drives, camping, picnics in the mountains and (rarely) driving in the desert. Women introduce me more to their families (moms, aunts, sisters, sisters-in-law, children, younger and older brothers, cousins, occasionally husbands); men introduce me more to other friends, younger (rarely older) brothers, cousins and occasionally wives.

16  Culture, research and methodology I don’t speak Gibali and have an intermediate level of Arabic. This is seen by some expats as hindering or negating my ability to do research, but in many discussions on this topic, the Gibalis I know agree that I know enough to speak about Dhofari cultures. I understand the academic POV that Gibali is an endangered language and there should be linguistic work done to preserve how it is spoken and create a written aspect; but I can also see the Gibali POV towards expats who speak it: “Why does this foreigner want my language? What are they going to do with it? Why do they need it?” No hakli has ever said or implied that I can’t understand them if I don’t speak their language and with some, there is a kind of relief that I don’t, i.e. I have some kinds of information but I don’t know everything. Money is not a part of my research process. I have never paid anyone in any way for interviews and I make it clear that there is no monetary benefit to my work. I try to reciprocate their patience and kindness by answering whatever questions come up about Western cultures, traveling in Europe, song lyrics etc. Following the Dhofar pattern, I give gifts when I return from trips such as books for children and I contribute to picnics by buying water, wood and snacks. Almost any topic in this book could be an entire book in its own right, e.g. the importance of camels, nutrition and food choices, household management, environmental change, growing crops etc. I feel like I am starting an academic conversation that I hope other people, especially Omanis, working in food studies, anthropology, environmental science, animal husbandry and land usage will take up. Limitations This book is, of course, incomplete. As I am still learning, I am sure I have missed some points. For example, as I was writing I had a picnic dinner at a beach with some of the research guys; one ate a handful of salad with what looked like large chunks of white onion. I had never seen anyone eat that much raw onion at once so I broke the convention of not commenting on the food choices of people and asked in Arabic, “Are you eating onion?” He replied in Arabic, “No, cucumber, from the mountain.” I tried a piece, delicious! Pure white, no seeds and the pieces were about the size of a date. Then I got the teasing, along the lines of “What, you don’t know what a cucumber is, you live here how long?” Well, no, I didn’t know of this particular variety of cucumber which is grown in the mountains, not for sale in stores and only available for a few weeks a year at the end of the monsoon season if you know someone who has a traditional style farm. One lacuna is information about foodways of the very rich. My only experience was not fun and shows the connections between foodways and cultures, as well as the difficulties of doing research in the place where I live. The unhappiness was my fault, I mistook a “polite” invitation for a “real” invitation. The party was in a rented hall, lavishly decorated with many markings of wealth such as fresh flowers, elaborate table ornamentations, lots of different kinds of food on each table, displays of foreign chocolates, many waitresses in professional

Culture, research and methodology  17 uniforms, etc. When I walked in the person who invited me was not there, nor had the person deputized someone to watch over me, so I simply stood in the entrance way for a few moments. I then, following the protocol I had done at other parties, went to the group of women sitting on decorated chairs (hostesses and special guests) and greeted them. I then sat at a table with a few women and a few empty chairs and sent the person who invited me a quick message to double-check that I was in the right place. Women would walk up to the table, coolly greet the other women, and I would get ready by smiling, saying the correct greeting in Arabic and extending my hand. The women would stare at me, turn their backs and walk away. Part of the reason might have been that all the women in the hall were wearing elegant, fitted black abayahs (black cloaks) or black, cream or white dresses while I was in a raspberry-colored, velvet thobe (loose Dhofari dress), the normal attire for other such parties I had attended. After an hour of being ignored, I was unsure what to do so I sent a message to a close Dhofari friend explaining the situation. “Do I have to stay?” I asked. The response was 1) was the person who invited me there? 2) was there a person responsible for me? When I said, “no” to both, I was told I could leave. So I fled. If I had been in Salalah for a limited amount of time, I think I would have stayed and pressed through – the person who invited me would have arrived at some point. It would have been interesting from a research point of view to stay and try to chart differences in the milieu of a much higher socio-economic level than I am usually in, but Salalah is tribal. To sit alone and be so publicly ignored was not just embarrassing me, it was hurting my reputation among the women in the hall who knew who I was, for example current and former students and their mothers. Living with people whose lives are organized by tribes means I wasn’t surprised that people didn’t speak to me. I needed a go-between who would put me in context so that the women at the table could explain me to other women. At an American party, I could have walked up to people with, “I don’t know anyone here, I am X’s friend.” In Dhofar, you can’t break the ice yourself; people are passed from one person to another. You need someone to vouch for you and explain to the group who you are. Another lacuna is that all my informants are middle-aged, 20s to early 50s. Some Gibalis who are over 60 do not speak Arabic, as they did not have access to schooling when they were young. As they lived through the Dhofar War (1965–1975), some are wary of North American/ European people. To talk about food “in the past” in Dhofar means to discuss the war, something very few older Gibalis would want to do with an American. I get around this by asking informants in their 40s and early 50s about what they ate when they were children and what they have heard about meals in the past. I also did not interview children, as Gibali children are, and are conditioned to be, shy with adult strangers; most have not spent time with, much less talked to North Americans or Europeans. Kids will often stare and point me out to their parents in public spaces. I don’t consider my lack of interviews a handicap because children and adults live in the same rhythm.

18  Culture, research and methodology In the States it is common for children to eat different things at different times than adults but in Dhofar, after they are weaned, children eat the same food at the same time as adults. Kids might get extra snacks, or their food might be cooked longer to make it softer or their portion set aside before hot spices such as jalapenos are added to the dish, but although canned baby food is sold in the grocery store, I have never seen a Gibali mother use it. Other lacunae are that I have not attended an a’zza (a gathering held one, two or three days after a death for people to pay condolences) or a male wedding party. I probably could have found one of each type of event to attend, but that would be, in my opinion, creating an unfair burden on informants for the sake of research; they would have been held responsible for my intruding on grief or making a spectacle of myself as the only female among dozens or hundreds of men. I have been told by many people what goes on at such events and have seen many photos of the male wedding parties. Living where I do research means I need to respect reasonable limits. Differences and hierarchies I have the highest regard for Lila Abu-Lughod’s work, but I disagree with her stance in “Writing Against Culture.” When she asks, “Does difference always smuggle in hierarchy?” (1991: 146), my answer is: not if you don’t want it to. I disagree with the cliché that anything that makes a difference makes a division. Abu-Lughod states that it is part of “anthropological discourse to enforce separations that inevitably carry a sense of hierarchy” (138). Further, “self is always a construction, never a natural or found entity … the process of creating a self through opposition to an other always entails the violence of repressing or ignoring other forms of difference” (140). In a later article she argues that “a difference between self and other will always be hierarchical because the self is sensed as primary, self-formed, active and complex, if not positive. At the very least, the self is always the interpreter and the other the interpreted” (2008: 13). Or, put another way, “Can we think of a difference without putting it against a norm?” (Mascia-Lees, Sharpe, and Cohen 1999: 29). I think we can. I think people can code a norm as a norm for only ourselves and recognize that it is not/should not/must not be the norm for anyone else, hence a norm without prescriptive power. Given my background, I don’t believe that the hierarchy is an essential part of discussing cultures; I have spent almost 16 years living overseas in four different counties and have lived in seven different American states, and I can’t rank any of those cultures into any kind of hierarchy. When I hit a cultural aspect that’s difficult for me, the question is, “why is this hard to deal with?” Except for physical harm, most constructs that are deemed “better” simply need to be picked apart and analyzed for how that construct fits into larger issues. For example, Dhofari families with small children are often in restaurants at 11pm. This is often viewed by expats as bad child-rearing. But strict and early bedtimes in America, for example, are linked to a host of other cultural features.

Culture, research and methodology  19 Children have an early bedtime in America because there is a cultural understanding that children and adults live on separate time schedules and do different activities. Children often have their own room, so they can be put to sleep separately from adult sleeping spaces. Parents may not have seen each other since the morning and might welcome an hour or two of peace and quiet to watch TV or talk after the children are sleeping. In Oman, most people take a nap after lunch so people are refreshed for staying up late. Dhofari children usually sleep in the same room as their parents or other children who might be several years younger or older. Trying to get a younger child to sleep while the other children are still playing, would be seen as unfair. Many Dhofaris think it is child abuse to force a child to stay alone in a room or to leave a child with a non-related teenager. Further, men usually spend several hours after dinner with male friends at cafés and return home between 10pm and 2am; if children were put to bed at 8pm, some fathers would not have the chance to see their children at night. One aspect that is not a division or hierarchy per se but is difficult for me, is getting the tone right, because making fun of another culture’s food is often seen as a harmless amusement. For example, I used the payment from my first book to throw a party for the men in my research group. I told American friends, “I’m using my author’s fee to buy a goat.” Which is both humorous and true but doesn’t convey nuances, such as it’s important to me that I have taken no monetary benefit from my publications and that one dinner in no way compensates for all the help these men (friends, informants and friends/informants) have given me over the years. It was funny to have a solemn conversation about how many goats to buy, but as someone living here, I wanted to make sure there would be enough meat. When I see “goat party” in my research notes, I laugh but I also feel a deep sense of gratitude towards the men who have allowed me to be part of their lives. Another layer is that I really hate the taste of goat but buying a cow or the best meal (a young male camel) is way out of my price range and a celebration meal calls for an animal slaughtered for the occasion, some of which should be given to family, neighbors or strangers in need. So I bought a goat.

Research overview Bibliography This section will briefly, chronologically discuss important works translated into or originally in English which have some connection to foodways.16 The main anthropology/ethnography studies on Omani cultures are written about other regions and towns, e.g. Sohar (Barth 1983; Wikan 1977, 1982, 1984), Jiddat-il-Harasiis (Chatty 1976, 1997, 2000, 2013), Hamra (Eickelman 1984) and Bahla (Limbert 2010). There are not many texts about Dhofar; there is some work in Arabic in (usually self-published) brochures but there is no systematic distribution. Abdulqadar Al Ghassani, who was the Director General of Education in Dhofar, dedicated his book collection to Dhofar and created an open public

20  Culture, research and methodology library in downtown Salalah, the Dar al-Kitab, which is currently run by his son, Mustafa Al Ghassani . Ibn al-Mujāwir visited Dhofar in approximately 1226–1230 CE, writing that Dhofar had at one time been connected to Baghdad by a trade route which was cut off in 616/1219 CE (2008: 261). Some of the town names he mentions are still in use, notably Mirbat and Hasik. Further he mentions that the people feed “riding animals” dried fish (camels and cows are still fed dried sardines during the hot weather) and many trees and plants that are still grown, including coconuts, sugar cane, bananas, pomegranates, lemons and limes. Ibn Battuta, in the early to mid-1300s, while describing his long journey through the Middle East, Africa, China and Russia briefly references Dhofar. He mentions that horses were exported from Dhofar to India, the abundance of fresh fruit and coconuts, and the use of sardines to feed cattle. There is no description of the inhabitants beyond “its people closely resemble the people of Northwest Africa in their customs” (1929, 114). In Ovington’s A Voyage to Surat in the Year 1689 (1929 [1689]) there is a very brief description of Dhofar which mentions the locally grown and produced frankincense, coconuts and butter. The first English explorers in the Dhofar region were Captain Haines and his crew from the Indian Navy who surveyed and explored the Dhofar coast in the brig Palinurus in 1834, 1835 and 1836. Haines (1839, 1845) and several of his officers published articles about the trip in general or Dhofar in detail. For example, Cruttenden’s short article (1838) details his journey from “Morebat” (Mirbat) to “Dyreez” (Dhariz), approximately 71 kilometers. He indicates he also visited “the ancient town of Hasec” (Hasik, also mentioned by Mujāwir) and, like Mujāwir, sees doum trees and various fruit trees including limes (184, 185). He also discusses indigo plants, whose dye has been used until the modern day for coloring the fabric worn by the mountain people. He notes that the “Gurrah [Qara] Bedouins” number about 1,500 men, and “are all armed with a sword and stick (which they carry in the same hand) and some of them have matchlocks (188).” In typical imperialistic fashion, Cruttenden ends by noting that “I do not think that any town on the coast is better than Dyreez for supplying of vessels with provisions;” of course, he means British vessels (188). Another officer, Henry Carter’s “The Ruins of El Balad,” focuses on one archeological site instead of a journey, but is similar to Cruttenden’s, in that, in addition to explicating what he sees, the author explains how what he sees might be helpful to the British empire, i.e. he explains that the source of fresh water in the ruins “is one of the cheapest and most convenient places on this coast for a ship to water at” (1846: 190). Commander J. P. Saunders with the same ship, and some of the same crew, continued this surveying work in 1844–1846 and published an article in 1846. The next English explorers were Theodore and Mabel Bent who, as with Haines et al., were more interested in furthering Britain’s imperialist agenda, but they are private travelers and archeologists, not government employees. Their Southern Arabia (2005 [1900]) is a book with plenty of spleen: Mirbat has a “malarious-looking swamp” and “Our boat was one of the dirtiest I have

Culture, research and methodology  21 ever traveled on” (232). Mabel Bent is clearly a fore-runner to the Theroux/ Naipaul/Granta “I hate the natives” school of travel writing: “There is no law, order, authority, honor, honesty, or hospitality, and as to the people, I can only describe them as hateful and hating each other,” and she refers to one of the men she traveled with as “that horrid little Saleh Hassan” (175, 217). It may be that the feeling was mutual. The mountain people of Dhofar, she writes, are “endowed with a spirit of independence which makes him resent the slightest approach to legal supervision … They would not march longer than they liked; they would only take us where they wished … and if we asked them not to sing at night and disturb our rest, they always set to work with greater vigor” (248). The Qara men she traveled with always addressed her, to her anger, only as “Mabel” with the local prefix when calling a person “ya” (258). But she includes a fair amount of real information, taking the time for example to explain how indigo is used to dye clothes (145). She describes the scenery with careful attention to plants, rock formations, distances, etc., e.g. Wadi Ghersid (256), Wadi Nahast (265) and, noticing that the language spoken in the “Gara” (Qara) mountains was not a dialect, she includes a few words (275). Some of her information is still current, e.g. the technique of cooking on stones (250) which I have seen practiced several times. Her summation is typical of British Victorian-era travelers: “we had discovered a real Paradise in the wilderness, which will be a rich prize for the civilized nation which is enterprising enough to appropriate it” (276). As the title suggests, Bertram Thomas’s Arabia Felix (1932) is a much happier book than the Bents’, although, like the Bents, he begins with a general history told with imperialistic British moralizing judgment, i.e. “for where treachery is a habit of mind, men are actuated by the stern necessities of the moment, not by any principles of morality.” As with the Bents, he makes notes on food preparation, e.g. making bread (166) and details such as men in the mountains do not eat chicken, a habit that is still followed by older men from the mountain tribes (59). The next important text is Thesiger’s Arabian Sands (1991 [1959]). Thesiger, like Thomas, crossed the Rub al Khali (Empty Quarter) but he spent more time with his guides and was far more interested in their lives than Thomas. He mentions the traditional dark blue cloth (45), trading pattern of mountain honey for coastal sardines (which were used for camel and cow fodder) (49) and throwing sticks (49) that are evident in the Bents’ and Thomas’ description, but he goes farther than any of them in explaining both his point of view and the point of view of his companions. Thomas reports that “each of my companions not only knew at a glance the footmarks of every camel and man of my caravan, but claimed to know those of his absent tribe, and not a few of his enemies” (178). Thesiger gives the same information but includes specific examples (e.g. 122). Thomas notes that “where food or water were short, no one of them would think of not sharing it equally with his companions, and if anyone was away, perhaps tending his camels, all would wait his return to eat together” (157); this is an accurate description (still in practice today) but Thomas did not ‘live’ this as Thesiger did, for example the description of Thesiger sitting thirsty and impatient for the others to come (65).

22  Culture, research and methodology It is rather a surprise, after the gradually lowering racist and condescending tone seen in the arc from the British sailors through the Bents and Thomas to Thesiger, to read Jan Morris’ Sultan in Oman (2008 [1957]) a smug and judgmental book. She begins by widely overstating her achievement, declaring that she undertook “The last classic journeys of the Arabian Peninsula,” as if being driven in a jeep from Salalah to Muscat in 1956 was on par with Dougherty or Philby (1). She describes Gibalis as having “obscure rituals, taboos, and prejudices” (31). In keeping with her general tone of relegating the inhabitants to prehistoric times, she presents Southern Omanis as retaining ancient/ pre-historic folkways. Thesiger’s companions fly on planes, yet Morris describes Gibalis as people with “shaggy” hair who are “strange” and they “hurl in the general direction of their neighbors the heavy throwing sticks (less scientific than boomerangs) with which they were sometimes quaintly armed” (30, 39, 40). It is clear that even in Thomas’ accounts, much less Thesiger’s, that the men of this region had access to and knowledge of guns. In fact, the cover of one edition is one of Thesiger’s photos showing his companion Bin Ghabaisha holding a rifle. The next series of texts are by British military personnel recounting their fighting in the Dhofar civil war (1965–1975) such as Jeapes (1980), Gardiner (2007), and Ray (2008). After the war, several non-fiction texts were written about various aspects of Dhofari life, including animal herding, language and plants as the rapid pace of development created an interest in preserving traditional knowledge and lifeways. For example, Janzen arrived in January 1977, staying until August and then returning from January to May 1978, to do research for his dissertation. This work was “very slightly modified” and published as Nomads in the Sultanate of Oman: Tradition and Development in Dhofar (1986). This book thoroughly explains the traditional lifestyles of three primary groups in the Dhofar region: Bedu (desert), Jebalis/Gibalis (mountain) and Hadr (people living on the coastal plain, the term is currently used to refer to ‘town’ people) including many photographs. Janzen returned to Dhofar several times and later published an article which describes the changes he witnessed between his first arrival in 1977 and his last visit in 1990: “The Destruction of Resources among the Mountain Nomads of Dhofar” (2000). Professor Tom Johnstone did extensive work on the Modern South Arabian languages in Dhofar, publishing the Jibbali Lexicon (1981), “The Language of Poetry in Dhofar” (1972) and several other articles. He is also significant as he served as mentor to two important researchers about Dhofar: Dr. Salim Tabook, author of Tribal Practices and Folklore of Dhofar, Sultanate of Oman (1997) and Miranda Morris, author in her own right (1985, 1987, 1997, 2007, 2012) and a co-author of Plants of Dhofar, the Southern Region of Oman: Traditional, Economic, and Medicinal Uses (Miller, Morris and Stuart Smith 1988). She is currently working with Janet Watson (see below). A less academic visitor was Suzanne St Albans who was in Dhofar in the late 1970s and wrote Where Time Stood Still: A Portrait of Oman (1980). The Duchess of St Albans was clearly no average tourist. The first “thank you” in her

Culture, research and methodology  23 Acknowledgements section is to Brigadier Peter Thwaites; the second is to “The Sultan’s Armed Forces” who “provided transport where I wanted to go” (ix). She has done some reading about the history of Oman but her opinions reflect no ability to understand the reality of the people. She states that there are “nine illiterate tribes of primitive aborigines” in the Qara (Mountains) and these “grand, pastoral, cave-dwelling noblemen have never worked with their hands” (152). How would “primitive” people living in caves and herding flocks have survived if they had “never worked with their hands”? And in any case, these “primitive aborigines” had just waged a ten-year war in which they had close contact with not only the People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen, but Russia, China, Cuba and various Arab countries. Musallim bin Nafl, the first leader of this revolution, is dismissed by St Albans as “a useless loafer” and a “shiftless, bitter, dissatisfied layabout” but when she visits mountain villages she is appalled at the conditions (155, 156). She never connects the revolution encouraged by Musallim with the desperate poverty endured by his people. She writes that the “entire population of the Jebel were forced to co-operate” in the war (157) without understanding that the disease and lack of food she sees in the late 1970s would have been worse in the late 1960s. The difficulties of daily life she herself witnessed encouraged the mountain people to fight against their government which denied them the basic amenities of modern life such as schools and electricity.17 St Albans states that, “like our own distant ancestors, they frequently paint themselves blue all over” (168); people did not paint themselves blue whereas Haines, more than 100 previously, is able to discern that the people’s “skins are discolored by the dye from their dress, which is composed of blue cotton” (1845: 112). St Albans’ attitude creates a vision of an ancient, primitive people which erases the reality of the Dhofar region in the late 1970s when there was an airport, a Holiday Inn, “shops and offices and ultra-modern television centre” and a hospital (180) in Salalah. Nicholas Clapp’s The Road to Ubar: Finding the Atlantis of the Sands (1999) shares a similar attitude. The book is an account of an archeological expedition he arranged and took part in during November 1991, including accounts of two previous visits, subsequent visits and extended discussion of pre-historic and pre-modern southern Oman. Dhofaris only show up as the comic or exotic other. During his group’s first reconnaissance of the area, their helicopter drops them off in an isolated wadi (valley/dry riverbed) A herdsman complains that the noise has killed or frightened several of his goats. The next morning, Clapp says, “the disconsolate Jebali herdsman of the day before had returned back with half a dozen of his clansmen, all armed with Belgian FAL automatic rifles” (128). This is played partly as a joke, partly as a danger, “Nothing really scary, but we clearly had to make the right moves” (128). The adjective “disconsolate” is odd, given that the Jebali was quite able to be find a way, with his gun and tribesmen, to be “consoled” for his loss. The final price for the goats was $130, a rain poncho, a crate of apples and a Batik shirt (129). Clapp paints the scene in terms similar to Yoda going through Luke Skywalker’s belongings when Luke crashes his plane, and in the same way that

24  Culture, research and methodology Luke first sees Yoda as a harmless pest, Clapp treats the men as children, happy to find a shirt that is too big for them. Clapp doesn’t acknowledge that a loud, sudden noise which scatters animals could, in fact result in the death of an animal and additional work in collecting the herd back together. The difficulty of herding goats in an area that is desert for 10 months of the year, the danger of losing goats, the cost of goats, the difficulty of a herder to get to Salalah for new clothes or fresh fruit makes no impression on Clapp. He doesn’t seem to see the great disparity between his life (research and movement by helicopter) and the life of the herder. There is no thought of, for example, giving the herders anything extra, such as food or water when the helicopter arrived to take them back to the city. Even now, when driving in remote wadis, the research guys offer whatever food and water we have in the car to herders. Current work on Oman is written by historians such as Jeremy Jones and Nicholas Ridout (2005, 2012, 2015), John E. Peterson (2004, 2006, 2007, 2016), John Wilkinson (1971, 1972, 2013), and political scientists such as Marc Valeri (2010, 2013, 2015, 2017, 2009) and James Worrall (2012, 2014). Current work on Dhofar usually concentrates on linguistic and cultural aspects. Miranda Morris and Janet Watson have done extensive work on Dhofar and the Modern South Arabian (MSA) languages. Janet Watson was also the principal investigator of a three-year project to document and do linguistic and cultural analyses of MSAs (Modern South Arabian Languages 2020). Aaron Rubin (2014, 2015) is also doing academic work on MSAs. From the area of food studies, I read many general works, e.g. Coleman (2011), Counihan and van Esterik (2012), Crowther (2018), Fieldhouse (1998), Goody (1982), Julier (2015), Jurafsky (2014), Klein and Watson (2019), Mintz (1996), Mintz and Du Bois (2002), Sutton (2010, 2019), Swift (2015), van Esterik, Julier and Counihan (2018), as well as texts specifically about food studies in the Middle East, e.g. Gilette (2019), Kanafani (1979), Salloum, Salloum and Salloum Elias (2013) and Yamani (2000). There are also a few texts and blogs about Omani/Southern Arabian food including cookbook writers and bloggers (e.g. Al Hamad 2016, Campbell 2015, Maclagan 1994, Popp 2018, Yasmeen 2018). I also looked at articles about related issues such as food security in the Gulf (Amery 2019 and Mbaga 2015), food and protests in the Middle East (Ciezadlo 2011a), food and tourism (Avieli and Grosglik 2013 and Cohen and Avieli 2004) and fishmarkets (Omezzine 1998; Omezzine, Zaibet and Al-Oufi 1996), as well as texts about foodstuffs that are related to medical practices, e.g. Lebling and Pepperdine (2006), M. Miranda Morris (1997, 2012), and Rodionov (2012). Comparison: Yemen – fighting with food, domestic help and qat The immense wealth and stricter gender segregation in Saudi Arabia18 and the Emirates19 makes comparisons difficult, but even with the terrible war, there are points of similarity with Yemen, such as people living in mountains, being organized by tribes and valuing self-reliance. Most Dhofaris see Yemenis as closely

Culture, research and methodology  25 related to them, living similar lives. There is some intermarriage (usually Yemeni women to Dhofari men) and some Dhofaris regularly cross the border for lowlevel trade (such as fodder). I will briefly discuss two articles to make some general comparison about foodways and then discuss four specific differences: fighting with food, fighting over guests, hired help and qat. Meneley’s work, including her book Tournaments of Value: Sociability and Hierarchy in a Yemeni Town (2007 [1996]) and her article “Food and Morality in Yemen” (2011), shows similarities between Dhofari and Yemeni foodways. Similarities include not talking during a meal, hosts serving the food and drink that is available instead of asking a guest what they would like, and that it is embarrassing for a guest to ask for more, as it signals that the host has not been attentive (2011: 20, 21, 23). Another parallel is that like Meneley, I have never cooked for my Gibali friends or informants as they believe that there is a slim chance that “by accident” I might serve them food that is haram (proscribed in Islam) (23). But I have never heard Gibalis make negative comments similar to what Meneley reported, “My God, they don’t even know how to eat in Canada” (19) and “Westerners were too morally da’if (weak) to fast as the Muslims did” (27). Vom Bruck’s “The Imagined ‘Consumer Democracy’ and Elite (Re)Production in Yemen” (2005) also offers some interesting contrasts. As in Dhofar, she explains that “prestige [is] derived from the ability to dispose of wealth – for example in the form of religious endowments” and “Cultural accomplishment was expressed through a commitment to learning, aloofness from the marketplace, the production and recitation of poetry, honorific language, and self-restraint” (259). However, it is not true that “Prestige goods, with the exception of daggers and qat, are usually foreign” (261); among hakils the best gifts are given from goods under one’s control, e.g. fish from “my hands,” samn (clarified butter) from “my family’s cows,” fruit from “my trees,” etc. In reference to Bourdieu’s ideas about cultural and social capital, someone economically poor (with low purchasing power) can still gain merit in the communal “field” by being able to give abalone, lobsters, wild honey, wild mushrooms, edible roots, etc. Stoller and Olkes (1986) and Ciezadlo (2011b) both discuss the anthropological aspects of fighting with food; “We tend to speak of food in benevolent terms, as the social glue that binds us together. But in the wrong hands, food can be a weapon” (2011b). This shows up in some Yemeni cultures with Maclagan (1994) discussing women showing anger by refusing to cook or serving food in a rude manner and Weir (2007) discussing men, who are in a dispute with another tribe, going to stay in that tribe’s village and forcing their enemies to feed them, thus causing economic hardship as a way to get the dispute settled more quickly. This does not happen in Dhofar. Neither does the kind of fighting over women to be guests as explained by Meneley (2007) and Dorsky (1986), in Zabid and ‘Amran respectively. Omanis in general and haklis in particular value self-control. To show anger in any form is almost always seen as a form of weakness and using anger to force someone to visit you makes you look weak. Further, de Regt (2009) states that “A small number of traditional elite families in Sana’a still make use of Yemeni live-in domestics” (569) and that “a number

26  Culture, research and methodology of local nongovernmental organizations developed training courses in domestic work … Most graduates were employed as cleaners in offices,” (570), as “People fear that Yemeni domestics will spread ‘the secrets of the family’ (asrar al-bait) or that they will become jealous when they see the wealth of others and cause evil with their gaze” (571). Vom Bruck makes the same observations that, for “wealthy men from leading tribal families … Their guards, maids, and retainers are recruited from the countryside” (2005: 263). This does not obtain in Dhofar. In the past, some Dhofaris had slaves, but since they were freed Dhofaris do not do domestic work for other Dhofaris. The last difference is qat, a type of shrub whose leaves are chewed to produce a pleasant, mellowing effect. Qat is ubiquitous in Yemen and most of the population chew it every day. Qat is illegal in Dhofar and having it in one’s possession can lead to fines or jail time. That difference creates a variance in how days are structured in that in Yemen, qat chews are often hours-long and held in the afternoon, with qat also distributed at evening parties. Many authors, including for example Dorman (2017), discuss the importance of Yemeni women visiting during qat chews in the afternoons, whereas Dhofari women entertain neighbors in the late morning, late afternoon (usually between the asr and maghrib (sunset) prayers) or evening visits. I have never heard of a Dhofari woman chewing qat. Comparison: Qatar – food and hospitality Sobh and Belk, sometimes with additional authors, have written several articles about hospitality in terms of inviting guests into private homes on the Arabian Peninsula, particularly Qatar. They argue that “Arab hospitality is one of the tropes that defines Arab cultures” (Sobh, Belk, and Wilson 2013: 443). In “Domains of Privacy and Hospitality” (2011), Sobh and Belk state: The importance of hospitality in the Gulf region is attributed both to its necessity in the harsh desert environment of Bedouins and its moral centrality in Islam. It is seen as closely associated with the compassionate treatment of strangers and the significance of sharing with others in the Arab/Muslim culture. (128) This is true in Dhofar but there is not the fear, set out in Sobh, Belk and Wilson, of conversations about one’s hosting skills, for example, “in the Gulf region … hosts and guests are expected to strictly obey the rules of hospitality and observe its etiquette. Failure to do so, will likely damage the reputation of the host and guest and bring social critique” (2013: 450); hence “Relatives and other members from the group are considered to be more powerful because they are more likely to gossip about the host if he or she does not meet the society’s norms and expectations related to hospitality rituals” in Qatar (456). Gibalis believe that it is immoral to speak negatively (even if truthfully) about other people in public. To speak badly about a host would reflect ill on the speaker, not a host who may

Culture, research and methodology  27 have missed some point of protocol; someone who gossips after accepting hospitality would not be seen as “powerful,” but weak and badly behaved. This will be further discussed in Chapter 8.

Notes 1 By “Dhofari” I mean Omanis who were born, raised and live in Dhofar, with the understanding that there are Omanis living in Dhofar who are there for work or to attend school and do not see themselves as “Dhofari,” as well as expats. The last census (2010) recorded 249,729 inhabitants of Dhofar, of which 164,073 were Omani (80,052 female; 84,021 male) and 85,656 were expat (19,306 female, 66,350 male) (“Distribution of Population (Omani/Expatriate) in Dhofar Governorate by Wilayat.”). 2 See Wilkinson (1971: 370), Eickelman (1984), and Peterson (2004). 3 Children with one Gibali parent usually identify themselves as Gibali and often speak Gibali at home, with the non-Gibali parent understanding Gibali but speaking Arabic or another MSA language. 4 Sheri/ Shari is an approximation of the Gibali language term for “mountain” and in this context is equivalent to Gibali. 5 https://www.ncsi.gov.om/Elibrary/Pages/LibraryContentDetails.aspx?ItemID=Z8IrPf D8tBHwm1UXWqoQRQ%3d%3d 6 Every Gibali I know has invited me to Islam; as they have found peace and joy in their religion, they wish the same for me. This is brought up now and then and I gently explain that I cannot alter my faith. 7 In some tribal meetings women are not allowed to attend, but women can send male relatives to speak for them and can influence decisions by discussions with brothers, husbands, sons and their father. Women are very active, for example, in political campaigns which are often run on tribal lines. For further information on Omani and Dhofari government and religious practices, see Chapter 2 of my previous book, Community and Autonomy in Oman (2019a). 8 There are a few non-Gibalis living in the mountain, coast and desert villages, for example Pakistani and Bangladeshi shepherds. 9 As many Gibalis own camels, cows and/ or goats themselves or have close family who do, they are will often slaughter animals themselves, instead of buying meat. This point will be discussed in detail in Chapter 2. 10 Please see Note 2 in the Preface for discussion of the term “expat.” 11 I moved to Salalah in September 2005 but I didn’t start to document picnics, camping and dinners until January 2010. 12 As discussed below, a good friend will tell you what you need to know, but never about anything positive that they themselves have done. At a wedding party, the person who invited me told me who had made the desserts but did not tell me what she herself had done for the wedding. On a picnic with X, Y, and Z, X thought I wasn’t eating enough so told me that the dish we were eating was from “the house,” not a restaurant to make me feel more comfortable (the food was safe/ clean). It was Z who said that the dish was very difficult to make. 13 A related factor is that Gibalis with decades of experience in a certain area would insist that they didn’t really know and I should talk to an expert. Sometimes this meant they didn’t want to be interviewed; sometimes they wanted a more explicit assurance from me that I was asking many people so their responses would be folded in as one of many, i.e. they were not personally responsible for the accuracy of my book. 14 My statements reflect Gibali understandings with the caveat that no one person can explain an entire culture. This book is descriptive of one group of Gibali-speaking tribes. For example, when I write that Gibalis say bismallah before beginning to eat or drink anything, I am in no way suggesting that this is a trait unique to Dhofar.

28  Culture, research and methodology 15 To check what I wrote would imply X did not trust me, an insult both to me and to X, who had chosen to befriend an untrustworthy person. 16 For a full bibliography, please see my webpage: Come From Away, https:// mariellerisse.com 17 The only other writer who shares St Albans’ point of view is Tremayne, who visited the area during the war and later wrote: The Dhofar War was not a revolution; it was an insurgency and it was foreign; that is, it was sustained from outside Oman, from the PDRY, and paid for by China and USSR. Its objectives were not those of the population. Its hard-core men were mostly Dhofaris removed from Dhofar as children, educated in the PDRY as revolutionary Marxists and trained in the Soviet Union, China and elsewhere as guerilla fighters. They were in fact not in the least representative of the people whom they sought to lead, nor concerned with the country’s own welfare. (1977: 47) This attitude is not shared by any of the soldiers who fought in the war, or by other researchers. 18 For example, Yamani’s “‘You Are What You Cook’: Cuisine and Class in Mecca” (2000) focuses on tactics of displaying wealth through food choices, as well as methods of display and serving. 19 I will be using Kanafani’s Aesthetics and Ritual in the United Arab Emirates (unpublished dissertation, 1979) throughout this book, especially in Chapters 3 (cooking), 5 (eating) and 7 (privacy and purity).

References For a full bibliography, list of food terms and several short essays on foodways, please see my webpage: Come From Away, https://mariellerisse.com Abu-Lughod, Lila. 1991. “Writing against Culture,” in Recapturing Anthropology. Richard Fox, ed. Santa Fe, NM: School of American Research Press. 137–62. Abu-Lughod, Lila. 2008. Writing Women’s Worlds: Bedouin Stories. Berkeley: University of California Press. Al-Hamad, Sarah. 2016. Cardamom and Lime: Flavors of the Arabian Gulf, the Cuisine of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman, Qatar and the U.A.E. Singapore: IMM Lifestyle Books. Amery, Hussein. 2019. “Food Security in Qatar: Threats and Opportunities.” Gulf Insights 7: 1–6. Avieli, Nir and Rafi Grosglik. 2013. “Food and Power in the Middle East and the Mediterranean: Practical Concerns, Theoretical Considerations.” Food, Culture and Society 16(2): 181–95. Bardenstein, Carol. 2010. “Beyond Univocal Baklava: Deconstructing Food-as-Ethnicity and the Ideology of Homeland in Diana Abu Jaber’s The Language of Baklava.” Journal of Arabic Literature 4: 160–79. Barth, Fredrik. 1983. Sohar: Culture and Society in an Omani Town. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press. Bent, Theodore and Mabel. 2005 [1900]. Southern Arabia. London: Elibron. Campbell, Felicia. 2015. The Food of Oman: Recipes and Stories from the Gateway to Arabia. London: Andrew McMeel. Carter, Henry. 1846. “The Ruins of El Balad.” Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London 16: 187–99. Chatty, Dawn. 1976. “From Camel to Truck.” Folk 18: 114–28.

Culture, research and methodology  29 Chatty, Dawn. 2000. “Women Working in Oman: Individual Choice and Cultural Constraints.” International Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 32: 241–54. Chatty, Dawn. 1997. Mobile Pastoralists: Development Planning and Social Change in Oman. New York: Columbia University Press. Chatty, Dawn. 2013. “Rejecting Authenticity in the Desert Landscapes of the Modern Middle East: Development Processes in the Jiddat Il-Harasiis, Oman,” in Anthropology of the Middle East and North Africa. Sherine Hafez and Susan Slyomovics, eds. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. 145–64. Ciezadlo, Annia. 2011a, April 25. “Eat, Drink, Protest: Stories of the Middle East's Hungry Rumblings: Buying Peace, One Feast at a Time.” Foreign Policy 186. https://foreignpolicy.com/2011/04/25/eat-drink-protest/ Ciezadlo, Annia. 2011b, March 15. “Eating My Way through the Cedar Revolution (excerpt).” Foreign Policy. http://foreignpolicy.com/2011/03/15/ eating-my-way-through-the-cedar-revolution-2/ Clapp, Nicholas. 1999. The Road to Ubar: Finding the Atlantis of the Sands. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin. Cole, Donald. 2003. “Where Have the Bedouin Gone?” Anthropological Quarterly 76(2): 235–67. Coleman, Leo, ed. 2011. Food: Ethnographic Encounters (Encounters: Experience and Anthropological Knowledge). London: Bloomsbury. Cohen, Erik and Nir Avieli. 2004. “Food in Tourism: Attraction and Impediment.” Annals of Tourism Research 31(4): 755–78. Counihan, Carole and Penny van Esterik, eds. 2012. Food and Culture: A Reader. London: Routledge. Crowther, Gillian. 2018. Eating Culture: An Anthropological Guide to Food. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Cruttenden, Charles. 1838. “Journal of an Excursion from Morbat to Dyreez, the Principal Town of Dhofar.” Transactions of the Bombay Geographical Society 1: 184–8. De Regt, Marina. 2009. “Preferences and Prejudices: Employers’ Views on Domestic Workers in the Republic of Yemen.” Signs 34(3): 559–81. Deeb, Lara and Jessica Winegar. 2012. “Anthropologies of Arab-Majority Societies.” Annual Review of Anthropology 41: 537–58. Distribution of Population (Omani/Expatriate) in Dhofar Governorate by Wilayat. 2010. Census 2010 Final Result. https://www.ncsi.gov.om/Elibrary/LibraryContentDoc/bar_ Census%20Final%20Result%202010_388bd9c6-a938-467d-8c92-f6950cc1785f.pdf Dorman, Deborah. 2017. “A Nasraniyya in Sanaa, 1988-99,” in Architectural Heritage of Yemen: Buildings that Fill my Eye. Trevor Marchand, ed. London: Ginko. 179–86. Dorsky, Susan. 1986. Women of ‘Amran: A Middle Eastern Ethnographic Study. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press. Eickelman, Christine. 1984. Women and Community in Oman. New York: New York University Press. Ferguson, Priscilla. 2011. “The Senses of Taste.” American Historical Review 116(2): 371–84. Fieldhouse, Paul. 1998. Food and Nutrition: Customs and Culture. Cheltenham, UK: Stanley Thomas. Gardiner, Ian. 2007. In the Service of the Sultan: A First-hand Account of the Dhofar Insurgency. South Yorkshire: Pen and Sword Military. Gilette, Maris. 2019. “Muslim Foodways,” in The Handbook of Food and Anthropology. Jakob Klein and James Watson, eds. London: Bloomsbury Academic. 48–73. Goody, Jack. 1982. Cooking, Cuisine and Class. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

30  Culture, research and methodology Haines, Stafford. 1839. “Memoir to Accompany a Chart of the South Coast of Arabia from the Entrance of the Red Sea to Misenat, in 50, 43, 25 E. Part I.” Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London 9: 125–56. Haines, Stafford. 1845. “Memoir of the South and East Coasts of Arabia: Part II.” Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London 15: 104–60. Ibn al-Mujāwir. 2008. A Traveler in Thirteenth-Century Arabia: Ibn al-Mujāwir’s Tarikh al-Mustabir 19, Third Series, G. R. Smith, trans. London: Ashgate for the Hakluyt Society. Ibn Battuta. 1929. Travels in Asia and Africa 1325–1354. H.A.R. Gibb, trans. London: Routledge. Janzen, Jorg. 1986. Nomads in the Sultanate of Oman: Tradition and Development in Dhofar. London: Westview Press. Janzen, Jorg. 2000. “The Destruction of Resources among the Mountain Nomads of Dhofar,” in The Transformation of Nomadic Society in the Arab East, University of Cambridge Oriental publications 58. Martha Mundy and Basim Musallam, eds. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 160–75. Jeapes, Tony. 1980. SAS: Operation Oman. Nashville: The Battery Press. Johnstone, T.M. 1972. “The Language of Poetry in Dhofar.” The Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 35(1): 1–17. Johnstone, T.M. 1981. Jibbali Lexicon. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Jones, Jeremy and Nicholas Ridout. 2005. “Democratic Development in Oman.” Middle East Journal 59(3): 376–92. Jones, Jeremy. 2012. Oman, Culture and Diplomacy. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Jones, Jeremy. 2015. History of Modern Oman. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Julier, Alice. 2015. “Family and Domesticity,” in A Cultural History of Food in the Modern Age (The Cultural Histories Series). Amy Bentley, ed. London: Bloomsbury Academic. 145–64. Jurafsky, Dan. 2014. The Language of Food: A Linguist Reads the Menu. New York: W. W. Norton. Kanafani, Aida Sami. 1979. Aesthetics and Ritual in the United Arab Emirates. unpublished dissertation, University of Texas at Austin. Kelly, J.B. 1976. “Hadramaut, Oman, Dhufar: The Experience of Revolution.” Middle East Studies Association Bulletin 12(2): 213–30. Klein, Jakob and James Watson, eds. 2019. The Handbook of Food and Anthropology. London: Bloomsbury Academic. Ladwig Walter C. 2008. “Supporting Allies in Counterinsurgency: Britain and the Dhofar Rebellion.” Small Wars and Insurgencies 19(1): 62–88. Lebling, Robert and Donna Pepperdine. 2006. Natural Remedies of Arabia. London: Stacey International. Limbert, Mandana. 2010. In the Time of Oil: Piety, Memory and Social Life in an Omani Town. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Maclagan, Ianthe. 1994. “Food and Gender in a Yemeni Community,” in A Taste of Thyme: Culinary Cultures of the Middle East. Sami Zubaida and Richard Tapper, eds. New York: I.B. Tauris Publishers. 159–72. Mascia-Lees, Francis, Patricia Sharpe, and Colleen Cohen. 1999. “The Postmodernist Turn in Anthropology: Cautions from a Feminist Perspective,” in Art and Interpretation. Eric Dayton, ed. Calgary: Broadview Press. 567–82.

Culture, research and methodology  31 Mbaga, Msafiri Daudi. 2015. “The Prospects of Sustainable Desert Agriculture to Improve Food Security in Oman.” Consilience 13: 114–28. http://www.jstor.org/ stable/26427275 Meneley, Anne. 2007 [1996]. Tournaments of Value: Sociability and Hierarchy in a Yemeni Town. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Meneley, Anne. 2011. “Food and Morality in Yemen,” in Food: Ethnographic Encounters (Encounters: Experience and Anthropological Knowledge). Leo Coleman, ed. London: Bloomsbury. 17–30. Miller, Anthony, Miranda Morris, and Susanna Stuart-Smith. 1988. Plants of Dhofar, the Southern Region of Oman: Traditional, Economic, and Medicinal Uses. Muscat: Office of the Adviser for Conservation of the Environment, Diwan of Royal Court. Mintz, Sidney. 1996. Tasting Food, Tasting Freedom: Excursions into Eating, Culture, and the Past. Boston, MA: Beacon Press. Mintz, Sidney, and Du Bois, Christine. 2002. “The Anthropology of Food and Eating.” Annual Review of Anthropology 31: 99–119. Morris, Jan. 2008 [1957]. Sultan in Oman. London: Eland. Morris, Miranda. 1985. “A Poem in Jibbali.” Journal of Oman Studies 7: 121–30. Morris, Miranda. 1987. “Dhofar – What Made it Different,” in Oman: Economic, Social and Strategic Development, B.R. Pridham, ed. London: Croom Helm. 51–78. Morris, Miranda. 1997. “The Harvesting of Frankincense in Dhofar,” in Profumi d’Arabia. Alessandra Avanzini, ed. Rome: L’Erma Bretschneider. 231–50. Morris, Miranda. 2007, April 19. “The Pre-literate, Non-Arabic Languages of Oman and Yemen.” Lecture at a joint meeting of the Anglo-Omani and British-Yemeni Societies. https://al-bab.com/pre-literate-non-arabic-languages-oman-and-yemen Morris, Miranda. 2012. “The Aloe and the Frankincense Tree in Southern Arabia: Different Approaches to Their Use,” in Herbal Medicines in Yemen: Traditional Knowledge and Practice, and Their Value for Today’s World. Ingrid Hehmeyer and Hanne Schönig, eds. Boston, MA: Brill. 103–26. Omezzine, Abdallah. 1998. “On-shore Fresh Fish Markets in Oman.” Journal of International Food and Agribusiness Marketing 10(1): 53–69. Omezzine, Abdallah, Lokman Zaibet and Hamad Al-Oufi. 1996. “The Marketing System of Fresh Fish Products on the Masirah Island in the Sultanate of Oman.” Marine Resources Economics 11: 203–10. Ovington, John. 1929 [1689]. A Voyage to Surat in the Year 1689. H. G. Rawlinson, ed. London: Oxford University Press. Peacock, James. 1986. The Anthropological Lens: Harsh Light, Soft Focus. New York: CUP. Peterson, John E.. 2004. “Oman’s Diverse Soceity: Southern Oman.” Middle East Journal 58(2): 254–69. Peterson, John E.. 2006. Historical Muscat: An Illustrated Guide and Gazetteer (Handbook of Oriental Studies: Section 1, the Near & Middle East). Leiden: Brill. Peterson, John E.. 2007. Oman’s Insurgencies: The Sultanate’s Struggle for Supremacy. London: Saqi. Peterson, John E.. 2016 [1978]. Oman in the Twentieth Century: Political Foundations of an Emerging State. London: Routledge Library Editions. Popp, Georg. 2018. “Notes on the Omani Kitchen Eating with Tradition.” Just Landed. https:// www.justlanded.com/english/Oman/Articles/Culture/Notes-on-the-Omani-Kitchen Ray, Bryan. 2008. Dangerous Frontiers: Campaigning in Somaliland and Oman. Barnsley, UK: Pen and Sword, Ltd.

32  Culture, research and methodology Rodionov, Mikhail. 2012. “Honey, Coffee, and Tea in Cultural Practices of Ḥaḍramawt,” in Herbal Medicines in Yemen: Traditional Knowledge and Practice, and Their Value for Today’s World. Ingrid Hehmeyer and Hanne Schönig, eds. Boston, MA: Brill. 143–52. Risse, Marielle. 2011. “John Clare Looks Good in a Dishdash: Linking John Clare to Middle Eastern Poetry.” John Clare Society Journal 30: 53–63. Risse, Marielle. 2012. “Using Local Voices in Literature Classrooms,” Learning and Teaching in Higher Education: Gulf Perspectives 9. http://lthe.zu.ac.ae/index.php/ lthehome/article/view/71 Risse, Marielle. 2013a. “Frosty Cliffs, Frosty Aunt and Sandy Beaches: Teaching Aurora Leigh in Oman,” Ariel: A Review of International English Literature 43(4): 123–45. Risse, Marielle. 2013b. “Verstehen/ Einfühlen in Arabian Sands (1959): Wilfred Thesiger as Traveler and Anthropologist.” Journeys: The International Journal of Travel & Travel Writing 14(1): 23–39. Risse, Marielle. 2013c. “Who Are You Calling ‘Coddled’?: ‘Cloistered Virtue’ and Choosing Literary Texts in a Middle Eastern University.” Pedagogy 14: 415–27. Risse, Marielle. 2015. “Generosity, Gift-giving and Gift-avoiding in Southern Oman.” Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies 45: 289–96. http://archaeopress.com/ArchaeopressShop/Public/displayProductDetail. asp?id={EE6A77A7-C282-4872-A17D-070CAEF2FDDF} Risse, Marielle. 2019a. Community and Autonomy in Southern Oman. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan. Risse, Marielle. 2019b. “An Ethnographic Discussion of Fairy Tales from Southern Oman.” Fabula: Zeitschrift für Erzählforschung/Journal of Folktale Studies/Revue d’Etudes sur le Conte Populaire 60(3–4): 318–35. Rubin, Aaron. 2014. The Jibbali Language of Oman: Grammar and Texts. Boston, MA: Brill. Rubin, Aaron. 2015. “Recent Developments in Jibbali.” Journal of Semitic Studies 60: 431–41. Salloum, Habeed, Muna Salloum and Leila Salloum Elias. 2013. Scheherazade’s Feast: Foods of the Medieval Arab World. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. Saunders, J. P. 1846. “A Short Memoir of the Proceedings of the Honorable Company’s Surveying Brig ‘Palinurus,’ during Her Late Examination of the Coast between Ras Morbat and Ras Seger, and between Ras Fartak and the Ruins of Mesinah.” Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London 16: 169–86. Sobh, Rana and Russell Belk. 2011. “Domains of Privacy and Hospitality in Arab Gulf Homes.” Journal of Islamic Marketing 2(2): 125–37. Sobh, Rana, Russell Belk, and Jonathan Wilson. 2013. “Islamic Arab Hospitality and Multiculturalism.” Marketing Theory 13(4): 443–63. St Albans, Suzanne. 1980. Where Time Stood Still: A Portrait of Oman. London: Quartet Books Ltd. Stoller, Paul and Cheryl Olkes. 1986. “Bad Sauce, Good Ethnography.” Cultural Anthropology 1(3): 336–52. Sutton, David. 2010. “Food and the Senses.” Annual Review of Anthropology 39: 209–23. Sutton, David. 2019. “The Anthropology of Cooking,” in The Handbook of Food and Anthropology. Jakob Klein and James Watson, eds. London: Bloomsbury Academic. 349–69. Swift, Candice Lowe, ed. 2015. Teaching Food and Culture. London: Routledge. Tabook, Salim Bakhit. 1997. Tribal Practices and Folklore of Dhofar, Sultanate of Oman. Unpublished PhD thesis, Faculty of Arts, Exeter University.

Culture, research and methodology  33 Thesiger, Wilfred. 1991[1959]. Arabian Sands. New York: Penguin. Thomas, Bertram. 1932, reprint. Arabia Felix: Across the Empty Quarter of Arabia. London: Jonathan Cape. Trabulsi, Fawwaz. 1972. “The Liberation of Dhufar.” MERIP Reports 6: 3–11. Tremayne, Penelope. 1977. “‘End of a Ten Years War.” Journal of the Royal United Services Institute for Defense Studies 122(1): 44–8. van Esterik Penny, Alice Julier and Carole Counihan, eds. 2018. Food and Culture: A Reader. London: Routledge. vom Bruck, Gabriele. 2005. “The Imagined ‘Consumer Democracy’ and Elite (Re) Production in Yemen.” Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 11(2): 255–75. Valeri, Marc. 2010. “High Visibility, Low Profile: The Shi’a In Oman Under Sultan Qaboos.” International Jounral of Midde East Studies 42(2): 251–68. Valeri, Marc. 2013. “Domesticating Local Elites: Sheikhs, Walis and State-Building Under Sultan Qaboos,” in Regionalizing Oman. Political, Economic and Social Dynamics. S. Wippel, ed. Heidelberg: Springer. 267–77. Valeri, Marc. 2015. “The Suhar Paradox: Social and Political Mobilisations in the Sultanate of Oman since 2011.” Arabian Humanities 4. http://cy.revues.org/2828 Valeri, Marc. 2017 [2009]. Oman: Politics and Society in the Qaboos State. New York: Columbia. Watson, Janet. 2013. “Travel to Mecca in the Pre-motorized Period,” in The Hajj: Collected Essays. Venetia Porter and Liana Saif, eds. London: The British Museum. 96–9. Watson, Janet, Miranda Morris, Alex Bellem, Domenyk Eades, Alec Moore, and Saeed Al-Mahri. 2020. Modern South Arabian Languages. https://ahc.leeds.ac.uk/ modern-south-arabian-languages Weir, Shelagh. 2007. A Tribal Order: Politics and Law in the Mountains of Yemen. Austin: University of Texas Press. Wilkinson, J.C. 1971. “The Oman Question: The Background to the Political Geography of South-East Arabia.” The Geographical Journal 137(3): 361–71. Wilkinson, J.C. 1972. “The Origins of the Omani State,” in The Arabian Peninsula: Society and Politics. Derek Hopwood, ed. Towowa, NJ: Rowman and Littlefield. 67–88. Wilkinson, J.C. 2013. Water & Tribal Settlement in South-East Arabia (Studies on Ibadism and Oman). New York: Georg Olms Verlag. Wikan, Unni. 1977. “Man Becomes Woman: Transexualism in Oman as a Key to Gender Roles.” Man 12: 304–19. Wikan, Unni. 1982. Behind the Veil in Arabia: Women in Oman. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Wikan, Unni. 1984. “Shame and Honor: A Contestable Pair.” Man 19: 635–52. Wikan, Unni. 2012. “Oman: The ‘Forgotten Corner’ of the Arab Spring.” Middle East Policy 19(3): 98–115. Wikan, Unni. 2013. “Travel to Mecca in the Pre-motorized Period,” in The Hajj: Collected Essays. Venetia Porter and Liana Saif, eds. London: The British Museum. 96–9. Worrall, James. 2014. Statebuilding and Counterinsurgency in Oman: Political, Military and Diplomatic Relations at the End of Empire. London: IB Tauris. Yadav, Stacey Philbrick. 2018. “Ethnography Is an Option: Learning to Learn in/ through Practice,” in Political Science Research in the Middle East and North Africa: Methodological and Ethical Challenges. Janine A. Clark and Francesco Cavatorta, eds. New York: Oxford University Press. 166–7.

34  Culture, research and methodology Yamani, Mai. 2000. “You Are What You Cook’: Cuisine and Class in Mecca,” in A Taste of Thyme: Culinary Cultures of the Middle East. Sami Zubaida and Richard Tapper, eds. New York: I.B. Tauris Publishers. 159–72. Yasmeen. 2018. Omani Cuisine. http://www.omanicuisine.com/ [link now closed, accessed in May, 2018, see: https://facesoman.com/omani-cuisine/] Zarins, Juris. 2001. The Land of Incense: Archaeological Work in the Governorate of Dhofar, Sultanate of Oman, 1990–1995. Muscat, Oman: Sultan Qaboos University Publications.

2 Procuring foodstuffs Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying

Food and geography/land use Dhofar has five distinct geographic regions, moving from south to north: beach, plains, mountains, nejd and desert. The southern border is the Indian Ocean; in front of the city of Salalah and extending to the west towards the port and to the east to the coastal town of Taqa there is a straight, white sand beach about 40 km long. Further to the east and west, the mountains come down to the ocean so there is either no beach or small, sheltered bays. Behind the beach, in the area around and behind Salalah, there is a flat plain that extends for about ten miles to the north called jarbaeb in Gibali. The area closest to the beach is neighborhoods of houses, stores and (on the eastern side) small, walled farms. The northern section, approaching the foothills, is mostly left open; in khareef (the monsoon season, June–September) it is inhabited by camel herders who build make-shift corrals and tents, usually a metal frame covered with water-proof tarp. Some have four sides with metal bars with a metal slat door so that fodder and personal possessions can be stored safely; some are more open, for relaxing or having meals with family and friends. Directly behind Salalah and at several points to the east and west there are roads that lead up into the mountains where there are a few scattered towns and settlements. The mountains are Jebel al Qamar (jebel is “mountain” in Arabic, qamar is “moon” in Arabic) to the east of Salalah, Jebel al Qara behind Salalah, and Jebel Samhan to the west of Salalah; but they are referred to both as one entity (“the mountain”) and in the plural. Jebel al Qamar continues to the east to the Hadhramaut region in Yemen; Samhan is the highest, over 2,000 m (see Zarins 2001: 23). Most families who live in the mountains own cows, camels and/or goats; some have walled plots of land for growing vegetables and/or fruit trees. There are some springs and a few wild plants which produce food such as figs. Further to the north and west, in the areas where there is little or no effect from the monsoon, the land dries out. Some areas have frankincense trees and/or aloes. The nejd is the area on the far side of the mountains as they slope down to the desert (to the north and north-east of Salalah) with fewer people, settlements and plants. People mainly have goats and, especially in Thumreit, a town on the way to Muscat, women are famous for braiding palm fronds into bowls and mats.

36  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying This flat area, between where the mountains end and the desert begins, is the site of several melon farms, irrigated with pumped water. North-east of Thumreit is the archeological site of Shisur, which is on the edge of the true desert, the Empty Quarter. This area, the north-east section of Dhofar, has another small town, Hashman, which is the most common starting place for desert adventures.1 In the past, all land was under the control of a tribe. Ending tribal ownership of land (especially sources of water) was one of the demands of the rebels during the Dhofar War. When the former ruler, Sultan Qaboos, assumed power in 1970 he declared that all open (undeveloped land) was owned by the government; however people still know and discuss the previous tribal boundaries.2 Technically this means that all territory that is not walled (claimed or owned) is open to every Omani but there are different practical applications to this. Beach areas are open for relaxing, picnicking and fishing, with the caveat that swimming in Western-style swimsuits should only be done in front of the beachfront hotels or in areas without Omanis. Expats can fish from the shore or boats but only with an inexpensive license and only for personal consumption. Expats, for example, cannot bring large nets to catch sardines. In everyday practice, people enjoying the view and fishermen are usually at the beach at different times and in different areas, although near Salalah one can see fishermen’s trucks driving on packed sand in front of picnickers. Any Dhofari woman can come to any rocky shore during low tides to take mussels, but realistically a woman will only go to places near her house, which usually means in the area formally controlled by her tribe. The flat plain is now arid and is open to all people for picnics. The area used to be fertile but now has no food value beyond scant fodder during the khareef (monsoon season) when mountain dwellers bring their camels down from the mountains.3 Camels have flat, soft feet and can’t get traction on the slippery, muddy mountain ground and need to be in the flat land when it rains. The empty areas become full of temporary corrals and tents, with people staking out small plots according to customary use. In the mountains, land is similarly open for picnickers; there are many dirt and gravel roads, which anyone may use for sight-seeing, picnics and camping. In the past few years, however, the government has started to put concrete barriers by some main roads to stop people (Omanis and expats) from driving as they please over land in order to preserve the grass for animal fodder. The government has also started to build concrete shelters next to parking lots in an attempt to corral people into paved areas because sometimes picnickers will leave all their trash (food, plastic bottles, used diapers, etc.) behind. The problem is not just unsightliness but that herd animals will eat the trash and become sick. For all gardens and farms near the beach, in the plains and mountains, passers-by should not eat or take any fruits or vegetables. Even very close relatives, neighbors and friends should call the owner to ask permission before taking anything, as a fisherman might take a fish from a close friend’s “box” (fish trap) if he is in need. Produce is very inexpensive and to steal any is seen as reprehensible.

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  37 The areas of the nejd and desert have little or no value in terms of food production, apart from the recently built melon farms and occasional goat or camel herds.4 Sometimes after heavy rainfall, people come to the dry areas of the mountains, near the nejd, to hunt for a kind of mushroom which grows under the crust of the earth, then breaks through, causing a recognizable kind of pattern of cracks. Janzen notes that fronds from a dwarf palm tree (‘azat or gazaf) in this area are used for weaving baskets, mats, ropes and the wide bowls used for milking livestock (1986: 113). The issues of extracting resources such as water and animal fodder are complicated. In Janzen’s “The Destruction of Resources among the Mountain Nomads of Dhofar” (2000), a follow-up to his Nomads in the Sultanate of Oman: Tradition and Development in Dhofar (1986), he explains that Before 1974, when all the tribal land was nationalized, land ownership and land use were based on common law … [and] each tribal area spanned all the different natural environments between the mountains and the coast … extreme over-grazing was prevented because the low number of waterholes in the wadis [dry river beds] could sustain only a limited size of herd. The lack of medical and veterinary facilities resulted in a high mortality rate of humans and animals alike. Traditionally only female animals were kept for milk and rearing calves. (2000: 162, 163, 165) He argues that the nationalization of land, and the resulting weakness of a tribe’s ability to oversee land usage, has led to current problems of deforestation and over-grazing. Previously, people could only own as many animals as the land available to them would support, but now “According to current law, all pasture land is open to livestock regardless of ownership” (166). Thus, with pumped water and the right to bring animals to land previously controlled by other tribes, herd sizes have grown. Some herds are maintained by the town-wages of relatives who pay for the low salaries of expat herders, fodder (hay) and feed (pellets); “the resultant over-grazing is aggravated by the fact that the best pastures are also being used by non-Jabali livestock-keeps, especially camel herders. Since camel urine makes the grass unpalatable to cattle, the cattle-herders lose even more pasture [in the mountains]” (Janzen 2000: 170). Janzen advises that “excessively large herds should be rapidly reduced” (172) and “exclusive rights of use for a clearly defined area should be granted to a specific group in return for the acceptance of ‘ecological responsibility’ (the revival of traditional practice)” (173). This echoes Chatty’s argument in “Integrating Participation into Research and Consultancy” (2000).5 Some herds bring sustenance for families; other herds are a kind of cheap insurance policy (up-keep costs are than the price camels will fetch if they need to be sold) or merely for the purpose of saying “we have camels.” The resultant over-grazing causes soil degradation on the mountain and, just as seriously, increased run-off of water that formerly recharged the groundwater.

38  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying

The food year This brief overview was inspired by Blake, Mellor, Crane, and Osz’s “Eating in Time, Eating Up Time” (2009), with its discussion of how food and eating are “embedded, constrained, and enabled by time and space” and how provisioning and feeding has a daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly rhythm. I will talk about foodways as pertaining to lifecycle stages such as pregnancy, birth, marriage and ageing in Chapter 6; here I discuss foodways in terms of calendrical and national seasons, as well as religious events. As Omanis don’t celebrate the Gregorian New Year, it makes sense to start the year in September, the time of going back to normalcy after the khareef (monsoon) in which Dhofar is inundated with thousands of visitors enjoying the cool, drizzly weather. In September, the sun comes back and there are a few glorious weeks in which the mountains are green but there are fewer foggy days so one can see. Students in primary and secondary levels go back to school on a Sunday, either the last week of August or the first week of September.6 Colleges and universities usually start the second or third week. Vacation time is over and the food timings adjusted, in that children are fed before school. Thus breakfast is at 6:30am or so for school children, then perhaps tea and bread at 10am for younger children and those who don’t work. Once the ground has dried out and is not slippery, camels, which spent the khareef on the flat plains to the north of Salalah, are herded back up the mountain. All concerned tribes meet together to determine which day camels might be moved so that all groups have equal, fair access to the new, lush grass in the mountains.7 A person might decide to bring the camels later, but no one may go before the date decided on. Cows stay in the mountains during khareef as their hooves have better traction in muddy ground and they move around less than camels. In September, cows return to a regular schedule of wandering or being herded during the day and staying in corrals at night. For fishermen, September until March/April is the time for “throwing boxes” (fish traps dropped in deep water) and sardines. Sardines (usually along the western part of the Dhofar coast) are caught in seine nets from a boat or with men holding one end on shore and the boat circling out to entrap the sardines, bringing the other end back to shore to another set of men who will pull it in. Sometimes a small amount of fresh sardines is kept and given or sold to fishermen to use as bait. Most sardines are dried on open, flat areas of sand or gravel and used for camel and cow feed.8 October is a low-key month. There are no major changes or disruptions. Cooking outside, either on picnics or while camping, happens frequently because the weather is not too hot, with little chance of windstorms or rainstorms. The sea has quieted down and beach picnics are pleasant again; it is possible, towards the end of the month, to go swimming in the ocean. November is a month of celebrations. November 18 is Oman’s national day (the birthday of Sultan Qaboos, the former ruler) and there is always a two-day vacation, usually towards the end of the month, not on the actual day. It is also

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  39 the month of college and university graduations, so there are lots of parties. There is also occasional rain as the weather turns cooler. Storms (rarely hurricanes) disrupt fishing patterns as high winds mean that men won’t go out in boats. But the accompanying rain is very welcome, especially in the mountains where rain means livestock owners will be able to spend less on buying fodder or feed. Sometimes the cool, dry winter windstorms from the north start at the end of November, with winds for a few days between 15 and 50 kph, and gusts that range from unpleasant to dangerous. Sometimes the wind carries sand with it, causing white-outs and playing havoc with animals. Trees and plants can be damaged and, depending on how strong the wind is, most outdoor activities stop. December is notable as the abalone diving season. In the past the high price and relative scarcity of abalone meant that a man could earn enough money to buy a car, start building a house and or pay the dowry for marriage during the season, which can last from one to three weeks. It is somewhat like the deer season in the American Midwest, in that men go diving year after year with the same group (friends, brothers, cousins) and often have a specific place where they camp. But unlike deer season, it is an all-encompassing time commitment. Men with jobs take vacation and adopt a pattern of rising at dawn, diving most of the day, eating a quick dinner and sleeping right after sunset. Thus in the coastal towns to the east of Salalah, the season brings an influx of men and changes to family patterns as there is little or no daily communication with brothers, fathers, sons, uncles and nephews. There are less abalone now and the government has not opened the season several times in the last decade but, for example, in 2019, the season opened for ten days starting December 11. January first is not celebrated beyond a few parties at hotels; it is a regular work day.9 January is seen as a good month for weddings as the weather is cool and, if there was rain during the winter, livestock might still be able to eat wild vegetation. The end of the month is the time of school exams. The structure is one exam per day for six days or more (depending on the grade level), with younger students going first. Moms who work often take days off or leave early and meals are sometimes adjusted. Households usually organize around helping children so that parents, older siblings and whoever else is in the house prioritize those who are studying. This can mean making the children’s favorite meals or ordering in food, either because the people who usually cook are helping others study (or are studying themselves) or as a treat. When exams are done, and if the results are good, families usually go on picnics or to a restaurant for a celebration meal. After exams, the vacation schedule of sleeping late/ having breakfast late starts. School starts again at the beginning of February For fishermen, the end of January/ beginning of February until the end of May is tuna season. The best times are March and April, depending on ocean temperature, and there is no government regulation. The market price is set by the men who buy the catch. Fishermen make daily decisions based on weather and reports from other fishermen about whether to check boxes or look for tuna. In March the weather starts to turn warmer. Depending on how much rain fell in the previous khareef and whether rain fell during the winter, the mountains

40  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying may now be dry and herders might have to buy fodder and feed. The periodic winter windstorms are usually finished by the end of March. For fishermen, March to the end of April is lobster season, which is regulated by the government to ensure sustainability. There are “ocean police” in boats and on land with binoculars occasionally checking on what fishermen are doing.10 As with abalone, if an older relative asks for one outside the season, one might be caught but never openly sold. In April, the hot weather starts. Picnics and camping are less frequent. May, like November, is a month of weather changes, with hurricanes and rainstorms some years. Towards the end of May, there are final exams with the same household eating pattern adjustments as explained above. One difference is that the final year (12th grade) students begin their exams after all the other grades have finished so in households with many children, the priority is given to younger kids, then the focus turns to the oldest students. Then there are celebrations for students who are finishing high school. In June, the weather starts to break and clouds come in. It gets cloudy at sunset, with cloud-cover increasing until it is grey all day. This is the favorite weather for Dhofaris, cool and drizzly, and June, July, and August are seen as the best time for marriages. The official start of khareef (monsoon) is the summer solstice, June 21, but this can vary by year.11 June 21 is also the accepted date for traditional, rain-fed mountain farms to plant crops. These farms are usually a few hundred square meters, walled with rocks and planted with cucumbers, dugar (cowpeas), and dhara (corn). Newer farms are usually larger, surrounded by cement block walls, containing a larger variety of plants and watered during the dry months by a well or water truck (see below). It usually takes a few weeks for the mountains to turn green so visitors don’t usually arrive until the beginning of July.12 The large number of visitors changes some Dhofari foodways because restaurants and grocery stores are now extremely busy and sometimes basics like milk are in short supply. Roads are crowded so while many families enjoy picnics in the mountains, some curtail activities such as going out to dinner or picnics. For example, some women (of their own volition or encouraged by their families) avoid the mall during khareef. Another change is that no one goes to the beach as swimming is forbidden because of the dangerous undertow and the high waves crashing down create a drenching spray of salt water. As the clouds approach, camels are herded down from the mountains to the plains behind (the north of) Salalah and a tent city appears as herders set up make-shift corrals and dwellings. Cows stay up in the mountains in khareef, with an inverted schedule. They are herded into small shelters during the day and let out to feed at night because of the multitudes of flies during the day. The cows would be so harassed by flies during the day, they would not be able to feed. Sometimes, slow burning, smoky fires (palm fronds are excellent for this) are lit to keep flies away. For fishermen, the beginning of the khareef means only the most skilled men can go out in boats (to catch squid or “deep” fish which usually can’t be caught by lines) in the rough sea. Many men fish from “the rocks” (shore) for squid.

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  41 July 23 is “Renaissance” (renewal/rebirth) day, the day when Sultan Qaboos ascended the throne after a bloodless coup d’état in 1970, another day of celebration with parties. It is unclear if the current ruler, Sultan Haitham, will make any changes to national holidays. Towards the end of khareef, food grown in the traditional and newer-style farms in the mountains is ready: fresh cucumbers and cowpeas are enjoyed, as is a kind of bulb from the white flower gladiolus candidus. Honey and samn (clarified butter, called “oil” in English) produced during and at the end of khareef is especially prized for its taste because the bees have plentiful flowers to choose from and cows are feeding on fresh grass every day. Samn can also be made from goat milk but camel milk does not contain enough fat to make a thick samn. Within this yearly rotation, there are several other factors. The most important are the two Eids (discussed in detail in Chapter 4); they take precedence over all other activities such as school starting and ending dates, exams, weddings, work projects etc. In 2020, Ramadan will start around April 24, so that Eid al Fitr will be around May 24. Eid al Adha will be around July 31. The dates move forward every Gregorian calendar year about 11 days. The three other Islamic holy days celebrated in Oman are Isra and Mi'raj (approximately March 22, 2020), the day Muhammad is believed to have ascended into heaven; Hijra/Muharram (approximately August 20, 2020), Islamic New Year/ beginning of the first lunar month; and Mawlid al Nabi (approximately October 29, 2020), the prophet’s birthday. All government offices and schools are closed and many Omanis do extra prayers, but there are no public celebrations. Depending on the day and the season, families might use the time to have a picnic. Two monthly considerations are the salary and the moon. Government and private sector salaries are given once a month on the 21st/ 22nd. For a week or so after this time, grocery stores are packed as people stock up. Restaurants are usually busy as promised treats/ celebrations that were postponed for lack of funds are now undertaken. Depending on the time of year (see above), weddings are often planned for the end of the month. Also working adults in households will usually go to the small shops (bread, vegetable, fruit, convenience stores) near their houses and pay off or pay down the household tab. The moon is important as the full moon is the prime picnic time. During khareef, people picnic during the day because the fog makes it dangerous to drive at night; during the rest of the year, picnics are often at night and are best under full moonlight. On Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights in clement weather with a full moon, families and groups of friends head out to beaches or the mountains. Within the weekly schedule, work days are Sunday to Thursday. Friday morning is usually for sleeping late and talking to family, with a big family lunch after Friday noon prayers. Because many Dhofaris live in large houses headed by a man and wife, with their married sons, daughters-in-law and grand-children, unmarried sons, unmarried/divorced daughters and other relatives, Friday is often seen as the time for a wife to be with her husband’s family, so some families create a second tradition of women going back to their parent’s home on Thursdays to have a large family meal.

42  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying

Crops13 One crop that is not found in Salalah is dates. The weather is not hot enough for long enough to produce the fruit.14 Decorative date trees, often at hotels or in public spaces, have their fronds cut and have the familiar ‘palm’ shape; wild ones look like angry porcupines, a round ball of spiky, difficult-to-cut fronds. As dates aren’t local and have always been imported, there is less of a tradition of Arabic coffee and dates being served to guests than in the northern parts of Oman (see Limbert 2008, 2010). Arabic coffee and dates are only essential for the Eids; Dhofaris often serve tea and coconut-flavored cakes for ordinary visits. Personal use Before the 1970s, most houses were built of mud brick; there were some made of rocks or coral blocks. In the mountains, people sheltered in caves and round structures consisting of a curved rock wall built up several feet with a roof made of interlocking tree branches. Now all houses are made of cement block and, in town, are on lots of usually 600 m. Most are designed by the owner; there are a few government housing projects. In the center part of Salalah houses open directly onto the street but most houses have a 6–8 ft-high concrete-block wall around them. The area between the wall and house is usually paved with small concrete tiles or bricks, sometimes colored and referred to as “interlock.” The enclosed area (haoush) is used for parking or as a play area for smaller children. The area along the side of house is often used to dry clothes. Some families have decorative plants (e.g. oleander, hibiscus, jasmine, queenof-the-night, bougainvillea) inside the wall; some have trees such as lime, papaya, banana, pomegranate, coconut or pots with mint or basil. It’s less usual to find olive, custard apple, almond, mango, orange, grapefruit, cherry, chikoo (sapodilla) or avocado trees and decorative plants such as roses and gardenias. Other plants might include lemongrass, prickly pear, parsley, cilantro or green onions. Newer houses are usually built to take up the entire lot; older houses are often smaller and set back from the street with more open space in front, so there could be older, large trees such as fig and guava. Some homeowners also plant trees in the space between the wall defining their property and the road; these are usually decorative (such as ficus, or non-food, such as henna) and protected with netting or metal fences so they aren’t eaten by wandering camels or donkeys or hit by cars. All the mentioned plants can be purchased at one of the several nurseries in Salalah; these also sell gardening equipment for both a home-based gardener and commercial enterprises: seeds, watering cans, gardening gloves, hoses, pesticides, mulch, compost, etc. Some homeowners have a double plot, with the house on one side and larger (400 or 500 m2) garden. Sometimes it is designed to be a pleasure garden with a tiled area, fountain, play house for children, sitting area for adults etc.; it can also be made into a vegetable and fruit garden, with the plan to build a second

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  43 house on the site later so there might be fruit trees around the edges and furrows with herbs such as mint and basil, or vegetables, such as peas or cowpeas.15 In the mountains, there are similar small plots, walled with a few courses of unpainted cement blocks and planted with trees, next to or near houses. Farms in Salalah In Salalah, especially in the south and eastern section there are several larger farms, some 100 m2. All the land is owned by Dhofaris and worked by expat laborers. Some are without walls but most have cement block walls and at least one small house where the workers live. The main crops are bananas, coconuts, limes, mango, papaya, and sugar cane; spinach, parsley, cilantro, basil, and mint are also grown. The crops are either sold from the farm (a covered, waist-high counter set into a section of the cement wall) or at one of a series of shacks with plastic tarps covered by palm fronds along the main roads parallel to the beach. These sell bananas, coconuts, sugar cane, etc. One can purchase fruit by the kilo; some shacks have a cooler for unripe coconuts. The stall-holder will cut off the top with a machete and give you the opened coconut with a straw to drink the milk. Having working farms so close to the center of the city means fresh produce is readily and cheaply available for those who don’t have access to produce from family members. In large grocery stores, fresh Salalah banana bunches are hung up on stands and you can cut as many ‘hands’ as you wish. When you buy from the fruit shacks, you ask not just for the type of bananas (by size) but say whether you want to eat them immediately or the next day. Fresh fruit juices are available everywhere. Farms in the mountains In the foothills and mountains, there are walled plots ranging in size from 200 to over 1000 m2; most are about 500. Older crop areas are walled with stone walls; some were created after the Dhofar War but most of the recent ones are about waist high and made of cement blocks, mainly to keep animals out. These usually can be looked after by the owner with the help of an expat worker, who usually does not live onsite. Older plots are sited to take best advantage of rain and sun or for being close to seasonal dwellings etc.; they were planted at the beginning of khareef, harvested at the end and left fallow the rest of the year. Newer ones are sited both for growing considerations and ease of access by truck for both owners and water deliveries so the crops can be grown year-round.16 As older farms were smaller and rain-fed, the main crops were munj (peas), thareet or dhura (corn), dugar (cowpeas),17 and cucumbers.18 Newer plots frequently have lime,19 mango, guava, pomegranate, papaya, jackfruit, fig and soursop trees. Less common plants include almond, cherry, coffee, orange, olive, and jamun (black plum) trees, as well as herbs, strawberries, and prickly pear. The farms are often tended by expat workers who might not feel invested in how the trees grow and might not have any background or interest in horticulture.

44  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying Thus, sometimes, trees are not shaped or cut back at optimum times, or not at all. Plants are usually put in straight rows and not always planted for best results, e.g. too close, too far apart, with less than optimum drainage, not taking into account slopes and wallows. They are often weed-choked during and after khareef because of the frequent mist and rain. Wild vegetation Gibalis who live in the mountains recognize that there was greater knowledge of plants in the past; now that it is much easier to access food, finding wild plants to eat is not necessary. For example, a kind of wild tobacco that was smoked is no longer used. Wild figs were a treat in the past, but are now usually bought. There was also a kind of wild potato that grew under certain trees in the mountain that is no longer harvested. A few items are still gathered and enjoyed. At the end of khareef, the bulb of the white flower gladiolus candidus is dug out and cooked.20 There are mushrooms that grow in khareef and another kind that grows only on the northern, dry, side of the mountains. It appears only after heavy rainstorms, growing underground until the top breaks through the crust of the dried earth. Subar, the bitter fruit of the tamarind tree, is also collected and eaten.

Bee-keeping Honey is a prized commodity (see Chapter 4 for more details) and some Gibalis keep hives. In the past, men would gather honey from wild hives, but now wooden boxes are constructed and put in fertile areas. Sometimes a wild swarm is caught but bees can also simply be purchased. People learn from others how to manage the hives, which is usually not a full-time job but something to do on weekends, during vacation or after retirement. To give an example of scope, one man has 30 boxes (hives) which produce about 80 liters of honey twice a year. Each time the honey is gathered, about 20 liters are given to family members and 60 liters are sold, netting about 1,000 Omani Riyal (OR) a year, what in America is called “pocket money,” i.e. for gas, snacks, sweets for children, tobacco, etc.21 Bees are an interesting example of issues which arise while writing this book. I was sometimes given completely contradictory information when doing research but I could always align it by considering the age, gender or location of the speakers. For example one person told me that there were no cats in the mountains; four other informants told me about the practice of setting out milk for cats to keep them around to eat or kill insects and snakes (including cobras and vipers) in barnyards. The person who said there were no cats did not milk their livestock, whereas the other four did, thus explaining the contradiction. But asking about bees led to all sorts of differing interpretations which I don’t have time or resources to sort out. Briefly, there are understandings that 1) bees are the same as they have always been 2) a new type of bee was introduced by the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries which has improved honey-making 3) bees that were being transported escaped from their box at Salalah Port and now are

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  45 in the mountains killing local bees and producing inferior honey. I heard both that a) Dhofari bees are lazy and slow to make honey and b) Dhofari bees are the best honey-producers and are in danger of being kidnapped (bee-napped?) by non-Dhofaris. 22

Domesticated animals All camels, cows and goats in Dhofar are owned by someone and are given names.23 Goat herds are usually with a shepherd, but some cows and camels are let loose during the day and herded home at night. Camels usually travel the farthest so they are almost always branded (wasm).24 During and after the Dhofar War, there was government emphasis on improving access to food, which meant both well-drilling and improvements for both crops and herds; “the Special Air Service [SAS] helped form Civil Aid Teams (CATs) that sought to provide the civilian population with tangible benefits … CAT efforts ranged from the provision of simple medical care to the creation of a model farm that taught Dhofari how to improve crop and livestock yields” (Ladwig 2008: 72). Janzen notes “road and well construction – more than 160 deep water wells were drilled in the rural-nomadic area – the building of schools, of health-care facilities (hospitals and animal vaccination centres), of mosques and of low-cost housing … ‘cash gifts’ (pensions and subsidies, particularly for fodder purchases)” (2000: 166). There have been subsequent government attempts to increase the size and milk production; the “SAS established a model farm on the plain outside Salalah … [and imported] Hereford bulls” (Ladwig 2008: 74; also see Tabook 1997 and Higgins 2011). I have heard stories about how the first bulls brought in were too big and almost killed the cows they were supposed to mate with; there have been more successful later attempts of interbreeding.25 For more information about Dhofaris and livestock, see Ball, MacMillan, Tzanopoulos, Spalton, Al Hikmani and Moritz (2000) and Sale (1980). Camels Camels are the most prestigious animal as they are seen as a link to the past, are the most expensive animal and are needed for marriages and funeral feasts. There is a small but growing interest in camel races and camel beauty contests, but those are events organized by the government (partially for tourism purposes) and while people participate and enjoy they aren’t seen as part of traditional Dhofari culture. No one travels by camel now except for men such as Ahmed Harib al Mahrouqi, who does camel treks to promote Omani culture. A few Gibali men I know remember riding them as children and have stories from the older generation (fathers, uncles) about traveling by camel. As camels stick together, if someone is not sent to stay with them all day, herders and owners go out about 4pm to find them. Sometimes, camels will come home by themselves, naturally clumping together and often organizing themselves in lines nose to tail. Mothers have their teats tied up in a bag so babies

46  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying can’t nurse; this (and the idea of extra food, water and safety) keeps most camels returning home every night.26 I came home once to find about 20 camels tearing at the tree branches which hung over my garden wall. I got out of my car and walked across the street to watch them. After a few minutes, an old Toyota pick-up came screeching around the corner and a spry older gentleman hopped out and walked over to the herd, yelling and waving his hands. One of the neighborhood kids was standing with me and I asked him to tell the man to leave the camels alone. The tree was big enough and had enough branches inside the wall that the camels could not kill it. They were doing me a favor by trimming it back. The boy called over to the man who shrugged, got back in his pick-up and waited for them to finish their lunch. Herding camels For the khareef (June-September) camels are kept in camps on the flat plain (jarbaeb in Gibali) at the bottom of the mountains. To keep the camels from wandering into populated areas, between Salalah and the jarbaeb, the Dhofari municipality built a road which has a shoulder-high divide and is steeply graded so camels can’t cross it; camels, either on their own or with the prompting of herders, use the roundabout to get to the other side of this divide.27 A person can have any number of camels. A person with one or only a few will add them to a family member’s herd; relatives working together will rotate the daily responsibility of watching them, have one person do to the work or jointly hire a shepherd. Twenty to fifty camels with one owner is the median; some men have more than one hundred. Normal daily herding is done with one or two pick-ups or two or three men on motorbikes for longer distances; when you need to get camels moved across roads, the pick-ups park on the shoulder with blinkers on to let traffic know camels are close to crossing. If you come across a herd crossing, it is common to end up on the wrong side of the road with camels on all sides – a little nerve-wracking the first few times. In the mountains, men will drive on dirt tracks to a spot on the far side of the camels and then walk, waving a stick and whooping occasionally, them back to the corral or to a long stone or wood wind-break that the camels will bed down next to. Sometimes a man can simply hit the metal feeding troughs and holler and the camels will slowly perk up and start to move homewards. Once they get close to the corral or feeding spot they will sometimes start to trot or race each other, shouldering each other and humans need to get out of the way. The herding is done mainly by hired help, usually Indian or Pakistani workers, but some Gibali men will do it themselves and the owners know the names and characteristics of all their camels, including parents, age and temperament. Some older men keep camels almost as pets, seldom selling them as meat and spending a lot of money on feed to the occasional consternation of their children.28 Now and in the past, dried sardines are used as feed during the dry months. Men milk the lactating camels after they have been fed and watered in the evening; as camels are so tall, they do this standing up, balancing the bowl on

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  47 their raised knee. It’s somewhat precarious as it’s hard to keep one’s balance, even harder if the camel is moving about. The skin of a killed baby is kept and stretched on a piece of wood and put under the mother’s nose in the evening to keep her milk flowing; I have seen this myself and it is mentioned often in books on Southern Arabia. Young male camels are usually killed for meat as adult male camels are ornery and people usually only keep one or two males, which are usually kept tied up or in a corral. If a male camel is let out, it is usually hobbled. Sometimes men have to physically help male camels cover the females. Some herds are kept near permanent homes. Other herds are moved among several different places, depending on the season and rainfall. This space might be improved with a metal-framed tent which could be locked to hold supplies or a windbreak that a man or someone in his family made. The men who have camels know which area “belongs” to which man; the government technically owns the land, but people know usage patterns and people sometimes use the language of ownership. There are common vocalizations to tell camels to move (like an American “giddy-up”), to come, or that there is water and food. Men raised with camels will stop and help herd camels which are in the middle of roads, but under no other circumstances should anyone interfere with another person’s camels. Only if dying of thirst should anyone milk a camel that isn’t theirs. Children raised with camels have no fear, and those as young as four or five will move about a herd easily, pushing camels out of their way. Girls might work with camels until they reach near puberty, then family or social pressure will keep them from herding camels, but they might herd goats. Cows After camels, cows are the most important animal. Cow owners will argue that they are more useful than camels because they produce more milk and have more babies. 29 They are also said to have sweeter temperaments, but that is an argument I am not getting into, nor will I discuss which is smarter. They are usually kept in at night, especially calves, and let out to graze freely in the day like camels. Cows roaming free are a rarity on the Arabian Peninsula, so Gulf Arab tourists often stop to take photos of them as an exotic creature. The local type are small (shoulder-height), often with great curving horns, and are usually placid.30 Like camels, they stick together in groups and walk in line along the sides of roads but unlike camels, cows will often lie down or stand in the middle of roads, as roads hold the warmth of the day. As with camels, cows are usually milked by men, but a woman can do it if there are no men around. Cows and camels don’t get along well, and you seldom see them feeding near each other and they are very rarely intermixed in the same area. Most people have one or the other, a division which is partially based on tribes or clans within tribes. Some tribes are known for having a preference for one or the other; friends who have different animals will occasionally argue about the relative intelligence, worth or temperament of the two types of animals.

48  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying Cow’s milk is often turned into samn (clarified butter) and kept in an urnshaped metal container. This is seen as more valuable than milk and in the past was a primary exchange item in a system of barter with townsfolk (see Tabook 1997: 274). The same customs for herding camels obtains for cows; either a Gibali man or an expat supervised by Gibalis will be responsible for a herd of around 20–50 cows which might be owned all by one person or by several.31 Goats The third most important animal is the goat. Goats don’t have the prestige of cows or camels. They are herded by Gibali women or men, or an expat laborer. A herder usually stays with the goats all day. Families in town will sometimes buy a goat and keep it in the yard of their house for a few hours or days, especially before Eid al Adha. I was reading in my garden one evening and felt something tugging and chewing on my shirt. I looked down to find two goats snacking on my L.L. Bean Oxford shirt. Turns out my neighbor had bought three goats to fatten up for the Eid. He let them out of his garden every day at 5pm to let them forage and they would come over and snack on my flowers. Economics of livestock I spent several summers as a child on my Uncle Bob and Aunt Alice’s Wisconsin dairy farm and several of my cousins are farmers so I should have known better than to ask Gibalis “how much does a camel cost,” but I did. And got back the short sigh, head tilted back, hands outspread, world weary-look and sorrowful “Ya, Marielle,” response which means I was being utterly nonsensical. I cannot reproduce all the details of the many ensuing discussions but suffice it to say, there is no “price” for a camel, or cow or goat. One needs to take into consideration several factors, which are not listed here, in order of importance because different buyers and sellers would rank them differently. One is that some animals are never sold, no matter how much money is offered. Either the owner likes the animal (perhaps it once belonged to the owner’s parent, etc.) or simply does not want to sell it. Second, gender is important. Male animals are usually sold for meat at a young age (about four months for camels) as they are less useful than females which produce babies and milk. Third is the overall wellbeing of the animals – a fat and healthy animal will get a higher price. A further consideration is age, older animals are worth more. Also the situation of the owner (and/or relationship with the buyer) might be taken into account; for example, a wealthy relative might pay more than the expected or market price for an animal belonging to a poorer relative as a way to give assistance. An owner might give a heavily discounted price to a young male relative who is buying an animal for food for his wedding party. The last factor is the purpose of the animal. In the past, for example, camels were rarely sold for meat; usually they were purchased to produce milk or as riding animals. Now, animals are divided by “milk,” “meat” and “DNA” – meaning

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  49 some are used for milking, some to be consumed and some for their lineages and will be used for breeding and/or contests, such as the increasingly popular camel “beauty” and racing contests.32 With all these variables in mind, a four-month male camel might sell for about 300 Omani Riyal (OR) for consumption and between 2,000 and 7,000 OR for breeding. A full-grown camel might sell for about 900 OR for consumption; up to 10,000 OR, perhaps more, for breeding. For the most expensive type of camels (healthy females five years or older of good lineage used for breeding), the payment might be made without money, e.g. in exchange for a plot of land or a car.33 In the past (meaning the 1970s, before modernization) normally if a person had camels, they had only a few, between 1 and 10, a herd of cows was around 40 head, and goat herds were approximately 40–100. In Southern Arabia (2005 [1900]), Theodore and Mabel Bent met an elderly sheikh who had 500 head of cattle and 70 camels (250), a great wealth in the 1890s. Now camels are usually herded in groups of 20–100, with 60 being about average, cows 100–400, and goats 100–400. Herds rarely belong to one person but are usually owned by close relatives. For example, from 100 cows, 30 might belong to X, 35 to X’s father, 20 to X’s brother, 5 to X’s sister, 10 are owned individually by X’s nieces and nephews, etc. X might oversee the expat hired to take care of the herd, with X’s father also helping oversee and X’s brother buying fodder. It is antithetical to Gibali beliefs to count how much money each person contributes to the upkeep of livestock.34 Cow milk is sold, consumed and given away; the milk of camels and goats is usually never sold but consumed by the family and given away, partially because there are no commercial enterprises set up which would buy and process camel or goat milk. Sometimes in khareef boys stand by roads and sell liter bottles of camel milk, but that is because the camels are all herded onto the flat plain behind Salalah. With a lot of camels in one place, there can be an overabundance of milk. Livestock eat grass and foliage from various trees after khareef and if there are rains in the winter. If there is nothing to eat, food must be bought.35 Sardines are still used but some owners use hay and feed. A bale of hay costs between 800 baisa and 1.5 OR; 40 kg bags of livestock feed cost about 5 OR. As a rough estimate, if there is nothing else to eat, 20–25 camels will go through about 4 bales and 3 bags each day, costing about 20 OR per day. An expat shepherd’s salary can be about 100 OR per month, depending on age and experience. There is additional payment given for food (which could be 30 OR per month or higher) and housing is provided. The informants I know also give phone cards, clothing, bedding, bonuses and help provide rides to town on vacation days etc. An economic activity that has started in the last two decades is selling animal dung (usually cow, rarely camel, never goat), especially to farms in the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia. The brightly colored plastic sacks are piled by roadsides and picked up by middle-men who pay Gibalis about 200 baisa (about 50 cents) per sack and haul them away. Dung for fertilizer is not sold between Gibalis but is freely given to relatives and neighbors who want it.

50  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying Other domesticated animals Sheep are common in the north of Oman, but not Dhofar, perhaps because the heavy monsoon might be hard with thick wool. Those who have sheep have only a few, not large herds. Many families in the mountains and a few in towns also have chickens both for eggs and meat. Some Dhofaris have cats, dogs or parrots as pets, but not many. Wild dogs and cats are seen as dirty and carriers of dangerous diseases. “Wadi dogs,” the common wild breed, are a golden color, like a corgi but with long legs. They are often seen scrounging for food but I have never heard of them attacking people. A few dogs are brought in as guard dogs for houses and farms. Cats are scrawny and, in town, jump into dumpsters or eat leftover food that has been put on the ground for them. In the mountains, milk and leftover food is often put out for them. One Gibali told me that cats in the mountains were valued and given milk to keep them around because they are “like police,” i.e. they are smart and catch any mice, snakes or insects near the livestock and household. Cats, but not dogs, also haunt the jetties and shorelines near fishing towns. Fish that is not eatable is given to cats which are seen as dirty but useful in keeping vermin at bay; fishermen usually don’t feed seagulls, which are viewed as useless pests.

Sea fauna Many Gibali men in the towns to the west and east of Salalah fish either full or part time. A wide range of fish is eaten, with types and prices varying by season. Octopus and conchs are rarely eaten, as they take a great deal of effort to cook. Sea urchins and crabs are not eaten as they are seen as dirty. Sea turtles are also not eaten, more from custom, but there is now a government edict protecting turtles. Sea turtles can be dangerous as they are often near the surface and can cause a boat to turn over if the driver doesn’t see the turtle. Dolphins, whales and sharks are not eaten. Dolphins are viewed as positive, as they are an indicator of schools of tuna, but they aren’t seen as special or good luck. If we are fishing and there is a school nearby, the fishermen I know will take me closer to see them but would never bother on their own; they view dolphins rather like Americans view squirrels, cute but common. Whales have been known to surface close to boats in ways that appear that the whale wants to see what is going on. Like dolphins, men will take me closer to the whales because they know I want to see them but would not waste the gas if they were on their own. Live whales are of no particular interest, but a dead whale causes great excitement because of the possibility of ambergris (umber). This very precious commodity can only be sold to the government for a fixed price in an effort to regulate the market. At times umber simply washes up onto the beach for a very lucky person to find because a big piece can bring enough to buy a car or house. A dead whale found at sea might be towed away to show and cut open to look for umber, but there is no tradition (or examples I have heard of) of killing whales for meat or sport.

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  51 There are several kinds of sharks (including harmless whale sharks) which are viewed with a wary respect. Sharks occasionally bump boats menacingly or will, when caught, appear to play dead until next to the boat. During abalone season, sometimes one man will stay in the boat to keep a look out for sharks while the other men in his group are diving. Turtles, dolphins, and non-eatable fish are never harassed or killed deliberately for spite. There isn’t any sense of anthropomorphism but rather a conversing of energy along the lines of “this octopus/ turtle/ dolphin won’t hurt me so why should I expend effort to hurt it?” Fish that are too small to eat are thrown back if still alive, cut for bait or tossed to stray cats at the shore. The only sea creature that is always killed if possible is eels. Pearls used to be a trading commodity from Dhofar, but not in recent memory although a few of the men I know have found them. Fishing Any person can catch fish for personal use with an easy to get, inexpensive license.36 The license is more for the government to know who is fishing; I have never heard of or seen anyone being asked to produce a license for casual fishing, whereas fishing for large catches is restricted to Omanis and regulated, especially for the two kinds of seafood with restricted seasons: lobster and abalone.37 Fishing casually (for dinner or for a relative) is done “from the rocks,” i.e. from shore even if it is on a beach, with a line that is whirled over the head, like throwing a lasso, and released. This section will concentrate on Gibalis who own or have access to a “boat” which in Dhofar refers to a specific kind of vessel used for fishing.38 There are a few day excursion boats at some of the hotels for dolphin-viewing, snorkeling, and diving trips, but for Gibali men, being on a boat is work. The typical fishing boat is fiberglass, about 18, 23, 25 or 28 ft long, about 6 ft wide, always white with a stripe or swatch of bright blue. Newer boats have a registration number on them. Some men will casually give their boat a name, but it’s not written on it. Most engines are 60 or 75 hp. Boats that will be used close to shore might have 25 hp; a man who goes after tuna, which often necessitates being out of sight of land for hours, usually has a 200 hp motor or two engines. Good engines have a key start but most are hand-pull; nicer boats have a steering wheel but normally they are steered by the engine handle, with a tall piece of wood lashed to the side of the boat for a man to hold on to for balance when standing. Gibali men who regularly fish know each other’s boats and usual routine. Most men have their own boat, but will sometimes go in a friend’s or brother’s boat depending on what they are fishing for, who has money for gas etc. Most boats have a built-in cool box for fish close to the engine, then a place to stand about 4 x 6 foot, then another built-in cool box, then the bow. Fishing supplies are tossed in plastic crates and plastic bags: small paring knives, small sheets (8 in.2) of lead, small bags of hooks, spools of line, plastic detergent bottles wrapped in line, and a round plastic basin. Bait is a plastic bag of dead sardines or squid or plastic spinners, depending on what the men are fishing for. There is

52  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying always a wooden chair leg or similar object to club eels (which slither around and gnash their teeth) or any large, biting fish. Line-fishing in a boat is done by dropping a line weighted with a small piece of lead into the water and hand-hauling the fish up. Men peer over the side at what is coming up and will call for the bludgeon (wooden chair leg) if it is an eel. “Throwing boxes” is the term for a fish trap. Most Gibali men buy the component parts and make them by hand, sometimes with the help of expat laborers. The result is a flat-bottomed, metal trap with a rounded top and funnel opening. These are tied to buoys (usually empty plastic containers such as laundry soap jugs) and dropped in the sea. The color and type of containers, color and type of rope and knots mark an individual owner. Men come to check them every few days, hand-hauling them up or using a winding winch. Close friends can check each other’s boxes, but it is unforgivable for a man to take from another’s trap without telling him before or immediately after with a reason. Men can put boxes in and take them out as they please but the sea-water rusts the traps so they never last more than a year and, in any case, they need to be taken out before the khareef or any heavy storm as the boxes would be destroyed on the rocks or taken out to sea. As boats can’t be locked up, supplies are taken out when tied up. Boats kept on the beach in town are left with the engines on, but gas canisters are usually taken out. Boats left on more distant beaches usually have the engine removed. Men aren’t worried about “stealing” per se but “borrowing.” Like cars, in Gibali towns, all the men know who owns what boat, and friends and relatives can ask to use it. At sea, everyone sees their boat as being at the disposal of all other fishermen and everyone else’s boat as being at their disposal. They have a system of hand signals to convey information from a distance and if anyone needs something, he will signal, and the two boats will pull up alongside each other. It is an absolute inviolate law that fishermen share what they have when asked. If, for example, one man needs to go back to shore, any boat heading to shore will take him. In the past, camel, cow and goat herders had to make a series of calculations every day regarding where to find food, but with wells and bought fodder, daily routine is now a little more settled. Fishermen still live by making such daily reckonings whether to throw boxes, fish from the rocks, mend nets, try for sardines or tuna, etc. depending on wind, wave size, and temperature. The men who fish daily are in constant contact with each other and readily share information. For example, in tuna season the men who go out early will tell others where they saw dolphins.39 Some fishermen don’t know how to swim and there is rarely if ever safety equipment such as life-preservers, but many men carry satellite phones. Men trust in Allah and in the fact that is something does go wrong, the whole fishing community will help. If an engine breaks down or if chasing tuna causes a man to end up far from his town as night comes on, any fisherman can go to any house in any of the villages along the coast and be given dinner and a place to sleep in the majlis. Chances are he will have family or friends in the town or who will drive to get him, but the law of hospitality is acknowledged by all.

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  53 As all men know each other’s boats and habits, if a man doesn’t return and has not been in touch, men will start calling each other and other towns to get news. If there is no information, all fishing activities will stop as men search in a coordinated manner (i.e. different men given different sections of the ocean), liaising with the local government and military which will send helicopters and coastal patrol boats. All the fishermen I know have had close calls: sudden storms, boat bumped or pushed by sharks, engine dying, running out of gas, flipping the boat because of hitting a sea turtle, whale or high waves, etc. When they go out looking, they know that one day it could be themselves who is lost. Men sell their catch to one established contact (“agent”) who will sometimes drive to a remote beach to pick up the fish if the fisherman will not be bringing his boat back to town. The agent sets the price and there is no arguing, but the relationship can work like an informal bank. Often, the fisherman will be paid for the catch in cash but a fisherman might not take the money because he is saving up and wants a large amount of cash at a later time (given that if he has cash in hand, he might be asked for it). Likewise, a man can ask his agent for cash and promise to pay back with future catches. If there is only a small catch or relatives have asked for fish, he will call the agent and say that there is nothing to sell. All the men I know, following Gibali custom, give part of every catch away to relatives and neighbors; they also give fish and petty cash to expat laborers who stay near the jetties and do odd-jobs such as helping launch and bring in the boats, clean boats, bring supplies and clean fish. Abalone and shellfish Abalone (sufela) season is usually in December. Men will free dive down, pry the abalone off the rocks with a knife, put it in a net bag and come up for air.40 They wear baggy wet suits with masks, snorkels and fins.41 It takes great strength to do this hour after hour in cold water, not to mention having to pull oneself up into the boat. There is the danger of sharks and sometimes one man will stay in the boat as a lookout. It is dangerous to go alone; men will almost always go in teams of friends, brothers or cousins, year after year. During the season, men will move to the beach towns with the most abalone, staying in rented rooms or camping as groups in wadis. The day starts at dawn with fajr prayers and tea, sometimes bread. Then the group will head out to the boat where they will dive almost continuously until mid-afternoon. They will then come to shore, weigh the days’ catch with their agent (sometimes the same person who buys the fish, sometimes a different one) and then return for showers, prayers, dinner and an early bed. As with fishing, some abalone are set aside for relatives. Young boys dive from the beach or in boats very close to the shore until they have sufficient skills to dive deeper and farther away. Older brothers teach younger brothers and cousins; any man who wants to can dive, but there is no pressure to do so. Men who don’t dive are expected to step up and care for the household while the divers are away, e.g. making sure there is gas for the stove, containers of water, fresh produce, rice etc.

54  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying Dhofari women never go out on fishing boats or fish with a line, but by custom have the rights to all sufela and mussels at low-tide on rocky points and in very shallow water. The shellfish is either eaten by the woman’s family, given away or sold. Some men put boxes near the beach and wade out to check them at low tide for fish or lobster, but for a man to take shellfish or abalone close to shore is seen as unfair. Seafood This is a short list of types of seafood eaten in Dhofar. It is not comprehensive and for more information see Al Rashdi and McLean (2014); Al-Jufaili, Hermosa, Al-Shuaily and Al Mujaini (2010); McKoy, Bagley, Gauthier, and Devine (2009); and Siddeek, Fouda and Hermosa (1999) [rough translations are given in italics, A = Arabic, G = Gibali]. • • •

• • • • • • • •

• • • • •

abalone – sufela, regulated season for a few weeks at the end of November/ early December, depending on quantity, some years the season is canceled amberjack – A shathruch, G shatrach barracuda – A akama, G ‘eqmat, not perceived as dangerous for swimmers close to shore but possibly dangerous for men diving for abalone, as fish are attracted to anything sparkling, and might bite a hand, for example, if a person is wearing something silvery belt fish – G sasul black tip trevally – A thumkeri (thum-ker-ri), G thumkiri (thum-kir-ri) cuttlefish – A habaar, G tarbha, common, usually used for BBQ, not seen as a delicacy farsh – A gazelle, G batemeera, only caught with ‘live’ bait, e.g. cut sardines grouper – A andak or andaka/ G. anthka, deep water fish, usually at a depth of 200 m, comes closer to shore in khareef when it can be caught by line hagmam – A shatruck, G shatraq, 2rd or 3rd most expensive fish after kingfish, only caught in boxes hamour – G difn, 2nd or 3rd most expensive fish after kingfish, caught in boxes or by line, usually favorite fish to eat king fish – A kanud, G tharnak, most expensive fish at 3 or 4 OR per kilo, caught by line and net, now protected by a winter ‘season’ (allowed to be caught and publicly sold only at certain times), fairly rare in Dhofar because it prefers flat, sandy seabeds and the Dhofar coast and seabed is mostly rocky except for the straight, flat beach between Raysut and Taqa lobster – shaarkha, regulated season from March to end of the April mahi-mahi – A anfluss, G bathubon, caught by line mussells – A zukka, G zikt, gathered by women at low-tide, often cooked with pasta, usually found along the coast north of Salalah red mullet – A and G zajajee, only in deep water, caught in boxes red seabream – A fraha, G farhat, deep water fish, usually at a depth of 200 m, comes closer to shore in khareef when it can be caught by line

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  55 • • • • • • • • • •

saafi – A seesan, G seedhob, used to be a very important fish for trading, was dried and shipped to other countries, still eaten but not dried and shipped, usually at a depth of 2–3 m salted fish – A marakh malah, salt and raw fish layered in a bucket, covered and kept for 1–4 weeks sardines – freshly caught, are served grilled; air-dried (usually on a beach) are used for animal fodder sea catfish – A khan, G gamm, least expensive kind of fish, often 200 or 300 baisa per kilo shark – not often caught or eaten, owaal – dried shark (sliced open, cleaned and, with skin still attached, the meat is sliced into thin sections; this is dried in the sun for 2–10 days, fewer days with lower humidity) sheri – A shari, G hamshk, available all year but more found more frequently after khareef, perceived as very healthy to eat squid – A habaar, G atharaya, usually caught only in khareef, and further north along the coast than Salalah, often 2–4 kilo, better tasting than cuttlefish sultan Ibrahim – G. ali br dughun, caught in boxes, not by line tuna – unregulated season from the end of January / early February until end of May, best times are March and April, depending on ocean temperature trevally – A/ G minaya

Economics of procuring food ‘A living wage’ is a flexible concept in Dhofar. With no taxes, free health care and free education, inexpensive food and low electricity and water bills, the cost of living is low. Equally importantly, Dhofaris typically live in multi-generational and multi-family homes in which older or more wealthy relatives (usually fathers and older brothers) will pay the bills, in addition to paying for necessities like water jugs for drinking water, gas canisters for the stove, school uniforms for children, etc. Thus a single man might need money for gas, meals with friends etc., and this might be given to him by an older relative, meaning he does not have to produce any income.42 Or he could have a job that provides these basics; if he has extra money, he is expected to help provide for the household which might mean doing a large grocery shop once or twice a month, giving an unmarried or divorced sister money for her phone or new clothes. If he has a lot of money, he is expected to give in commensurate proportion: “to whom much is given, much is expected.” Each person keeps their own money; there is no pooling of cash per se – if a group of brothers, for example, decide to buy a camel for Eid they will decide as a group who should pay how much and each person gives from their own money. However, resources are pooled, in that if a man has lime trees, all his family consider themselves as having the right to ask for limes; perhaps there aren’t any at this moment because there isn’t a good crop or he has just picked all the limes and given them to other people. Very close relatives, friends and neighbors should call before taking any produce from another person’s farm. It is important in Gibali cultures for individuals and families with access to foodstuffs to give

56  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying (in addition to selling) what they have to relatives, friends and neighbors. But it is also important that the owner makes the decision to give. Within the rubric of “provide for the household,” cash or cash price is not the main or only determinant of worth; growing crops, raising animals and fishing occupy different economic sectors but all have real and perceived value. No one makes their living solely by growing crops. Crops grown next to a house, in a small plot adjacent to or near the house, or a large walled plot will not generate a large income but do yield good-will along with the harvest. Giving bananas, for example, means that the recipients have bananas, but also they are spared the trouble of procuring them for themselves and they have the ability to tell guests “these are from our trees” or “we got them today from our son,” showing both the freshness of the fruit and that they are part of a respectful family which shares. Camel-herding is a full-time job done only by men who have been around camels since birth and are extensively trained for it; it requires processing information about the camels themselves as well as the weather (wind, rain, sun). Men need to check the health of the camels, decide if a camel should be covered or kept at home because it is close to giving birth, which one(s) should be killed for meat or sold, whether fodder should be bought and what kind, etc. Some older men have done it their whole lives, some men have day-jobs and supervise an expat worker with a small herd, some men will take over day-to-day herding after retirement and some will start helping out when young and begin full-time after graduating high school. In the same manner, cow herding is done by Dhofaris, often with the help of expat laborers with whom they will consult daily about the welfare of the cows. Goat-herders are usually with the goats all day, work done by Gibali women or men, or male expats. Owners are similarly in constant touch with expat herders. Expat herders might come to work for a few months, or might work with the family for decades. In terms of scale, fishing can be similar to crop-growing (not full-time, less monetary benefit) or camel-herding (full-time, more monetary benefit), i.e. done as an occasional hobby from the shore, a weekend “side hustle” from a boat one has borrowed or has a partial share of, a full-time undertaking, or by owning a dhow. The life of full-time fishermen is explained above; part-time fishermen might do it enough for sundries and gas money, a few times a week to supplement income from a paying job, after retirement or a few times a year when a particular fish (or abalone) is in season. Full-time fishing, like full-time camel-herding, takes great skill and years of accumulated knowledge. Thus most Gibali households acquire foodstuffs from a variety of sources. Camel or cow milk or samn (clarified butter) from relatives in the mountains might be dropped off several times a week at the houses of people who live along the coast. People who live along the coast might bring fresh fish, lobster, abalone or squid up to relatives in the mountains. Those who live far from stores, for example older men who are staying with herds of camels, will often have relatives drop off bottled water, rice, flour, sugar and other staples. Relatives and neighbors may drop off bags of raw meat or bags of vegetables, such as potatoes,

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  57 or fruit, such as mangos. Some people will give a variety of foods; some will give only one, such as honey they have collected themselves.43 Giving foodstuffs is not seen as a gift and does not accrue as a debt. Anyone with an excess of anything eatable is under religious, social and family pressure to share, even when there is no foreseeable chance for a return. Sometimes the giving will always be one-sided, sometimes other food will be given back at a later time, sometimes the balance is addressed in another medium, for example a child from a family in the mountains which regularly gave cow’s milk might go to live with a relative in Salalah while attending university, without anyone viewing the situation as a repayment. Someone kindly gave X at one time, someone else is kindly giving Y at this time. To reduce deeply intertwined family obligations as a series of “pay-backs” is antithetical to how Gibalis view social relationships. This will be discussed further in Chapter 8. In addition, helping the household secure foodstuffs is done by members who are not principle procurers. For example, a woman might give her brother money to buy a boat for fishing, land for an orchard or livestock. A jobless man who owns a few camels which are tended with the family herd by might be free to help in a myriad of ways, such as bringing fodder from Salalah to the homestead. A man with a taxi might be asked to ferry goods to or from relatives. Further, people without jobs who do not procure food also contribute to the household by doing important tasks, such as running errands, bringing women to visit relatives, making visits themselves, or taking care of government formalities. For example, an older woman might own goats, and among her children there is one who is known for cooking skills, one known for religious learning and piety, one who has a job, one who takes care of a small garden in their yard, one who is primary care-giver to an older relative – all valuable undertakings.

Wildlife This is not a complete guide to wildlife in Dhofar. I mention those species which figure prominently in everyday life with a connection to foodways, either as a threat, such as wolves attacking camels, a food source in the past, such as gazelles, or those which consume leftovers which are set out for them, such as foxes. Haines (1839, 1845) and Saunders (1846), leaders of the Palinurus’ surveys in the 1830s and 40s, both mention wild and domestic animals still extant in Dhofar: hyenas, wolves, ibex, rabbits, foxes, partridges, as well as goats, sheep, cows, and camels. Predators When herding animals, men in the past would carry guns and some continue to do so, as there are several wild animals which attack and eat camels, cows, and goats: Arabian leopards, Arabian wolves, striped hyenas, and caracals (washq). Arabian leopards are rare and the Jabal Samhan Nature Reserve was created primarily to protect them. It is 4,500 km2 of uninhabited, mostly arid land. The primary researchers on Dhofari leopards are Hadi al Hikmani, Khaled al Hikmani and

58  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying Andrew Spalton, see Spalton, Al Hikmani and Al Hikmani (2014), Al Hikmani and Al Hikmani (2012) and Spalton, al Hikmani, Willis and Bait Said (2006). More of a direct threat to herd animals are Arabian wolves. There have been a few attacks on humans, one recently, but they will usually try to get domestic livestock, which is why cows and goats are herded home at night. For camels in remoter areas, the owner will bed them down near him, usually next to a windbreak, and build a fire. Striped hyenas don’t usually attack livestock but will eat carrion and sometimes haunt dumps; caracals also usually do not attack. Smaller predators include the honey badger, Blanford’s fox, red fox, African small-spotted genet and white-tailed mongoose.44 All Gibali men build fires when camping away from permanent dwellings for both practical (cook dinner and make tea) and protective reasons. Wood is usually bought in small bundles for about 1 Omani Riyal (OR) of eight to ten, elbow-tofinger-tip lengths of dried wood. Dhofaris usually burn only two or three pieces at a time, with only one end on fire to make the wood last longer. Non-predators The prestige animal is the Arabian gazelle, which is now forbidden to be hunted and, although in no way tame, can often be seen close to roads outside of inhabited areas. They look like Bambi, but grunt in a most unrefined manner when they are scared and pee forcefully when they are getting ready to bolt. Larger and rarer, are the Nubian ibex (wael) a large mountain goat with distinctive curved horns. I have only seen them twice in the drier areas of the mountains. Oryx (maha), a type of antelope, are found north of Dhofar, near the town of Hima.45 Wild donkeys are a very pretty grey or light brown with sweet faces and a distinctive dark grey slash on their shoulders. They used to be domesticated work animals but, after the advent of modern transportation, were simply released into the wild. Like all the wild animals, donkeys are not harassed by Dhofaris except by a few rock-throwing young kids. Like camels, donkeys walk along the road and stand on the hard shoulder looking for a chance to cross. They usually stay in a small group of 3–8 animals, away from camels or cows. They are seen both in the mountains, along the coast and on the outskirts of town. Small mammals include the very cute rock hyrax (wubar), similar to a marmot but smaller, and less round. It lives in rocks in dry areas in the mountains; one stays on guard on high ground while others play and gather food. There are also the Indian crested porcupine, the Ethiopian hedgehog and small rodents, including gerbils, jirds, mice, spiny mice, rats, and shrews. There is one adorable mouse whose name I could not find, which is almost a perfect circle of orangish fur, looking like a furry tangerine. Gazelle and oryx were eaten in the past, as were wubar and rabbits. The predator animals, donkeys, porcupines and smaller mammals were never eaten, but for the sake of accuracy, several informants told me that “maybe someone ate one if he was starving.” For example, donkeys are proscribed as food in Islam, but any animal can be eaten if the choice is eat or starve to death.

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  59 Birds, bugs and lizards There are many birds and bats in the Dhofar region, some year-round and some passing by on migration routes. This is not a complete list but is simply intended to give an overview; for further details see Birds in Oman (al Kindi 2014), Common Birds in Oman: An Identification Guide (Erikesen and Eriksen 2010), Common Birds in Oman (Erikesen and Eriksen 2005), and Oman Bird List (Eriksen, Sargeant and Victor 2003). Widely seen in Dhofar are the bee-eater, dove, hoopoe, roller, silverbill, swallow and weaver in addition to • • • • • •

along the coast: avocet, bittern, coot, crake, duck (pintail), egret, grebe, flamingo, gull, heron, ibis, moorhen, spoonbill, tern, wader in the grasslands: pipit, raven, grackle, stork in the wadi/ mountains: courser, partridge, sandgrouse, owl in semi-wooded areas and woodlands: bunting, cuckoo, flycatcher, grosbeak, kingfisher, pigeon, owl, shrike, sunbird, warbler in the semi-desert and desert: bunting, lark, owl, sand partridge, warbler, wheatear raptors: find eagle, falcon, kestrel, osprey, vulture

One bird that was eaten in the past is the “mountain chicken,” the Arabian partridge, a small, pheasant-like bird which speeds along the rocks in the mountains in groups of 10 or more birds. The Gibali name (which I can’t write out) means “the pigeon which is like a young girl ready for marriage.” These were caught in wooden box traps. Thesiger undertook his epic journey to look for locust breeding grounds, but never found any. I have seen videos of swarms in other parts of Oman, but not in Dhofar, although various informants told me that locusts were a source of food in the past. In and near houses, especially those with gardens, there are sometimes toads and numerous insects: bees, wasps, hornets, butterflies, dragonflies, moths, ants, etc. There are also ticks, centipedes, millipedes, spiders, and scorpions. I was once stung several times by a scorpion while I was sitting on a mat. I felt the sting and looked down to see a large white one scuttle away; the pain was quite severe, but when I tried to say that I had gone to get an injection for the pain, the research guys thought I was being ridiculous: “You went to the hospital because of a scorpion?” One man told how he was getting ready to dive for abalone and felt something on his back. He realized that he had zipped up his wetsuit with a scorpion inside, which was now repeatedly stinging his back. So he unzipped, got the scorpion off him and out of the tent, then went diving for abalone for six hours. Several men I know have similar stories and in all the cases, there is no attempt to kill the scorpion. The only living beings which are deliberately killed in all circumstances are snakes and eels.46 Nicer co-residents are the geckos, lizards, chameleons and skinks (see Gardner 2013). Lizards elicit fear from Dhofaris as their mouths are believed to contain

60  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying a poison. It is thought that if a lizard chews, for example, a piece of fruit on the kitchen counter and people later eat the fruit, they will get sick and perhaps die.

Receiving Animals for life events Gibalis can be given a camel, cow or goat as a gift for various life events. The animal will be kept with the family herd and it and its children are the receivers’ property to dispose of as they please; they are never expected to help pay for the fodder. For example, a graduate or a new-born baby might be given an animal, but not every child will receive one. An older woman with goats might not have enough animals to give one to every grand-child so only certain ones will have one, e.g. a first grandchild, grandchild named after the giver or the giver’s parent, a child born after years of infertility or difficult pregnancy, or when it is assumed to be the woman’s last baby. The animal will never be gifted to another person but might be sold or killed for family consumption. Normally, when a Gibali dies, the family will slaughter animals to feed funeral and mourning guests, so a person might ask that their animal be killed for this reason, for Eid or for a wedding. Foodstuffs Since most Dhofaris live in large family units, most basic kinds of food are sold in bulk, such as large flat boxes of onions, oranges, frozen chickens etc.; these are sometimes divided and part given away with an explanation of “we have too much.” The giving of foodstuffs is done as simply as possible. Raw meat, fish, fruits and vegetables are delivered in plastic bags; used plastic or water containers are used for milk. Honey is given in used glass bottles; metal containers are used for samn (clarified butter). It is not necessary to put something in the recipient’s hand; bags or bottles can simply be put on the doorstep or given to a maid. However, there should be a significant amount; several kilos of fruit or vegetables, enough fish to feed to at least ten people, a liter of honey etc. To give a small amount indicates stinginess or an unwillingness to give and the recipient will feel “shy” that they are either being insulted or are taking necessities, not excess.47 Prepared foods Prepared food is given to friends, neighbors and relatives in the same manner as foodstuffs, using a casual attitude of “thank you for taking this excess off my hands.” Food can be given regularly (perhaps even daily) to relatives and neighbors who are less well-off. This will mean putting the prepared food on a plate, covering it with tinfoil or plastic wrap and bringing it to the house, either by the person who prepared the food, a child, or an expat worker in the house. Common dishes that are given include rice with meat or fish (less often chicken), aseeda/

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  61 asida (cooked wheat flour, served with samn), harees (boiled wheat with meat that is cooked and blended into porridge-like consistency) and sweets. Food is passed between houses often during Ramadan. A woman will usually make too much of a dish for the people in her family to eat for Iftar and give a plate to neighbors or relatives and then receives plates in return so that there is a greater variety of dishes for everyone’s Iftar.48 Prepared food is also given at Eids and at parties for graduation, someone’s safe return home or release from hospital, the birth of a child or a new job. It is mandatory to give plates of rice and meat to neighbors and relatives for a wedding; in Gibali cultures, a happy event necessitates sharing food. Flimsy plastic plates or one-use foil containers are never returned but melamine and glass containers should be returned. Some Gibalis believe that the returned container should be filled with food, some don’t. Some people take advantage of decorations (which have arrived in Salalah in the last five years or so) such as cupcake papers, paper gift-bags, colored cellophanes, ribbons, personalized stickers with names, symbols etc. But it is very important that the container not be returned immediately or filled with a very expensive type of food (such as imported chocolates) as this might be interpreted as an attempt at bribing, showing-off, or insulting (with the connotation of “I want your container out of my house as soon as possible”). Moving food Small loads are placed in plastic bags and can be put in any kind of vehicle. Livestock and foodstuffs in bulk are moved around Dhofar by pick-up truck; Toyota Landcruiser or Hilux are the most common. Camels are usually transported roped in a crouching position. Cows and goats are usually moved while standing in large trucks with metal slats along the sides and rear. They are moved either to get to better pasture or to be slaughtered. People with pick-ups should make them available to family members, neighbors and friends to move goods without bargaining for a pay-back or price. Everyone is expected to help to get animals to safety in the face of oncoming storms, thus even men who don’t work with animals day-to-day usually have basic skills in moving, tying, feeding and milking livestock.

Buying49 Foodstuffs that aren’t acquired through family connections are bought at a variety of stores. There are small shops located in most residential neighborhoods and groups of specialty stores (fruits and vegetables and bakeries) in several areas within Salalah and in each of the coastal and mountain towns. In the middle of Salalah, there is an area with the fresh fish, meat, fruit and vegetable souqs. Lastly, there are a few big grocery stores in Salalah. As most households have over 30 people [father, mother, unmarried sons and daughters, married sons with their wives and children, older relatives] grocery shopping is usually done once, twice or three times a month, often with a big stock-up when the salary comes on the 21st or 22nd of every month. The senior

62  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying women may send messages out to husbands, sons, daughters or daughters-in-law about what ingredients should be picked up for that day’s meal or to have on hand in case visitors come.50 Neighborhood stores Fruits and vegetables can be bought from trucks parked by the side of the road (usually watermelons and cantaloupes or musk melons) or from palm-frond thatched shacks in the south-eastern part of Salalah with the walled farms. There are also small neighborhood stores with basics such as potatoes, tomatoes, onions, apples, oranges, etc. Usually purchasing takes places with the buyer sitting in the car and the seller taking the order, bagging the produce and bringing it to the car for which service the buyer usually gives a small tip of 200 baisa. For large households, there might be a standing order with a delivery every day and the bill paid down or off when the salary comes. Small bakeries work on the same principle, so that a person might simply walk in, grab the bread needed for lunch and the clerk will add the cost to the person’s tab or there might be a daily delivery. There are also small neighbor stores with basics such as rice, sugar, tea, instant coffee, milk, evaporated milk, chips and sweets. Children often run in and take what is needed at that moment, with the clerk writing down the debt in a ledger. Large stores Men (less often women) sometimes go to the fruit, vegetable, meat and fish souqs in the middle of Salalah; some of the other towns have smaller souqs. For example some of the coastal towns have fish souqs for expats and Dhofaris who don’t have family members who fish. There a few large grocery stores in Salalah, notably Al Mashoor, Al Isteqrar, LuLu and Carrefour. All items in all stores are halal and all stores have a tendency to put items on the shelf and leave them until sold, so that it is very much caveat emptor in terms of expiration dates. There is a greater emphasis on quantity of basics rather than range, thus in all the stores both sides of one aisle have rice, one side of one aisle is only for cooking oil, one side of one aisle is powdered drink-mixes. Kleenex and hot sauce, for example, take up sections that are five feet tall and over ten feet wide. Basics like milk and yoghurt often run out during Ramadan, Eids and in khareef.51 Most of Al Mashoor’s and Al Isteqrar’s stock is food for Dhfoaris. LuLus, whose chairman and managing director is Yusef Ali, an Indian based in the United Arab Emirates, has a wide variety of spices and lentils, and the several types of expat food including Filipino, Thai and American.52 Carrefour, which is a French-based company, has European-style bread and croissants and the best cheese selection.53

Economics of receiving and buying food What are the average cash values of foodstuffs received and cash amounts paid for food per household per year? – these are great questions that I can’t answer.

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  63 I hope someone comes along and does that kind of fine-grained study but I can lay out some of the difficulties. In terms of giving or receiving foodstuffs, there would have to be an elaborate system of keeping track of who gives what which encompasses many different people and objects as an uncle might give honey, a brother limes, a cousin fish, another cousin meat, a neighbor a prepared cake, a work colleague melons, a parent milk etc.54 In addition, the price of livestock and crops fluctuates, for example, the price of various items differs depending on season and relative rarity. In figuring out the household costs, it is difficult to work out what each person contributes, as it is incumbent in Gibali cultures for people to be both generous and to cover their acts of generosity. In interviews, Gibalis will give all credit to another person (such as “X buys everything for the house”) when I have witnessed the person who is speaking buying foodstuffs for the household. There are also many ways to pay for food. There are often one or two large purchases of groceries every month, usually paid for by the father or oldest son, but daily “pick up on your way home” shopping and/or paying off the family’s debt at small neighbor shops can be done by any member of the family. Further, one needs to factor in not just the foodstuffs but ancillaries such as water containers (which would mean marking how many are used per week and who pays the water delivery person) and gas cylinders for the stove. I will end with a story that will highlight the difficulty of figuring out accounts and point to issues raised in the next chapter. I interviewed one Gibali (X) several times years ago about my research on generosity in Gibali cultures. I asked a lot of questions about what was given and received by X and in X’s household, with follow-up questions and remarks over several months. When I started to work on food issues, I again talked with X informally several times because I know X helped purchase food for the house and gave foodstuffs to friends, neighbors and relations. While writing this book X mentioned by chance that X had just discovered that a senior woman in X’s house had been sending prepared dinner to a neighbor for years and no one knew about it except the woman who supervised the cooking and the person who brought the food to the neighbor. A few points to highlight: X was primed by years of me mentioning giving and receiving foodstuffs to think about this topic, but didn’t know about an important, pertinent example; X was not tracking what X bought (as in “I just bought rice and we are already out of rice!”); and no one except the senior woman was in the kitchen at dinner time to see how much food was being prepared. The senior woman only brought up what she had been doing when it was no longer possible and she shared her concern about this neighbor with someone else in her household.

Notes 1 Janzen identifies nine bands of vegetation: the coastline belt, grassland of coastal plain, bush and tree vegetation of the foothills and escarpment, grassland of the lower and middle levels of the plateau, bush and tree vegetation of the mountain wadi area, grassland of the upper plateau, desert vegetation of the transition zone to the Nejd, desert vegetation of the Negd and sand desert vegetation (1986: 34–35). He notes that

64  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying there “are many indications that the plateaus were once more thickly wooded than they are now” and that the “last stands of trees” on the coastal plain were cut down in the 1960s (35). 2 The government gives away plots of land for free or with a nominal payment to people who register. People are only given plots in areas in which they were born, which effectively keeps people in X tribe continuing to live in the area formally known as belonging to X tribe or areas in which no one lived, animals weren’t grazed etc. 3 One of the memoirs of the Dhofar War from a British soldier states that as he flew over the plain at low altitudes, he could see lines of stones which were former field markers, but I have not been able to find the reference. Visitors in the 1840s describe the plain as green (see Chapter 1). 4 If the research guys and I are planning to drive in these areas, we always bring extra food and water, not just in case we get stuck but to give away. Driving in a seemingly deserted wadi (dry riverbed) one can come across a herder with a few camels and it is customary to stop and offer water, cold drinks and food. 5 For more discussion of flora in Dhofar, see Galletti, Turner, and Myint (2016) For information about plant life in Oman, see the work of Patzelt (e.g. 2015) and Ghazanfar (e.g. 1998). 6 Schools in the Dhofar mountains start two or so weeks later because the excessive rainfall during July and August means the schools need to be cleaned from mold and mildew and roads need to dry out before school begins. 7 If you happen to be driving against the flow of the round-up, first you have a pickup with blinkers on to warn oncoming traffic, then the camels are interspersed with a few more pickups and young men with thin sticks calling and whooping at the camels to stay together. Most of the camels are quiet and walk steadily but in the large groups, mothers lose track of babies so they stop, bellow, turn around, and generally create confusion. At the end of the group (sometimes several hundred camels strong) is another pickup or two to warn traffic coming from behind. On steep, twolane roads with no shoulder, drivers either accept the slow pace or gently navigate between the camels, trying not to get between moms and babies or spook young camels. 8 See Janzen (1986: 157–159) for a short discussion on sardine fishing in the 1970s. 9 Some Omanis believe that there should be only two celebrations: Eid al Fitr and Eid al Adha. 10 Their mandate is both punitive and preventative. During the khareef season, they patrol beaches to make sure no one is swimming; during storms they warn fishermen not to take boats out. 11 On May 25, 2018, category 3 hurricane Mekunu hit Dhofar with estimated maximum sustained winds of 115 mph. The clouds from that event combined with the approaching khareef so it was cloudy from mid-May until mid-September. 12 This depends on various factors. When Ramadan was during the khareef, there were fewer visitors. Now that Ramadan has shifted to the spring, there are visitors throughout the season although economic (e.g. price of oil) and political (e.g. Saudi and Emirati unhappiness with Oman’s refusal to support the war with Yemen and the blockade of Qatar) tensions influence visitor numbers. 13 The best reference for plants in Dhofar is Miller, Morris, and Stuart-Smith’s Plants of Dhofar, the Southern Region of Oman: Traditional, Economic, and Medicinal Uses (1988). Also see Note 6. 14 When I asked about date trees in the mountains, one of the research guys told me they came from British soldiers during the war who spit out the seeds. I have no way of knowing how accurate that is, but one can find wild date trees in odd, out-of-the-way places far from past or current dwellings. 15 Sometimes expat workers such as maids, gardeners or shepherds are given small plots to plant up as they wish, in which they grow vegetables, for example chili peppers, for their own use or to sell. Any money they earn is theirs to keep.

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  65 16 Land ownership/control is a fraught topic. In terms of farms, the working perception among Dhofaris is that if a person has inherited and kept up a walled area, it is treated as theirs, even if they do not have a deed or this ownership is not acknowledged by the government. Some people will simply build a wall in open space to enclose an area for either a camel corral or a farm. There is a perception that if the land is “improved” with plantings, it is theirs, but there are also cases of newly built walls being bulldozed by government order because this particular area should be kept open. 17 Dugar is a good example of the perils of researching food. I had heard the term but when it came time to figure out exactly what it was, the way it was described (small, round, dry, cooked in water) I thought it was a kind of lentil. Then I was told it was a bean (foul). When I asked another Gibali, I was shown a photo of green beans and told “this is it.” Finally I talked to a fourth person who told me that they were different colors, which is certainly not a green bean. Finally I got the answer: cowpeas, which are small, round, dry, cooked in water, look like green beans before the peas are taken out and are different colors. 18 Sorghum is mentioned in writing about the past, but no informants spoke about it. Two other items mentioned by one informant each are cherry tomatoes and a plant that produced “oil.” 19 Limes are called “lemons” in Dhofar and are a small, round variety, about the size of a ping-pong ball, referred to as Key West limes in the States. 20 This is an example of problems inherent in trying to do research as a foreigner. The bulb is cooked by being smothered in fresh cow dung which is heated, but it was impossible to get someone to describe the exact method in detail because it is seen as an old-fashioned activity. The informants who ate it all stated that they didn’t know how to cook it and quickly changed the topic. I didn’t press the issue because my interpretation is that they were a little embarrassed and by writing the method in a book, it might show them, their family or their cultures as being not modern. I made several of these kinds of decisions; for another example, see the section below on bee-keeping. 21 There are 100 baisa in 1 Omani Riyal, which is worth about 1.9 British pounds (fluctuates) and 2.6 American dollars (steady). 22 Further, each kind of food-producing activity has attendant tensions between people; with livestock it might be issues of grazing, water rights etc., with bee-keeping it is that non-Dhofaris bring hives to Dhofar during khareef so their bees can take advantage of the abundant greenery. Some are believed to put sugar near their hives to attract bees from Dhofari hives. Bee-poaching is a sore subject amongst hive-keepers. Another aspect of the bee-conundrum is that while I have informants with close relatives who keep bees, I decided not to ask for interviews as they are very traditional, older men and might refuse (putting my informant in an embarrassing position) and if they did agree, asking “where do you keep your hives” etc. might be taken as too personal a question. Some hives can be seen from the road, but some are hidden away. I got information about number of hives and amount of honey from the informants who have been to the hives or helped distribute honey but I made the decision not to pursue the topic about hive placement. Doing research where you live involves these kinds of questions, figuring out which details are important and I deemed placement of bee-hives as non-essential to this book. 23 Large trees in the mountains are also named, I think partially for the purposes of navigation in the past, but also they were seen as friends and companions to people. 24 Wasm is also the term used for medicinal branding. Branding for identification can be done across the top of the nose of the animal, but some Dhofaris believe that it is not good to put the brand on an animal’s face. Camels can be branded on the cheek, but more common now is at the base of their neck. 25 I think this would be a fascinating area of study, how the characteristics of local cows have changed over time, but this is beyond the scope of this book. See Janzen (1986: 154–156) for a short discussion on stock breeding.

66  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying 26 Not all camels are herded home, so you need to be careful on roads in the mountains at night. Camels have long legs so the body will hit the hood of the car and come straight through the windshield. To prevent accidents, when you pass camels on or near a road, it is a driver’s duty to turn on the hazards to signal to on-coming traffic. Older camels walking in line are normally safe and will not pay attention to traffic even if cars pass close to them at great speeds, but you never know when one might scare. Baby camels are the most dangerous, as they will take off in any direction at the slightest provocation, sometimes causing other camels to panic. 27 Camels who wander into housing or business areas without supervision are caught and put in “camel jail”; their owners have to pay a fine to have them released. 28 Rubin 2014, text AK2, has a boy complaining to his father after the father sold the boy’s favorite camel. The father relents and buys the camel back. The situation in some families is similar to the situation Elie discusses in his article on Soqotra: … pastoralism is being transformed from an economic livelihood with monetary exchange value into a tradition-maintaining activity with mere social exchange value, as the relative importance of animal herds decreases as a source of pastoralist income while increasing as a source of expenditure, as the herds have to be fed from purchased cereals. (2006: 160) 29 Camels take longer to have babies; usually a female camel will have her first baby when three years old and babies gestate for 13 months. After birth, mothers produce milk for about a year (average can vary from about two to 16 liters per camel per day, the upper end is very rare), but produce no milk if pregnant, so owners have to balance whether they want milk or more camels. A healthy female can produce about ten babies in her lifetime. Cows are pregnant for about nine months and usually produce more milk per day, between three and nine liters. Goats are pregnant for 5–6 months and produce half to two liters a day. 30 Some parts of Oman in the north have a tradition of bull fighting in which two bulls charge each other. This isn’t part of Gibali culture. 31 Usually herds are all owned by people within one family. It is less common to have friends herd their animals together. 32 Several Gibalis have told me that racing and beauty contests are “foreign” and came “after [the discovery of] oil” from Saudi Arabia and the Emirates. 33 Janzen’s Nomads in the Sultanate of Oman (1986) has a chart on the “Movement of Livestock Prices in Dhofar” for cattle, camels and goats with data from 1965–70, 1971–75 and 1976–78, showing, for example, the cost of a milk cow in 1971–75 as 40-100 OR and 250-330 OR in 1976–78 (102). 34 Some Gibalis also believe it is dangerous to count the number of animals in a herd. The owner will know all the animals but not specifically count them, as knowing the exact number might cause the animals to die. 35 Bought fodder and feed started to be widely used in the late 1970s/ early 1980s. Before then, herds had to be either self-supporting (eating wild vegetation) or, for herds closer to the coast, were fed sardines. One informant who herded camels as a boy remembers seeing camels eating “from the ground” (i.e. bought feed) for the first time and laughing, thinking it was funny to see camels bending down to eat. His family’s camels had only eaten from trees, reaching their necks up. 36 For more information about fishing in southern Oman, see Al-Marshudi and Kotagama (2006), Lancaster and Lancaster (1995), Omezzine (1998) and Omezzine, Zaibet and Al-Oufi 1986; about fishing in Oman, see Choudri, Baawain, and Ahmed (2016). 37 Kingfish also has a season which is closely enforced in the north of Oman where there are the flat, sandy ocean beds which kingfish prefer. There are few kingfish caught in the Dhofar region, which mostly has a rocky coast and ocean bed.

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  67 38 A few Dhofari men own wooden dhows which are staffed by expat laborers. The ships usually go to sea for ten days to two weeks catching various types of fish depending on the season, sometimes sharks. Fish are either sold to an agent or, in some cases, the dhow owner also owns refrigerated trucks and the catch is driven directly to the north of Oman, the Emirates or Saudi Arabia to be sold. The entire catch of sharks is sold by auction as soon as the ship comes into harbor. Dhows do not go out to sea in the khareef. 39 I once went out for tuna with men and we ended up in a loose flotilla of boats following dolphins that were following the wake of a large container ship. After several seasons of Somali pirates taking ships, the big container ships (which call at Salalah Port) now had extensive security measures; I could see several men in military dress tracking the movements of our group of fishing boats with binoculars. 40 Air tanks are strictly forbidden as being unfair. Men rich enough to pay for scuba lessons and tanks would be able to take all the abalone in short time. Enforced freediving means only men who are physical fit dive. Some Gibalis know how to scubadive, but do not do so during abalone season. 41 Close-fitting suits would be more aerodynamic but it’s not customary for men to wear anything tight. Before getting in the water and as soon as they get out, they wrap a wazar (sarong) around their waists. 42 One choice for Gibali men in the mountains is the firqat, a reserve militia. The training is not onerous and it allows men who work outside the cash economy (such as taking care of animals, supervising hired workers who take care of animals, bringing water/ grain/ hay to a house in the mountains, catching and drying sardines etc.) to save enough money for a dowry or to build a house. By joining the firqat they have the assurance of a monthly salary which they can supplement with fishing or owning livestock. 43 In Clements and Chen (2010), Oman is listed as having a 22.1 “food share,” meaning the percentage of income spent on food for the home (913). It is beyond the scope of my discussion but perhaps that percentage might be higher if not for the widespread and long-term food sharing between relatives and neighbors. 44 For years I thought there were skunks in the mountains because the research men talked about an animal that gave off a bad smell and described it as bigger than a cat, short-legged, furry, and black with a white strip on its back: a honey badger. 45 In 2007, the Arabian Oryx Sanctuary in Hima had its listing as a World Heritage Site by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) taken away because the number of breeding oryx pairs dropped precipitously, see Chatty 1997, 1998, 2000, 2013a, 2013b. 46 I have heard no stories of Gibalis using scorpions or snakes etc. in a joking or harmful manner. The research guys see my fear as a weakness, but not something to tease me about. Once, I was turning over rocks looking for mushrooms and saw a large scorpion a few inches from my hand; unable to be coherent, I started jabbering meaningless words. The two Gibali men I was with came to where I was standing, kicked the rock back over and never mentioned that incident again. 47 It took me a while to realize that my gifts of a few candy bars or small containers of chocolate were seen as odd and that Gibalis were trying to find excuses for my seeming miserliness. Eventually I realized that being told the gift was “cute” meant “parsimonious.” The issue wasn’t cost, that is never a factor, but that the small gifts looked mean; better a large, inexpensive box of chocolates than a small “boutique” brand. The only times I have received a typical American food-gift (a small plate of cookies), one or both of the giver’s parents were non-Omanis. 48 Iftar is the sunset meal Muslims eat to break their fast. Passing around food for Iftars is like the American Midwest Christmas tradition of “cookie exchange,” in which each person makes dozens of one kind of cookie, then places one dozen on one plate. Each person then exchanges a plate for another person’s plate so everyone ends up with many types of homemade cookies without having to make 10 varieties themselves.

68  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying 49 This discussion concentrates on how local consumers buy foodstuff, see Mbaga (2015) for a broader discussion on country-wide food security in Oman. 50 In the house, women decide what to make and when, but which women make the decisions varies from house to house. “Senior” has variable meanings: it might be a 35-year-old woman who is married to the oldest son with a mother-in-law who is not capable of supervising the food preparation or a 60-year-old woman with 5 married sons. Some girls as young as 16 cook lunch (the main meal) regularly; some girls never learn how to cook. 51 Grocery shopping at one of the large stores is a very different experience for Dhofaris than it is for expats. Dhofari men will often shop alone around 2pm on their way home from work, often calling someone at home to see what is needed. Dhofari women usually shop with other women or children (less often with their husbands) in the late afternoon or evening; since Al Isteqrar, LuLu and Carrefour are set in malls with cafes and restaurants, getting groceries is often part of an evening out. For expats, it is more stressful. Items appear and then can be gone for weeks, months or forever so shopping is more like hide-and-seek. You can never be sure a type of cereal, crackers, pasta, cheese, or nuts will be in stock; single expat men will often go to the stores on weekend evenings to people-watch, so grocery shopping is a social spectacle. 52 When I moved to Salalah in 2005, the only place for expat food was a small supermarket near the Royal Air Force of Oman base. The customers were expats and Omanis who had lived abroad. 53 I would love to discuss store floor plans and culture with an architect. LuLus, for example, is brilliantly lit with wide aisles and it’s easy to orient oneself. Fish and meat are sold along the back wall and in the back right-hand corner; vegetables are sold in the back left-hand corner so vegetarians can easily shop without ever seeing meat. Carrefour seems to be based on a small European store: less well-lit, lots of secluded spaces, narrow aisles, goods are stacked at the back of the store and in all the spaces between aisles. Fish and meat are sold along the back left-hand wall, directly opposite the vegetables. To me, it’s less intuitive, for example pasta sauce is sold in three different aisles: the organic section, with the pasta and with the vegetables; matches are placed next to dish soap. 54 Plus issues of how to measure the worth of, for example, giving a home-made cake. Would it be counted as the price equivalent of a store-bought one or would you factor in the cost of ingredients (some bought, some received) and add a labor cost, and would the labor cost be different if made by an Omani or with paid expat help? How would you factor the cost of a line-caught fish? The retail price or retail price plus a percentage of fishing costs (buying sardines for bait, gas for the boat, sheets of lead, hooks, line, etc.)?

References For a full bibliography, list of food terms and several short essays on foodways, please see my webpage: Come From Away, https://mariellerisse.com Al Hikmani, Hadi and Khaled al Hikmani. 2012. “Arabian Leopard in Lowland Region on the South face of Jebel Samhan, Oman.” Cat News 57: 4–5. Al-Jufaili, Saud, Greg Hermosa, Sulaiman S. Al-Shuaily, and Amal Al Mujaini. 2010. “Oman Fish Biodiversity.” Journal of King Abdulaziz University 21(1): 3-51. Al Kindi, Nasser. 2014. Birds in Oman. Muscat: Muscat Printing Press. Al-Marshudi, Ahmed Salim and Hemesiri Kotagama. 2006. “Socio-Economic Structure and Performance of Traditional Fishermen in the Sultanate of Oman.” Marine Resource Economics 21: 221-30. Al Rashdi, K. and E. McLean. 2014. “Contribution of Small-Scale Fisheries to the Livelihoods of Omani Women: A Case Study of the Al Wusta Governorate.” Gender in

Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying  69 Aquaculture and Fisheries: Navigating Change - Asian Fisheries Science Special Issue 27S: 135-49. Ball, Lawrence, Douglas MacMillan, Joseph Tzanopoulos, Andrew Spalton, Hadi Al Hikmani, and Mark Moritz. 2000. “Contemporary Pastoralism in the Dhofar Mountains of Oman.” Human Ecology 48: 267-277. doi:10.1007/s10745-020-00153-5 Bent, Theodore and Mabel. 2005 [1900]. Southern Arabia. London: Elibron. Blake, Megan, Jody Mellor, Lucy Crane, and Brigitta Osz. 2009. “Eating in Time, Eating Up Time,” in Changing Families, Changing Food. Peter Jackson, ed. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. 187–204. Chatty, Dawn. 1997. Mobile Pastoralists: Development Planning and Social Change in Oman. New York: Columbia University Press. Chatty, Dawn. 1998. “Enclosures and Exclusions: Conserving Wildlife in Pastoral Areas of the Middle East.” Anthropology Today 14.4: 2–7. Chatty, Dawn. 2000.“Integrating Participation into Research and Consultancy: A Conservation Example from Arabia.” Social Policy and Administration 34.4: 408–18. Chatty, Dawn. 2013a. “Rejecting Authenticity in the Desert Landscapes of the Modern Middle East: Development Processes in the Jiddat Il-Harasiis, Oman,” in Anthropology of the Middle East and North Africa. Sherine Hafez and Susan Slyomovics, eds. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. 145–64. Chatty, Dawn. 2013b. “Negotiating Authenticity and Translocality in Oman: The ‘Desertscapes’ of the Harasiis Tribe,” in Regionalizing Oman: Political, Economic and Social Dynamics. Steffen Wippel, ed. Heidelberg: Springer. 129–45. Choudri, B., Mahad Baawain, and Mustaque Ahmed. 2016. “An Overview of Coastal and Marine Resources and their Management in Sultanate of Oman.” Journal of Environmental Management and Tourism 7.1: 21–32. Clements, Kenneth and Dongling Chen. 2010. “Affluence and Food: A Simple Way to Infer Incomes.” American Journal of Agricultural Economics 92(4): 909–26. Elie, Serge. 2006. “Soqotra: South Arabia’s Strategic Gateway and Symbolic Playground.” British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 33.2: 131–60. Erikesen, Hanne and Jens Eriksen. 2005. Common Birds in Oman. Muscat: Roya Press. Erikesen, Hanne and Jens Eriksen. 2010. Common Birds in Oman: An Identification Guide. Muscat: Roya Press. Eriksen, Jens, Dave Sargeant, and Reginald Victor. 2003. Oman Bird List. Muscat: Sultan Qaboos University, Centre for Environmental Studies and Research. Galletti, Christopher, Billie Turner, and Soe W. Myint. 2016. “Land Changes and their Drivers in the Cloud Forest and Coastal Zone of Dhofar, Oman, between 1988 and 2013.” Regional Environmental Change 16.7: 2141–53. Gardner, Andrew. 2013. The Amphibians and Reptiles of Oman and the UAE. Frankfurt: Edition Chimaira. Ghazanfar, Shahina. 1998. “Status of the Flora and Plant Conservation in the Sultanate of Oman.” Biological Conservation 85: 287–95. Haines, Stafford. 1839. “Memoir to Accompany a Chart of the South Coast of Arabia from the Entrance of the Red Sea to Misenat, in 50, 43, 25 E. Part I.” Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London 9: 125–56. Haines, Stafford. 1845. “Memoir of the South and East Coasts of Arabia: Part II.” Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London 15: 104–60. Higgins, Andrew. 2011. With the S.A.S. and Other Animals: A Vet’s Experiences during the Dhofar War 1974. Barnsley: Pen and Sword Publishing. Janzen, Jorg. 1986. Nomads in the Sultanate of Oman: Tradition and Development in Dhofar. London: Westview Press.

70  Raising, herding, catching, receiving and buying Janzen, Jorg. 2000. “The Destruction of Resources among the Mountain Nomads of Dhofar,” in The Transformation of Nomadic Society in the Arab East, University of Cambridge Oriental Publications 58. Martha Mundy and Basim Musallam, eds. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 160–75. Ladwig, Walter C. 2008. “Supporting Allies in Counterinsurgency: Britain and the Dhofar Rebellion.” Small Wars and Insurgencies 19.1: 62–88. Lancaster, William and Fidelity Lancaster. 1995. “Nomadic Fishermen of Ja'alân, Oman.” Nomadic Peoples 36/37: 227–44. Limbert, Mandana. 2008. “The Sacred Date: Gifts of God in an Omani Town.” Ethnos 73.3: 361–76. Limbert, Mandana. 2010. In the Time of Oil: Piety, Memory and Social Life in an Omani Town. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Mbaga, Msafiri Daudi. 2015. “The Prospects of Sustainable Desert Agriculture to Improve Food Security in Oman.” Consilience 13: 114–28. http://www.jstor.org/stable/26427275 McKoy, John, Neil Bagley, Stéphane Gauthier, and Jennifer Devine. 2009. Fish Resources Assessment Survey of the Arabian Sea Coast of Oman - Technical Report 1. Auckland: Bruce Shallard and Associates and the New Zealand National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research. Miller, Anthony, Miranda Morris, and Susanna Stuart-Smith. 1988. Plants of Dhofar, the Southern Region of Oman: Traditional, Economic, and Medicinal Uses. Muscat: Office of the Adviser for Conservation of the Environment, Diwan of Royal Court. Omezzine, Abdallah. 1998. “On-shore Fresh Fish Markets in Oman.” Journal of International Food and Agribusiness Marketing 10.1: 53–69. Omezzine, Abdallah, Lokman Zaibet, and Hamad Al-Oufi. 1986. “The Marketing System of Fresh Fish Products on the Masirah Island in the Sultanate of Oman.” Marine Resources Economics 11: 203–10. Patzelt, Annette. 2015. “Synopsis of the Flora and Vegetation of Oman, with Special Emphasis on Patterns of Plant Endemism.” Braunschweigische Wissenschaftliche Gesellschaft, 282–317. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/281240453_Synopsis_of_the_Flora_ and_Vegetationof_Oman_with_Special_Emphasis_on_Patterns_of_Plant_Endemism Rubin, Aaron. 2014. The Jibbali Language of Oman: Grammar and Texts. Leiden: Brill. Sale, J. 1980. “The Ecology of the Mountain Region of Dhofar.” The Journal of Oman Studies: Special Report 2: The Oman Flora and Fauna Survey 1975. Muscat: Diwan of H. M. for Protocol. 25–54. Saunders, J.P. 1846. “A Short Memoir of the Proceedings of the Honorable Company’s Surveying Brig ‘Palinurus,’ during Her Late Examination of the Coast between Ras Morbat and Ras Seger, and between Ras Fartak and the Ruins of Mesinah.” Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London 16: 169–86. Siddeek, M., M. Fouda, and G. Hermosa. 1999. “Demersal Fisheries of the Arabian Sea, the Gulf of Oman and the Arabian Gulf.” Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science 49.1: 87–97. Spalton, Andrew, Hadi Al Hikmani, and Khalid Mohammed Al Hikmani. 2014. The Arabian Leopards of Oman. London: Stacey International. Spalton, Andrew, Hadi Musalam al Hikmani, David Willis, and Ali Salim Bait Said. 2006. “Critically Endangered Arabian Leopards (Panthera pardus nimrpersist) in the Jabal Samhan Nature Reserve, Oman.” Oryx 40(3): 287–94. 291 Tabook, Salim Bakhit. 1997. Tribal Practices and Folklore of Dhofar, Sultanate of Oman. Unpublished PhD thesis, Faculty of Arts, Exeter University. Zarins, Juris. 2001. The Land of Incense: Archaeological Work in the Governorate of Dhofar, Sultanate of Oman, 1990-1995. Muscat: Sultan Qaboos University Publications.

3 Cooking

Overview of past foodways Food is so tied to traditions, customs, family rituals etc. that most people appear to live in an always diminished present full of longing for the (better) homemade food of the past. However, in the modern era before Sultan Qaboos came to power in 1970, the southern region of Dhofar was impoverished. There was only one small school for the entire region and limited food and medical supplies. Although some men sailed on dhows to India for trade or went (illegally) abroad for work, as laborers, drivers, police, military etc. in other Gulf countries, the majority of the population moved only within the area of Dhofar and could neither read nor write. Dhofaris were not cut off from the world, as there was some land trade with Yemen, Saudi Arabia, the Emirates and northern Oman, but most lived a very traditional life in the 1960s. Modernization only came to Dhofar towards the end of the Dhofar War (1965–1975) in terms of schools, clinics, roads, cement block houses, running water, etc. As set out in Chapter 1, the few, early historical documents about Dhofar mention an abundance of plants such as coconuts, sugar cane, bananas, pomegranates, limes and indigo, and the habit of using dried sardines as cow and camel fodder during the dry months before the monsoon seasons starts. Haines and Saunders, the two commanders of the Indian Navy survey brig Palinurus, and other officers make several comments indicating that the Dhofar region was wetter than now. For example, the ship’s surgeon Carter (1846), explains that the area now known as Salalah “is one of the cheapest and most convenient places on this coast for a ship to water at” (190). Saunders mentions year-round “streams” (1846) and “Dyreez [Dhariz] is … surrounded by well cultivated lands like Thagah [Taqa]” (Cruttenden 1838: 187). The area of Dhariz still has many farms, but they are irrigated by pumped water; the area around the town of Taqa is now arid. These articles mention that sugar cane, fig, tamarind and henna trees are grown along the coast; aloes, corn, onions and tobacco were grown in the mountains; indigo and cotton were no longer grown but had been within the living memory of the speakers. Both Haines (1839, 1845) and Saunders (1846) mention the trade of “oil” (samn, clarified butter) and frankincense from the mountain for coastal goods such as sardines and (imported) dates, rice and cloth.

72  Cooking Theodore and Mabel Bent were in the Dhofar region from December 20, 1893 until January 23, 1894. During their short stay, they traveled along the coast and a short distance in the mountains; I believe they were the first Westerners to visit the Dhofar mountains to write a description of it. In Southern Arabia (2005 [1900]), they recount that along the coast they saw coconut palms, “bright green fields,” “[t]obacco, cotton, Indian corn, and various species of grain” (233), as well as gardens with “the plantain, the papya, mulberries, melons, chilis, brinjols [eggplants], and fruits and vegetables of various descriptions” (234). During their journey through the mountains, they saw the still-used method of cooking meat on heated stones (250); plant-life including sycamores, acacia, jessamine, convolvulus, maidenhair ferns and fig trees (256); and they describe how rice was eaten (275). In Arabia Felix (1932) Thomas recounts his journey across the Rub al Kahli (Empty Quarter) in the fall/ winter of 1930. His trip started in Salalah, so there are a few food references. For example, at the home of a prosperous merchant, he is given a meal of “beef grilled crisp and black, spaghetti drenched in tomato sauce, and slices of pineapple” (19). During a short trip in the mountains, he explains that the Gibali diet was milk, honey and beef (51) and that hyena, fox and “eggs, chicken and all manner of birds are under strict taboo” (59). In general, the brief description given by Carter in the mid-1800s, still held true until the early 1970s: “Their food consists almost entirely of milk, flesh and honey, and the wild fruits of the mountains” (1845: 200). As Watson writes, “The older generation today is unique in having experienced both the pre-motorized past and the motorized, industrialized present” (2013: 96). For example, “[pre-1970] … people outside the small towns on the coast lived in caves or in brushwood or stone huts they constructed themselves” (Watson and al-Mahri 2017: 2).1 Before the disruption of the Dhofar War, Dhofaris from the three main geographical sectors (coast/plain, mountain, and desert/nejd) engaged in complex trading patterns to meet basic nutritional needs and acquire extra cash to buy imported goods.2 Webster notes, “A distinctly southern characteristic is the apparently ancient interconnection of the pastoral and maritime fishing economies” (1991: 477). Watson and al-Mahri explain people of the interior enjoyed symbiotic relationships with people of the small coastal towns. The common currency was Maria Theresa Dollars, but for many people a barter system operated, and townspeople would barter dried fish and imported goods for farm produce from the mountains. Frankincense would be bartered for food and clothing. (2017: 3) In both his unpublished dissertation, Tribal Practices and Folklore of Dhofar, Sultanate of Oman (1997) and “Tribal Structures in South Oman” (1982) Salim Tabook (Salim Tabuki) gives examples of this interconnectedness, for example men who supply sardines would go “with their families to drink the milk of the cows fed on this fodder” (1982: 54).

Cooking  73 Morris explains the types of exchanges in more detail. Mountain and coastal dwellers traded clarified butter (samn) from mountain cows for dried sardines which were used as fodder. Bedouins from the desert areas sold goatskins, dried acacia, palm fiber, salt, and frankincense to cattle herders in the mountains in exchange for butter, dried bean, sorghum; both desert and cattle peoples would bring wood and charcoal to the coast to exchange for bought goods such as cloth, rice, dates, sugar, and metal work. Mountain dwellers would sometimes plant sorghum, cow peas, maize, beans, cucumbers to eat and barter; coastal dwellers sold and bartered sea salt, cereals, sardines, fish and lobster.3 Before the 1970s, the mountains were inhabited almost exclusively by Gibalis and the diet was mostly milk, rain-fed agriculture, wild honey and game (1987: 69–73). In another article, “The Harvesting of Frankincense in Dhofar, Oman” (1997), Morris shows how frankincense was part of this exchange structure; before the Dhofar War, the worse the previous year [in terms of providing fodder] the greater the number of people who would arrive to seek work in order to pay for the food which they purchased at a high price from the coastal merchants on the promise of future payment with their share of the frankincense harvest (244) For the people harvesting frankincense, “daily food was simple: a scoop … of sorghum … and a double handful of dates” with milch goats kept to provide fresh milk (238), with “some individuals dropping in to work for only as long as it took to pay off a debt or to buy a sack of sorghum for the family” (236).4 Gibali men whom I know, who lived in the mountains as children, remember breakfast being just milk or tea with milk, a main meal including rice at lunchtime and milk again at dinner, perhaps with bread. One informant mentioned making aseeda/ asida (cooked wheat flour served with samn), was arduous because it had to be pounded by hand for a long time. Some informants who were children in the 1970s remember the difficulties of the war; relatives died or were killed and there were many hardships.5 It is not a topic for easy or common conversation as it brings back memories of the sadness for themselves and their relatives. One outcome of the war was the creation of firqats, civil militia which evolved into something similar to the American National Guard, in that men would undergo a short training period of a few months, then have duty 10 days a month. There is a low salary and food is provided. This was important at the end of and after the war as it was a way of getting regular food deliveries to families in the mountains. Soldiers were not only fed, but given extra foodstuffs. Janzen, who did his fieldwork from January to August 1977 and January to May 1978 (1986: xxi), discusses “Monsoon-rain fields” in which millet and beans are grown along with cucumbers, tobacco, maize, “red” (chili) peppers, and tomatoes (107, drawing 106, details of planting 108). In the mid-1950s, when diesel pumps could bring up water faster and cheaper than animal labor, crops included millet, wheat, maize, “watermelons, cucumbers, tomatoes, sweet potatoes, eggplants, onions and peppers,” as well as bananas, papayas and

74  Cooking coconuts (154). He explains that after the war, the composition of plantations changed, in that cereals were no longer sown, given that corn and flour became easily available and that land was given over to fruits and vegetables which were in higher demand (154). There are now far more choices than in the 1970s. The Gibali men in my research group are aware of and often discuss culinary changes. Some food, such as locusts, are no longer eaten because the nutrition they provided can be easily obtained from other sources; others, such as gazelle, are now forbidden to be killed by the government.6 Some kinds of bread cooked in the ashes of a fire are not made because of it is simpler to buy bread; while other kinds, such as qibqab, made by pressing dough to the wall of a round, sunken oven, are still eaten frequently. There are noticeable changes in commercial food production in Salalah such as the opening of McDonalds, a sushi place, a Mexican restaurant and the Carrefour grocery store. One aspect of food culture that is not changing (perhaps it will in the future) is that of eating locally and in season. Although the commercial trade/ bartering system is no longer used (goods are usually either given or sold), there are continuing close connections between relatives who live in the mountains and those who live in the coastal villages or Salalah, e.g. seasonal delicacies such as wild roots, mushrooms, a local kind of tuber, and seed pods are brought down from the mountain and eaten. On the coast, changes in the ocean temperature bring various fish closer to or farther from shore so that people are used to eating certain fish at certain times of the year. Further, the government enforces seasons on various seafood, so that abalone and lobster, for example, can only be easily found at certain times of year. Currently the outsider’s view of Omani food is varied. “Oman Food and Drink” (Rough Guides 2020 is dismissive: “Food in Oman is mainly a question of eating to live, rather than living to eat” and “There are plenty of places to eat in Oman, although few have any airs and graces.” On the other hand, Sadeghin’s online article is titled “The Food of Oman is Too Good to Ignore” (2015) and states that “its cuisine is a remarkably delicious case of cultural transfusion” with “Persian, North African, Indian, and Arab” influences and the “usual suspects like saffron, rose water, and dried limes, but also shark, wheat berries, coconut, and nutmeg.” Nestle’s website “Omani Recipes” (2020) gushes that “a culinary treat is inevitable” and “It’s [sic] healthy balance of vegetables, meat and rice, infused with mouth-watering aromas, delicious tastes and appealing presentation make it a cuisine that is unmatched in flavor and nutrition.”

Cooking at home Houses There are few houses in Dhofar that are more than forty years old. Before the onset of modernization in the early 1970s, most houses along the coast were built of mud brick; some were built using rocks or coral. In the mountains people sheltered in caves and round structures consisting of a curved rock wall built up several feet with a roof made of interlocking tree branches.

Cooking  75 All houses now are made of cement blocks and almost all are painted in the spectrum of beige, ivory, fawn or taupe. Some are tiled in the same range of colors. A few are painted in brighter colors such as strawberry pink or tropical green. Houses in the center part of Salalah open directly onto the street but most houses have a 6–8 ft-high concrete-block wall around them. Houses in town are in lots of usually 600 m. People with double or treble lots will sometimes build two, three or four houses together for co-wives or the children of one man. Houses are almost always designed by the owner, not built and sold for speculation. A man who is planning or building a house will often have the blueprints with him and discuss them with not just close family, but friends and sometimes co-workers.7 Houses are usually one or two stories with a flat roof. In the middle of the roof is a small “hat”/cupola where the staircase is built up to allow for roof access and a possible additional floor. On top of the cupola (accessed by a ladder) are usually satellite dishes and the white plastic round water tank. Most houses have “Arabic” details; Omanis say that there is a governmental edict that this is required, i.e. arched windows and flat roofs. In the past, Smith notes, “Inland from the groves, the traditional Salalah townhouse was limestone built and featured an extensive open yard to the front which faced the sea. In this way the onshore breezes passed undisturbed towards and through large openings in the upper levels of the south wall, thus ensuring ventilation within” (1983: 19). Now houses in town are constrained by the orientation of the lot, i.e. the entrance must be on the side facing the road; usually no adjustments are made for prevailing winds or view. Curtains are usually closed so the view is not important; the only majlis I have been in with open curtains was located next to the high wall surrounding the house so you couldn’t see anything except the wall. As Smith says in talking about houses in Muscat, “the rendered [cement] block walls have no thermal insulation resulting in excessive heat gain for the interior. This in turn leads to the over-working of the inefficient and noisy wall-mounted, packaged air conditioners, themselves poorly located near the corners of each room” (1983: 20). The front entry is usually set in the middle of the house, with a main door and a side door or second door which leads into the majlis, the formal sitting room used by male visitors and the men of the house, although the women and children will also use it when there are no visitors. When you walk up to the house, you can gauge how many men are there by how many pairs of sandals are near the door. If you walk through the main door, you find a large open hallway with the salle (family/ female living room) to one side. Both the majlis and the salle will have a bathroom nearby, and then a door or long hallway to separate these public spaces from the rest of the house. In larger houses owned by Gibalis, in the mountains and in Salalah, there is a formal majlis and salle used for entertaining guests, then a smaller room where the family sits together informally. Sometimes that room has mats on the floor and a TV, sometimes it is as richly decorated as the formal salle. There might also be a salle upstairs in a common area outside the bedrooms only for family.

76  Cooking Bedrooms are at the back or upstairs. Depending on the size of the house and wealth of the family, the bedroom area might just be a room for sleeping, a room with attached bathroom or a small suite with a room for sleeping, a sitting area and a mini-kitchen for a married couple with or without small children. A family may make a bedroom next to the salle for an older relative so that s/he doesn’t have to navigate stairs. Houses in the mountains are slightly different. Up until the early 2000s, concrete houses often had pitched roofs. Also in the mountain, because of the heavy fog and rain from the monsoon season, the paint is often faded and blackened. The houses have much lower walls (2–3 ft), used to keep animals from coming into the courtyard. Also, they are usually either alone or in a tight cluster, with the nearby houses owned by relatives. As there is less emphasis on blocking the house from outsiders’ eyes, houses are often sited for views, i.e. on the top of inclines, and owners point out or ask visitors to comment on the view. There is often a dekka, an open, roofed or unroofed front patio for all the family to enjoy the view in good weather. Another major difference is that houses in the mountains aren’t set up with majlis (male/ visitor living room) and salle (family/ female living room) as Gibalis in the past did not live segregated lives (see Tabook 1997 and Tabuki 1982). One style for older houses is to have one main hallway with all the rooms built off of it, with the living room and kitchen the front two rooms. Sometimes there is a separate door for majlis but the other front room (facing the street), which is a salle in Salalah, is a bedroom for either the house’s owner or a parent, i.e. the most important person in the house. Kitchens Usually there is one kitchen per house, set towards the back or along the back of the house with its own door for deliveries, bringing in food and taking out the trash. Some recently built houses have seating areas in the kitchen, but traditionally the kitchen is only for preparing food. The floor and walls are usually tiled, often with a color scheme which can seem bleak. I have been in several kitchens which had dark grey tiles, giving one the impression of being caught in the stomach of a whale. Kitchens have fluorescent lighting and, sometimes, a window with frosted glass over the sink. All have extractor fans; some newer ones have an AC unit. As with all other rooms, kitchen have high ceilings of nine feet or more. There are usually tiled or stone counters along two walls. The counters are set high, not at normal waist-height, even if the house is purpose-built for a family.8 There are usually small plastic step stools around to help people work at the counters easily and reach the upper shelves, which can be open or closed cupboards with doors. There is always open shelving or cupboards underneath the counters. Most kitchens have a small locked closet called the “store” to hold the bulk goods such as sacks of rice, cartons of juice, etc.; this sometimes has a second refrigerator and/ or a deep-freezer to hold frozen chickens, fish, packaged frozen vegetables, etc.

Cooking  77 The fridge and stove are usually set up on raised (4 or 5 in.) platforms, as the floor is usually cleaned by sluicing with water, then mopping with a squeegee; excess water goes down floor drains. Often the washing machine is also in the kitchen, also on a raised platform. I have never seen a dishwasher or clothes drier, but I assume some houses have them. Stoves run on gas bought in heavy cylinders and placed (sometimes in little locked huts) outside the kitchen; a small hole is drilled through the wall for the pipe which connects the canister to the stove. Gas is bought from government regulated orange-painted pick-ups for a nominal price (3.300 Omani Riyal, about $9); you bring your empty cylinder and trade it in for a full one. There is usually a lot of open space in kitchens.9 Sometimes there is a table, but often you can find an area that is five to ten feet square empty. This is so a lot of women can work together for parties and also because some cooking is done on the floor. For example, large pots of meat are sometimes cooked on gas rings set on the floor because it is easier to stir from a standing position than trying to reach into a pot set on the stovetop. Some kinds of bread are cooked using small gas burners set on the floor. Kitchens are utilitarian; pretty trays might be leaned against the splash-back or there might be a pretty vase to hold wooden spoons, etc., but kitchens are seldom decorated or set up as welcoming or comforting spaces. As soon as you walk in, it’s easy to visually orient yourself; often the cupboards have glass fronts so you can see inside them. I will go into this point in more detail below in terms of the five senses, but it is important in Gibali culture that objects appear to be what they are, so for example, fridges aren’t designed to appear as cupboards. Most families will have items for hosting in sight and easy to reach: many trays, several sets of teacups and saucers, tea and coffee pots, carafes, glass bowls or plates.10 Dishes for everyday use are usually melamine or brands such as Luminarc or Corelle. Cleaning up is done while cooking or as soon as the meal is finished. Given the chance of attracting ants, flies, cockroaches and lizards, especially in houses near farms, dirty dishes and food are never left sitting on the counter for long. All dishes are cleaned and put away, the counter-top wiped down and floor swept; the garbage bin is usually covered and if mostly full might be put outside on the steps up to the kitchen. Thus, for most of the time, the kitchen is empty and very clean. Dhofaris only go in the kitchen to cook before meals or to prepare dishes ahead of time for Ramadan/ Eids and to clean up afterwards. Expat workers are in the kitchen to cook and clean. Some houses have a room for the maid with a door off the kitchen, but most of the maids’ rooms are in the hallway near the kitchen or upstairs, so that the kitchen can be locked when not in use, not so much to stop people from eating but to prevent small children causing a mess or hurting themselves. Larger and newer houses will have small suites for each married son. This will usually consists of a door to the hallway which opens to a small space with a door to the bedroom, a door to a bathroom and an open sitting area which might have a galley kitchen with a small sink and microwave so they can make tea and simple meals for themselves.

78  Cooking As almost all houses are built by their owner, the kitchens are designed by the people who will live in the house. Sometimes the oldest man will make the decisions (which can result in the women who cook complaining about the awkward lay-out in the kitchen) but in almost all cases, hakli men will show the blueprints to “the women,” meaning his mother, wife, older or near-in-age sisters. There women might also consult with younger sisters and or sisters-in-law. If brothers and sisters are building a house together, the women will usually take full control over the kitchen design. Houses are usually painted or refurbished for Eids and weddings, but besides buying new appliances, kitchens are usually not re-done. The kitchen designs for married sons’ rooms are done by the groom or the groom’s sisters. If she is a cousin, the bride might be asked about her favorite color, but normally the bride has no say in how the suite is decorated and is usually not allowed to make any changes for several years (as it would be insulting to whoever designed the room).11 So it is rare, but a woman might cook her whole life in kitchens that she had no hand in designing. Who cooks at home Before, during and in the period just after the war, almost every Gibali knew how to make a fire and cook basics such as rice and meat. Women cooked for their families but men, who could be away for extended periods of time going to Salalah to barter or with livestock in grazing areas, could cook for themselves. Small children might be given the responsibility of taking care of goats, going to get water, checking on the family rain-fed crops etc. Cooking and knowing edible plants were part of everyone’s education; boys also learned to hunt and joint animals. One change since that time is that the person who does the cooking depends on the place. In rough approximation the culinary landscape is as follows: in restaurants, male expat workers do the cooking; in homes, older women decide what and when to cook with input from male and female family members, preparing the food themselves or supervising younger women or maids; on picnics and while camping, women may give suggestions, bring purchased prepared food and occasionally cook, but usually men will plan, buy for and cook meals. In most milk and foodstuff commercials, it is a woman who cooks and serves food but there is one Dhofari chicken company which has ads featuring one or more men. In the home, the two biggest changes since the mid-1970s are that some of the cooking responsibility has devolved onto expat workers and that not all Gibali women cook. These two points are related but not necessarily causative. Before the mid-1970s, malnutrition, disease and lack of medical care led to high infant and childhood mortality rates; herd size (and thus access to milk, samn and meat) was restricted by the necessity of keeping livestock close to natural springs and sufficient feed. With clinics, drilled wells, and easily available food for people and livestock, family size grew. With the ability to build large, multi-story houses, families were able to live in larger units, and with schools and the increase in marriage-age for

Cooking  79 girls, daughters stayed with their parents for longer. Now in one house one might find a husband and wife, three married sons with their wives and children, two unmarried daughters, a married daughter and her children with a husband who works in Muscat, a divorced daughter and an older paternal aunt – that’s nine women and one kitchen. Thus, with or without outside help, cooking is not seen as a required skill for all women. There are Gibali women who are in charge of cooking or overseeing cooking for the household; women who will pitch in with simple dishes like pasta or during Eids; women who don’t want to, don’t like to, or don’t have a chance to cook; and women who cook as a job, advertising their skills on social media. As with the discussion on distributing food in Chapter 2, a woman who cooks is seen as doing necessary work to help the household, but it is not the only (or even the best) kind of work. As one woman is cooking, another might be in the salle entertaining guests, another teaching at a masjid (mosque), another working at a government job, another taking care of small children, another might be focusing on her studies and another making majmars (clay incense burners) or bukhoor (wood infused with aromatic oils which is burnt for the perfumed smoke). Gibali cultures understand that people are different and a person’s character, within the parameters of acceptable behavior, should be respected. Thus a girl who likes to study might be frequently excused from household tasks, a girl who is sociable takes more responsibility for entertaining female guests, etc. A married woman who has moved to her husband’s house would normally not be expected to take part in household tasks for weeks, if not months or years. Usually her mother-in-law, older sisters-in-law (both her husband’s sisters and the wives of her brothers-in-law) and other older female relatives would make all the culinary decisions. Thus a female might never cook, cook her whole life or move through various stages of cooking and not cooking in her life. For example, she might not start helping her mother until she is 10 or 11, help for several years, stop helping if she decides to concentrate on studying in high school, resume again after graduating, stop cooking when she goes to her husband’s house, start again after a few years if her mother-in-law becomes sick, stop cooking if a maid is hired, start again if she and her husband move to their own house, and finally stop when her son’s wives take over the responsibility. Likewise, some men are (and are known to be) skilled at killing and butchering animals, buying good quality fresh meat and vegetables, making tea, and cooking over campfires; others are not competent at this.12 As with women, culinary ability is a positive attribute, but seen as one of many possible positive qualities, not necessarily the most important one. On over 100 picnic dinners with three different groups of Gibali men, there were always one or two men in the group who usually did the cooking and a few men who never cooked. The person who cooked decided the menu: some variety of rice with meat, chicken or fish; a type of meat, chicken or fish stew served with bread; or white rice with grilled or boiled fish or just fish if there was no bread or rice on hand. Non-cooks of their own volition would clean the fish, prepare the platters, build up the fire, or cleanup afterwards.

80  Cooking Expat help with meal preparation can take many forms: a live-in cook, a maid who cleans and also cooks some of the meals, a person who comes every day for several hours to cook and clean, or someone who only cleans the kitchen after lunch and dinner. Having household help is not a status marker, as the cost of hired help is low and in the typical large households there are many people who share the cost. As Wanucha and Babar explain, in the Gulf, “Rising wealth has allowed families to increasingly depend on migrant domestic workers” (2018: 3); Popp speaking in general about Oman notes, “almost every middle-class household employs a housekeeper from southern India or the Philippines” (2018). All cooks, maids and household help are expat, usually from India, Nepal, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, or the Philippines. Usually expat women live in the house and work full-time; expat men live outside the house and come in for a few hours. Some maids or cooks will stay with a Dhofari family for over ten years, going home for a month each year; others will work for a few months or a year and then return home or move to a different family. Who cooks and who sells outside the home As discussed in Chapter 2, there are differences between Dhofari and expat workers in terms of food production and retail. Both Dhofaris and expats grow plants for food near their houses and work on small plots of land, but only Dhofaris can own land. Similarly, both expat men and Dhofari men can herd, milk and care for cows or camels, but only Dhofari own livestock in any quantity. Dhofari women and expat men herd, milk and care for goats. In terms of cooking and selling foodstuffs and prepared food, there are similar social lines about what a Gibali person may or may not do according to cultural expectations, most importantly that Gibalis should be generous with food, but not do menial work, nor should women expose themselves to censure by working alone in public. Thus expat men sell fruit and vegetables from the back of pick-up trucks parked next to roads and from small palm-frond covered shacks near the plantations in Salalah. Expat men work at roadside restaurants, and bring simple foods such as schwarma, fatayer (see below), paratha, tea, fruit juice and soda to people sitting in their cars. Expat men work as cooks and waiters in most restaurants. Dhofari women sell their own prepared food in certain times and places that are sanctioned by custom. In Ramadan, they sell bread (khubz roqaq and qibqab, see below) by sitting on mats outside of grocery stores. They also sell prepared food (bread, rice and meat dishes, sweets) from temporary tents near roads during Ramadan; this food is bought by Dhofari men as a way to help the women of their family from having to make many dishes and non-Dhofari men so they have “home-cooked” food if they are single. Some women also sell prepared and packaged food (such as chips) from road-side tents during khareef for tourists. They are never alone, usually there is a boy or man (relative) to sit with them and bring goods to people in cars or a group of women. Women also sell packaged food at stalls in “festivals,” public events held in khareef and sometimes in the spring at the municipal fairgrounds: walled areas

Cooking  81 with children’s games, exhibits, food stalls and temporary cafés. Women sell packaged food and their own prepared food at women’s festivals held in halls (large buildings with no interior dividing walls used for weddings, parties and festivals) every few months; only women and children are allowed in. Women entrepreneurs (selling their own or commercially made soap, cosmetics, perfume, clothes, etc.) take up most of the stalls, but there is always a section for food in which Dhofari woman, sometimes assisted by expat women, sell dishes they made themselves. Most have a title for their business, business cards, an Instagram/ Twitter account, special packaging, e.g. stickers, bags and napkins with the business name and logo. Typical choices include: •

• • •

• •

Various types of pasta with a white, cream-based sauce, pieces of chicken and hot peppers; one kind had bow-tie pasta with a cream-based sauce, slices of chicken, sliced jalapenos and quail egg-sized scoops of coarsely mashed potatoes on top, dusted with spice mix and baked Burgers French fries with a spicy tomato-based sauce with slices of deboned-chicken “Factory cake,” a triangle piece from a round, white sheet cake (or square cut from a rectangular, white sheet cake) as the bottom layer, layer of “cream” (soft, sweet frosting), layer of vanilla ice cream, layer of “cream,” layer of cake, layer of “cream” Saffron cake (square slice of white sheet cake drenched with saffron-flavored cream) Vimto Mojito (Vimto mixed with slices of lemon or other fruit, sprigs of mint, ice and 7-Up or Sprite)

It’s common for a Dhofari woman to sell home-made goods on Instagram, posting a photo of a type of bread, cake or rice dish, a phone number and her name, usually not her first name but a patronymic (Bint Ahmed, daughter of Ahmed) or teknonymy/ paedonymic (Umm Ahmed, mother of Ahmed). The food is usually delivered by her male relatives. A few women have succeeded well enough to open small stores which sell pre-made sandwiches and sweets, which are staffed by expat men.13 Thus Gibalis do not usually cook in public for money. Gibali men can sell livestock to individuals and fish, abalone, lobsters, and produce in large amounts to middlemen, but they do not normally stand in a shop and sell individual fish or pieces of produce.14 Dhofari men cook for themselves when they live alone or for their families and friends on picnics, but not to sell. If they own a restaurant, they supervise the staff. Dhofari women can sell their livestock to an individual (usually through a male relative) and prepared food in public either during certain times of the year in certain places with people around them, in women-only events, via Instagram or from a store.15 But they do not make the food in front of other people. Qibqab (round, cracker-like bread) is baked by Dhofari women in sunken earthen ovens, but I have only seen this done with the dough balls covered in plastic tubs, taken out, shaped, and slapped against the side of the oven. I have never seen women making the dough.

82  Cooking Selling prepared food is something women do although I am sure there are Dhofari men who love to cook or would like to sell food. For right now, I see this as the same sort of division for abalone diving. Men can dive for abalone far from shore but should not dive close to shore or take mussels from the rocks. Those are resources for women, as women don’t have the chance to dive. In the same way, men should not take or take over one of the chances women have to run a home business, be it selling food, making bukhoor (perfume infused wood chips), forming and painting majmars (clay incense burners), designing abayahs, etc. Deciding what to make and how The menu for what is eaten in the house is decided by the senior woman based on two factors: what’s on hand and what people want to eat. There is not the sort of plan-meals-for-the-whole-week work that is found in some cultures. One reason is that guests may appear without warning for meals or someone might drop off food unexpectedly. Another is that in a large household, it’s easy to get hold of a needed item. Small children could be sent to the nearby small store or a message sent to an older child to bring X to the home. The senior woman will usually ask her husband, older relatives, sons and daughters what they would prefer, then make a decision. She will know what everyone’s favorite foods are and, for example, make a briyani saying, “This is for X, tomorrow we will have Y dish for Z person.” One Gibali informant told me that his mother asks her sons what they would like. I asked, “What if two sons ask for different things? Would she make both?” I asked. He said, “Then she would make what was best for both of them.” The veto players are the oldest men and women, but food decision power can also be given to younger males and females, for example if a child did well on a test or needs to be cheered up. In Dhofar, older people are in charge of what “good” food is, but since Gibali is a non-written language, there are no cookbooks, hence no written authority on how a traditional dish should be prepared.16 An experienced cook will rarely if ever ask for advice on how to cook but might ask for opinions on simple issues such as “is the rice fully cooked,” “is there enough salt,” and “should more spices be added.” This is done by dipping a spoon in the pot and handing it to another person.17 If the person cooking is young or a servant, they have to season as directed. However, if the cook is an older Dhofari, the suggestion given might or might not be followed. There are no protests if, after being told there is enough salt, the cook dumps in another handful; the cook is in charge.18 Ideas for new dishes come from eating in restaurants or dishes received from neighbors and relatives. Younger Dhofaris use social media to see photos of food and drinks (such as coffee decorated with cream, sprinkles, sauce etc. or Vimto with pieces of fruit) to replicate at home. Cooking is usually done with minimal equipment; items such as bowl mixers are not found in all kitchens. Microwave and blenders/ grinders are common. Knives, cutting boards, large pots for cooking large amounts of rice or meat and large spoons for stirring are essential. Most houses have electric kettles to make hot water, but water can also be boiled in a metal pan or bowl. Stovetop cooking

Cooking  83 is much more common than the oven, which is usually used for baked vegetables and pasta dishes, as well as cakes.19 The usual framework is intensive meal preparation, followed by allowing the food to cook. The work, except for items that are fried, is done up-front and is labor intensive. For my first ten years here, I would explain to friends in the States that the grocery stores had “ingredients” – rice, oil, spices, vegetables (fresh and canned) and (usually frozen) chicken that were supposed to be taken home and turned into a meal by someone who spent two hours washing and cutting everything. Stores now have some prepared food but there are no frozen dishes, no heat-and-serve, no salad-in-a-bag, no ready-made dips or sauces. You buy prepared meals or you stand in your kitchen and cut up stuff. Thus the need for multiple cutting boards and knives. For a typical dinner you would cut tomatoes, onion, eggplants, carrots, okra, and potatoes to be cooked in a large pot with spices and pieces of chicken with the bone attached. You would set rice cooking in another large pot, then you would cut onions, tomatoes, green peppers, lettuce, cucumbers and carrots for a salad. Then you would dice or blend onions, tomatoes and spices for a “spicy” (hot sauce). Another kind of meal (usually for dinner, not lunch) is macaroni boiled in a large pot, drained, and then cut tomatoes, spices and chicken or tuna are added. Baked dishes might be spaghetti with a béchamel sauce poured over it or sliced eggplant and potatoes in a tomato sauce. Thus time is spent in the primary preparation of the dish – food is not usually changed or adjusted mid-cooking, i.e. there is little or no basting or multi-step processes of cooking something then pureeing it, adding it to something else, etc. When the rice is done, it is heaped on a platter and the pieces of chicken, meat or fish are put on top. When a “curry” (meaning stew, not necessarily made with curry leaves) is done, it is set on a platter and served with bread without sprinkling parsley on top or some such embellishment. In general, time is not the point for cooking or eating. It might take a man over twenty minutes to build up a fire, boil water in a kettle and make tea, only to take two sips and be done. I have never heard anyone mention how long it took to cook or bake something. If I am on a picnic with research guys, the preparation can take about half an hour to cut vegetables and prepare the meat, then it’s put in the pot and stirred a few times, then usually left to cook for between half an hour to 2 h. Time becomes an important factor after the food is ready. One informant told me that food “is new for two hours, not four hours.” “New,” here, meaning it can be eaten by relatives, friends or neighbors; when it is no longer “new” it should be given to others, such as expat laborers. As Kanafani (1979) mentions, the “initial cooking of food” is the most important (158). Food can be the same temperature after sitting on the counter one hour or three hours, but after time has passed, it is no longer regarded as fresh. In the same manner, it’s not important if fried foods (such as cheese rolls) are served hot, if they were made within the last hour, they are fresh. Dhofaris try to buy the freshest pita bread from bakeries so it is kept in coolers (to keep it warm) in stores. A few prepared foods such as fruit salad, cake, chutney (a condiment of pureed, sometimes cooked, vegetables and spices) is fine for a day or two after being made.20

84  Cooking If there is a large kitchen and a small (nuclear) family, dinner may be served in the kitchen at a table, but not on the floor of the kitchen which is seen as dirty. Normally everything is brought to the majlis or salle. Family dinners are usually eaten while sitting on the floor of the salle. If there are male guests, food is served in the majlis, either on the floor or set on low coffee tables. Sometimes women will take over the majlis for a meal, for example if a woman has a party for her sisters and cousins. It is understood that the men of the household will be outside and not come home until the party is over. Some newer houses also have a dining area, either as a separate room or a large table set along the side of salle.

Pragmatics of when and what to eat Below is an extended discussion of what is eaten at what time, but to preview briefly: children usually eat breakfast between 6 and 7am during school weeks, those who work usually pick up something on the way or at work, people who stay in the house usually eat later, between 9 and 11am. Lunch is the main meal, usually eaten around 2 pm, after schools, government offices and most work places have closed. Dinner at home can be eaten anytime between 7pm and 1am. There should be tea and/ or coffee with fruit and/ or snacks in the majlis at all times for guests and something on hand (such as cake, fruit salad, pudding, etc.) to serve any guests who appear. For the timings of meals, the senior woman will take various factors into account, not just whether the food is ready but also prayer times and who is in the house. When the time is judged as correct, the senior woman will signal the maid or younger women to bring the food on trays into the room where it will be eaten. Any Gibali man or woman is welcome to eat any meal at the house of any close relative, but usually they only share breakfast if they are staying in the house. Breakfast Breakfast is usually a light meal. Almost everyone drinks tea, usually with a lot of sugar, with milk and/ or spices such as cinnamon or cardamom.21 Some Gibalis simply have tea or tea with toast (sliced bread from a loaf); pita bread (khubz lebnani) with butter, jam, honey or processed cheese; round, thick traditional bread (kak, see below); or store-bought biscuits.22 Eggs (scrambled, fried or boiled) are often set out and children often eat cereal and sometimes pancakes. Breakfast is a meal that is just for family. The timing varies from after the dawn (fajr) prayer to 11am on weekends and holidays. Tea and/ or coffee, bread and accoutrements are set out by the senior women and/ or a maid early and people usually eat at different times according to school, work and sleep schedules. School-age children are fed before they leave the house for school, which usually starts around 7 or 7:15. Mothers might eat with these children, or just have tea and go back to sleep with younger children and eat at 10 or 11am, perhaps sharing tea and bread with a neighbor.

Cooking  85 Work usually starts at 8 or 8:30am. Gibalis who work or go to university will usually leave the house without eating anything and pick up something along the way or once they are in their office. Men going fishing, for example, will buy paratha (Indian flatbread cooked in ghee or oil) served plain, with eggs or with dal (cooked legumes with onions and spices such as curry leaves, cumin seeds, black mustard seeds, dried red chilies, etc.) to eat mid-morning. People who work in offices will usually have an expat “tea-assistant” or “runner” who will bring tea, instant coffee and/ or paratha. Sometimes in good weather, a family will have a breakfast picnic, which would include choices such as omelets, boiled eggs, cereal, bread, cheese, fruit, a thermos of tea and various condiments including hummus. This would be eaten on a holiday or weekend morning with the egg dishes prepared in the house and all the food packed into the car, then the family driving to a scenic spot to enjoy a leisurely breakfast. When camping, breakfast is almost always tea and bread with a choice of honey, processed cheese or jam. Lunch Lunch is the main meal of the day and eaten between 1:30 and 2:30pm after children return from school and most adults return from work. In almost every Gibali household rice must be served.23 The rice might be plain white and served with dates and fried or grilled fish; biryani with fish, meat or chicken placed on top; a “curry;” a salona; or one of the dishes seen as traditional including qabooli/ qabuli, briyani, kebsa/ kabsa/ maqboos, or mandi/ mehndi.24 The main dish is served with one or more condiments called “chutney” and a chopped salad, often made with fresh vegetables such as onions, cucumbers, tomatoes, carrots, green peppers and, sometimes, lettuce; this is served without a dressing.25 Quartered limes and small plates of chili peppers are often set out; some families use bottled hot sauces such as Tabasco. When the Gibali men I know say “lunch” they mean “rice with fish or meat” (goat, cow or camel); there is no other definition. Meat is the preferred protein; fish with lunch is usually only found in some houses by the coast. Chicken is least common. More than one male Gibali friend told me that his father had never tasted chicken in his life; this is mentioned in Thomas (1932: 103). In some families, everyone waits until the whole family is gathered; in some, the lunch is set out when children return home from school and whoever is there eats. Leftovers are covered and set in the kitchen for late-comers to help themselves. The atmosphere depends on the attitude of the senior parents. Some mothers will ask (meaning demand) that married sons eat with whole families; others will support a daughter-in-law to take some food and bring it to her room to have lunch alone with her husband. Even with families who do eat together at the same time, it is usual to eat at home, although working men or women might occasionally eat at a restaurant with a friend or work colleagues. As lunch is after work and before the nap/ relaxation time of late afternoon, it is generally eaten quickly without the social time that usually precedes and succeeds dinner. 26

86  Cooking Snacks and bread Given that most people do not eat breakfast and lunch is not served until between 1:30 and 2:30, most Dhofaris have mid-morning snacks. And as dinner might be as late as midnight, there are also mid-afternoon snacks. Children at school and home usually have biscuits (meaning dry, baked items made primarily from flour which might be unsweetened like rusks or sweetened, what Americans would call “cookies”), fruit or various types of bread (discussed below) with processed cheese. Older Dhofaris usually eat parathas plain, with processed cheese or eggs, or keema.27 After four or five in the afternoon, the schwarma stands open up. Schwarma is a sandwich of shaved slices of chicken or meat on a pita bread with various condiments including pickled vegetables (beets, carrots, tubers, etc.), French fries, garlic spread, tahini sauce, ketchup, mayonnaise and hot sauce. A favorite for a fast snack is to spread processed cheese on pita or slices of white bread, open a bag of spicy Chips Oman, crush them and sprinkle on the bread, splash on some hot sauce and then toast the bread in a panini press (at a restaurant) or a fry pan (at home). A variation is to spread processed cheese on a warm paratha, add a fried egg and a bag of crushed Chips Oman, with hot sauce if you need more heat. In houses, there should be snacks at the ready in the majlis and salle at all times in readiness for guests. Most houses will have thermoses of tea or coffee set out throughout the day made by or under the direction of senior women. There will also usually be fruit, often in a glass covered container, and something to snack on such as wrapped boiled sweets, dates, baklava, roasted and salted sunflower seeds, nuts, or Omani halwa. The Arabic word for bread is khubz/ khoubz; sometimes it is used with an adjective such as khubz lebnani (Lebanese bread, called pita bread in America); the types can be divided into three broad categories: without sugar, with sugar and fatayer. The most common sort of bread for breakfast and snacks is called kak/ kaek, qaleeb, tanoor (oven) or thakheen (thick), dofdof or godom in Gibali. It’s about 6 in. across, three quarters of an inch thick with hebba sowda (black seeds) and marked with pressed fork tines on top. It can be cooked in wood-fired or gas ovens and can be eaten warm or kept for several days. A thinner, cracker-like, plain bread called qibqab/ qalib (meaning “put in a mold” or “turned”) or “thin kak” is about 12 in. round and baked by slapping the dough onto the side of a sunken round oven with coals at the bottom. It is usually eaten with Omani halwa. Khubz roqaq/ raqeeq or rekal is round, about 24 in. across and very light. The dough is dabbed by hand onto a convex, oiled, heated surface and taken off (not flipped). Roqaq is most often used in Ramadan to make thareed/ threed/ farid (this bread soaked in a beef or chicken stock with spices). It is sometimes eaten with processed cheese, rolled up like a long cigar. Sweeter breads include mukuskus/ muqasqis, a yeast dough a little lighter and sweeter than pizza dough which is deep fried into pillow shapes about 2–3 in. across. These can be kept up to 2 or 3 days after frying and are eaten with tea

Cooking  87 or milk. A similar dough is used for luqaymats/ loukoumades which are round fried balls of dough, coated with a sweet topping such as sugar syrup, Nutella or sweetened coconut. These need to be eaten soon after they are fried. Khaliyat al nahla (bee cells) are little yeast rolls with processed cheese in the middle and a sugar/ honey syrup poured on top when still warm. Khubz luhuh is made from a dough with baking powder that is cooked in a skillet with the size and consistency somewhere between an American pancake and a French crepe. Fatayer (pie/ pastry, can also be used to mean “pancake”) means two different types of snacks. One is a thick pastry (with dough similar to but lighter than pizza dough) that is rolled out into an oblong shape with the dough pinched into two pointed ends, usually 8–12 in. long and 4–6 in. wide. This is topped with processed cheese spread and a variety of savory toppings, such as chopped hotdogs, and sweet toppings, usually honey. It is baked open-face and then covered in tin foil. These are sold in many Arabic restaurants and by a few stores (some belonging to a chain) that specializes in them. Usually cooked to order, they are available throughout the day and are sometimes served as part of a meal, especially picnics, as they are easy to transport. The second fatayer is very different – it is a very thin batter, similar to a crepe, which is spread on a flat, heated, round, oiled cooking surface. When the bottom is cooked, a filling (usually processed cheese) is spread over the surface. The sides are then turned in until it is rectangular-shaped, then it is flipped over. When cooked, it is transferred to a paper plate and cut into 12 square pieces and usually drizzled with honey. These should be eaten immediately as the dough becomes rubbery and gummy when cold. They are usually for sale at small stalls at festivals or road-side stands and since they are not readily available or transportable they are seen as a “treat.” People buy them and eat them quickly, usually with tea or fruit juice, either standing by the stall or sitting at a table or in their car. In Indian restaurants, roti means a flatbread made with stoneground wheat and water (healthier than a paratha because it is not cooked in oil); in fast-food stands, roti means any kind of soft, white flour bun that is cut in half. Western-style sliced loaves of bread are sometimes called “toast,” even if not toasted. Yemeni bread refers to a round, 24-in. diameter bread with hebba sowda (black seeds) served plain or drizzled with honey cooked in a wood fire oven (like a West Indian oven) and available only in Yemeni restaurants. It’s pliable with a variable consistency, some sections thin and crisp like a cracker, and some about a quarter of an inch thick and chewy. Dinner There is more diversity for dinner than lunch. There is, like lunch, usually one or two main dishes but the timing and choices are more varied. It can be eaten between 7pm and 11pm, or even later while camping or at large formal parties. At home with just family present, there might be one of the rice dishes with meat, chicken or fish as eaten for lunch, such as kabsa or briyani, but other options exist: pieces of chicken beaten into rice with cardamom; baked vegetable dishes such as potatoes and eggplants sliced thin and baked in tomato sauce; macaroni

88  Cooking or spaghetti mixed with tomatoes and fish (usually tuna), meat, or chicken; macaroni or spaghetti with a béchamel sauce; soup; stewed chicken fish or meat; or harees (boiled wheat with meat that is cooked and blended into porridge-like consistency). There are several special fish dishes such as rees (fish that is skinned, de-boned and shredded into small pieces, sometimes added to a curry or pounded into rice) and salted fish (salt and raw fish layered in a bucket, covered and let to sit for 1–4 weeks). Another choice is dried shark, which is a small shark sliced open, cleaned and, with the skin still attached, the meat sliced into thin sections. This is dried in the sun for 2–10 days (fewer days with lower humidity) then it can be hung in the kitchen and pieces cut off as required or soaked in hot water then made into curry Lighter meals include stuffed grape leaves or pizza. There is usually a chopped salad, chutney, hot sauce and sometimes yogurt.28 Both lunch and dinner might be bought from a restaurant, but at dinner it is more normal to have a mix of options, so that the adults might have macaroni while chicken burgers are ordered from a nearby restaurant for young children. Both lunch and dinner are eaten quickly with little attention to presentation. Both also fit seamlessly into the movements of the family. For example, children might be working with a tutor, doing homework, or playing in the salle as the women are talking while men are out of the house or talking in the majlis. The senior woman will be in the kitchen supervising the food preparation. The meal is brought out on trays, people convene to eat, then go back to what they were doing before, sometimes moving from sitting on the sofas, to the floor to eat, washing hands, then sitting again on the sofa. (Details of eating will be covered in Chapter 4.) When there is a special occasion and/ or guests are present, the dynamics change, in that more care is taken with the preparation, presentation, and choice of food as detailed below. But a normal dinner might be viewed as plain from an American point of view, in that there are usually only one or two dishes and condiments and/or a salad, such as white rice with grilled fish served with dates. Drinks Tea is now the most important drink in Dhofar. It is served as “red” tea [chai ahmar] which is black tea with only sugar added, “milk” tea [chai haleeb] which is black tea with fresh goat, cow or camel milk/ canned milk and sugar, or karak which is loose tea with spices (cardamom, cinnamon, saffron, etc.) and canned milk. Green tea is available but usually not offered to guests, the same with canned iced tea. Tea must be served very hot and usually in cups which to Americans appear tiny (holding perhaps 1/3 cup) and drunk in a few sips. It is expected for all jobs, especially office work, that there will be someone who will bring tea or (instant) coffee on demand either as part of the job or for a low price, usually 100 or 200 baisa. Before modernization, the most common drink was milk from goats, cows or camels – many families still drink it unprocessed. In the past, and sometimes now

Cooking  89 on picnics if someone is feeling nostalgic, rocks are cleaned and then put on coals to be heated. Once hot, they were dropped one by one into a bowl or tea kettle of fresh milk. Laban/ leben/ labneh (fermented milk) is also popular. Processed milk and laban comes from three firms: A’Safwah (Dhofari), Al Razat (Dhofari) and Al Almarai (Saudi). There have been a lot of changes over the last ten years, including offering plain milk in different sized containers and new types of milk, such as low-fat and flavored with chocolate and strawberry.29 There are three main kinds of coffee. The most important and most traditional is qahwa (in Arabic) or “Omani coffee,” which is made from roasted coffee beans that are ground, then boiled (plain or with spices), then other spices and flavors such as cardamom, ginger, rose water, etc. are added. In the northern parts of Oman, it is required to serve this with dates; this is also offered in Dhofar, but tea with cakes or qahwa with halwa (see below) can also be served. “Coffee” can also mean instant coffee, sometimes called Nescafé, although there are other brands of instant coffee for sale, which is usually served with canned milk and sugar. “Coffee” might also mean a drink from one of the several kinds of recently introduced coffee-capsule machines. For example, a guest might be offered a caramel macchiato, cappuccino, latte or mochaccino. Like tea, coffee is served very hot and in cups that are much smaller than typical American mugs. Juices come in cardboard packages with added sugar and marketed to children (e.g. Suntop), clear plastic bottles and large jugs from a Dhofari (A’Safwah) or Saudi (Almarai) brand, or freshly blended and served in a pitcher, usually melon. The Omanis I know usually order fresh lemon with fresh mint in restaurants, but I have never seen that served in a home although I assume some families do. Mango juice is also a popular drink in restaurants but I haven’t seen it in homes, probably because it is more labor-intensive to make. There is a vast array of powdered fruit drinks available; the powdered drink section of one grocery store is about five feet high and over ten feet long. These are loved by kids, but not usually given to guests. Vimto, a cordial concentrate of fruits and spices, is the flavor of Ramadan. It’s drunk throughout the year but is almost always served at Iftar, the meal to break the day’s fast. Sodas include all the Coke and Pepsi products as well as various flavored “malt beverages,” which usually have young men playing or watching sports in their advertisements and are packaged in green glass bottles with a shape similar to beer bottles. The Gibali favorite is Mountain Dew, perhaps because of the name but my (unscientific) feeling is because it is because it has both caffeine and is clear. Gibalis like to know what they are eating and drinking. Men in my research group will sometimes open a can and then peer in to see what’s inside. Some will, if they drink Coke or Pepsi, pour it into a clear glass before drinking. Water is usually served to guests in individual plastic bottles or in a jug, but most people have a “bubbler” (a large, plastic jug of water upended into a stand, to get a glass, you push a small lever; some bubblers will heat or cool the water). Water jugs can be bought at stores but big families usually have a regular delivery service in which full ones are dropped off and used ones picked up.

90  Cooking Dhofaris rarely if ever drink while moving. I have only seen Gibalis drink in a car during a long (several hours) car trip and never while walking. Gibalis usually drink after they eat – first food, then drink; not chew, sip, chew, sip, chew, sip like Americans. Men will drink many tiny cups of tea if they are talking to friends and smoking shisha (hubble bubble/ hookah) but it is a sit-down thing. Some changes in drinks over the past ten years include the introduction of nondairy milk (e.g. almond or soy) and commercially produced camel milk. There is a limited, but growing selection of specialty drinks, such as root beer and drinks from the Philippines. Stores now stock a wide variety of teas, including organic ones, but Lipton’s is the clear favorite. The Lipton’s section in most stores is about an area 5 × 5 feet or larger. It was only when I was doing final edits for this book that I realized I hadn’t addressed alcohol; sometimes the most obvious points are hardest to see. Alcohol is served in some hotel restaurants and one stand-alone restaurant.30 I don’t know any Gibalis who drink alcohol (which is forbidden in Islam) and real alcohol is never used as a flavoring. Imitation rum is sometimes available in the cooking aisle and desserts traditionally made with alcohol like baba au rhum are sometimes seen on dessert menus, but never have actual alcohol in them. Desserts The most important dessert is Omani halwa (the Arabic word for sweet) which is made with sugar, water, clarified butter, and cornstarch, with various additions (sesame seeds, almonds, cashews, etc.) and flavorings (cardamom, saffron, smoked rose water, etc.). It is slow cooked in large batches and then poured into various-sized plastic trays and bowls. The color varies from a light blond to reddish to almost black, depending on ingredients. The consistency is like a tough Jell-O. To eat, one scoops out a teaspoon- to tablespoon-sized piece with a spoon and eats it plain or plops the piece on of a small piece of a thin, plain cracker-like bread (qibqab) and eats both together. You usually take some mouthful by mouthful. Halwa is necessary for special events such as Eid and weddings, but some people have a covered bowl on a tray in the majlis at all times.31 As noted above, there are usually some kind of sweets set out in the majlis and salle at all times in readiness for guests, such as individually wrapped chocolates, baklava, roasted nuts, or Omani halwa. These long-lasting treats will be supplanted by fresh items such as juice and cake when guests arrive, but it is usual to have something on display at all times. Dessert is sometimes served after lunch, more usually served after dinner. After the food and used dishes are cleared away, sometimes a fresh carafe of tea or coffee is brought in with a dessert such as basbousa (semolina cake, in Dhofar usually flavored with coconut), cheesecake, chocolates, ice cream, a plate of fresh fruit slices, or small bowls of chopped fresh or tinned fruit. Baklava, halawiyat (fried dough or filo dough with various fillings and flavorings such as honey, nuts, rosewater, cardamom, cinnamon, etc.) and luqaymat/ loukoumades (sweet dumplings dipped in sugar syrup) are also common

Cooking  91 Desserts made at home are usually on the spectrum of flour, sugar, milk/ cream, with nuts and/or flavoring such as rose water, cardamom and cinnamon. One common simple dish for everyday is Marie biscuits spread in a 9 × 11 glass baking dish, covered with an instant vanilla pudding mix and refrigerated for a few hours. Except for raisins, desserts do not usually have fruit as an ingredient; fruit is eaten by itself or in a juice. Items such as blueberry muffins, fruit-topped Danishes, chocolate covered-strawberries are available in hotels and bakeries and might be offered at special events, but usually not for a normal dinner. The five senses and food This section is thanks to Black’s chapter “Sensory Anthropology of Food” (2017) which stressed that eating involves all five senses, not just taste, and encouraged me to think through how the senses are engaged while cooking and eating in Dhofar. In terms of sight, food should look appetizing: fresh vegetables and fruit with no signs of wilting or discoloration, cooked food without burnt patches. It should be served in bowls or platters that are correctly sized so that the food is mounded up to show that there is an abundance. Further, food should be served, especially for guests, “whole” so that the people can see that this is a complete item, not pre-portioned. Everything from fish to goats to cakes should be brought out cooked and complete to be cut up in front of everyone. Even fruit is served as a whole piece with a knife, not pre-peeled or pre-sliced. The same concept obtains for drinks. Fresh fruit juice can be brought out in (preferably clear glass) pitchers but water and all other beverages are served in individual bottles to be opened by the person who will drink, never pre-poured. At restaurants, unopened cans of soda/ juice are brought to the table; the only place you can get a pre-poured soda is at fast-food restaurants. Very few dishes have any sort of decoration. There is universal agreement that hummus should be served in a low bowl with a “moat” holding olive oil, a dusting of spices (usually cumin) and some pomegranate seeds. Some desserts have a chocolate drizzle, but normally the food is served without ornamentation. Some hotels will cut fruit into fancy shapes etc., but I have never seen that in homes. Lastly, there is no attempt to disguise food by trying to make one item look like another, such as “ice-cream spaghetti” or even a cake shaped like a teddy bear. In Gibali cultures, things should look like what they are.32 Issues of taste are addressing throughout this chapter, but I would like to highlight that the three main measures of whether food tastes good are freshness, salt/ spice, and temperature. Freshness is paramount. Food such as meat, fish, chicken and rice should be eaten directly after it is cooked. If I am having a picnic with the research guys, either a man will drive into town to get fresh bread right before the meal is ready (20 to 30 minutes of driving) or someone who will join us is asked to bring bread, which is then covered with a shawl or blanket to keep it warm. Men will never mention the cost of meat but when they bought it and/or when it was slaughtered.

92  Cooking When eating qabooli, briyani, kebsa/ kabsa/ maqboos, mandi/ mehndi and curry, the first bite is usually small and there are a few seconds of what looks to me like silent appraisal, and then (unconsciously) some people nod once and then begin eating in earnest. If the first bite shows that the food is under- or oversalted, not spicy enough or too spicy, there might be a comment thrown but I have never seen anyone attempt to correct the seasoning.33 This is what the cook made so you either eat it or don’t. Among men, a negative comment is always given as a compliment, “this is very delicious!” Tea and coffee should be served scalding hot. Iced coffee is gradually making inroads, but generally only among younger Dhofaris and when taken from restaurants. Drinking or eating cold things is generally believed to cause sickness. Kids who ask for ice cream are told it will cause a sore throat and drinks are served without or with a bare minimum of ice cubes. There is understanding that one should only eat hot/ room temperature food with a hot drink, never a hot drink and cold food. When I asked a Gibali friend if he wanted some ice cream as he was drinking tea, the reply was “Do you want to kill me?” Kanafani (1979) discusses the importance of touch for Gulf Arabs in all aspects of food buying, preparation, cooking and eating – from feeling fruit and fish to determine freshness to the squeezing of rice into a lipstick-tube shaped form to eat (117). The senses of smell and sound are important only in the negative aspect. The smell of food cooking is not considered positive, unlike American culture, in which walking into a house which smells of food is considered wonderful. Trying to explain to Gibalis that garlic frying in butter is a positive smell was as useless as trying to explain the delights of cold mashed potatoes. Kitchen fans run nonstop; while cooking, the door to the outside is usually open and the door to the rest of the house is usually shut. Perfumed smoke is wafted thought the salle and majlis after meals. In the same way, meals should not have any aspect of sound. You should chew with your mouth closed; showing an open mouth with partially chewed food is, like in America, a funny/ insulting action only for kids and among close friends. There is usually little talking and no ambient sounds, like music; although the tv might be on in the salle, the volume is usually turned down. Non-innovation Food is judged by quantity; novelty in cuisine is not a virtue in Gibali cultures. Many families eat one of a limited selection of meals every day; for example, lunch is almost always a qabooli/ qabuli, briyani, kebsa/ kabsa/ maqboos, or mandi/ mehndi, all dishes based on rice, meat and spices. Plain white rice is usually served with fish or various kinds of meat stew. Meat and chicken are boiled or grilled (chicken is sometimes fried) and are served with the bone on, either alone or in a stew, never as a filet with a sauce. Fish is boiled, fried, grilled or wrapped in foil and cooked on coals; if you order “fish” you will usually get the whole fish (with eyes, skin, bones and guts intact) on your plate. “Pasta” is usually spaghetti or macaroni with tomato or “white” (béchamel) sauce and chicken

Cooking  93 and/ or tuna. The main side dishes are a salad made of a chopped mix of lettuces, tomato, cucumbers, and carrots and baked vegetables (eggplant, potatoes, zucchini, okra, etc.) in a tomato sauce or “white” sauce. Part of the reason for this is economies of scale. When there is one kitchen and 30 people in a house, you don’t want to make a large amount of something that no one wants to eat. It is simpler to make what you know will be accepted. With older women, there is the issue of not having access to new/ different recipes. Plus the basic ingredients of rice, oil, fresh fruit and vegetables, as well as basic spices (e.g. cinnamon, cardamom, black pepper) are inexpensive. The place to try new foods is in a restaurant, although there is also some fear of dishes containing something haram or simply gross, so some Gibalis will try something new like nachos, pad Thai, wontons or poutine and some will order something safe like fish or chicken with rice, pasta or pizza. With Gibali friends in a Thai restaurant, a French restaurant and a tapas restaurant, I was given the menu and told to deal with ordering food.34 I’ve never met a Gibali who was interested in what I ate, asked me to cook for them, or wanted to try any of my food. Food is fuel or a way to show hospitality.

Notes 1 Writing about Hallaniyat (the Kuria Muria Islands off the coast of Dhofar), Clements says, “During the monsoon seasons the islanders dwelt in caves, living on fish, shellfish, and goats’ milk with the occasional diet of dates and rice traded from passing ships” (1977: 38). 2 Janzen (1986) has an example of balance of trade data from 1896 which lists the top six exports: incense, butter fat (samn), cotton, skins, latex, sharks’ fins; and top six imports: rice, sugar, cotton cloth, dates, coffee, wheat (47). 3 There are still systems of giving or selling samn (clarified butter) for sardines within families and tribes (see Tabook 1997). People going to visit relatives in the mountains often bring “town” (meaning paid for with cash) supplies such as sugar, rice, flour and sweets and are given honey, meat, milk and samn. 4 For purposes of comparison Morris explains: “a sack of locally produced sorghum or cowpeas sold for about 5 MTD [Maria Theresa Dollars]; a man’s indigo-dyed body wrap 4 MTD; a goat for slaughter 2 MTD, and a cone of coarse sugar or two dera lengths of unbleached calico 1 MTD” (1997: 240). Further, “The majority of the captains … involved in the frankincense trade were Mahra or Sada operating from the port of Al Gheydha in Yemen … As well as frankincense gum, trading ships also purchased ghee, dried sardines, goats for fresh meat, and wood or charcoal for cooking” (243). 5 Given that the Dhofar War started because of Dhofaris who wanted access to school, medical care and aspects of modernity such as paved roads and electricity, talking about foodways in the 1960s is a political act. “We were starving in the 1960s” is a statement more connected to people whose family or personal inclination is more aligned with the rebels (freedom fighters) than those affiliated with the government. 6 As I was writing this book, a warning was circulating with a photo of a locust, stating that they were carrying a deadly disease and should not be eaten. I have not been able to find out who first posted this or why, but it did not originate from the government. 7 With the exception of some Gulf Cooperation Council countries, foreigners are not allowed to buy land or houses in Oman. Most of those who do are absentee landlords. Some Dhofaris will not take a loan to make a house (as charging interest is forbidden in Islam) and will build piece-meal, paying for each stage as they have money. Houses can stand with walls but without roofs for years; if the foundation hole is

94  Cooking dug but not filled in by the monsoon season, it will fill with water and then plants. Sometimes a family will build a one-story house, live in it for a few years, then add a few rooms upstairs (for example, for a son who will marry) or build out the entire second story. Land and houses in Dhofar can be owned by one person (male or female) or a group. Often the land is in the name of one person, but several people, usually siblings, join together to pay for the house. Men and women can buy, inherit or be given land by the government after putting in an application and paying a nominal fee. Except for rare cases, usually older people in the mountains, a man or a woman will never live in a house alone. 8 One explanation for the oddly high counters is that previously the cupboards underneath had doors made out of aluminum window frames with plastic (not glass) inserts so the counter had to be high enough to have the frames fit. Another is that with high counters, younger kids can’t reach anything on the counter. 9 I think of Gibali houses as the antithesis of the houses of wealthy Victorians, with all those little rooms each for a separate purpose: the morning room, the seamstress’ room, billiard room, the music rooms, the library etc. There are usually only four types of rooms: majlis/ salle with stuffed chairs and sofas around the walls and a large open space in the middle with coffee tables; kitchen with counters around the walls and a large, empty open space in the middle; bedrooms and bathrooms. 10 Almost all food and eating utensils, plates, cups, etc. are moved around on trays. A platter of rice and meat might be carried by itself after having been prepped in the kitchen, but just as one always gives foodstuffs in a bag, one carries everything connected to eating on a tray, rarely by hand. 11 Brides bring their clothes (trousseau) and are given gold, perfume, make-up sets etc. In Gibali culture, brides are never given appliances or practical goods for the house (such as linen or towels); everything they receive is for them. Furnishing the apartment, room or house is the sole responsibility of the groom and his family. 12 In some cultures on the Arabian Peninsula, butchering was and still is seen as a lowstatus occupation (see Weir 2007: 64). In Dhofar, there was no separate group of butchers and in the past, men killed their own animals. Nowadays some Gibali men know how to and some don’t; it is a positive skill, but is in no way a required one. 13 Given that expat workers may not be fluent in English and/or Arabic, one can end up in situations such as my asking (in both English and Arabic) “Is this strawberry cake?”, “Is this cake with coffee flavor?,” “Is this chicken spicy?” and being given the wrong answer. 14 Sometimes a person will come up to a boat that has just pulled in to buy fish directly from the fishermen. Normally, any person (expat or Omani) who asks to buy a fish will be given one or two that are large enough to feed several people for free. But if the person wants several fish, then they are sold at the going rate by the fisherman. The middleman purchases what the fishermen wants to sell, with absolutely no discussion if the fisherman gives some away or keeps some for himself. Like almost all business and personal relationships, each man is free to do as he chooses. 15 Women also sometimes sell foodstuffs, such as mussels they picked. 16 As Ferguson states in “The Senses of Taste” (2011) “In valorizing some tastes, disparaging or simply ignoring others, cookbooks and dietary treatises articulate values and legitimate the very production of taste” (376) and “professional culinary writers became more insistent upon the precision of the dishes they produced” (377). The issues of valorizing, articulating, legitimizing and making precise dishes are not part of Gibali culture except within specific households, along the lines of “this is how our family makes this dish.” Campbell (2015) has a section on “Muscat’s Food Scene,” which includes a discussion on celebrity chefs and cookbooks, but I have never seen a cookbook in a kitchen or heard any one refer to one (xxvi–xxix). 17 Blowing on food to cool it is rarely done and never by a person who will give the food to another person to taste, as one’s breath is seen as polluting the food. Waving the spoon around a bit is preferred.

Cooking  95 18 As Kanafani notes, salt is added at the very end of cooking and salt or pepper shakers are usually not set out with food (1979: 136). 19 A type of round, sunken, earth oven is used to make qibqab (round, thin, cracker-type bread the size of a dinner plate). Some people might have this at home but normally these are made in or near markets where the bread is sold. 20 There is the same concept of drinks being new/ old. If I offer one of the research guys a bottle of water from my car, he will ask when did I buy it. If the bottle is not “new” (bought within the past few hours), he will not drink it unless there is nothing else and he is very thirsty. 21 Tea is usually served very hot and very sweet. As an example of language confusion, har in Arabic means “hot” and, as in English, that can mean a high temperature as well as a high degree of spiciness (e.g. hot sauce). It can also mean tea that does not have enough sugar in it. You can tell the meaning by the way it’s used. If a Gibali says, “this chai is har” you know it doesn’t mean hot temperature because one doesn’t comment on food that is served correctly (congratulations! you made the water hot!). It means there is an unacceptable flaw which needs to be fixed and the person should be given a new cup of tea with more sugar, not adding sugar to the cup already given. 22 “Biscuits” in the United Kingdom sense of sweet, crunchy baked goods eaten as snacks, not the American sense of a type of roll (usually made of flour, baking powder, salt, butter or shortening, and milk) usually eaten warm with butter and jam or gravy. 23 As Al-Hamad (2016) states, “The Arabic for rice is riz/ruz, but in the Gulf it is “‘aish,” the Arabic word for living or life. In other countries such as Egypt, bread is called ‘aish but in Oman, rice is the most important staple. 24 “Curry” is used locally to mean a stew or vegetables and meat, chicken or fish, not necessarily made with curry powder, which is poured onto a platter to be eaten by being scooped up with bread. Salona is usually local, to mean a thin soup with chicken, meat or fish, usually with pureed tomatoes as a base which makes it dark red. It is served in bowls or tin-foil containers. People either simply dip bread in the soup or position bread between thumb and two forefingers and, using a pinzer action, tear off a piece of meat. Qabooli/ qabuli, briyani, kebsa/ kabsa/ maqboos, or mandi/ mehndi are considered traditional, local rice dishes in several Middle Eastern countries. It is beyond the scope of this book to adjudicate origin, ingredients or recipes. 25 “Chutney” is not the same as chutney from India which is usually fruit cooked with spices. It is a condiment whose exact composition varies from family to family but is usually made from blended spices with uncooked vegetables. A common one is made from pureed tomatoes, onions and spices and is similar to salsa. A more traditional one is made from pureed garlic and ginger with vinegar. When I showed several Gibali men a small dish of Indian-style mango chutney and asked, “Is this chutney?” all of them said no. 26 Lunch then a nap or quiet time is the status quo in Dhofar. Expat workers such as house builders will down tools, eat lunch (often in stacked metal bowls with sauce in small plastic bags, delivered to the site by a driver) and then rest for an hour or two. Truck drivers will nap in the shade of vehicles. 27 Keema/ Qeema is an example of meaning drift. It is originally a Hindustani word meaning minced meat, usually beef. In Dhofar it means a warm sandwich filling of minced meat, vegetables (most notably tomatoes, onions and peas) and spices, similar to an American “Sloppy Joe” except it is served in a rolled up paratha instead of on a hamburger bun. 28 A useful cookbook in English of Omani dishes is Campbell’s The Food of Oman (2015). Al Maskiry states in her 3rd edition of A Taste to Remember (n.d.) that the first edition (2005) was the first cookbook in English published by an Omani. She has a practical approach to measurements – instead of the American system (cups), metric system or using weights, she uses “coffee cup” (the small, handle-less cup used for Arabic coffee), “tea cup” and “mug” in the recipes, with ml, flour ounce and sugar ounce equivalents at the beginning of the book (4).

96  Cooking 29 A’Safwah (Dhofari) and Al Almarai (Saudi) have long been competitors with regard to milk-based products: if one introduces a new product, the other will have the same within a few months, so there are now all sorts of choices, such as low-fat and flavored yogurts and different kinds of cooking creams. 30 Expats can bring an official letter from their workplace that states they are not Muslim and what their salary is to the police and get a small booklet with one page per month that has an amount (small percentage of their salary) stamped on it. This is taken to the one or two government-run alcohol stores and that amount can be spent per month. This is to prevent people buying a lot of booze and then selling it for profit. I don’t have the booklet but have been to two of the stores; they are basic – painted concrete walls, no advertising – with a standard selection of beers, wines, spirits, champagnes and wine coolers. Drinking alcohol is viewed as eating in Ramadan or kissing, i.e. expats can do as they like in the privacy of their homes but should keep to Omani social norms in public. 31 Halwa is a name for different desserts in different countries, but this version is acknowledged as special to Oman. For example, the company Tiffany (made in the Emirates) sells a chocolate selection called “Arabian Desserts”: Pistachio Mahalabia, Sunflower and Honey Praline, Roasted Almost Truffle, Salted Caramel Pudding, Pistachio Umm Ali, Turkish Coffee Trifle and Cardamom Omani Halwa. 32 This understanding permeates all aspects of Gibali culture. Seeing Gibalis misrecognize something is awful – they are shocked and go over the point again and again, trying to figure out how they could have made such a mistake. As visual recognition (of other people, cars, boats, etc.) is so important in order to issue correct greetings and understand non-verbal clues, to misread a situation is terrible. I understood this point before I could articulate the reasoning and have always dressed and spoken in a way that I am instantly recognizable as foreign and female. At wedding parties when I am dressed the same as other women I use a slightly incorrect Arabic greeting so I am not mistaken for a Dhofari. Whenever I am with the research guys on a beach I always wear loose, modest clothing with a flower print. In the darkness with a shawl wrapped around me it might be possible to mis-see me as a man (all men wear headscarves also, but of different fabric and tied differently) so flowers are my insurance policy. No man would ever wear a flower print. 33 When I help by chopping vegetables, I chop in four hot peppers and toss the rest away into the darkness. When someone else cooks, someone who knows me well may warn me that the meal is spicy but it’s my problem. I can grab cucumbers or eat just a dab on a piece of bread but it’s not the cook’s responsibility to check with the 5–10 other people eating to see what degree of spiciness they would like. 34 Not to torment graduate students, but I think asking students focusing on X area to order food for X locals from several foreign cultures would be a great comprehensive exam question. Staring at a tapas menu, trying to figure out what the Gibali fishermen I was with would eat was one of the harder cultural tests I have had to face.

References For a full bibliography, list of food terms and several short essay on foodways, please see my webpage: Come From Away, https://mariellerisse.com Al-Hamad, Sarah. 2016. Cardamom and Lime: Flavors of the Arabian Gulf, the Cuisine of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman, Qatar and the U.A.E. Singapore: IMM Lifestyle Books. Al Maskiry, Fawziya Ali Khalifa. n.d. A Taste to Remember, 3rd edition. Muscat: Al Nahda Press. Black, Rachel. 2017. “Sensory Anthropology of Food,” in Food Culture: Anthropology, Linguistics and Food Studies. Janet Chrzan and John Brett, eds. Oxford: Berghahn. 228–38.

Cooking  97 Bent, Theodore and Mabel. 2005 [1900]. Southern Arabia. London: Elibron. Campbell, Felicia. 2015. The Food of Oman: Recipes and Stories from the Gateway to Arabia. London: Andrew McMeel. Campbell, Felicia. 1845. “Notes on the Gara Tribe.” Journal of the Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society: 2(11): 195–201. Carter, Henry. 1846. “The Ruins of El Balad.” Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London 16: 187–99. Clements, Frank. 1977. “The Islands of Kuria Muria: A Civil Aid Project in the Sultanate of Oman Administered from Salalah, Regional Capital of Dhofar.” Bulletin (British Society for Middle Eastern Studies) 4(1): 37–9. Cruttenden, Charles. 1838. “Journal of an Excursion from Morbat to Dyreez, the Principal Town of Dhofar.” Transactions of the Bombay Geographical Society 1: 184–8. Cruttenden, Charles. 1839. “Memoir to Accompany a Chart of the South Coast of Arabia from the Entrance of the Red Sea to Misenat, in 50, 43, 25 E. Part I.” Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London 9: 125–56. Ferguson, Priscilla. 2011. “The Senses of Taste.” American Historical Review 116(2): 371–84. Haines, Stafford. 1845. “Memoir of the South and East Coasts of Arabia: Part II.” Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London 15: 104–60. Janzen, Jorg. 1986. Nomads in the Sultanate of Oman: Tradition and Development in Dhofar. London: Westview Press. Kanafani, Aida Sami. 1979. Aesthetics and Ritual in the United Arab Emirates. Unpublished dissertation, University of Texas at Austin. Kanafani, Aida Sami. 1987. “Dhofar - What Made it Different,” in Oman: Economic, Social and Strategic Development. B. R. Pridham, ed. London: Croom Helm. 51–78. Morris, Miranda. 1997. “The Harvesting of Frankincense in Dhofar,” in Profumi d’Arabia. Alessandra Avanzini, ed. Rome: L’Erma Bretschneider. 231–50. Oman Food and Drink. (2020). Rough Guides. https://www.roughguides.com/destinations/ middle-east/oman/food-drink/ Omani Recipes. 2020. Nestle. https://www.nestle-family.com/en/recipe-category/ omani-recipes Popp, Georg. 2018. “Notes on the Omani Kitchen Eating with Tradition.” Just Landed. https:// www.justlanded.com/english/Oman/Articles/Culture/Notes-on-the-Omani-Kitchen Sadeghin, Farideh. 2015, Oct. 27. “The Food of Oman is Too Good to Ignore: Recipe-testing a Middle Eastern Cookbook gives our Test Kitchen Director a New Love for an Under-appreciated Cuisine.” Saveur. https://www.saveur.com/ food-of-oman-cookbook-cuisine-felicia-campbell Saunders, J.P. 1846. “A Short Memoir of the Proceedings of the Honorable Company’s Surveying Brig ‘Palinurus,’ during Her Late Examination of the Coast between Ras Morbat and Ras Seger, and between Ras Fartak and the Ruins of Mesinah.” Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London 16: 169–86. Smith, John Alexander. 1983. “Desert Developments.” Building Design 11: 18–21. Tabook, Salim Bakhit. 1997. Tribal Practices and Folklore of Dhofar, Sultanate of Oman. Unpublished PhD thesis, Faculty of Arts, Exeter University. (same author as below) Tabuki, Salim Bakhit. 1982. “Tribal Structures in South Oman.” Arabian Studies 6: 51–6. (same author as above) Thomas, Bertram. 1932. Arabia Felix: Across the Empty Quarter of Arabia. London: Jonathan Cape, reprint. Wanucha, Elizabeth and Zahra Babar, eds. 2018. Hawwa, CIRS Special Issue: Family in the Arabian Peninsula 16.1–3.

98  Cooking Watson, Janet C.E. 2013. “Travel to Mecca in the Pre-motorized Period,” in The Hajj: Collected Essays. Venetia Porter and Liana Saif, eds. London: The British Museum. 96–9. Watson, Janet and A. al-Mahri. 2017. “Language and Nature in Dhofar.” https://www. researchgate.net/publication/316087457_Language_and_Nature_in_Dhofar Webster, Roger. 1991, Oct. “Notes on the Dialect and Way of Life of the Āl Wahība Bedouin of Oman.” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, 54(3): 473–85. Weir, Shelagh. 2007. A Tribal Order: Politics and Law in the Mountains of Yemen. Austin: University of Texas Press.

4 Special meals and special foods

Special meals Guests When there are guests, especially people from different tribes or people who are not well known by the family, a normal dinner is changed in terms of preparing for the event, monitoring who is eating what, offering different types of food and extending the pre- and post-dinner rituals. It is essential that every person who lives in the house, both male and female, works to create a positive event. If there are guests of both genders, Gibali men will host the men in the majlis, while women host women in the salle. Young children will run messages back and forth so that the husbands and wives hosting are in constant communication, even if they don’t see each other. If it is a women-only party, men will be sure to leave the house so the women can take over the majlis, bring fresh meat and whatever other supplies are needed, etc. If it is a men’s gathering, the women of the house will be in the salle and kitchen cooking or supervising to make sure the food is made correctly, served when hot, etc. The first difference between a normal family meal and one with guests is that it is absolutely necessary that the preparations for the salle and majlis are finished before anyone comes. The cost (and whether or not the food is home-made) is less important than the fact that when guests enter the majlis or salle there is a pleasant smell of incense and everything is ready: thermoses or carafes of tea or coffee, bottles of water and juice, and trays of more elaborate finger-food than are usually set out. Examples of snacks include cupcakes, wrapped chocolates, and mini-pizzas. Also common are home-made or store-bought mini-cheesecakes, basbousa (semolina cake usually flavored with coconut), baklava, halawiyat (fried dough or filo dough with various fillings and flavorings such as honey, nuts, rosewater, cardamom, cinnamon, etc.) and luqaymat/ loukoumades (sweet dumplings dipped in sugar syrup). The shorter the time the guest has known the family, the more varied the choices, however there is no emphasis on providing new or expensive dishes or creating elaborate visual presentations. Fresh fruit is usually also put out, either whole or as a fruit salad with small bowls for an individual serving. Whole fruits are usually apples, grapes, and oranges, as well as bananas, which are grown in Dhofar. Although guava, mangos,

100  Special meals and special foods and papayas are also grown in Dhofar, they are not set out but found chopped into the fruit salads. To walk into a salle and majlis that has no display of food ready is like walking in on a person who is not properly dressed. In many regions of Oman, qahwa (Arabic-style coffee) and dates are required for guests, but in Dhofar, coffee and dates are only absolutely required for Eids. Guests must be greeted and offered drinks and snacks at once. This can be refused once or twice, but eventually guests have to accept something while they engage in general chit-chat. Even if the guests are late, the dinner is all ready and the hosts are hungry, there must be 10–20 min of preliminary talk with a token amount of drinking and eating. Then the main meal, rice and meat with side dishes, is brought in or guests are asked to come to a prepared table, usually in the same room. It is rare in Dhofari houses to find a separate dining room. It makes no difference in terms of showing respect to guests if the food is store-bought or home-cooked. The cost of food is never mentioned and no one would think of pointing out any particular aspect of the food. In Gibali culture, bragging of any kind is considered shameful, so a woman might remark that her sister (for example) made a dish, but no one would highlight something they had made themselves. Freshness and the fact that the item was grown or produced by the family might be mentioned, e.g. “this milk is from our cows.” When dinner is served, hosts must actively try to get the guests to eat a lot, a typical Arabian Peninsula custom, see for example Yamani (2000). The more distant the relationship, the more the host will focus on how much is eaten. The host monitors what is on the guests’ plate or in front of them, making sure all the best pieces are given to guests and encouraging them to eat more. This can be sidestepped with protestations of being full, having eaten before and taking token bites. After eating, guests’ hands are usually sprayed with perfume. When the food has been taken away or the guests leave the table and return to the sitting area, tea and coffee are offered with a new variety of sweets and fruits, not what was on display when the guest first walked in. Hence, for guests there should be three distinct eating episodes. At the end of the evening, instead of standing and immediately leaving as close friends and relatives may do, a good guest will signal an intention to leave, be talked out of it by the host, sit for a while longer, signal again that they want to leave and then perhaps be talked out of it or insist on going. The male or female host then sprays perfume on the guest; female hosts often give a gift: a small bag with fruit, bukhoor (perfume infused wood chips), a thobe (loose, brightly colored Dhofari dress, made from cotton for every-day wear or velvet for parties), or honey. Male hosts will walk male guests to their car; female hosts will walk guests to the door of the house. Sobh and Belk, sometimes with additional authors, have written several articles about hospitality in terms of inviting guests into private homes on the Arabian Peninsula, particularly Qatar. In “Domains of Privacy and Hospitality in Arab Gulf Homes” (2011), Sobh and Belk state: hospitality in the Gulf region is … encoded in the rituals of hosting in an Arab home, including scenting the home with oud [incense] and perfuming

Special meals and special foods  101 guests with expensive fragrances. They are also evident in the obligatory sweets and qahwa (Arabic coffee) offered to guests. (128) Most of their conclusions are true for Dhofar, but there are some differences in regard to women. They make it clear that “Women of the household’s host should not appear nor interact with unrelated men. Doing so would jeopardize the host’s honor and bring shame on him” (Sobh, Belk and Wilson 2013: 450). Gibali men and women have opportunities to interact while being a host or guest; for example, a wife can bring food to the majlis where her husband is speaking with his best friend. Even if there are no men in the house, a Gibali woman should provide tea and dinner for a male visitor. A lot of writing about food in the Middle East jokes about guests being offered goats’ eyes; that hasn’t happened to me. The difficulty is being pressed to drink several cups of the super-leaded, espresso-strength cardamom Omani coffee along with a bowl of crème caramel, followed by a huge slice of cake, followed by a bowl of ice cream, then wrapped chocolates.1 With good friends, it’s easy to smile and shake your head. In houses and parties where you aren’t close to the host, you can accept desserts, mush them up a bit and declare yourself done. Hosts aren’t monitoring consumption as much as attitude; it’s not gavage, the force-feeding of geese for foie-gras. If you look happy and insist you are full, the host will back off. Ramadan Ramadan is the lunar month in which Muslims abstain from food, drink, sex and smoking from sunrise to sunset. It is a time to focus on prayers, charitable giving, reading the Holy Qur’an and family so Muslims should avoid worldly concerns such as getting angry or secular music. Ramadan starts when the new moon is sighted (hence the symbol of Ramadan is a crescent moon) and ends when the next moon is seen and the celebration of Eid al Fitr. Pregnant women and those who are sick or traveling are exempt from fasting, but the days should either be made up by fasting before the next Ramadan starts or paying for food to feed the needy. Children are encouraged to fast a little, for example until noon or only a day or two while young, and begin fasting the entire month between 10 and 14 years old, depending on the child’s readiness.. A Dhofari tradition is qatil al-hanash (“kill the snake,” i.e. hunger), a party with family, friends, or work colleagues in the week before Ramadan to ‘fatten up’ before fasting. So the week before Ramadan involves a lot of cooking for pre-Ramadan parties and to prepare dishes for the month ahead. The two main meals during Ramadan are suhoor, the meal eaten before sunrise (approximately 5:30 to 6:45am in Salalah), and iftar, the meal eaten at sunset (approximately 5:45 to 7pm in Salalah). These two meals are almost always eaten with family members, although some workplaces will sponsor a catered iftar. There is often another meal eaten between 10pm and 1am but it is not as formal as suhoor and iftar as family members might be in different places: in the

102  Special meals and special foods mosque, playing football, visiting relatives, etc. This meal (sometimes called “dinner”) might be pasta or rice with meat, chicken or fish, and spices and/ or soup; the dishes are usually set out on a table or in the kitchen for people to take as they want. Typical suhoor and iftar Suhoor is not eaten by all Gibalis; some go to bed late and sleep until mid-morning, but every household has food put out. It’s a fast meal with simple, filling food as people are eating in the time between waking up and the sunrise call to prayer. A common food for suhoor is asseda/ asida (cooked wheat with samn [clarified butter] and sometimes sugar). Other dishes might include rice with meat or chicken and samn, shorba (a soup served in Ramadan with beef, vegetables and oats, sometimes with lemon) and thareed (light bread soaked in a beef or chicken stock with spices). Drinks include juice, water, tea and milk or laban (soured milk). For iftar, laban and dates are almost always taken as soon as the call for the sunset prayer is heard. Some families will break the fast, then the men will go to the mosque to do the sunset prayer, then return home for everyone to eat iftar together. Others will eat a variety of foods, then pray.2 As an American comparison, it’s like putting on a Thanksgiving dinner for 28 nights in succession. Since iftars are usually eaten at home, the cooking falls on the women. As discussed previously, some women don’t cook, some pitch in just for Ramadan, some families have full-time kitchen help, some hire kitchen help just for the month but for some women, Ramadan is their Olympics. They set out suhoor, clean up, then sleep until early afternoon. They spend the afternoon cooking, eat iftar and then spend several hours reading the Holy Qur’an, praying and visiting with family, sleep an hour or two and then get up to make suhoor. The difficulty is not just the amount of food to prepare but that for most of the preparation, they can’t taste the food to make sure the seasoning is correct.3 Many Dhofari families split the burden in a variety of ways. Different women might “call” different nights, so that in a week for example a woman might prepare four iftars: one for just her nuclear family, one for her and one sister’s families, one for her and one brother’s families, a family iftar with many relatives and then have three iftars outside the home: one for her work, one at her parent’s house, one at her husband’s parent’s house. As explained in Chapter 2, women often make a lot of one item and share it with friends, neighbors and relatives so that there is a variety of items. Men are responsible for the shopping and may pick up home-made, prepared dishes that are sold at roadside stands.4 An iftar spread should include dates, a fruit bowl (bananas, grapes, oranges), cut fruit and/ or fruit salad with oranges, watermelon, apples, etc. There should be a variety of food such as shorba, thareed, stuffed grape leaves, salads, sandwiches and sambusas (aka samosas, a baked or fried pastry with a savory filling such as spiced vegetables, cheese or meat). Meat and vegetable sambusas are available all year, but cheese ones are usually only available during Ramadan.

Special meals and special foods  103 Sambusas are sometimes made at home but are usually bought at little covered stalls which are set up outside most bakeries from 4pm to 6pm; they are sold by the kilo in brown paper bags. Whereas a normal lunch consists of one main dish (rice with protein, vegetables and spices), an iftar should have a large variety of different savory and sweet dishes.5 Sweets include custards, dumplings, Jell-O, kanafeh/ kunafa (shredded filo pastry or semolina dough that is baked in sugar-based syrup, usually with a layer of cheese, sometimes served with cream or nuts), luqaymat/ loukoumades (sweet dumplings dipped in sugar syrup), Swiss roll, “traditional sweet” (pita bread soaked in milk with sugar and cardamom), saffron/ coconut/ chocolate cake, etc. The prized drink of iftar is Vimto, a cordial of fruits and spices that is diluted with water. Some people hate it but it’s ubiquitous in Ramadan. It can also be jazzed up, for example, as a “Vimto Mojito,” which has Vimto mixed with slices of lemon or other fruit, sprigs of mint, ice and 7-Up or Sprite. Eid There are two main Eids (religious celebrations) in Islam: Eid al Fitr at the end of Ramadan and Eid al Adha after the haj (pilgrimage). Both are marked by prayers and meeting family members. Families clean and refurbish the majlis and salle (perhaps buying new rugs, chairs, trays, tea sets, decorative bowls, etc.), buy new clothes, and prepare or purchase food for guests. Both Eids last for several days. The first day begins with prayers and then the entire family gets ready for visiting. In Dhofar, men usually visit their relatives in the morning; women visit at night. Within the household, there are discussions about who is going where and when so that there are always some men in the majlis and women in the salle to receive visitors while other members are paying their visits. A married woman will visit both her husband’s relatives and her own relatives. For Eid al Fitr, Omani coffee, dates and halwa (the traditional Omani dessert) are essential, in addition to a normal display of fruit, sweets and savory snacks for guests. The tea and coffee must be constantly refreshed and young women in Gibali households might be called into duty to bring supplies to the majlis. During visits, everyone should eat and drink something to be polite, but one is not usually served a meal of rice and meat. For Eid al Adha, the most important food is mageen, meat that is partially airdried and boiled in fat. Eid al Adha celebrates Ibrahim’s willingness to sacrifice his son in obedience to God. This is commemorated with the slaughtering of animals and giving most of the meat to those in need, either directly to poorer relatives and neighbors, or giving to someone who will distribute the meat. In Dhofar, Gibalis will slaughter their own animals or buy as large an animal as they can afford. For example, several brothers might buy a cow or camel together, then arrange for dividing and distributing the meat. Almost every Gibali family will then cut their portion of meat into thin strips which are air-dried for a few hours. The meat is then boiled in fat, cut into smaller pieces and set out in large bowls. The fat makes it look like pieces of candy covered in icing sugar.

104  Special meals and special foods The mageen is set out in the majlis and salle alongside the other dishes. It is now possible to buy mageen ready-made, but most families prefer to make their own. Mageen was originally made in Dhofar as a way to preserve meat for weeks or months but is now usually all eaten within a few days. Celebrations: weddings Weddings have two parties in Dhofar. The party for the groom is usually held on a Saturday (second day of the weekend) morning; it is best if the date is close to the end of the month, after the salary has arrived. The groom’s family will usually rent a marquee near their house, near a mosque or at a space outside of town. The tent will be furnished with rugs and chairs, arranged in a circle. Sometimes there is a secondary tent to the side where the food is prepared. In many Dhofari tribes, the brothers, close friends and cousins of the groom will butcher the camels/ cows the night before, or very early in the morning; some meat is then distributed to close relatives and the rest given to restaurant workers to cook. The quantity of food shows respect for the guests. No one is expecting (or would like) a new recipe or dishes. The most important components are tea and meat with rice; Omani coffee, Omani halwa (dessert), fruit, soft drinks, water, and salad are also usually served. Male relatives, work colleagues, neighbors and friends stop by to give their congratulations but there is always a core group of brothers and close friends with the groom. The event ends at the ‘asr (mid-afternoon) prayer when all the guests and the groom leave. Sometimes the bride’s party will be quite simple. The bride’s friends and sisters help her get ready at home and serve dinner (rice and meat) to female relatives and friends, while male relatives sit with her brothers and father outside the house or in a nearby relative’s house. Then the bride is brought to the groom’s house by her relatives in a procession of cars. The groom’s sisters and her own sisters take her to her new room. Her sisters help arrange her and her dress; then the bride’s female relatives come in to see the room and the groom’s female relatives come in to see the bride. She usually does not speak, and never smiles in keeping with the expected cultural ideal that she is “shy,” and sad to leave her parents. Sometimes items bought with the mahar (dowry) and gifts, especially of gold and perfume from friends and relatives, are put on display in the room. The groom’s family then serves the bride’s relatives dinner (rice, meat, condiments, drinks) in the salle and majlis or in an open space near the house, then the bride’s family leaves except for the bride’s mother and/ or a close (older or already married) sister or aunt. A more elaborate bride’s party will be held at a hotel or “hall,” basically a big empty enclosed space. This is paid for by the groom and arranged by his sisters and female relatives. The bride and her female relatives have no responsibility except to show up. Women start to gather about 7 or 8pm; finger-food, sweets and drinks are passed around by waitresses. There is usually water, fruit and maybe snacks laid out on the tables, but no name cards – people sit where they like. The bride makes a triumphal entrance (think the fan fare from 2001: A Space Odyssey) late in

Special meals and special foods  105 the evening, perhaps 12 or even 1am. The main meal is usually served after the bride arrives. Then, with the bride seated on a sofa on the elevated stage, various women dance for her in an open space in front of her or on the elevated stage. At the end of the event, the bride will be brought in a procession of cars to the groom’s house, or the groom might actually come into the room (a very new innovation) and escort her out. At home or at a hotel or rented hall, there should be finger-food such as fried dough with cheese, fruit (whole, sliced or a chopped salad) and a selection of appetizers (hummus, fattoush, baba ghanoush, etc., with pita bread). The main meal should be rice and meat, usually qabooli, rarely if ever is chicken or fish served. The sweets are the typical Dhofari choices of custards, cheese-cakes, kanafeh/ kunafa, luqaymat/ loukoumades, saffron/ coconut, chocolate cake, baklava, crème caramel, halwa, Umm/ Om Ali (a pudding of bread or pastry baked with sugar, milk or cream, spices [usually cinnamon], perhaps with pistachios, almonds and/ or raisins), etc. The drinks are coffee (qahwa/ Arabic or Nescafé/ instant), tea (with sugar, with sugar and milk or with sugar, milk and spices), juice (fresh or bottled), soda, laban, and bottled water. There is usually not a typical Western style tiered wedding cake. Celebrations: birthdays, graduation, recovery, return home There are several kinds of celebrations which have special meals, such as parties to celebrate a birthday, graduation, recovery from an illness, return home after traveling, etc. These events can be divided in terms of whether or not an animal is slaughtered. For simple celebrations and parties for younger people (graduations, birthdays) a display of various sweet and savory finger-foods is sufficient. Decorations are important (balloons, colored cupcakes, small signs, pretty napkins, etc.). Many women take photos before guests come to show that all is in readiness. If the party is in honor of a woman, she may ask the host for some of these photos and post them on her social media to signal that she was given this respect by her family and/ or friends. This kind of event can be pulled together in a day or two, often on the same day and usually has 10 or so guests. People who live in the house may come in the salle or relatives might stop by, but it is not usually a long or large affair. For more important events, such as someone coming home from the hospital after a major illness or living abroad, there are little or no decorations; platters of rice and meat, perhaps pasta or baked vegetables, a few side dishes and a choice of tea, coffee, water, soda and juice covers every need. However, there is more planning as, for example all of the person’s siblings, aunts, uncles will be invited. Perhaps two brothers each want to give a party so there will be many discussions about which date is suitable and who can attend. An animal is killed, with some of the meat cooked and served to guests and some given to poorer relatives and neighbors. Like having guests, the important part of a celebration is not the choices of food but the effort of preparing for the event ahead of time. The majlis and salle

106  Special meals and special foods must be clean and perfumed, the drinks set out on trays with carafes of tea and coffee; there must be a covered bowl of halwa and a selection of fruit. The main meal will be rice and meat in some form, with side dishes of salad and maybe hummus or stuffed grape leaves, etc. There is no differentiation if the food is made at the home or store-bought. Like an Eid, everyone who lives in the house will be involved in some way: cleaning, cooking, buying supplies, supervising, communicating with relatives, etc. and the party will last for hours with some relatives arriving early to help with preparations or to chat. Mourning It was a tradition in the past that when a Gibali man died, most, if not all, of his cows and camels were killed for the funeral; a lesser number of animals were killed for the death of a child or woman. For example, in Arabia Felix (1932) Thomas discussed the Dhofar custom of killing half of a man’s cows at his death (55–56). Animals were also killed if it was thought a man had died, for example, in Watson’s article, “Travel to Mecca in the Pre-motorized Period” (2013), a man left for Haj and was gone for so long, “And his people, his tribe here, missed him and thought he had died. They slaughtered for him” (99). This was done to feed the people who came to the a’zza (the three-day mourning period). In the past, Gibalis, even within one tribe, were spread out in different locations throughout the mountains and coast, and might have to walk for miles for a funeral so it was necessary to feed guests. This tradition has continued, with some families serving mourning guests a full meal of rice and meat, with a salad and fruit, but a smaller selection of finger-food and sweets than a regular party. Some Dhofaris are now advocating for a change in the culture in that only coffee, water and dates should be served to guests to keep the atmosphere less like a party. The idea is that people now travel by cars without hardship and there is no need to feed guests. Some families have adopted this alteration. The crux of the matter is how to show respect and to whom. Traditionally minded families believe that they should respect the person who died by treating the people who come to mourn with them politely. The other side posits that serving food creates a party-like atmosphere which disrespects the feeling of the mourners. This is part of a larger cultural reworking of funeral expectations. As set out in Kanafani, the expectation is that during condolence visits women should not wear perfume, make-up, jewelry or anything brightly colored (1979: 284), yet some women do. Mourning visits are very segregated, more so than Eid visits for example; men will be in the majlis or a rented tent is set up near the house. Women stay in the salle. A widow should not leave her house or see men who are not mahram (proscribed from marriage) for three months and ten days and the close female relatives are not expected to do the work of serving or cooking. They are seated in the salle or in their own rooms. Female relatives less directly related to the person who passed away step in to do the work of hosting, e.g. providing tea; men shoulder more of the responsibility of arranging for the food.

Special meals and special foods  107 Mourning affects all other types of celebrations in that when a person dies, all parties by close relatives and neighbors should be canceled or be much more subdued. For a wedding, perhaps a few close female friends may come to the woman’s house and be given dinner, then the groom will come to take her to his house.6

Special foods Traditional foods When the Gibali men in my research group discuss food from their childhood, it is clear that the most important (and favorite) dishes are still served and enjoyed: fresh goat, cow or camel milk, aseeda/ asida (cooked wheat flour, served with samn, clarified butter), harees (boiled wheat with meat that is cooked and blended into a porridge-like consistency), and a rice and dugar (cowpea) dish. What has changed is how food is made. For example, bread is no longer cooked in the ashes of a fire and milk is heated on a stove or gas ring. I have never heard a Gibali say that they “miss” a food from the past. They might miss a dish seasoned in a specific way made by a person who has passed away or moved. Or they might note that X kind of food, such as a type of fish, was more readily available in the past, but not that anything has disappeared. Occasionally men will make something in the traditional way for their own enjoyment. One of the group members once decided to make “special milk.” This meant filling a tea kettle 2/3 of the way full with fresh camel milk, then carefully dropping in small rocks heated in the coals. If you put too many hot rocks in at once, the milk will boil and froth over the top; if you put the rocks too slowly, the milk won’t get hot enough. I once saw a man do this using a plastic water bottle. Another example is cooking findal (a type of sweet potato grown in the mountains) by burying them in the sand with fire-warmed rocks. Some traditional methods of cooking meat such as mageen (air-dried meat which is then cooked in fat) and madhbi (meat cooked on heated rocks) are now used in small shacks or stalls which sell the cooked meat packaged for take-away. Meat Killing animals is necessary for the two Eids, guests and any event that involves a transformation, especially one that involves someone crossing the threshold, such as someone coming (arriving home after a long journey or a hospital stay, marrying into the household, etc.), leaving (funeral), or a moving into a new house. It is normal when a baby is born but does not happen for every child. If a Gibali woman is divorced her family will slaughter an animal for her when she moves back to her father’s or brother’s house. This is not exactly a celebration, but a signal that she is valued and welcomed back. If a man divorces a woman and then remarries her, he should kill an animal to celebrate her returning to him. In her article, “Travel to Mecca in the Pre-motorized Period” (2013) Watson quotes am older man talking about a man who did Haj by foot, spending 2 or

108  Special meals and special foods 3 years on his journey, and that when he came back, “People slaughtered and told everyone that he was well” (99). In Gibali households, meat is the prestige food and all guests should be given meat, preferably freshly slaughtered. Fish is acceptable if the guests asked for it; guests are customarily never given chicken. The most expensive type and size of animal that can be afforded is bought, in the order of goat, cow, then camel. If it is a small animal (goat, male cow or camel calf) the whole animal is cooked and placed on a platter on top of rice; if it is a large animal, pieces are distributed among several plates, with the best pieces (including liver) on the platter of the main guest. Sometimes this is used to indicate wealth, as in “he killed five camels for his wedding.” If the slaughtering is done for a specific reason (wedding, mourning, etc.), part of the meat must be given away to neighbors, relatives and/ or poor people. The only time an entire animal is eaten by the people who kill it is on a picnic where there is no one in the vicinity, but even then cooked pieces might be set aside and given to expat laborers when the people return to town at 1 or 2am. Butchering is a part of many boys’ education.7 If they are going to learn slaughtering (often called “slit” or “slice” in English), boys will start with killing and jointing goats around the age of 10 to 12. Learning to butcher a cow comes later, in the early to mid-20s and camels usually later still, mid- to late 20s. One person alone can do a goat; cows and camels need at least two. To kill the animal properly according to Islamic rites is specialized knowledge; for example, among eight brothers, perhaps one or two do the actual killing, but most or all will know how to gut and cut up an animal. Thus, some men know how to kill, some to joint, some can do both and some neither. Knowing how to kill and joint livestock does not make a man more “manly”; they are two skills among many that a man might or might not have.8 In the past, and in the present day on picnics, goats are usually hung from a tree for jointing; cows and camels are jointed on flat ground. The Dhofari government is making a concerted effort to make animal slaughter more hygienic by building slaughtering centers in each town which are overseen by government-paid inspectors. Some families continue to slaughter in the same places their fathers and grand-fathers used, on flat land or the beach, away from houses. Gibali culture is not set-up for vegetarians, although some Gibalis are. There might be teasing and some pressure from close family members, but if, for example, a 16-year old girl decides she wants to be vegetarian, she is. As there are many expats who are vegetarians, all restaurants (and even the meal choice on Oman Air) have vegetarian options. I am not getting into the “meat is murder” debate but will state that in terms of welfare, Dhofari animals are carefully looked after. Owners know their animals, bring in vets as needed, assist with births and there is mutual, genuine affection.9 Goats, cows and camels are never cooped up in small holding cells; almost all are let out to wander every day.10 Killing is done quickly and by Islamic law and local culture, an animal should never see the knife that kills it or be in fear. For most Gibalis there are three essentials for eating meat: it should be well done, on the bone and you should know its mother. All meat is well cooked; as

Special meals and special foods  109 Kanafani discusses, blood pollutes (1979: 158–159) so there should be no trace of it.11 Meat (even chicken) is cut so that it is still attached to the bone; there are no filets. Organs are also eaten. In terms of “know its mother,” as many Gibalis keep and slaughter animals or have close family who do, they are used to appraising both animals and meat. Most Gibalis won’t eat meat from a restaurant as they can’t vouchsafe for themselves the quality, to the point of not having pepperoni on pizza. In the same way, Gibali fishermen will go back into a restaurant’s kitchen and check the fish themselves. Details of cooking (for example cleanliness of restaurant kitchen, the time it takes to cook, method of preparation, etc.) is of far less concern than the original freshness and quality of the fish. Honey The second most important item is honey, which inhabits two separate spheres with a huge difference in the cultural importance and function between Dhofari/ Yemeni honey and imported honey. Honey from Yemen or Dhofar is valuable, not just in price but in worth. Local honey is a treasured gift, consumed slowly and entirely over weeks or months. The tall glass bottles are kept in a safe place, out of the reach of children. This type of honey is seen as having many health benefits; it is a medicinal product, taken straight by the spoonful for coughs, upper respiratory and stomach ailments. Most Gibalis are trained to be able to judge the quality of honey and take a tablespoon dosage of the best kind daily or when sick. When Gibalis hear a person is ill, they will often inquire as to whether the person has honey, which honey they are taking, offer to bring some of their own honey, etc. Some men keep hives; in the past men would gather it from wild hives. Glass bottles, often recycled Vimto bottles, of honey are given to family members and occasionally sold. The best is usually said to come from Yemen and at festivals, there are booths of Yemeni men with large glass containers offering tastes (see Rodionov 2012).12 The careful consideration of what kind of honey is brought into the house matches the care in picking luban (frankincense) for perfuming the house; there is the same mix of superficial (good taste and smell) and medicinal functions.13 On the other hand, commercially produced, European honey is bought at a grocery store and drizzled liberally as a sweetener on bread at breakfast. It is not expensive; for example, when non-local honey is brought on a camping trip, whatever is not used is often poured out and the container thrown away. If it is spilled or wasted, it is not perceived as a great loss. The Omani government supports bee-keeping both in terms of honey production and protecting/ increasing the bee population. “Local” food There is some, but not much, emphasis on eating local food (i.e. from the country – baladi, see Maclagan 1994). There is a government campaign to “Buy Omani”

110  Special meals and special foods with a special symbol to show “made in Oman.” Supermarkets sometimes have promotions and displays of Omani food. The Gibalis I know will almost always buy Omani items (such as Omani-produced milk, potato chips, flour, oil, etc.) because of price, taste and/or habit, not as an active choice to support Omani businesses. In larger grocery stores, all produce items have labels that show the country of origin but only a few items (such as eggplants, strawberries, herbs and cucumbers) are available both from local and foreign suppliers. Most local fruit and vegetables are bought from the small farm stands or off a truck parked by the road. Omanis talk about different types of food that is available in different parts of the country, to the extent that Gibalis mention that there is a Dhofari restaurant in Muscat, but regional differences are not seem as important. They eat that, we eat this.14 One notable dish from the northern part of Oman is shuwa, which is lamb, goat or camel meat, marinated with spices, wrapped in banana leaves, placed in a pit with coals and covered. Mishkak, pieces of marinated meat grilled on skewers, is available in Dhofar, but more associated with the north. Performative foods In The Arab Table: Recipes and Culinary Traditions (2005), May Bsisu describes specific foods for New Year which indicate happiness (322), something I have not found here. In asking about “performative” food, i.e. food that brings about a change such as to good luck, my informants say that is not part of Gibali cultures.15 Trying to explain that some cultures create food in the shape of something (like money) to be eaten to enhance one’s chances of getting it or call food by evocative names (“breath of heaven”) or affirmations (a sandwich called “I am beautiful”) brought only pained expressions, disbelief, sighs, and “we don’t do that.” Although there are foods for specific events, such as after childbirth, to use food as something outside its primary function is seen as leaning towards or practicing some kind of magic, hence dangerous and harmful. To lose weight, the common remark is eat less; to gain weight, eat more, especially meat and samn. But to eat certain things to, for example, get pregnant or have a child of a certain sex, is seen as edging towards blasphemy. “Some people do, I would never,” is a phrase I heard a few times and my interlocutor would not venture as to what should be eaten or not eaten.

Notes 1 This panoply of sweets is because of modernization. Before the war, sugar was available as a product, but there was not the wide range of candy and chocolates. The large, quick increase of sugar consumption has led to widespread diabetes, called “sugar in the blood.” As a way to combat the effects, the government has built well-lit, wellpaved walking paths by many major roads and along wadis and the corniche in Salalah and some other towns so that people have places for exercise.

Special meals and special foods  111 2 I discuss the issue of how long food can stay on display and still be considered edible in Chapter 3 (Cooking) but the perception of “old” food changes in Ramadan. Normally a meal of rice with meat, fish or chicken should be eaten right away and can be seen as not edible/ not suitable to be given to friends and neighbors after 1–2 h. However the food cooked for iftar is usually left out for snacking for several hours. It could be covered with plastic wrap and set on a side table or set on the “table” (thin plastic drop-cloth) before the sunset call to prayer, people would eat, then pray, perhaps eat again, relatives and friends might stop by and eat, and the food finally is cleaned up or given away at 10 or 11pm. This difference is partially because of the method of serving and food choices. A dinner is usually served on a platter (if rice) or a large baking dish, but iftars should have a much wider variety of food but be served in small quantities, thus there is not usually a platter, but many plates (holding for example sambusas ) and small, glass, open-proof dishes which are easy to cover. 3 A woman who has her period will not fast (and will make up the days later in the year) so she can act as taster, although she should not eat when anyone can see her. Some families will hire non-Muslims to cook and clean up as non-Muslims are free to eat as long as they are not in public. There are stories and jokes (even public service announcements) of men seeing a woman eat in Ramadan and judging her harshly because he did not realize she had her period. Another issue is women who, in the midst of cooking, forget for a moment that it’s Ramadan and taste the food and then worry that they have spoiled that day. 4 Expats sometimes see Ramadan cooking as some Americans see Thanksgiving: women slaving away in kitchen while men laze. I have never heard this kind of complaint from a Gibali. Women who cook are gaining not just societal, but also religious, merit which I will discuss in Chapter 8. Men have to do the driving around (getting whatever ingredients are asked for) and a man cannot be judged as good within the Gibali community if he is not helping his mom/ wife/ sisters by making sure that the women have nights off, i.e. going to a relative’s house, buying all the food for iftar himself, hiring expat help etc. 5 For iftars, as a variety of choices are expected, to make things easier for the cook, one ingredient can show up in different dishes. For example, one iftar dinner included using the same shredded chicken twice, potatoes cooked two different ways and chopped cucumbers in several dishes: mashed potatoes spread on top of tuna with chopped tomatoes and spices, baked; baked macaroni with ‘white sauce’ with shredded chicken, chopped tomatoes and spices; pieces of baked chicken with spice rub; shredded chicken with tomato and spices; sambusas; baked potato wedges; baked compilation of vegetables including golf-ball sized pieces of potato, onion, carrots, green peppers; cut pieces of watermelon and melon. Drinks: laban, water with mint leaves and slices of lemon, water with lemon juice and pureed mint, with the host apologizing for not having Vimto. Sauces: raita, green raita, finely chopped vegetables (green olives, green peppers, grated carrots, cucumbers, corn, cilantro) and a salad with dried bread and cucumbers in a yogurt sauce. Raita – a yogurt-based sidedish with chopped/ seeded cucumber, chopped fresh cilantro, chopped green onions, ground coriander/ chopped cilantro, ground cumin and possibly chilies, ginger, lemon, chaat masala spice mix and/ or gram masala spice mix. Green raita, green chutney/ mint chutney/ mint raita – yogurt, green chili, mint, coriander, onion, garlic, cumin, and possibly sugar, lemon or lime juice, peanuts, coconut, mustard seed, olive oil, chaat masala spice mix and/or gram masala spice mix 6 This severely limits planning for a “dream wedding.” A bride can never be sure until she is ready to walk into the wedding hall whether there will be a party of not. If it was a distant relative who died within the past few weeks, the party might happen as planned, but without any music or dancing. 7 I have been told that animals are sometimes slaughtered for non-Islamic and nondietary reasons related to magic. For example, to cure a person (this involves slitting the animal’s throat from a position above the person so that the blood drips on him/ her)

112  Special meals and special foods

8 9

10 11 12 13

14

15

or at specific sites in Dhofar known for their magical properties. Another tradition is to put the blood of a slaughtered animal on a newly built house. None of my informants do this or have seen it done. I have been told that some Gibali women would kill and butcher goats in the past in cases of extreme necessity. I don’t mean the touristy photos of men kissing their camels. I mean men knowing the names, age, lineage and children of dozens of camels/ cows and being able to identify them from a far distance; leaving work or parties to help animals give birth; forgoing wished-for items to buy fodder and pay vet bills; refusing to sell favored animals and buying back an animal that was sold because that animal left the current owner and walked back to its home. I don’t know the conditions for cows in milk-producing companies or chickens in the frozen chicken companies. I was once talking to a Gibali fisherman about smoked salmon. He had seen it as part of a buffet but had never tasted it. His one concern was, “But is there blood?” Local honey, as far as I can tell, is not used in cooking. The Yemeni dish made with honey, bint al Sahn, is not served as dessert normally in Dhofar, but it can be found in Yemeni restaurants. I have never seen a Dhofari use honey to sweeten tea. Frankincense (Boswellia sacra) is the most important plant in Dhofar. Most women perfume their houses (and sometimes work places) with the fragrant smoke from the burning pieces of resin every day. It is not a food product per se, put high-quality pieces can be chewed or put in warm water as medicine for stomach pains. For example, Salalah Mills Company distributed Omani Foods: 2020 Calendar with one type of food highlighted each month. January: asidah/ asseda/ asida (cooked wheat with samn [clarified butter] and sometimes sugar); February: siwiya (vermicelli with honey/ sugar/ molasses and milk); March: mukuskus/ muqasqis (yeast dough a little lighter and sweeter than pizza dough fried into pillow shapes about 2–3 in. across); April: luqaymats/ loukoumades (round fried balls of dough, coated with a sweet topping); May: labania (thick kak bread cooked with coconut milk and sugar); June: harees (boiled wheat with meat that is cooked and blended into porridge-like consistency); July: luhuh (dough with baking powder cooked in a skillet with a size/ consistency between an American pancake and a French crepe); August: kak/ kaek (a long-lasting bread about 6 in. across, ¾ of an inch thick); September: tawa (unleavened bread usually served at breakfast, similar to naan, but cooked on a flat heated metal cooking surface, also called saj); October: qaras (thin bread with coconut milk and sugar); November: khabisah (flour or semolina cooked with milk and/ or butter with honey, dates, nuts, and/ or coconut and flavored with molasses, cardamom powder and/ or saffron); December: thin kak/keak, also called qibqab/ qalib. Going through this with an informant, seven were eaten regularly (asseda, harees, kak/ kaek, luhuh, mukuskus/ muqasqis, qibqab/ qalib and tawa), two seldom (luqaymats/ loukoumades, siwiya) and three never (khabisah, labania, qaras). She also discusses foods such as raw meat (225) and types of cheeses (16) which are not eaten here.

References For a full bibliography, list of food terms and several short essays on foodways, please see my webpage: Come From Away, https://mariellerisse.com Bsisu, May. 2005. The Arab Table: Recipes and Culinary Traditions. New York: William Morrow. Kanafani, Aida Sami. 1979. Aesthetics and Ritual in the United Arab Emirates. Unpublished dissertation, University of Texas at Austin. Maclagan, Ianthe. 1994. “Food and Gender in a Yemeni Community,” in A Taste of Thyme: Culinary Cultures of the Middle East. Sami Zubaida and Richard Tapper, eds. New York: I.B. Tauris Publishers. 159–72

Special meals and special foods  113 Rodionov, Mikhail. 2012. “Honey, Coffee, and Tea in Cultural Practices of Ḥaḍramawt,” in Herbal Medicines in Yemen: Traditional Knowledge and Practice, and Their Value for Today’s World. Ingrid Hehmeyer and Hanne Schönig, eds. Boston: Brill. 143–52. Salalah Mills Co. 2020. Omani Foods: 2020 Calendar. 2020. Salalah: Salalah Mills Co. Sobh, Rana and Russell Belk. 2011. “Domains of Privacy and Hospitality in Arab Gulf Homes.” Journal of Islamic Marketing 2(2): 125–37. Sobh, Rana, Russell Belk, and Jonathan Wilson. 2013. “Islamic Arab Hospitality and Multiculturalism.” Marketing Theory 13(4): 443–63 Thomas, Bertram. 1932. Arabia Felix: Across the Empty Quarter of Arabia. London: Jonathan Cape, reprint. Watson, Janet C.E. 2013. “Travel to Mecca in the Pre-motorized Period,” in The Hajj: Collected Essays. Venetia Porter and Liana Saif, eds. London: The British Museum. 96–9. Yamani, Mai. 2000. “You Are What You Cook: Cuisine and Class in Mecca” in A Taste of Thyme: Culinary Cultures of the Middle East. Sami Zubaida and Richard Tapper, eds. New York: I.B. Tauris Publishers. 159–72.

5 Eating and location

How to eat When the food is ready and the person in charge of the meal has decided it is time to eat, instructions are given to lay the “table” (a light plastic drop-cloth that comes in a roll) and people will clear the area, moving toys if they are in the salle, brushing sand off the mat if on a picnic. The cook puts the dish on a platter and brings it to the eating place; everyone else grabs whatever is necessary such as Kleenex, limes, bottles of hot sauce or drinks, and washes their hands. Guests have no role beyond perhaps getting up to wash their hands if there is a rice dish. In the mountains, villages and most Gibali families in Salalah, family members eat lunch and dinner together, gathered in a circle around platters of food which are usually placed on the floor, with women bringing small children next to them to hand feed them. If there are guests, the men will eat in the majlis (the men’s sitting room); women will eat in the salle (the sitting room for women and close male relatives). Sometimes guests are put in the majlis alone, so they can “feel free” to eat as much as they want. In families where it is expected that family members will eat lunch together, everyone will wait until all are there. In others, the meal is served at a certain time and everyone there eats; the remainder is put in the kitchen, covered and ready for anyone who comes later to help themselves within the next hour or so. Everyone can choose what to eat among the food presented, but there is no special food made except for the very young or very old or sick. Babies are given bottles or are hand-fed. Children eat at the same time and usually transition from breast feeding or the bottle to regular food.1 If the food is eaten while sitting on the floor, the “table” is set down, with the round platter of rice and protein in the middle and small plates with bread, salad or chutney set around it. If the food, for example baked vegetables, can’t be eaten by hand, a stack of plates is placed on the drop-cloth and the woman in charge of cooking will ladle the food onto the plates and pass them around. If the family eats at a table, there will usually be a glass and silverware at each setting, napkins/ Kleenex and a table cloth/ placemat on the table with a stack of plates in the middle or at one end where the platter of food will be placed. The cook or senior woman will serve up the plates which will be passed along the table.

Eating and location  115 When everything and everyone is in place, one of the senior people will say bismallah (in the name of God) and either start eating or begin putting food on plates. The others will say bismallah, signaling that the meal has started and any food may now be consumed. Food such as rice is eaten with the right hand; bowls and spoons are used for soup, cut-up fruit, etc. Usually four to six people share one round platter, depending on its size. Men will either sit cross-legged or with one knee up and one tucked underneath them; women sit cross-legged or resting on one hip with legs to the side. Close friends and siblings might touch or lean against each other but normally there are at least a few inches between each person. Good manners dictate that everyone digs into the section of the platter closest to them. Anyone can reach for condiments and salad or ask for more bread but one should not touch any part of the platter except the pie-slice shaped area immediately in front of them. If it is a “curry” (thick stew), one tears off a piece of bread and uses it (in the right hand) to scoop up the sauce, vegetables and meat or fish and bring it directly to the mouth. You always try to keep a Maginot Line between your portion and your neighbors but if everyone is hungry, it disappears. Large mouthfuls are fine but you should not try to eat so much at one time that the food is spilled and wasted. When eating rice, the first bite should be taken from the edge; one never sticks one fingers into the middle of rice. The four fingers of the right hand are kept close together and rice is gathered in a scooping motion, pulling towards you, then the rice is kneaded briefly in the palm of the hand and deposited in the mouth in one swift motion. The rice is always pulled back towards the person eating so that the edge of the platter is cleared first, then you work forward and towards the sides creating a trapezoid (triangle with the top cut off). The very center of the platter is a kind of no-fly-zone; one should not reach across it nor, if the meat is piled on top, try to take any piece except what is closest unless it is a group of very close friends who have known each other a long time. If, as people eat, the center portion becomes like a high hill on an empty plain, the cook or oldest person will push the rice down so it spreads out evenly into each person’s “sector” and one starts again with the rice closest to the edge of the platter. Eating is very communal. There is no such thing as “my plate/ my food” in Gibali culture. One of the few times the research guys ate at my house I reheated spaghetti with vegetables in one pan and fish in garlic sauce in another, then I made up three plates, with a serving of each dish on each plate. When I set them on the plastic “table” spread on the floor, one of the men picked up the plates and brought them back into the kitchen. He took clean plates, rinsed them, then put all the spaghetti on one plate, all the fish on a second plate and brought them back into the majlis. He set them down and gave me a stern look. Ok. Lesson learned. Even in restaurants, everyone is expected to share everything. You can steal French fries as much as you like, but a good person will immediately scoop up some of their food and set it on someone else’s plate or in the middle of the table. If a person orders dessert, it should be accessible to all people (i.e. the plate

116  Eating and location pushed towards the middle of the table), or cut into pieces and put onto other people’s plates. Eating is casual. On picnics, Gibali men will toss the best pieces of fish or meat around. The host will take a choice piece from the top of the pile in the middle of the rice and pitch it so it lands in front of a person. It’s an act of hospitality and if you don’t want it, you can toss the piece back or to someone else. On the other hand, wasting food is seen as a very serious breach. If you toss a piece of lobster, that piece had better land on the communal platter; if it lands in the sand you will get scolded for wasting food. If there are guests, care is taken so either the guest is left alone with a huge amount of food or that a guest is never left alone, i.e. a family member might not be eating, but will stay next to the guest to encourage the guest to eat more and make sure the guest is given choice pieces of meat. When people are done, they say Alhamdulillah (praise be to God), stand up and wash their hands. Among Gibalis, there are no protocols about finishing; it’s not rude to leave one person eating alone if they are among family or close friends. If a man has been sitting with the group for a while, he can leave as soon as he has finished eating without saying goodbye or he might sit and talk to those still eating. Often there is some sort of teeth or mouth cleaning after eating. With family and friends, toothpicks are usually passed around or placed nearby. Sometimes a miswak (a pencil-sized twig from the arak tree which is traditionally used to clean teeth in Arabic cultures) is used. In more formal settings or with guests, toothpicks which are individually wrapped in paper are offered. On picnics, people will often take a sip of water, swish and spit it out on open ground. In a house, the women who live there and/ or a maid are responsible for taking the dishes back to the kitchen; guests, even close friends, may not help. On picnics, the cleanup is always done by someone who did not cook. The time for eating is devoted to eating; there is usually no drinking until the food is finished. Drinking is usually, like eating, done with concentration, i.e. when given a soda men will usually drink most or all of it right away and then set it aside, not take sips over a period of ten or fifteen minutes. If we are driving somewhere and the research guys get tea to go, they will drink the small cup quickly in two or three sips. If I am out for coffee with female Gibali friends, they will usually finish their drinks within the first few minutes. Dhofaris rarely eat or drink while in motion. The Gibali men I know will sometimes drink water or Dew on long car trips but usually because I open the cooler and press them to drink. Most of them grew up without piped or easily available drinking water and are thus not used to drinking a lot of water. One result is that kidney stones are a frequent complaint among Dhofari men. I would like to make a few comparisons using Kanafani’s unpublished dissertation, Aesthetics and Ritual in the United Arab Emirates (1979). For example, she mentions similarities such as sitting on the floor (75), the manner of sitting with one knee bent and upright, other knee flat on floor and bent to keep a narrow profile so that several people can fit around the platter of food (76), using the right hand to eat and hand food to other people (79), eating on a mat (80), and “eating as soon as the tray is ready and leaving as soon as one is full” (82).

Eating and location  117 However, as this was published over 40 years ago and the Emirates has experienced exponential growth, I would venture that her descriptions accord more with Dhofar now than the Emirates. Also, her accounts show a definite gender bias in the Emirates that I have seldom seen among Gibalis, for example women eating less, eating leftovers and giving up their food for guests (73). Also I have not seen people eat radish tails (86–92), nor is drinking tea with saffron as popular here as Kanafani describes. Policing who eats what, when and how I see Gibali hosts as trying to break the guest–host dyad with constant remarks such as “this is your house,” but the real status of the relationship is shown in how much the host is monitoring what is eaten. The less the guest is known or the greater the power–age differential, the more the host has to work. When I am at a wedding where I have met the women several times before, I get gentle recommendations to eat. When I don’t know the host well, it can get to the point of the host declaring I have irreparably wounded the honor of the household and she’s going to immediately commit hara-kiri if I don’t eat that 17th bowl of crème caramel. I quickly learned the tactic of accepting the piece of cake, smushing the piece of cake, then protesting vehemently that I have eaten three bakeries worth of food and then peace reigns. Thus watching food consumption is only done for strangers, to show hospitality, and the very old or very young, to make sure they eat enough. Among friends and close family members there is sometimes a little teasing about who is eating how much, but there’s no controlling. As the cost of food is never discussed and left-over food is almost always given away, there is no pressuring to eat in terms of “this cost so much, you have to taste it” or “it will go to waste is you don’t eat.” The pressure is that hosts should make sure guests are full and feel looked after, not that they have consumed expensive items or all the dish is finished. As in other cultures, to not eat when others are eating can be read as a sign of anger or sickness; so if someone refrains, they need to make the effort of offering a plausible explanation or eating a token amount. On picnics, if a Gibali man doesn’t want to eat with the group, he should give a ritual excuse or apology. Guests should be served first and given the choicest portions, which includes the liver if the group has an entire animal. When it’s a group of family and friends, people normally wait until everyone who is intending to eat is there and the senior person has said bismallah but younger children can grab food and start, as long as they say bismallah. Eating dinner on the beach or in the mountains, the group cannot start eating until everyone who is expected shows up. If a group has waited a long time and is hungry, as soon as the late arrival’s car is heard, the person who cooked will start putting the food on the platters but normally everyone needs to be seated and all the greetings finished before there is any movement towards eating. I have seen men go to the pot, take food and eat before everyone was in attendance; this was not condoned but also not discussed. It is bad manners, but it is

118  Eating and location worse manners to call someone out for violating social norms. A Gibali might correct a much younger close relative, but it’s degrading for a Gibali to tell another person of the same age (or older) how to behave, especially in public. If X wants to eat before the rest of the group, let him. The choice for the other members is to say “X is like this” or silently decide not to eat with X again, not attempt to correct his behavior in relation to food. In the same way, how people eat is not policed, beyond the basic rule of chewing with your mouth closed. A good person won’t notice that another has spilled food or made a mess, much less mention it. To discuss this brings shame on the person who is speaking, not the person who stained their clothes. Most Gibalis are so practiced in eating, that they seldom do, but when a woman spills something on herself, she will usually laugh and say, “my abayah wanted to eat.” I have been the grateful beneficiary of this social construct as I am still not adept at eating rice with my hands, but I have never received a comment, nor heard people comment on others. In general, regulating food consumption is similar to Oman’s foreign policy of: “we don’t interfere with others and we don’t want others to interfere with us,” or as I have heard it explained, “enemy level zero.” On the personal level it means don’t tell me what to do and I won’t tell you what to do, unless the person you are eating with is very young, much older or a guest.

Restaurants Restaurants are usually a chance to rest in between shopping, visiting, and running errands, a special occasion to celebrate good news or a chance for a husband and wife to be alone. Dining in a restaurant usually means “Let’s try something new or non-Omani.” In his 2017 article, “The Top Restaurants of Salalah,” Medhat mentions seven, six of which are in hotels and none of which serve distinctively Omani food. There is always a disconnect between what one eats at home and at a restaurant, for example no American restaurant serves the beloved American meal of cold Thanksgiving leftovers, but this divide is very noticeable in Dhofar, as almost all cooking in restaurants is done by expat men. Thus, while innovation is not essential at home, restaurants are a place to try food and flavors that often started in one culture, got interpreted by a cook from another culture and then eaten by someone from a third culture. For example, flavors and foods that are eaten in restaurants but not usually in the home are “Buffalo” sauce, nachos, bruschetta, and wontons. The many types of restaurant in Dhofar can be plotted along several vectors: cost, outlook, clientele and location. Cost covers the range from tiny shops selling only parathas and tea with a few plastic tables to very expensive hotel restaurants. Outlook means how conservative a restaurant is, from places that play music and have expat women as waitresses to those with only expat male waiters and strictly segregated seating.2 Another vector is clientele, from small, Indian or Pakistani restaurants for laborers with long communal tables to those which serve alcohol to wealthier expats to those with small carpeted rooms where you eat Omani-style sitting on the floor. Locations can include restaurants in malls,

Eating and location  119 along streets, on the outskirts of towns and in remote areas, 20 or more miles away from other buildings. One aspect of eating out is the frequent worry about food poisoning.3 Hence most Gibalis only go to restaurants they have eaten in before or are vouched for or run by close friends or relatives. Word of mouth is vital, although ads on social media might raise interest, most people prefer to go only when they know others have been, so that they will pass on information, “I went to X last night, you should go,” to friends. Websites and apps with reviews are seldom or never used to make dining decisions. Judging a place by the outside appearance is a last resort. In Salalah, there is one Omani restaurant chain, Bin Ateeq; the most common types of restaurants are Lebanese, Turkish, Yemeni or “Arabic,” meaning grilled meats, chicken and fish with various kinds of rice dishes including biryani. There are also many Indian and Pakistani restaurants, some targeted for middle-class Omani and expat families with smaller tables and segregated seating and some with only one open area for expat men with long tables with benches. There are a few foreign restaurants, including Chinese, Iranian, Italian, Thai and Mexican. Most of the expensive restaurants at the tourist hotels are “Arabic/ Asian,” meaning meat, chicken and fish dishes served with rice, sometimes with Chineseor Thai-influenced sauces. These are beyond the budget range for most Dhofaris and, given that alcohol is served at most of them, they are sometimes seen with suspicion, regarding both the kinds of food served and the kinds of people who visit them. Most restaurants have two entrances, one for women only and families, one for men only. Inside, the two sections are divided. The women and family section is either an open area that is separated from the men’s section by a wall or staircase, or it is a series of small box-like rooms. The division is not policed; groups of women or families can sit in the men’s section if they want to. Restaurants with no family section are often small, very inexpensive places, mainly used by expat workers. One sign of Omani communal culture is that the only restaurants with tables for two are Western chain restaurants, such as Pizza Hut. Omani restaurants have tables for four, six, eight or more given the usual large size of families. The only restaurant with traditional seating on the floor is the Omani chain, Bin Ateeq. Restaurants and cafés in the past had to create non-smoking sections because of government decrees but now smoking is forbidden in enclosed spaces. Smoking is still common in outdoor restaurants, many of which have shisha (hubble-bubble, hookah). A few Dhofari women use shisha in the family (screened off) section of outdoor restaurants. I have heard of older women who smoke cigarettes but, although many Dhofari men smoke, I have never seen a Dhofari woman with a cigarette. Sobh, Belk and Gressel argue that in the Gulf States, “There is a dramatic presence of foreigners from both Western and Non-Western cultures, such only around 17% of Qatar residents are Qataris … Locals increasingly fear the dissolution of their ethnic identity” (2010: 588). This is less true for Oman: “The last official census was done in February 2013: 2,146,924 Omani, 1,684,629 ex-pats for a total of 3,831,553” (Zafar 2013).

120  Eating and location I have not heard of a Dhofari expressing concern over “ethnic identity” in terms of foodways; foreign restaurants and foreign food in grocery stores are not a source of worry. The Omanis I have spoken to about this are glad there is food for expats, and happy sometimes to try something new, but do not feel that their traditional dishes are disappearing because of an influx of foreigners. In “Making Room for Migrants, Making Sense of Difference: Spatial and Ideological Expressions of Social Diversity in Urban Qatar” (2006), Nagy explains that Doha’s urbanscape resembles the “multiplicity of cultural environments” found in most cities with highly transnational populations. Small areas serving specific nationalities exist—for example, a strip of shops with a Filipino restaurant, Asian grocer and news-stand with Tagalog periodicals. Yet rarely are these spaces marked by the rigid and threatening boundaries described in other cities such as those plagued by “gang violence” or frequent ethnic, racial or religious tensions. (121) This obtains in Dhofar, in that there are restaurants which cater to specific nationalities but there are no barriers to entry. All restaurants are open to all inhabitants of Dhofar; women may choose not to go to, for example, a small restaurant that does not have a separate seating area for women, but if a woman entered, she would be served. Dhofaris choose where they will eat out in terms of location, price, cleanliness, freshness, and what they feel like eating. Further, there are no restaurants set up only for tourists. In “Food in Tourism” (2004), Cohen and Avieli argue that tourists need a “simplified register,” restaurants need to “provide neophobic tourists with familiar food,” thus “[T]ourism-oriented culinary establishments constitute environmental bubbles” (757, 767, 769). Dhofar receives two sets of tourists: Europeans enjoying the sunny days during the winter months of November to February and Gulf Arab tourists enjoying the cool rainy and foggy days during the khareef (monsoon) season from the end of June to the beginning of September. Any place tourists eat, one will find Omanis and vice versa. Cultural aspects of eating in restaurants Men eating alone will want and expect to be served quickly but a group of Dhofaris will often see a restaurant meal as a special event. Dhofaris can easily sit and talk for twenty minutes or half an hour before they order and then will wait without complaint for another half an hour or forty-five minutes for the meal. For women, restaurants mean relaxation and comfort. Surrounded by family (I have never seen or heard of a Gibali woman eating alone at a restaurant), she has no responsibilities and since she is either in a small room or separate area, she can take off her niqab (which covers the face) and small children can run around at will. It is a time for celebrating or unwinding after shopping, thus a family will not mind a long delay for their meals. The main dishes, side dishes and salads,

Eating and location  121 as in homes, are usually brought all at once with the drinks brought after the food is served. My Gibali friends get frustrated with me if I get impatient for the food or drinks to arrive or if the order delivered is wrong.4 They might say something to the waiter if the wrong order arrives, but they will not send the food back. Their point of view is: it’s food – be grateful. When the food arrives, they focus on eating, then leave. For formal dinners, most of the time is spent before the main course is served. When people arrive, they will chat and eat appetizers: khbus lebnani (Lebanese bread, known to Americans as pita bread), salads such as fattoush or tabbouleh, cut vegetables such as carrots, finger-food such as kibbeh, grape leaves stuffed with rice or falafel, and dips such as hummus, baba ghanoush, and mutabal, as well as several kinds of condiments such as pureed garlic and hot sauces, etc. There will be speeches to commemorate the event and after the last, usually most important, person has spoken, the main dish (rice and meat) is brought in. People take second helpings as they wish and almost immediately upon finishing, take dessert, sometimes with coffee or tea, then leave. Sharing food carries a psychological importance; Gibalis will carefully delineate their degree of relationship with others by levels such as “I will shake their hand and respect them as a person but I never ate with them.” Men will say, for example, “I will greet him but he never came in my car” (i.e. they never went anywhere together). “I went with him many times” conveys that the two men went to restaurants or trips together and that there is a solid basis of friendship and respect between them. When a Gibali man agrees to have dinner with another man, it means, “I agree to be publicly linked with you.” A man might have dozens of close relatives and dozens more tribe-members, co-workers, neighbors and acquaintances who must be greeted, but to take the step of sitting down to eat with someone in public signals that the men are now connected. Gibalis are constantly scanning and assessing the surroundings so for a man to sit with another man at a restaurant will be noted. Who serves Almost all waiters and clerks in all types of restaurants are expat men. The only places with waitresses are large hotels which have mixed staff, fast-food chains and places (usually cafés) which hire women as part of the marketing strategy. Like store clerks, waiters and cooks have zero incentive to work quickly. Tipping is either not done or consists of small bills, so it is usually less than $1. The slow service works perfectly with Omani culture, in that in restaurants and cafés people are happy to be together to talk; the only people who want fast service are men sitting alone who will bolt their food and leave. There are language barriers in talking to wait staff, as many waiters don’t have fluent Arabic and/or English. They are trained to do specific actions in specific ways and to know specific orders. For example, at many sweet shops, doughnuts or cookies will be made and kept on display until sold. If you ask if they are

122  Eating and location “fresh,” you will be told “yes.” If you ask if there is “decaffeinated coffee,” you will be told “yes” and given regular coffee. At one restaurant I went to frequently with the research guys, the men would ask which kind of fish is available and the waiter who has worked there for years would shrug and say sumak, the generic Arabic word for “fish.” If he was asked to go find out what kind of fish, he might be gone for 10 to 15 minutes. The menus can be confusing and in no way reflect what is available. One Chinese restaurant in town has a menu with a photo of shish kebabs (small pieces of grilled meat and red pepper on a skewer) and a sandwich consisting of French bread, sliced “deli-style” meat, sliced cheese, sliced apples, lettuce and some kind of mayo or spread. Neither of these items is available at the restaurant.5 Waiters will often disappear in the middle of taking orders, sometimes to check if what was ordered is available. Asking “what’s available?” sometimes works but usually you are told “everything,” then you order, then you are told what’s not there. With expats who have lived overseas for a while, I have realized that we unconsciously sit silently for a few moments after we have ordered, waiting for the server to reappear and tell us what is not available so we can re-order, then we start to chat. Often the food is prepared ahead of time so there is no way to alter a dish, i.e. have it made less spicy or without tomatoes. And, except for the basics of rice and meat or fish, there is a lot of latitude as to what is produced. A “cobb pizza” from Pizza Hut can arrive with beef pepperoni, no pepperoni, with chicken, no chicken, with peppers, no peppers, with tomato sauce, no tomato sauce. One time it had a creamy mayonnaise dressing on top, another time a delivery order arrived with a slice missing. Most restaurants will hire all the workers from one country so they have a common language and culture; most workers will live in the same place and are bussed to work together. Fast food There are very few options to get food quickly. KFC (called “Kentucky”) delivers, but that can take up to one and a half hours and the order is often incorrect. There are a few fast food places (McDonalds, Crispy, ChicKing, Subway, etc.) but beyond that, one either needs to sit down for a restaurant meal which takes over an hour or get one of the few choices from a large super-market’s take-away options.6 There are many small Indian/ Pakistani restaurants but they have limited menus and often don’t have air conditioning. The most common fast food is a shwarma; the Arabic equivalent of a Greek gyro. Chicken or meat are sliced off a large revolving block and put inside khbus lebnani (pita bread) with a mayonnaise-based sauce, pickles, lettuce, ketchup, French fries, or hot sauce. It’s about 200 baisa (about 75 cents) but only available after sunset. Other fast sandwiches are a paratha with egg/cheese or keema (like American sloppy joes but with peas). At shwarma and paratha stands you can usually get a whole roast chicken, fresh fruit juices, instant coffee, tea and sodas; sometimes there are hamburgers, hotdogs and pizza.

Eating and location  123 Like small fruit and vegetable stores and convenience markets, you order from your car, giving a quick beep to alert the staff. The runner comes to the car, takes the order, brings the food, takes the cash to the cashier, and brings the change. Elaborate menus are sometimes posted with photos and items listed that aren’t available. Among Gibalis, a chicken shwarma, a paratha with keema or an egg scrambled in oil with processed cheese is an acceptable snack, but fast food is usually seen as food for children. Cohen and Avieli note that McDonald’s, KFC and Pizza Hut “attract a younger set of locals” in non-Western countries, meaning teenagers and those in their 20s, but in Dhofar, McDonald’s is usually the place to take children under ten (2004: 768). Normally a parent will buy fast food for a child and then will either wait to eat or buy rice and chicken or fish from another restaurant. I have never seen any of the Gibali men in my research group eat a hamburger or hotdog, partially because many Gibalis won’t eat meat from a restaurant as they can’t vouchsafe for themselves the quality. They know that all meat sold in Oman is halal (butchered according to Islamic principles) but don’t know how fresh the meat is. But it’s also because for them a “meal” means rice and chicken or meat from an animal slaughtered by themselves or someone they know. If they are hungry, a sandwich with egg and cheese is something to prevent hunger pangs but is not really “food.” French fries and desserts are mere frippery.

Cafés Gibali men are usually out of their homes at night, as after the sunset prayer they might take female relatives to go shopping or visit relatives, but they are often out with other men at cafés or making tea in a scenic location. There are expensive places in which coffee can cost 2 OR, about $5. Such places are at the mall or are very large, with big plate glass windows and are often frequented by men who want to see other people and be seen. Most cafés are more basic with plastic tables and chairs, perhaps a big screen TV and a simple menu of rice and meat dishes with tea, instant coffee and a few kinds of juice. Every neighborhood has several small cafés and there are a few on the hills overlooking Salalah, some built by the government for tourists in the khareef (monsoon) season. Most Dhofari men who live in or near a town will have one or two cafés that they goes to often; men also might meet regularly with friends in a scenic location in the mountains or on a beach. Men will usually not hang out with brothers although they will often have friends in common. Men will sometimes come to their café with small children, daughters or nieces up to the age of about five or six or sons or nephews of any age, but usually only one child at a time.7 Dhofari women go to cafés, but usually during the day and as a refueling stop while shopping, sometimes to meet friends to talk. Women in cafés will sometimes have children with them, but usually more than one, either several children from one mother or two mothers. Children with women are usually a bit more active, but will rarely be the focus of attention, beyond being kissed and exclaimed over while greeted.

124  Eating and location I have never seen women alone in cafés in the mountains. At the tourist or scenic cafés, women come with families to have a meal or drink tea. I also see them in cars with men or families at the small roadside cafés having a tea or sandwich without leaving the car.

Picnics When I go on picnics with the men in my research group (usually Thursday or Friday nights), I am often struck that although our gatherings are very simple, the men act with the most refined sense of social responsibility towards each other. In addition to the foodstuffs (meat or fish, vegetables, salt, tea bags, sugar, bottled water, rice and/ or bread) one needs only a mat, Kleenex, some wood, a tea kettle, cups, a pot, a knife, and a round plate to cut meat and vegetables on and to eat off of. A big spoon to stir is helpful, but the knife can be used at a pinch; extras like canned milk, fruit, limes, spices, spicy sauce, etc. are welcome but not necessary.8 But in these modest surroundings, everyone acts with the utmost grace. When someone arrives, men will shift themselves so if they were sitting on a pillow, it is suddenly “free” and handed over to a newcomer. When someone opens the cooler, he will ask all the other men what they would like before he takes what he wants. The men all try to give each other (or me) the choicest pieces of meat or fish. When we are done eating, one or two men who didn’t cook will get up of their own accord to gather the trash together and clean the knives, platters, spoon and pot. When one of the men invites another, he says, “Come, there is dinner.” But “dinner” is the least important aspect of the evening – reaffirming the friendship is the core function of the get-together. Men will often come having already eaten dinner at home or planning to eat with another group of male friends later. If a person is not hungry, they should eat a token amount and/or give an explanation. The main purpose is to be together: the food itself is never commented on. No one ever attempts to introduce a new recipe or way of cooking. To have dinner together means that one is acknowledging a public, social link to another person and enjoying time with one’s social network. Thus, for most Gibalis, the best kind of meal is a picnic with just close family members or friends. Meals on picnics are usually cooked over the fire and are typically freshcaught fish grilled over an open fire or boiled in sea water or some sort of “curry,” chopped vegetables with pieces of meat, chicken or fish cooked into a stew, with or without spices.9 One simple recipe for picnics is to put chopped potatoes and carrots with a little olive oil in a pot which is balanced on three rocks over a fire. They are stirred for a while, maybe with water added, then chopped tomatoes, onions, chili peppers, okra, eggplant are added; this is stirred until the tomatoes break down, then covered and kept at a simmer. Chopped pieces of meat (cow, camel or goat) or chicken with the bone still attached are added, then salt and, possibly, spices. This is cooked, then poured onto a platter with high sides and eaten with bread. Although it is time consuming and labor intensive, meat can also be cooked in the traditional method of being placed directly on heated rocks (madhbi).

Eating and location  125 Fish are cooked depending on the type and how quickly people want to eat. On beach picnics, ocean water is often used to cook fish and abalone. For example, if men have caught several medium size fish, they might cut them into pieces of fish heads, fish tails and fish “steaks.” The bigger pieces of meat are set aside; the heads and tails are boiled in sea water until cooked. As this is cooking, the fish steaks are salted (sometimes doused with a dry spice mix), wrapped in aluminum foil and baked on the hot coals. When the fish steaks are done, they are pulled off the coals but kept close enough to stay warm until ready to eat. Sometimes fish or meat are cooked on small “hibachi”-style grills. Fish can also be grilled by setting a whole, gutted fish into a two-piece, hinged grill which is closed and set on rocks over a low fire. Lobsters, with the heads twisted off, are nestled into ashes near coals, sometimes wrapped in aluminum foil and sometimes covered with processed cheese. If it is not a stew but pieces of meat or fish, these are usually eaten with white rice. If the food is boiled, the cooked food is taken out of the pot and set on a metal plate. The pot is rinsed, then filled with bottled water and white rice with a few handfuls of salt. After it is cooked, the rice is transferred to a large round metal plate and “oil” (samn, clarified butter) or margarine is usually added. The fish or meat is put on top of the rice. If there is no rice and the people are picnicking near a town, someone will usually go to buy bread, either paratha or pita (khbus lebnani). Family Family picnics can be long-standing routines, such as every Friday afternoon a Gibali family will have a picnic in a certain place, with everyone coming. It can be a planned treat, a reward, or it can be decided at the spur of the moment. They can happen in a wide variety of places – on a beach, on family land, on land that was seen as controlled by their tribe in the past, in the flat area north of Salalah, or in the mountains. The car is driven to the chosen spot, parked and the plastic mats are spread close to or next to the car. If it is a nuclear family or close relatives, Gibalis will eat in a mixed group spread out on one large or several over-lapping mats. If there are several families, men will make a fire, cook and eat in an area within eyesight of the women, who are usually sitting next to or near the car. Men are typically in charge of the food for family picnics, either buying from a restaurant or cooking. Women might bring home-made desserts, hot sauce, salads or prepared vegetables. Family picnics have the same main dishes explained above, but usually also have a large variety of food, as there should be snacks for the children such as pieces of fried dough, rolls, processed cheese and small pastries with cheese or meat. Likewise there should be juice, soda and water to drink and desserts such as slices of cake, fruit and candy. The meal may be cooked and eaten as soon as they reach the place, especially if they have driven a long way, or they may sit for hours, then eat. The senior women and men decide when to eat, call for the eating area to be prepared and organize the cleanup. Food not eaten will be carefully set aside for late-comers.

126  Eating and location Thermoses of tea and coffee and drinks are always at arm’s reach and people help themselves as they like. Single-gender As Gibali men are usually out of their houses every night, most groups of male friends have specific cafés or places to meet, often cooking dinner together on the weekend. Some men will have only one place but many men belong to several different groups and will decide each night, after sunset, where they will go. Prime beach locations are reserved early on Thursday afternoons (first night of the weekend), especially if there is a full moon. Men will leave a pile of mats, pillows, wood and boxes of water to reserve a spot if they will be out fishing. At beaches or in the mountains, any public space is seen as up for grabs, i.e. if a group of men usually go to the same place, if another group gets there first, there is no recrimination or expectation that the first group will move. Even for men who have built a rough “shelter” on a beach, if another group arrives early on a Thursday afternoon, that shelter is seen as theirs until they choose to leave, even if that means the entire weekend. Men in the mountains generally have a scenic location where they congregate, a cave on the side of a wide valley, a hilltop, under a large tree, etc. The only rationale for how to park is to provide a windbreak. Outside of homes and cafés, men usually sit on folding (camping) chairs or the ubiquitous plastic mats. The material looks like long woven straws and they are usually two colors, so that there is the opposite pattern on each side. The standard sizes are 3 × 6.5 feet for about 1.4 OR ($3.75) and 9 × 12 feet for 6.5 OR ($17). Most Gibali men carry one and/ or a folding chair in the trunk of their car. If a younger man is in a chair when an older man arrives, he will jump up and force the older man to take his chair. Not wanting to get involved in hierarchy issues, I steadfastly refuse to sit in a chair. Male-only picnics only usually have one dish, water, soda or juice and tea.10 If the picnic is for a reason, for example someone got a promotion or came back from a honeymoon, the man might tell other men a few days in advance, but often everything is decided only a few hours ahead of time. Sometimes a man will start to cook, then call other men and say, “there is a dinner.” There are three basic food scenarios. The first is one man will bring a small box or plastic bag of mixed vegetables, round metal platters, and meat or fish. I usually chop vegetables, not because it is woman’s work but because it is the one way I can contribute as I don’t know where to get good meat and can’t catch fish. Sitting on a corner of the mat, I wash the vegetables by rinsing them over the sand (not mat) and cut them using knives from my picnic box onto one of the metal platters. Sometimes dinner will not require any work from me, either someone decides that he wants to do the vegetables or it’s rice and fish. Occasionally, men will come and sit, with no one making a move towards cooking. In this case, we talk with the expectation that we will eat food made in the house of one of the men. Either a man will come with food, or one of the men sitting will drive home to get the food and bring it back. In these cases, the

Eating and location  127 dinner is usually a thick stew eaten with bread, rice with fish, or macaroni with chicken or meat. The third case is rarely done: bringing food from a restaurant. This is either a whole roasted chicken or small tinfoil containers from a Pakistani restaurant. There is usually fresh paratha and a small bag with a salad of chopped cabbage, cucumber and a lime. This usually happens when people come at the last minute, or someone assumed someone else was bringing dinner. No money ever exchanges hands; no one ever tries to pay anyone back, split the cost, figure out who paid for what, etc. Women-only picnics happen less often and are usually planned at least a day in advance as some women might need to arrange transportation. A group of sisters or cousins will decide that they want to gather, then decide with brothers/ husbands/ sons how to get everyone together.11 Women picnicking alone usually sit on land that belongs to their family, at the beach or they rent a house; although they are in a building this is still considered as a “picnic” as they are out of their home and have no household duties. A group with women outside of a house will sit close together in a circle, even if there is a lot of open space around them and they are inviolate. People who want to stay in the same area must park in such a way so that both cars act as barriers between the two groups.

Eating – location, purpose and sociability For Gibalis, a picnic is the most enjoyable kind of dinner. When Gibalis eat dinner at home or alone, the emphasis is on refueling. When there are guests, the emphasis shifts to making sure they feel honored by having the food ready and nicely displayed and by encouraging guests to eat. A Gibali’s house is their castle, but it is not exactly their refuge, as there is little difference between dress and deportment inside and outside the house. In houses, restaurants and cafés, Gibalis are usually at a state of “ready-rest.” At home, a relative or neighbor might show up at any moment, requiring a fresh carafe of tea/ coffee or instructing a maid or young woman to make food. A house is both a personal space (just family) but also common (lots of family). Some Gibali women in their 30s and 40s can never remember ever being alone in the house for even an hour. For a man in a café, a friend or acquaintance might walk in, requiring the man to stand up and greet him, perhaps demanding the friend sit, introducing him to others, asking what he wants to drink, trying to give him the most comfortable chair, the seat that has the best view or is closest to the AC, etc. Picnics are usually the only times Gibalis are away from people they must show respect for and the gaze of any strangers. Picnics are safe spaces; during a picnic no one is on show and there are no outsiders to judge. As no Omani would come up to a family or women-only group unless there was a drastic emergency, picnics are safe from interruptions. Women often turn off their phones or leave them in their purses, explaining later that they were on a picnic so they couldn’t answer. Thus, it is only on a picnic, with the combination of family or close friends, a beautiful setting and plenty of food on hand, that lunch and/or dinner becomes a drawn-out, relaxing event.

128  Eating and location Gibali cultures are tribal; there’s not really the concept of “me time” but everyone understands “family time” – a chance to really catch up on the news, listen to old stories, have a side-conversation with a favorite cousin or talk about up-coming events. On family picnics, everyone has the chance to listen to stories told by older relatives and girls can interact with their father, brothers and uncles in a casual manner that can be difficult to achieve at home because men are often out of the house or in the majlis talking to other men. In addition to the aspects of being free from public gaze and responsibilities, I think there is an additional facet of purity. All Muslims wash before prayer and it is common in the Arab world to value good scents. Gibali often burn luban (frankincense) in their homes at sunrise and sunset. Personal hygiene is taken very seriously; clothes are often “smoked” by standing over an incense burner so the perfumed smoke scents their clothing or by putting an incense burner in a closet. The smell of cooking food is not regarded as pleasing. The kitchen door is closed while cooking and the extractor fan is usually on full time. I will discuss this further in Chapter 6 but, briefly, eating at home puts the house and inhabitants into a state of temporary uncleanliness. There is not only the smell of food, but food might be spilled on the rug; there are dirty dishes and trash in the garbage can. Hands, faces and clothes may have food on them. So while eating, one’s person and the salle/ majlis/ kitchen move from a state of clean to not-clean. After eating one must nullify the effect of food – dishes, kitchen, face, and hands washed, scent reapplied through air fresheners, incense, and/ or perfume. However on a picnic, there is no need to rush. Gibalis wash themselves for prayer, but the fresh wind, smell of grass and trees or sea take away or cover the smell of cooking. Instead of having a specific time to eat, then cleaning the salle, majlis or kitchen, food is at hand for hours. After the main meal, you merely brush off the mat and cover the cooked food. There is no way to clean your surroundings, so the tension of refreshing the space is gone. Gibalis don’t envision themselves as “impure” on a picnic; this is me imposing a way to explain the difference between eating in a house and on picnics. For both, the main meal is brought out, eaten quickly with concentration and then put away, but in a house there are lengthier and more elaborate ways of cleaning which are done immediately while on a picnic there is less work and it can be postponed.

Notes 1 Baby food is sold in grocery stores, but in public or in private homes, I have never seen a baby fed except from a bottle or the common dishes. Some families will put aside some of a dish as it is being cooked for children. The children’s portion will then be cooked longer (to make the rice softer) and/ or have less spices added. 2 Gender of waitstaff is key. Comments such as “he goes to a café with Moroccan women [meaning waitresses]” or “I do not go to cafes with women [meaning waitresses, not other customers]” are important markers about a man’s personality. The first indicates he is less serious, might enjoy flirting, not that he is actually behaving inappropriately. The second is a conscious desire to be thought serious and “good with the religion,” as it is termed in Dhofar.

Eating and location  129 3 The Omani government, on both national and local levels, have systems in place for food safety including restaurant inspectors, but with hot and humid weather conditions, spoilage is a constant concern. 4 I warn expat newcomers – never go to a restaurant hungry. A fish “steak,” a vertical cut, grilled to the edge of carbonization and sprinkled with seasoning with plain white rice and a salad of chopped lettuce with some pieces of green peppers and carrots can take over 45 minutes. 5 I mention this because it is a common gambit for people in a foreign country to be given a menu with photos to pick something. That doesn’t work in Dhofar. Similarly, stores with large “Sony” or “Panasonic” signs don’t necessarily have any Sony or Panasonic items for sale. 6 The most common fast-food sandwich is called a “Zinker” – a piece of boneless fried chicken on a bun with hot sauce and sometimes lettuce and/ or tomato. 7 Children generate very little baggage. I have never seen a man with anything remotely resembling a diaper bag. A woman in a café with a small baby will usually only have a few diapers and some wipes in her purse. Baby strollers are not often used. Children are much fussed over when they first arrive but then are expected to sit still, without being amused in any way, while the men talk. I have seen boys as small as three years old sit immobile for up to two hours in cafés and in houses while visiting. The kids look around but will not interrupt. I haven’t been able to ascertain if men only take out children who are known to be quiet or take care in timing café visits but I have never heard a child crying or complaining with his/her father in a café; men often take small kids with them to the grocery store as well. 8 A few men might bring a folding chair, but usually everyone sits on the mat. If it’s a family picnic, there might be more items such as toys for kids, pretty tea sets, small tables, etc. 9 “Curry” does not necessarily mean that curry leaves are added. If I have a bottle of dried spice mix in my picnic box, whoever is cooking might or might not use it without concern about the kind of mix. A bottle of mixed spice marked for fish could be used for meat, etc. 10 I usually bring chips, cookies and/or chocolate. This is seen as acceptable but not necessary; no man else ever brings any. 11 Women drive and own cars, and can drive themselves, but women’s movements are more coordinated than men’s in that wives need to tell fathers/ husbands that they will be with their sisters (for some women, this is akin to asking permission). It’s a fraught subject because the common reaction from expat women is “Dhofari women are oppressed.” Spending so much time with Gibali men, meeting some of their wives and other female relatives and hearing dozens of stories of how they helped and accepted help from their moms/ sisters/ wives/ daughters/ female cousins, the reality is more complicated than “oppression.” A Gibali man is judged on his own behavior and how he treats women – taking female relatives to meet other female relatives is part of his duties as a man. And he will inform (depending on his age) his mother/ wife/ daughters about his movements. From being told directly or via general conversations, the women will know who he is with and where he is. Many Gibali women have met, for example, their father’s/ brother’s/ husband’s/ son’s best friends; many Gibali men have met their mother’s/ sister’s/ wife’s/ daughter’s best friend.

References For a full bibliography, list of food terms and several short essays on foodways, please see my webpage: Come From Away, https://mariellerisse.com Cohen, Erik and Nir Avieli. 2004. “Food in Tourism: Attraction and Impediment.” Annals of Tourism Research 31(4): 755–78.

130  Eating and location Kanafani, Aida Sami. 1979. Aesthetics and Ritual in the United Arab Emirates. unpublished dissertation, University of Texas at Austin. Nagy, Sharon. 2006. “Making Room for Migrants, Making Sense of Difference: Spatial and Ideological Expressions of Social Diversity in Urban Qatar.” Urban Studies 43(1): 119-37. Sobh, Rana, Russell Belk, and Justin Gressel. 2010. “Conflicting Imperatives of Modesty and Vanity Among Young Women in the Arabian Gulf,” in Advances in Consumer Research. D.W. Dahl, G.V. Johar, and S.M.J. van Osselaer, eds. Duluth, MN: Association for Consumer Research. 38 Zafar, M. 2013, April 23. “Oman Population hits 3.83mn mark.” Muscat Daily. http:// www.muscatdaily.com/Archive/Oman/Oman-population-hits-3.83mn-mark-27eq. Accessed 2014, no longer on website.

6 Lifestages, power and gender

Foodways and lifestages Pregnancy, newborn, infant As in all cultures, there are suggestions for what pregnant women should or should not eat, with variations between families. In Dhofar, pregnant women are encouraged to eat dates in the morning to help with morning sickness. Samn (clarified butter), honey and coconut water should be avoided until the last month as it is believed these will induce/ help with contractions. Women almost always give birth in a hospital, but unless there are complications, will go home as soon as possible. “Home” in this case usually means her parent’s home as a new mom, especially if it is her first child, normally spends the first 40 days after the birth with her mother. If her mom is divorced or widowed, she might go to an older sister, an aunt, grandmother or wherever her mom is, for example, an older brother’s house. New mothers are fed simple foods such as beef boiled with water, hot milk and aseeda/ asida (cooked wheat flour served with samn).1 Her husband should visit often; depending on the set-up of the house, the wife might bring the baby downstairs and sit with her husband in the majlis or the couple may not be able to sit alone. When she returns to her own house, the husband will usually slaughter an animal for her to make a celebration meal, with some of the meat given to relatives and neighbors. Traditionally babies were only breastfed by the mother, or a close female relative if she was not able.2 In Islam, breastfeeding is recommended for two years and if siblings are born close together, the mother can nurse both. Less often, animal milk was used by heating it, then skimming off the fat and feeding it to the child through a small bowl with a small cut in the rim. Formula first appeared in Dhofar in the 1960s but was not common until the 1970s. Babies are sometimes not given water until they are about four months old. In the past, babies started on food with “soft” (overcooked) rice with samn, a mush made of oats cooked with dates or other fruit, or milk heated with dried bread. Teething children were given dry bread and, if possible, clean fabric to champ on. Honey was both given to as a food and also rubbed on babies’ stomachs. Date syrup, if it could be obtained, was also given when the baby was around a year old.

132  Lifestages, power and gender Now newborns are breastfed or given formula. Nurses are trained to help new mothers learn breast-feeding at hospitals and all types of breast pumps are widely available. Formula is also widely available if a woman does not want to or can’t breastfeed. Usually babies start on “soft” rice with vegetables between four to six months, adding new vegetables in a staggered manner to see which ones the baby likes. This is usually prepared without salt. Chicken is the first main protein, sometimes at about seven months; meat is usually added before the baby is a year old and fish after the baby is a year old, with variations between families. Doctors often try to dissuade moms from giving babies samn or honey, while grandparents often recommend these traditional foods. Teething babies are given traditional remedies of dry bread, but also teething toys, some of which can be put in the freezer, are used. A new mother, even if it is her first baby, is expected to rejoin the social life of her and her husband’s family after the initial 40-day period of rest. She should do visits to other new mothers, make condolence visits (sometimes leaving the baby with a sister or sister-in-law), show up for special occasions, etc. She and the baby are completely folded into normal life. As a Dhofari woman might have ten children (some men have daughters and grand-daughters the same age), most families have formula, clean clothes, etc. on hand as a visiting woman will know whatever she is missing can be easily supplied. The baby is seldom put alone in a room to rest but sleeps in the salle as the women are visiting and in the parents’ bedroom at night. Some babies have pacifiers but they are not universally used. There are few specialized food items for babies beyond bottles; when started on solid food, babies are hand-fed from a normal bowl. Special rubber spoons and plastic plates are not always used, although care will be taken that they drink from plastic glasses. Child Even after children are able to feed themselves, at two or three years old, they continue to be hand-fed, partially for ease and cleanliness, but also so that the mother is sure that the child is eating enough. After about a year and a half, they are fed from the communal platter or a small bowl of the same food that is cooked longer and/ or without hot peppers. The monitoring of consumption tapers off as a child gets to be about five or six but mothers will always note what and how much their children are eating. Children between about two and puberty are often indulged with chocolates and junk food, such as hamburgers and fries, but this is sometimes seen as “babyish,” i.e. a stage to outgrow. Eventually children will settle on eating only from the communal dish as one of several indications of maturity, for example doing the five daily prayers. Aging After decades of not being policed, as Gibalis age, there is more care, solicitousness and monitoring of what is eaten. Favorite foods are made and the person is encouraged to eat more. Anything that is asked for is provided if possible. Some

Lifestages, power and gender  133 older Gibalis ask for foods that were eaten more frequently in the past, such as drinking only warmed milk for a meal, aseeda/ asida (cooked wheat flour, served with samn, clarified butter), or garesh (uncut oats). Sometimes only laban (soured milk) is added to plain, cooked rice. Everything should be made “soft” for those who have trouble chewing. Sometimes older Dhofaris with chronic conditions go in and out of hospitals frequently (ten or more times a year) as health care is free and some people, used to being in control their whole lives, refuse to take needed medicine and/or adjust their diet.3 Sickness Two common foods that were used for sickness were bananas and honey.4 Green bananas are used for diarrhea and over-ripe ones for constipation. The first step against simple illnesses such as coughs, sore throats, a cold and the flu is honey. A family will either have a bottle of local or Yemeni honey on hand or will purchase one when someone falls sick. The dosage is one or two tablespoons taken straight. A second cure is warm liquids: milk that is heated with a little water or meat broth.5 Some will have chicken soup or “Chinese” (hot and sour) soup. Sometimes ginger or lemon is added to hot water or tea. For stomach ailments, one should not drink milk but take yoghurt or 7-Up. Many Gibalis I know will soldier on, eating normal meals and refusing to take any kind of medicine, even aspirin for headaches. From an American perspective, in which people with the flu/ cough/ cold/ fever are usually expected to self-segregate themselves, it’s a little startling to sit down to share a communal platter with someone who is clearly ill with a cold. Sickness and health are in the care of Allah; if you are supposed to get sick, you will. Thus people with a fever will eat from shared platters, expect to be greeted with kisses on the cheek (female) and handshakes (male). Several Gibalis have told me that it’s good to be sick because it reminds you of your mortality and might make you behave better. Asking about food and sickness brought fewer responses than I expected, in part because when speaking about the past, informants said, “we didn’t know,” meaning both that people didn’t know about different types of illnesses and people didn’t know that some traditional cures weren’t effective. When asking about the present, informants said, “we go to the hospital.” As with discussing houses, informants are aware that explaining how people lived in the past might be judged negatively by outsiders (and younger Omani generations), so informants can be reluctant to discuss examples. In some cases, they felt they had incomplete information about what was done and how. Also, explaining an old-fashioned cure was felt to have no purpose as doing X to solve problem Y was no longer done; thus there is no need to discuss it.6

Foodways and power7 Reading Avieli and Grosglik’s “Food and Power” (2013) made me consider how their argument, “Food is a prominent means of power” (185), works in Dhofar.

134  Lifestages, power and gender What is the “culinary powerscape” (188)? Their focus was on the negative (e.g. controlling access to or regulating food intake) and positive (e.g. showing cooperation, giving mutual assistance) aspects of how power can work through foodways, with hunger being the ultimate instance of powerlessness. Who has power over food?8 An over-generalization is that Gibali men bring foodstuffs to the house and women turn it (either directly or by supervising expat workers) into meals. This doesn’t really cover what happens, as women also bring foodstuffs (goat milk, produce, mussels, bought groceries, etc.) and men also bring prepared meals. Further, one could argue that women are in charge of meals because they will send messages to ask for specific items to be brought, or that men are in charge because older men are usually asked what they would like, or that children are in charge because a child will usually be given what it wants to eat. Two other over-generalizations are associated with access to foodstuffs. First, that only men have primary access to the most important foodstuffs: honey, camel and cow milk and meat. But there are complications to this view. First, objects are less important than their giver and the situation of giving. Having excellent honey does not make a man powerful or respected. Food gifts from men with bad reputations are given away. Second, all food work by good people is honored and valued. The men and women in a family have to work together not just to feed themselves but to show hospitality to guests. Raw camel meat, for example, needs to be well cooked and nicely presented for it to be eaten. Further, it might be assumed that since men often do grocery shopping, that they control what food comes into the house. However, there are small stores within walking distance of most houses and women have money not only from the work of their father, uncles, husband, brothers, and sons, but also their own, and that of their moms, aunts, sisters and daughters to buy what they want. Almost all restaurants deliver and a woman who is going shopping will often buy for other women in the house, so that sometimes at a grocery store checkout, a woman will arrange purchases into groups, each set of items paid for separately and put in its own bag with the bill to be distributed at home to different women. One way to look at the situation is the classic anthropology text “Eating Christmas in the Kalahari” (1969) in which Lee learns that !Kung [now called Ju/’hoansi] who he is researching have social systems in place to not give too much respect to a generous person. Lee has bought a large ox for a feast and the enormous animal is criticized by the whole community as scrawny and thin. Lee writes As I read it, their message was this: There are no totally generous acts. All “acts” have an element of calculation. One black ox slaughtered at Christmas does not wipe out a year of careful manipulation of gifts [tobacco] given to serve your own ends. After all, to kill an animal and share the meat with people is really no more than Bushmen do for each other every day and with far less fanfare. The group as a whole enforces humility and this common practice stops, for example, a successful hunter from potentially becoming arrogant and thus harmful to a communal society.

Lifestages, power and gender  135 This is what I see in Gibali cultures, writ both large and small. On a picnic, the person who cooks the dinner is no more appreciated that any other. The person who pays for the dinner is either not thanked or quickly thanked in an off-hand manner. Amongst friends and family, everyone is constantly exchanging items; giving or receiving foodstuffs is simply one small point in a long, unending chain of interactions. Even if X never gives, X knows that by receiving, Y has received a religious benefit so there are no unequal exchanges. In other words, to be seen as a positive person in the Gibali-speaking hakli cultures, one should never try to claim or exercise power over food. I realize this sounds utopian and unrealistic, in part because most writing about Arab, Muslim, and tribal women puts them in a position of powerlessness.9 I can’t speak about other parts of the Arabian Peninsula, nor in detail about other tribal groups in Dhofar, but what I have observed in over ten years of research is that men and women in hakli tribes work equally hard in different ways to make sure everyone in the household has clean, fresh food to eat. Women do this by cooking and/or supervising; women and men both do this by bringing home what is requested by women and men in the house. In hakli cultures, self-control is paramount and to be self-sufficient is the goal. When X asks for something, X is now in a “one-down” position, meaning X may get the object but has sacrificed some self-respect to be in the position of petitioner. If Y gives what is requested, Y has lost the object, but gained the religious benefit and perhaps the respect of other people, although that is lost if Y tries to publicly show what Y has given. What Y does not have is X in a state of indebtedness. X asked, Y gave – the topic is closed. This is how things function when, for example, someone asks for produce, fish or meat.10 Second, what a person owns, in general, means far less than personality traits such as bring generous with objects and refraining from making negative remarks. A person with a small plot of land who constantly gives away produce has more social credit and respect than a person with a large farm who sells the harvest. Third, age has a far bigger impact on power than is generally mentioned in writings about the Middle East. If two children are fighting, the younger one (male or female) will almost invariably win. It is seen as harmful if a child cries and shameful for an older child to keep something a younger child wants – especially in terms of food. A respected older person (male or female) usually can’t dictate what others eat, except in the most general terms such as “in this house we don’t give our guests chicken,” but should be given the best portions of any meal. Lastly, men carry the responsibility for taking care of females, to the point where if a wife works, all her salary is hers to do with as she wishes. Her husband should pay all the household expenses including rent, electricity and groceries. Thus insofar as moms/ wives/ sisters/ daughters should be working to make or supervise palatable meals for the family, fathers/ husbands/ brothers/ sons should be working to supply sufficient foodstuffs and breaks, such as bringing home prepared food and taking the family to a restaurant. A father or husband who does not bring needed food to his family is “not a man.” I gave the hypothetical instance of a man refusing to bring foodstuffs to his wife if they were angry at each other and was told that people “have to eat”

136  Lifestages, power and gender and “we never punish with food.” One informant said you can “punish in many ways, not food.” And that, for example, sending children who misbehaved to bed without dinner is something “I saw it in movies,” i.e. done in other cultures but not Gibali cultures. No informants could think of examples of fighting with food, except as a joke in which a woman put salt in another woman’s tea. The only time food was used negatively and deliberately was to put ground black pepper in the mouth of children who were eating sand to teach them not to. When asking if men and women have the same amount of food, i.e. if the men and women of a household were eating separately, was the same quantity of food brought to the majlis and salle, the answer was yes, “two portions, the same.” However, some informants noted that in the past, if men were visiting, the food was placed on one platter and set before the men. The remainder was given to the women and children. Men had first choice, it was explained, because male guests would have walked far distances in the pre-modern period. Lastly, I would like to briefly mention the issue of societal power over eating/ not eating. Many informants told me that in the past overweight women were prized for their beauty and were often encouraged to gain weight before marriage. This is changing somewhat, as some Dhofari women now try to diet before their wedding. But in general, it is hard to “body-shame” men and women over their weight as Dhofaris are normally in loose fitting clothes in public; men in white dishdashs and women in black abayahs.11 I don’t have any sense of whether/ how many Dhofaris are anorexic or bulimic; I don’t know of any personal examples.

Foodways and gender The time period when women and men were seen as equally productive members in rural societies in Dhofar (for example, women taking care of relatives and livestock when men were away for weeks, months or years) shifted fairly seamlessly into modern lifeways in which males and females have equal rights and chances for primary and secondary education, and fairly similar chances for a college education. Both men and women can drive; vote; own cars, business, and land; travel without permission from another person; and, in most Gibali families, choose whom they will marry. Although men, not women, do the asking, most women have the right to refuse suitors. In Gibali cultures, gender lines are not drawn the same ways as in North America, for example with colors, objects and scents. A majlis can be decorated in pastels while the salle can be in browns and black. Gibali men show up for camping trips with blankets decorated with flowers or drawings of baby animals; they use pink pillow cases. No one thinks it’s odd that I have a tow rope and six or seven knives in my car; they only wish I brought higher quality/ sharper ones. Men and women traditionally wore kohl (black eye-liner) and many Gibali men still do. As almost all clothes are made at a tailors and men will buy fabric for their dishdashs, as well as for female relatives, men know textiles and the fundamentals of clothing design. Given that both men and women should have a good smell, men are used to buying cologne and taking care to have their clothes “smoked,” i.e. scented with

Lifestages, power and gender  137 perfumed smoke from burning frankincense or oud, wood chips saturated with aromatic oils. Dhofari men will chose their scent by what they like, not heeding Western concepts of male/ female perfume marketing and will wear a “woman’s” perfume. One red-line is clothes. In public all clothing items are gendered: only a very small child could be dressed in the same way for both genders, i.e. a onesie or shorts and t-shirt.12 The research men will use my pillows, blankets, scarves, but won’t ever put on one of my shirts or sweatshirts, even if it is clean, i.e. I haven’t worn it after it was washed. This section will look at how foodways are, and aren’t, connected to concepts of gender. First I will discuss issues of being a female ethnographer working with both male and female Gibalis.13 Then I will look at gender in terms of cooking, eating choices, images and humor. The “pleasant experience” of the ethnographer while eating I would like to situate myself as female researcher in Dhofar by reflecting on a reviewer’s comment that in my research “the author is just presenting her own pleasant experience.” I have also gotten the “oh, so you just eat and write about it” response. While it is not a hardship to live and do research in Dhofar, it’s not my culture and it’s difficult to adjust to a completely different world view. The Gibalis I know are instinctively patient and generous. They relentlessly downplay personal positive qualities and achievements while making excuses for anyone else’s shortcomings; they eschew any act or speech that could be taken as self-aggrandizing or boastful. The Gibalis who help me with research understand that I am trying to fit in and give me suggestions and feedback but, even after years here, there are many nights I come home dispirited by my selfishness: my getting a juice out of the coolbox without asking if anyone wants one first or my pleading with the cook to put in fewer hot peppers when that is not my business. There are dozens of adjustments I make every day, from my hairstyle to my clothes to how I drive and how I speak and when and to whom.14 I am not gathering data by frolicking about and that “pleasant experience” quote comes back to haunt me when I am sitting still for hours with a look of agreeable affability on my face, trying for 15 min to get the fire started, being hungry for hours because it was not the right time to eat, tasting a meal to find it is too spicy for me to eat, driving home at 2am, and trying to be respectful while fighting my corner. I constantly pray for patience: politely fending off someone trying to get me to eat cow intestines or drink the ninth cup of Omani coffee, trying not to cry when I burn myself, never being able to ask “when will we eat” because that is impolite. Once a group of us were going camping; I waited for over an hour for other people to get ready. Once everyone was all ready and the car was packed, one of the guys announced that “Since we are ready now, I need to get fruit.” He was not kidding; with 7 people waiting for him, off he went to the fruit stand to buy apples. I have a lot of fun, but I also have back pain (sitting with no support), multiple scars (from knives and fires), a compulsive need to squirrel food in my car from

138  Lifestages, power and gender being hungry so often, and a hatred of rice that has only grown over the past years. I eat pretty much everything, including spaghetti and scrambled eggs, with my hands and I have infuriated dozens of waiters in America, Canada and the UK by unconsciously exclaiming, “Look! I got what I ordered! I asked for a salad without tomatoes and there are no tomatoes in the salad!” It’s not always pleasant for those who I eat with, and it’s not always pleasant for me. I have been on magical picnics. In khareef if you are sitting near the edge of a cliff, the clouds move in and out, opening and closing the vista down to the sea or over the plains. In the mountains, the ground is a carpet of green, with beautiful white and purple flowers later in the season. “Isn’t it gorgeous?” Dhofaris say to me. I try to smile, using a mushy Kleenex to dry off my face, “Oh lovely!” And it is with the fog rolling in and that wonderful smell of growing plants, but could we not enjoy this loveliness through a plate glass window? No, we could not. So I sit on a muddy plastic mat, dive-bombed by mosquitos with soggy bread and a film of water on everything while constantly drinking tea to stay warm in my damp clothes. With men I don’t know I am emphatically “other”: female/ American/ Christian. If I am sitting with the research guys and a man I don’t know comes, he will sometimes ignore me, sometimes give me a quick glance and a brief greeting, and sometimes put out his hand and engage me in conversation. All three are considered equally polite and I am expected to keep seated (even if the men I know stand up) and respond at the same level: ignore if I am ignored, brief greeting if given a brief greeting and shake hands if offered. How much a man interacts with me sometimes depends on how religiously conservative he is or his level of English. Some Gibali men will tell the men I know to apologize on their behalf for their not knowing English. When they are told that I do speak some Arabic, they might either start a conversation in Arabic or still decline to talk, the language barrier being an excuse not to speak to me. The first few meetings with a new man are marked by either ignoring me or lots of comments about my comfort (asking me how I like Oman, checking how much I eat, etc.) After a few meetings, men will find their level, either a brief greeting or treating me like the other men. I sometimes feel that I am post-gender with men I know well, partially I think, because I am in my 50s. I have positive (can cut vegetables well) and negative qualities (am bad at choosing the right place to make a fire, really bad at making tea) that aren’t judged according to gender. The only time I get a comment about being female is if I try to discuss some new item I bought. Being excited over new curtains, painting my apartment, new shoes, etc. brings eye-rolls and comments about women. Other odd behaviors are explained as typical of Americans, for example saying that I needed to get to somewhere with cell phone reception so I could call the woman who cleans my house and ask her to feed my cats when a picnic dinner turned into two days of camping.15 Another American trait is frequently picking up trash on picnics or while camping. On camping trips, men will toss empty soda cans and trash about, but just before leaving they will collect all the trash in plastic bags which are put in the boot or bed of their vehicles to be put

Lifestages, power and gender  139 in municipal trash dumpsters. My sweeping the area for trash often is seen as a harmless oddity.16 Perceived American/ Western traits include selfishness, violence and drunkenness (especially on Christmas, I have said that I don’t know anyone who gets drunk on Christmas but I do not think I am believed). If I do something wrong, men who have known me a long time might comment that I am lazy or a child, not “a lazy woman” or “a lazy American.” “Child” is not as negative as it would sound in American cultures; it means one who does not yet have all the necessary information through lack of years, not lack of intelligence. For example, my tossing something to someone in a horizontal motion so that it flies at a person directly. When I did this, I was told along the lines of, “No, this is not the way, toss it towards them but throw it up.” So the person can track it coming down and grab it as it is landing. Comments like this are almost made when there are only men who have known me a long time. If I do something right, Gibali men say, “Now you are Gibali.” Examples are making a fire quickly in the right spot (according to the wind or where people are sitting) or rapidly bringing drinks and snacks to guests. If I do something right such as keeping my patience or understanding the motivation for an action, I am usually told, “Now you grow up.” Gibali women say, “Now you’re Gibali” when I manage to show up with the right kind of thobe (loose Dhofari dress) and headscarf for the event but don’t call me a “child.” Unlike with men, Gibali women very rarely tell me that I am making a mistake. The few times they have, it is when I have failed to be polite to someone who has been unkind to me. In the Gibali cultures I work with, even if someone is evil to you, you must respond with perfect equanimity in public and keep up all niceties of social interaction. I get asked a lot of questions about being Christian. Islam has brought joy and peace to the Gibalis I know and they wish the same comfort for me. I am occasionally given books about Islam (which I accept and read) and videos done by former Christians who converted to Islam (which I watch). I am always open to discussions about what I believe and comparisons between the Bible and the Holy Qur’an, but don’t make any public manifestations of my faith. My status as professor is used by Gibali men to explain who I am to Omani men I don’t know; Gibali women never mention it.17 Cooking Cooking is coded “masculine” and “feminine” mainly by place, not method. In general, women cook in the home and men cook outside the home. But at least one informant has a father who cooked meals in the home for the whole family and several male informants have cooked for themselves at home. Expat men cook in restaurants and, sometimes, in Dhofari houses, although unlike expat women, they rarely live in the house. Further, some Gibali women know how to cook over campfires, so that cooking with fire is not something only men do. Two articles made me think about how men cook in situations with other men only, as young boys camping together, men having picnics or during abalone

140  Lifestages, power and gender diving season: Julier and Lindenfeld’s (2005) “Mapping Men onto the Menu” and Wilk and Hintlian’s “Cooking on Their Own: Cuisines of Manly Men” (2005). Writing about “Cooking on Their Own,” Julier and Lindenfield state that it gives an historical basis for future discourses about men’s relationship to food and eating, by examining the diet and food production of 16th century Caribbean buccaneers and 19th century California gold miners. Minimal cooking, an eclectic use of available ingredients, and cycles of festive gorging and routine restriction, all fit with the conditions of homosocial environments, where men worked and lived away from the main social body. (2005: 10) Wilk and Hintlian (2005) explain that Both groups [pirates and miners] did a poor job cooking and caring for themselves while they were out hunting treasure. A lifestyle that hinges everything on chance, living constantly with dangers, and hard labor leaves men with little time or aptitude for cooking. At work, quantity was more important than quality of rations. (167) When groups of men camp together in Dhofar, I see two of the above-mentioned aspects: gorging and restriction, and quantity is more important than quality. Men have almost infinite patience when waiting for food. While diving for abalone, for example, men will eat nothing or a small piece of bread in the morning and a large meal after sunset. While camping, dinner can be served at midnight or 1am. And it is always better to have more of something less expensive than a smaller portion of something more expensive, for example dates or fish. Price is less important than freshness and cleanliness, for example the bread will not be bought from the cheapest bakery if it is believed to sell old bread or be dirty. Eating choices It’s difficult to see where the gender lines are with food choices. Men and women state that women eat more sweets but it’s hard to tell if that is actually true, i.e. how much is personal choice vs. following cultural norms. The men in my research group will eat cookies or chocolates sometimes if I bring them, but in more than ten years of picnics, I have never seen a man show up with sweets. A few times, a man bringing dinner from his house will bring pieces of cake, but this was a decision made by a female family member, not that he requested it.18 I have never seen a man order or eat dessert at a restaurant. I have seen Gibali men drink water, milk, tea, soda or, rarely, coffee or lemon with mint. One informant told me that within the family, men should be given tea without milk or plain milk, never juice or tea with milk and sugar. Women make, eat, share or order sweets frequently, and often drink non-alcoholic fruit cocktails

Lifestages, power and gender  141 which are colored and have pieces of fruit added. On the other hand, there are Gibali women who eschew sweets. Eating sweets could be coded as negative, as that is associated with children, but when I asked male informants if women ate differently than men, the answer was always “no.” When I would specifically ask if men and women liked the same foods, then listed some, it usually came out that women were thought to like desserts more. Images As I have said, food is seldom, if ever, a topic of conversation, but there are a lot of photos circulated on social media signaling different aspects of foodways for men and women. Many Dhofaris use WhatsApp, Snapchat and Instagram to let friends know what they are eating, but although both men and women are careful to keep women’s faces out of publicly shared photos, there is a gender divide as to what kind of food-photos are shared. Dhofari women usually photograph a celebration dinner at home or dinner in a restaurant, events which involve aspects of showing respect. After the preparations are done but before guests arrive, women photograph their salle, majlis or kitchen counter to show that they have filled their requirements as a host. The photos proclaim, “Look what I have done for others!” On the other hand, women who are being honored by a party or who are being taken out to dinner will also take photos to show that they are respected. The photos proclaim, “Look what someone has done for me!” Further, women usually show food in indoor locations: their own home, a rented house or in a restaurant. If it is a photo of food outside it is usually either artistically rendered (such as food on pretty plates with flowers on the mat) or a lot of food in covered dishes showing that this is a big family picnic. Lastly, it is almost always clear that the photographer is with other people. Most often Gibali men will share photos of food taken on picnics. The most frequently seen shots are: tea kettle on a wood fire, tea in a glass cup, strips of meat drying on rope, a large bowl of fresh/ foamy camel milk or a picnic mat with tea supplies and a nearby fire. Tea, milk or meat are the three most important food items and either the background is out of focus or it’s a vantage point: a mountain drop-off, running stream, cave, beach with horizon, bower, man-made shelter. Sometimes there are livestock in the photos, usually camels. It is imperative to show “I am outside.” I have never seen a man share a photo of dinner at home or in a restaurant; sometimes the photo is of a picnic dinner with a platter heaped with rice and meat with a few side dishes, clearly enough for several people. The few examples of photos with food indoors is the typical majlis display of trays of tea carafes, tea cups, fruit and sweets arrayed in front of a group of standing men to show that this particular male relative or guest was at the sender’s home. The food is only as a marker to show that the guest was suitably welcomed. Unlike typical women’s photos, there are no close-ups of the food or attempts to show that the food was special or decorated.

142  Lifestages, power and gender Although the places and objects shown are different in photos by women and men, the pictures have the same underlying meaning: that the photographer is part of a group.19 Whether celebrating, being celebrated or relaxing, photographs prove that they are enjoying themselves with other people. The implication is that the woman is with family or friends at her house or a restaurant and the man is with a group of friends at a scenic location. Humor Marieke Brandt (2017) and John Postill (2015) have written about using social media to do anthropological research in places that are difficult to reach; it is also valuable when you are living in the same area. Scanning social media in Dhofar helps me to understand how food is conceptualized through looking at how food is used in jokes – what’s funny shows what’s significant. Several types of food jokes circulate through Omani social media during Ramadan, when eating with family takes on a heightened importance. I should be clear that there are no jokes about Ramadan itself, but about, for example, food for iftar (the meal at sunset to break the fast) and who to have iftar with. One type of joke is about the differences in choices between iftar on the first day of Ramadan and the last day, such as comparing the nights of Ramadan to elimination games in the World Cup series, in which one starts with many teams (types of food) and ends with just dates, sambusas (baked or fried pastry with cheese filling), laban (soured milk) and Vimto. There are also funny photos of a mother and child with an elaborate spread and the same child on their own (perhaps out of the country for a university degree) with a meager iftar. Another type of joke highlights the extra work that women have, for example a woman standing at the sink with a huge pile of dishes or a woman trying to balance many dirty plates on a tray. One shows the hand and forearm of a woman wearing an ornate gold bracelet with the words: “suitable medicine for hands hurt from making sambusas.” There are two types of jokes (sometimes as a still photo, sometimes as a video) that highlight men’s foodways in Ramadan. One makes fun of how small stores set up small tables in front of the shop to sell prepared food. Many bakeries and restaurants set up tents covering display cases with sambusas (cheese, meat or vegetables), but there are humorous messages in which men are confronted with tailors, tire salesmen, hair cutters, etc., trying to sell them food. The second makes fun of enforced hospitality in which a man insists another man come home with him for iftar. This type usually have A inviting B, who refuses. A then goes to comic/ horrific lengths to force B to come, such as chasing him, blocking his car, fighting him, etc. The last photo/ frame is A and B eating in A’s house.

Notes 1 Al Maskiry’s A Taste to Remember (n.d.) has a recipe for “hilba porridge (traditionally for the nursing mother)” made with millet flour, water, sugar, milk and almonds but she is not from Dhofar and I have not heard this mentioned here (97).

Lifestages, power and gender  143 2 Sometimes a neighbor was used. In Islam, children who were breast-fed by the same person are not allowed to marry, even if there is no blood relation, which has led to a few marriages being stopped when an older woman remembers this connection between the engaged couple. 3 There are no hospice services; to say that a person is dying is to almost imply that you wish for them to die or that you are not trying to stop them from dying. All conceivable cures are attempted; large amounts of money are spent to bring elderly relatives to other countries for any possible treatment. If a person is in fact dying, they are usually not told. Sometimes the doctor will not tell the patient or family directly as this can be taken as the doctor is not actively trying to help the patient; sometimes a doctor will tell one family member, who will then usually not tell anyone else. 4 Two common non-food remedies from the past which are still sometimes used are putting aloe vera on the affected area and medicinal branding. 5 My advice of drinking fresh orange or mango juice is seen as strange because the juice is seen as “cold,” even if not refrigerated, and a person should drink warm liquids. 6 Plants of Dhofar, the Southern Region of Oman: Traditional, Economic, and Medicinal Uses (1988) by Miller, Morris and Stuart-Smith is very comprehensive for practices in the mid-1980s and earlier. 7 When female power is discussed in the anthropology literature for the Middle East, it is often linked to family issues, such as Altorki’s (1982) marriage article. I have seen Gibali women pressuring brothers to get married or which woman to marry, but there is a lot of other kinds of work going on which is not generally known. For example, in Dhofar, women give active support for political candidates, through sending messages and visiting other women, even strangers, to try to convince them how to vote. Gibali men talking to other Gibali men do not say that they were persuaded into a course of action by a female, in order to keep a calm and in-control public persona, but so will women. Women will rarely, and only to close relatives or friends, admit they influence or are influenced by men, as they are also invested in portraying both their male relatives and themselves as responsible, intelligent and able to make decisions. Thus, a whole series of relationships and opportunities for influence are usually not discussed or acknowledged. Gibali men whom I have known for over ten years will openly explain how their decisions are influenced by female relatives and their wives, but this is private information. Several times Gibali men, including the husband of a female friend, have asked me for advice relating to specific fields where I have extensive experience (for example where to study abroad). I know none of them ever told other men, “Marielle told me to…” What is said in public is more for signaling than for conveying information. What might be coded by an outsider as a loss of power can actually be a claim for a different kind of power. For example, men will state that they are undertaking or not undertaking specific courses of action to please their mother, signaling not that they lack agency, but that they are a good son. 8 This discussion uses the definition of “power” as being able to make someone do something, i.e. give foodstuffs, cook prepared food. 9 I am often lectured about how Dhofari women are all miserable, usually by people who aren’t friends with any Dhofari women and/ or haven’t been in the country more than a few weeks. The expat insistence that Dhofari women must be unhappy reminds me of Ursula Le Guin’s short story The Ones who Walk Away from Omelas about a mythical city in which everyone is happy because one child lives in misery. If that child was ever given comfort, the perfection of the city would disintegrate. Many of the citizens go to see the child, and some who do then leave with the implication that they will not accept those terms. Expats with so little experience of Dhofari women who maintain that, of course, Dhofari women have no power, seem to be forcing them into the category of that wretched child so that their own lives are most positive by comparison. Further, some expats who do talk to Dhofaris fail to realize that while angry and depressed Dhofaris may speak to expats as a safety value, Dhofari women

144  Lifestages, power and gender and men who are content are far less likely to speak to foreigners about their close positive family relationships, fulfilling jobs and hobbies and active social lives. It took years of knowing the research guys before they started to talk to me about how they took care of their sisters, and how their sisters took care of them. 10 I have heard of instances in which, for example, a brother tells a sister, “Make me spaghetti.” The sister can agree (and gain “brownie points”), bargain for a return favor or refuse, in which case a parent might adjudicate, perhaps telling her to make the food, but she now has made it clear to both brother and parent that she sees this as an unwarranted imposition. In some families, this is not taken into account and in some, it means she has a future bargaining chip. In these cases, food is part of an exchange, but the same behavior can obtain between women: an older sister demanding a meal from a younger sister or a young girl demanding from an older female. An older woman might demand a younger brother bring her a meal from a restaurant or a young girl might demand that from an older brother. It’s not simply that men force women to make food. 11 Some men wear very close-fitting dishdashs. Some women choose clingy fabric and have the abayahs cut to accentuate, not hide, the curves. But these are the exceptions. Women’s abayahs are often so loose, it is difficult to tell if they are pregnant. In the past few years, some women have started to wear abayahs shorter (ankle-, not floorlength) or a loose black skirt with a loose black tunic – but basic body shape is still concealed. 12 Purses are strictly female – there are no “male purses” and the only things a man can put on his shoulder without inciting glances are back-packs for fishing gear or photography equipment. Dishdashs have large, deep pockets and men stuff everything in, with sunglasses either up on the kumma (cap) or hanging on the placket. 13 I discuss gender issues frequently in my book Community and Autonomy in Southern Oman (2019) specifically Chapter 4, “Community/ Autonomy in Daily Life: Practices and Perceptions” and Chapter 6, “‘Why Would I Hurt a Woman’?: The Absence of Honor Killing in Gibali Culture.” 14 Meeting a new person can be difficult because I am then judged by Gibali standards, in that I should henceforth remember this person the next time I see them. Gibali men find it difficult or impossible to believe that I don’t remember a man’s face after meeting him once for three minutes four months previously. There have been a few times a man I have met once has later complained to our mutual friend that I didn’t greet him when he saw me later. As I lack the Gibali scan ability (seen once, never forgotten) I have been judged as unfriendly and impolite. Even the simplest of interactions can go haywire; for example, mentioning that my much-loved grandfather was a Mason turned into hours of discussion – no, Grandpa was NOT a threat to world order and peace. 15 The research guys don’t understand why I have cats and dislike mine immensely. When one died, I was teased for being sad, but the man who teased me the later asked me where she was buried. When I said I didn’t know the exact location (someone had buried her for me as I was out of the country), he scolded me because if another one died, I should bury them next to each other. I thought this was a way of making fun of me, but he was serious. Even if he didn’t like them, the cats are siblings and they should be together. This is a small example of typical hakli thinking: just because I hate X does not mean I should treat X badly. 16 As an example of Gibali patience, the men endured years of me stomping on soda cans and scrunching plastic water bottles before someone finally asked in exasperation, “Why do you do that?” I explained that it was so the containers took up less space in trash bags, dumpsters, etc. Soda cans are now recycled so they are gathered together; the largest grocery store in Salalah now uses bio-degradable plastic bags. 17 Gibalis understand, more than most people, that earning a PhD means a person has certain kinds of knowledge, not necessarily the best kinds, and/ or life skills.

Lifestages, power and gender  145 18 If a man is planning to meet friends, he will say that he wants “extra dinner” to whichever woman is in charge of food for the house. He might make a specific request, or just for a portion of whatever is made “parcel” [put on a platter and wrapped with aluminum foil], sometimes saying about how many people will be eating or simply asking for “dinner.” In households where this is common, what is needed is known through established custom so that a man will only have to say a word or two. The person who cooks will organize the meal (usually rice or macaroni with protein). Sometimes there is a separate bowl with salad, sometimes sliced salad vegetables (such as cucumbers and carrots) are scattered on top of the rice. Cake is given if there happens to be some freshly made. The food is covered with aluminum foil and set in the footwell of the car or bed of the truck; it is only brought out when it is time to start eating. 19 Some photos by men (glass cup filled with tea on a rock with scenic background) can be interpreted that the photographer is alone, but for a man to make tea alone gives the impression that he is “thinking about something,” with the implication he is lovesick or has a difficult problem that he can’t share with anyone.

References For a full bibliography, list of food terms and several short essays on foodways, please see my webpage: Come From Away, https://mariellerisse.com Al Maskiry, Fawziya Ali Khalifa. n.d. A Taste to Remember, 3rd edition. Muscat: Al Nahda Press. Altorki, Soraya. 1982. “The Anthropologist in the Field: A Case of ‘Indigenous Anthropology’ from Saudi Arabia,” in Indigenous Anthropology in Non-Western Countries. H. Fahim. ed. Durham, NC: Carolina Academic Press. 167-75. Avieli, Nir and Rafi Grosglik. 2013. “Food and Power in the Middle East and the Mediterranean: Practical Concerns, Theoretical Considerations.” Food, Culture and Society 16(2): 181-95. Brandt, Marieke. 2017. “The Delocalization of Fieldwork and (Re)Construction of Place: Doing Ethnography in Wartime Yemen.” International Journal of Middle East Studies 49(3): 506-10. Julier, Alice and Laura Lindenfeld. 2005. “Mapping Men onto the Menu: Masculinities and Food.” Food and Foodways 13: 1-16. Lee, Richard Borshay. 1969, Dec. “Eating Christmas in the Kalahari.” Natural History 78(10): 60-4. https://laulima.hawaii.edu/access/content/user/millerg/ANTH_200/ A200Unit1/EatingChristmas.html Miller, Anthony, Miranda Morris, and Susanna Stuart-Smith. 1988. Plants of Dhofar, the Southern Region of Oman: Traditional, Economic, and Medicinal Uses. Muscat: Office of the Adviser for Conservation of the Environment, Diwan of Royal Court. Postill, John. 2015. “Public Anthropology in Times of Media Hybridity and Global Upheaval,” in Media, Anthropology and Public Engagement. Sarah Pink and Simone Abram, eds. New York: Berghahn Books. 164-81. Risse, Marielle. 2019. Community and Autonomy in Southern Oman. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan. Wilk, Richard and Persephone Hintlian. 2005. “Cooking on Their Own: Cuisines of Manly Men.” Food and Foodways 13(1–2): 159-68.

7 Purity, privacy and danger

Introduction This chapter addresses the circumstances in which food, usually the symbol of life-giving, becomes harmful and opens a person to being religiously contaminated, publicly shamed, and/or bodily sick. I use purity as a synonym of “clean” with an overlay of an Islamic religious understanding, i.e. what is acceptable in Islam, not in the Marie Kondo/ no clutter sense or in terms of architectural styles, i.e. “clean lines.” “Privacy” is in reference to how to eat without being seen, but also in the general sense of how to protect one’s self and family from public gaze. “Danger” refers to religious, not so much physical, risk, although I do mention systems of warnings about expired or unhealthy food. As most of this writing centers on the home, I want to foreground this discussion with the observation that when I write about Oman I am always toggling back and forth between writing what I am told or know and how the information might be perceived outside of Oman. My informants do the same kind of work; they know their life choices and religion are usually portrayed negatively in North America, the United Kingdom and Europe. There is sometimes a shyness, a hesitation, a feeling of: “well, I will say this because it is true but I know it will be turned against me and my people.” This happens often when talking about gender issues, but it came up when I asked questions about food, houses and clean/ dirty. One informant said, “there is no house” in the past. Most Gibalis lived in caves or made temporary shelters as they practiced transhumance, herding livestock to good grazing in different areas at different times of years until the 1970s. Sometimes they would set up circular low-stone walls and use wood to create a domed roof. “My father, he has nothing to do with a house,” I was told. “He will not ask you to turn on lights or AC.” If he visits, he “just makes a fire” outside the home and he is happy. This was said with a kind of sadness and yearning, knowing that I was writing his words, that I would put them in this book and his father would be judged as being old-fashioned, but he wanted to make sure I understood that some Dhofaris in their late 40s and older remember life before moving into cement-block houses. For these people, the rules of houses (how to design, decorate, and clean) are still being worked out. Thus when asking about purity/ privacy in homes there were many differing views.1

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Foodways and purity Purity in the house: kitchen, salle, majlis, bathrooms, bedrooms Kanafani discusses how a human body can get clean with water and/or perfume and food can be cleaned with fire (cooked) and spices but the places polluted with body waste and food preparation can never be fully cleaned (1979: 311). In her understanding, slippers and luban (frankincense) help give the majlis, salle and gurfa (“room” in Arabic, meaning bedroom) the chance to be cleansed but kitchens and bathrooms are always places of possible contamination (314, 315). I used these ideas as a starting point for questions. Answers varied, some Gibali informants said that a kitchen can ever never be completely clean, some said it could. I was told “no one will eat inside the kitchen” by an informant who I know has a good friend whose kitchen is set up with a table where the family eats. The more traditional view is that cooking food creates unwelcome odors and mess that are perceived as dirty. The kitchen becomes unsanitary in the process of cooking so the finished product (prepared meals) must be transported out of the (dirty) kitchen and eaten in the (clean) majlis or salle. Then the consumption of food makes the majlis or salle dirty. After eating, stray pieces are picked up, the drop cloth and dishes removed, the floor is swept and the majlis or salle is perfumed with scented smoke: the majlis or salle is now clean.2 In the kitchen, the counters are wiped down, dishes washed and put away, floor swept or mopped and trash taken outside the house, but to some Gibalis, the possibility of impurity is so prevalent, that it can never be declared absolutely clean. When asked about eating in the kitchen, one Gibali informant said that when he came home shortly after the rest of the family had eaten or if he had taken food from a restaurant, he would eat quickly and alone, sitting on the floor of the kitchen so that he didn’t make extra work for anyone by making another room dirty. His understanding is that while the kitchen might be superficially clean (everything tidy, floor mopped, trash emptied) it was still less clean than any other room. In the same manner, on picnics, I can cut vegetables and the men can cut meat while sitting on the mat (where we will eventually eat), but the cooking is done usually at least three meters away with the placement of the fire carefully considered to make sure it is downwind. In contrast, a fire to make tea or just for light or warmth can be placed directly next to the mat. Sometimes men will bring a burning stick from the fire that cooked dinner and place it beside where we are sitting. The same object has two different meanings: this piece of wood when used for cooking food must be far from people, for tea it can be close. But some families have broken this understanding and, putting tables in the kitchen, eat the food where it is cooked. And some Dhofaris on picnics will set up a small table and gas ring fire to cook (while sitting in a chair) next to where people are sitting. Another way to think about purity in the house is the placement of the washing machine. Some houses have it in the kitchen (but one should never wash clothes while one is cooking) and some houses have it in the bathroom but as neither place is seen as completely unsoiled, the best place is in its own alcove or a

148  Purity, privacy and danger bathroom that is not used. In any case, clothes are never hung to dry in either the kitchen or bathroom but in a bedroom or outside. Bathrooms, although they almost always have tiled floors and walls for ease of cleaning, are always beyond the pale. I had fun with this hypothetical question: if you filled a super-soaker with bleach and sprayed the walls … ? No, it was still contaminated. Body waste, even in scoured toilets, creates pollution which can never be eradicated. After a shower, a person can walk out of the bathroom clean, but the place itself is never.3 The thought of eating in a bathroom makes Gibalis retch. Bathrooms by the majlis and salle, which are used by guests, often have a door which opens to a space with one or several sinks, then another door leading to a small chamber with toilet (either sit or squat) and sometimes a shower. There are usually inexpensive flip-flops left next to the inner door so that guests don’t have to step on the floor with bare feet. Discussing eating in bedrooms helps clarify how eating and purity are connected to physical space. As in the majlis or salle, there is some casual consumption of foodstuffs in bedrooms: potato chips, chocolates, cookies, etc. and drinking tea. This is not considered “eating,” nor does it require the careful cleaning and bringing in of perfumed smoke as after a normal meal of rice and meat, chicken or fish. One informant told me that children in the family are instructed never to eat in their bedroom, not from the fear of potentially attracting insects or mice but that it isn’t “nice.” In Chapter 6 I mentioned that Gibali children are not punished by being sent to bed hungry, neither are they punished by being made to eat alone in their rooms. The only time a lunch or dinner meal is brought to a bedroom is if one is very sick; in all other circumstances, one eats in the majlis, salle or (less often) the kitchen. Purity and water One aspect of purity that I am still trying to articulate is how water (not necessarily soap) is what makes something clean. Normally when the research guys come to my house, I bring drinks and glasses to them in the majlis; a few men who have known me a long time will come into the kitchen. If they want to drink something, they will take a glass from the shelf, rinse it, then pour in the drink. The first time I saw this, I got angry and stated that my house was clean, my kitchen was clean, my glasses were clean; there was no need to rinse glasses before use. I got a “calm down” type of response. This pattern happened several more times until one day, after a man had finished drinking, he shook the glass and put it back on the shelf. Their framework for kitchens is opposite mine. To them, objects in the kitchen might always potentially be dirty as they might be put back after use and that even a clean object might become dirty merely from being in a kitchen, so glasses, plates and utensils should be cleaned before use. Water alone is sufficient for this. My framework is that you clean objects with soap and water after each use and put them away and as simply being in a kitchen does not change their status, there is no need to clean before use.

Purity, privacy and danger  149 Once I understood this belief structure, I started to rinse glasses before putting them on trays to bring them into my majlis. The same concept is observed in the large bowls of water that the small, handless cups for Omani coffee are often kept in. A person takes out a cup, shakes it, fills cup with coffee, drinks coffee and puts the cup back in the bowl. On the other hand, for picnics, the research guys and I work out of the same understanding; we both see car trunks, pick-up beds and picnic baskets as both potentially dirty and having the potential to make objects dirty. They and I always rinse tea cups, knives, platters and pots before use. Tea cups, for example, can be quickly sluiced with bottled water after use, but should be carefully rinsed with boiling water before the tea is put in, not simply to warm the cup for the tea, but to clean it. Knives, platters and pots can be rinsed with either bottled water or sea water. Purity – body Keeping up a clean, groomed appearance is extremely important for Omanis/ Gulf Arabs. Bodies should be clean at all times, but especially before praying; face, lower legs, feet, arms, and hands must be washed with water or a briefer, symbolic washing with sand if water is not available. If one has kept in wuduu (the state of cleanliness/ purity that is needed to be able to pray) between prayer times one does not need to wash again. In public, mouths are used for kissing small children and babies; normally when greeting (same-sex except with siblings), the two people touch the area to the side of the mouth, not the lips, to the area around the cheek-bone. When kissing older people, lips are used to kiss the top of the head, which is almost always covered in fabric (scarf for woman and cap or scarf for man) so that there is no skin contact. For eating, moms and older female relatives touch children’s mouths when feeding them, interspersed with feeding themselves, but that is the only time hands touch another person’s mouth. With people who are not relatives or close friends, they take care not to touch with their lips something another person has touched. For example, drinking from the same water bottle, people will hold the bottle above their head and tilt it slowly, so there is no cross-contact. Air coming out of the mouth is believed to be impure, so that it is not good to blow on food that is too hot to eat, especially if you are giving that food to someone else to eat. For example, a cook wanting someone to taste the soup will wave the spoon around a bit to cool it. Hands should be washed with water (and soap if one has been handling fish or raw meat) before eating. The underlying concept is that hands while eating are perceived as clean. Usually the food is transferred from hand to inside mouth without the hand touching the lips but sometimes it happens. This contact is disregarded. Gibali men, who for religious reasons will not shake hands with me, will dig into a piece of fish I am trying to eat to help me find every edible piece or get bones out within the framework that a person should eat all the flesh off the fish

150  Purity, privacy and danger and not waste it. Their fingers will have touched their food, perhaps their mouths, the food I am about to eat and then again the food they will eat. This is in contrast to some cultures, in which to eat food with your hands then touch another person’s food would be seen as rude or unsanitary. Feet are, like bathrooms, always and inevitably dirty. Hitting someone with the bottom of a shoe is a terrible insult and the one rule of conduct that most foreigners know is never to show the soles of feet, i.e. sit with the bottom of your feet pointing at an Omani. When eating, pieces of rice which drop on clothes can be eaten, but food that touches a foot is always tossed away. Purity – odors The importance of good odors for a person and house on the Arabian Peninsula are well-attested.4 Aubaile-Sallenave states: In Arab-Muslim societies, odors and perfumes occupy a specific place. The importance of fragrance is attested by the pleasure and the attention individuals bring to scenting themselves, their clothes, household furniture and even certain objects. The odors that are considered to be “good” convey well-being – they are a way of fostering contentment with oneself and with others. (2006: 391) Kanafani discusses the necessity of perfuming both for normal, at-home dinners and when visiting (1979: 101–18), as well as the concept of “scent renewal” (303). At the beginning of an evening, the guest, majlis/ salle and hostess are in a clean state but the smell of cooked food nullifies good scent, so perfume has to be offered and applied after eating.5 Sobh and Belk argue that, “The importance of good smell in Qatari homes is inherent in the requirement of cleanness and purity (taharah) in Islam, both physical and spiritual” (2011b: 132). Further, Purity, cleanness, and good smell are central to Muslims everywhere in the world, but the obsession with perfuming bodies and homes is something of a fetish in Gulf countries and is very prominent in Qatar. This may be due to the smell’s link to two central values of the Arab-Gulf heritage; hospitality and privacy … Carrying a bad smell symbolically means encroaching on other people’s private domains and causing them harm while carrying pleasant smells is considered as an act of charity that benefits others. (132) In some cultures, it is perceived as pleasant when the house smells of cooking food but in Dhofar everything is done to keep the odor of cooking outside the house. When someone goes in the kitchen to cook, the door to the rest of the house is closed, the door to the outside is opened and the extractor fan is turned on. One informant told me, if you eat in a room you should “open a window.”

Purity, privacy and danger  151 Sobh and Belk, discussed below, take further the concept of why people scent the house by arguing that, “fumigating and perfuming the home seems to provide local Gulf people with powerful symbolic means for imposing ethnic boundaries between them and ‘invading’ foreigners” (2011b: 134). I don’t dispute that this is the case in their research area of Qatar, but it does not hold true in Dhofar. Burning incense is for the good of the people in the house, not in reaction to or because of anyone outside the house. Purity outside the house: cars, restaurants, picnics The cultural understanding that bodies should be clean is expanded unto the places that bodies go. There is a government regulation that the outside of cars should be clean and most workplaces have an expat laborer who works in the parking lot and will clean the interior of your car every day for a nominal fee of about 10 OR ($25) per month.6 There are also laborers who will clean cars in the parking lots of large stores and by the municipal souqs.7 Similarly, AC units on houses should be covered with a decorative box to make houses look attractive. Further, cars, like houses, should have a good smell and almost every vehicle has some kind of air freshener. When they buy or bring home fish, some people will tie the bag to the rear bumper so the (smell of) fish does not enter the car. Livestock might be carried in the bed of a pickup, but the cab is usually perfumed. Although Dhofaris will sit down at a restaurant table covered with dirty dishes, they will expect them to be cleared quickly and the table wiped down. Even the least expensive type of restaurant will have basic sanitary conditions met, with food covered, swept floors and electronic devices to zap flies. Plates, glasses and silverware are examined to make sure they are clean. Soda and water are brought to the table in closed bottles and opened and poured in front of customers. In smaller restaurants, patrons can walk back to inspect the kitchen themselves. In hundreds of restaurant meals with Dhofaris, I have never seen anyone return food because they didn’t like it. If the food is not to their taste, they will not eat it but pay for it without complaint. Rarely, but a few times, someone has been served something that is not fresh or the plate is not clean, in which case they will return it and refuse to pay. Cleaning up after picnics is a sore subject for many Dhofaris; all the men in the research group always clean up after picnics and will pick up trash that others have left. Everyone wants to have a picnic in a clean place, but not everyone picks up their trash afterwards. There is an ongoing government campaign about not littering and various Instagram photos/ videos of dirty picnic areas that are circulated with pleas for people to not ruin the landscape and harm livestock. Various groups are blamed for the mess, which happens more frequently in khareef when the number of people picnicking rises exponentially. There are municipal workers who come to clean sites near the roads, and this is used as an excuse to not clean up. Laziness is also an issue, as is dislike of touching something dirty. As someone who has had to pick up a lot of trash (used diapers!) and knows people whose livestock has died from eating trash, I can’t look at this issue dispassionately.

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Foodways and privacy Cultural understandings of public/ private in food-related communal spaces The basic understanding in Gibali cultures is that women should not be seen eating in front of men whom they don’t know/ aren’t related to. This means that restaurants and cafés have at least nominal markers for family/women and male spaces. Some places have a token barrier, such as an openwork wooden screen or other such flimsy barrier, others have separate entrances and/ or small box-like rooms for privacy, even if it is easy to hear what is said in the nearby rooms.8 This segregation is not enforced in any way, so a woman with men or a group of women can sit in the “men’s” section without sanction. If there is not a physical barrier, a Gibali woman will usually position herself so that she is facing a wall and, if she feels she might be seen, may keep her niqab (face covering) on and lift it slightly to slip food into her mouth. If a woman is eating in a car, she will pull down the visor and turn towards the interior of the car. Many cars have tinted windows to insure privacy and drivers will park to cut off sight-lines from other vehicles. In all cases of eating outside a home (restaurant, café, hotel, car, plane, etc.) what is important is not so much that a man can’t see her, but that if a Gibali woman is signaling her wish to not be seen, the men around her should act as if she can’t be seen. Some Gibali women will eat in restaurants with their faces showing and this is not condemned but it is taken for granted that a man might glance at her. However, a woman who is turned towards the corner and wearing a niqab must be completely ignored by all men, or they will risk public censure. Although men can eat in public, it is not seemly to make a production out of eating or appear to be greedy. Men should make sure they are eating quietly and always attempting to share their food, inviting those they know to eat with them. A man coming into a café will ask those he has come to meet, plus anyone else he is acquainted with, if he may buy them a coffee or something to eat. A man eating alone will want the food served quickly and eat quickly, keeping a lookout for anyone he knows. When he is done, he will either leave or ask the dishes to be taken away, then he may sit at leisure, drinking tea and playing with his phone. Food in public is always consumed sitting down. Only small children, with a piece of chocolate, ice cream etc. can eat while walking. Cultural understandings of public/ private in private spaces Kanafani states that “Outside the bathroom there is almost no private activity of individuals in the UAE” (1979: 307); this is also true in Dhofar and creates an interesting dichotomy. Outside the house, wearing a niqab or pulling a sheila (lightweight black headscarf) over her face will render a woman invisible. She moves within her own sphere of privacy, but in the house, she is always on display, for example her hair must be covered at all times, unless she is in the bathroom or her own room with the door locked. In the same way, men must always have on at least a wizar (sarong) and shirt; many men wear dishdashes in the

Purity, privacy and danger  153 house so that a man will look exactly the same in his office, café, majlis, and friend’s house, blurring the dichotomy of public/ private into a life of always being on display. As I explained in my first book, Gibali houses are private (only family) but also public (many family members come to visit/ share meals and usually a lot of family members live in the house) so that there are several public/ private borders. The first is the wall which typically surrounds the house, over six feet high in Salalah, lower in the mountains. This is the place of food exchanges between non-family members. A restaurant delivery man will ring the bell in the wall or pound loudly on the metal door for people or there is a large, sliding gate for cars. Even if the door and/ or gate are open, he will not cross the threshold into the yard without permission. Sometimes a person will open the front door and beckon him to come closer, but usually a child is sent out with money to take the food and bring it in. Even a person who regularly drops off samn from family in the mountains, for example, will ring the bell and never walk up the front steps. Sometimes a wealthy person will have boxes of foodstuffs delivered during Ramadan. The person distributing will set the box directly inside the wall, not venturing closer to the house. At houses in the mountains, the next border is the dekka, the space outside the front door where the family sit in the evening. For some houses, there is simply a plastic mat put down with a few cushions to lean on, for some the space is covered and furnished with upholstered chairs. The space can be on the same level as the front door (elevated a few feet above the ground), or at ground level. Male and female family members enjoy the view and fresh air while drinking tea. Close family members will easily join the group, whereas more distant relatives, friends and strangers should park a little way from the wall around the house, approach the house slowly and call out, allowing for the inhabitants to react appropriately, when the women will perhaps cover their faces or go inside, someone might need to make a fresh pot of tea, men might come forward to give greetings or see what is wanted. The next borders are the front doors, which friends, family and neighbors may approach. The outside door to the majlis is left open in Gibali houses and close male relatives may come and go freely. Men will always eat meals in the majlis if there are male guests, but husbands/ brothers/ sons will eat with women in the salle if the men do not have any hosting duties. Inside the majlis is a door to the interior of the house; this should never be touched or opened by any man who is not a father/ husband/ brother/ son of one of the women who live in the house.9 The main front door is for women, men who live in the house, and brothers/ fathers/ sons of women who live in the house if there are no men in the majlis. All men will give a quick knock on the door and open it slowly while calling out to alert women of their presence because they don’t know if, for example, a female neighbor, might have dropped by while they were gone. The salle is very close to the front door but situated so that little or none of it is visible from the door. If only women who live in the house are there, there will be an immediate response, but if there are neighbors, other female relatives or friends, as the man stands by the door, the women will sit up straight, set down

154  Purity, privacy and danger tea cups and any food in their hands, and make sure their hair is covered, then the senior woman will call out in response. The man will then slowly walk into the salle, giving greetings. If it is only female family members, he may sit down and have tea with the women; if there are neighbors or friends, whether he sits down depends on how long he has known them, their relative ages, etc. Some houses may have a second salle, which is just for family members located behind (i.e. further into the house) than the salle for guests. Depending on the layout, in the large entryway/ hallway after the salle there is usually a bathroom for female guests which is used to wash hands before and after eating. This is the border of normal guest space in the house. Further down the hallway is the kitchen (and maybe bedrooms) which are off-limits to anyone except those who live in the house. Normally the only time a guest can see the kitchen is when the family has first moved into the house and will give a quick tour.10 The kitchen usually has its own door to the outside, used for bringing in groceries and taking out trash. If the door is near the car parking space, men who live in the house can enter and exit this way without having to call out, but never guests or strangers bringing prepared food or foodstuffs to the house. Julier states that, “The general story of the kitchen has been its movement from a shared space, to a private space, back to a public space” (2015: 161) but in Dhofar the movement is in the opposite direction. In the past, cooking was done in the open-air and could be seen by everyone, whereas now kitchens are only for the few people who are actually preparing the meals. I hadn’t realized the importance of kitchen privacy until, as I started to draft this book, I realized I had never seen a Dhofari cook in their kitchen. I have eaten in many houses (sometimes in the kitchen), have hundreds of examples of watching men cook for picnics and a few examples of Dhofaris cooking in my house (because I am not trusted, with good reason, to cook seafood correctly) but none of a man or woman cooking in their own home. When I have arrived at houses, either someone is in the kitchen making food while someone else is talking to me in the salle or majlis or the food was ready. Reflecting on this and wondering if I could ask someone if I could watch them cook, I suspected (rightly, as it turned out) that informants would view this as odd and discomforting. From an American point of view, it would be like asking someone, “Can I watch you brush your teeth?”; it’s not a problem to have someone watch you, but it’s awkward. The worry came from a few directions; one is the way books are viewed, as set and immutable information. I sensed a fear that they might be held as responsible for the way to make X if I watched them. There was also fear that they might be judged (by me or readers) against some standard of cooking perfection in terms of the ingredients, method or final product. Plus, what to do with me in the down-time (stirring, waiting for water to boil, etc.)? Two people having a coffee together can ignore each other and look at their phones, but a guest in the house must be given attention; if one person is cooking, there should be another person in the kitchen to make sure I was entertained, which is a tricky issue in kitchens without tables or chairs.11 Another issue is that as the kitchen is placed at the back

Purity, privacy and danger  155 or side of houses, men who live in the house enter it without giving notice. To have me sit in the kitchen for hours would mean alerting (possibly displacing) all the men. I decided to lobby to watch cooking towards the end of writing the book, to do interviews and talk about my research for a few months, then ask. But two events happened to make this infeasible. One was the death of Sultan Qaboos on January 10, 2020. He was the only ruler that many of my informants and their parents had ever known, so while it was not a surprise – he had been ill for some time – it was an occasion of great sadness. He had led the country with continually expanding prosperity for 50 years. His vision was ever-fixed on creating a peaceful, unified, modern country. It would have been unkind to intrude in a time of grief with requests to sit in a kitchen and as the weeks passed and I thought it might be okay to ask, the corona virus hit. With workplaces and schools closed, to have a guest in the kitchen would be even more disruptive. In the end, it never worked out for me to watch, causing a mild panic from me – how could I write a book about foodways when I had never seen Gibalis cook in their own home? I have lots of interviews about cooking, but I hadn’t seen it myself. This problem I resolved with an ethnographic sleight of hand: explaining the absence of something is still explaining something important about a culture. The lines of private/ public are drawn in different places in different cultures. This also made me reflect on cooking on picnics in which the fire is always at a remove from the people sitting and while one or more people may cut vegetables and meat or skin and cut fish, there is only one person in charge of making the meal. The cook will walk to the fire, stir, adjust spices and come back to the group; if it is cold, there will be two fires, one for cooking and one near the mat where people are sitting. In over ten years, only two times I have seen someone sit next to the cooking fire and talk to the cook, and this was when the person had not seen the cook for several years and it was a chance to catch up privately. Cooking is usually a solitary task unless it is a person teaching a younger relative. Cultural understandings of public/private in private spaces – comparison with Qatar In Nagy’s “Social Diversity and Changes in the Form and Appearance of the Qatari House” (1998) she states that “The house has been considered a visual medium useful for communicating with strangers in complex societies” (281) and she wants to “examine how the Qatari house is used as a medium of communication of status to both strangers and intimates alike” (282). Houses in Dhofar are decorated in a fashion similar to those in Qatar, as Nagy describes, with “arched windows, balconies, and doorways. Denticulated parapets, elaborate balustrades, marble cladding, columned entrances, colored roof tiles and stained glass” (300). However, Nagy explains that Recently it has become increasingly popular to have one majlis decorated in a style reminiscent of traditional majalis, with upholstered cushions and local antiques, and another majlis furnished with chairs and/or couches.

156  Purity, privacy and danger In homes which have only one majlis, one corner might be decorated in “Arabic” style and the remainder with more European-inspired furniture … Other furnishings which are part of the revival of the “Arabic majalis” include wooden chests, braziers, camel saddles, and coffee pots. While some authentic antiques are still found in homes or are in circulation on the market, most of those available today are recently manufactured replicas. (296) This is an important in noting how Qatar and Dhofar are on different trajectories. Qatar modernized early and quickly, resulting in some families attempting to recreate a “traditional majalis.” Dhofar has many families still directly involved in keeping livestock; some men still practice transhumance. There is no need to buy or show old-fashioned furnishings. Sobh and Belk similarly set out how Qatari attitudes are, and are not, analogous to Dhofar. For example, A person’s rights in his or her individual sphere are highly respected in Islam … while the public sphere requires the outer manifestation of religious conduct. The strong behavioral constraints faced in public are likely a key reason that privacy within homes is so central in Muslim societies. (2011a: 322) This is accurate for Dhofar, however there is an important difference. (1) Qatar is a society that exhibits a pattern of strong adherence to traditional values and social norms, as seen for instance in the head-to-toe covering of women in black and men in white; (2) Qataris have one of the highest per capita incomes in the world, potentially allowing for conspicuous and luxurious consumption; (3) there is a dramatic presence of foreigners from both Western and non-Western cultures, such that less than one in five residents are Qataris. (2011b: 319) Points (1) and (3) are similar to Oman, although there are fewer expats, but point (2) is not true. In a second article, Sobh and Belk lay out a parallel argument: Modesty requirements have also traditionally necessitated a unique convenient style whereby women’s living quarters are separated from men’s quarters so that they do not have to veil while in their homes, even if male guests are present elsewhere in the house. (2011a: 128) which is correct in Dhofar, but some of the repercussions are not: Although this tension very likely exists in all societies and all housing contexts, the open/closed, welcoming/unreceptive, and social/asocial dialectic

Purity, privacy and danger  157 is especially salient in Qatari homes because of traditional Arab emphasis on hospitality, local interpretations of the Islamic need for modesty and gender segregation, and the identity threats posed by being a minority in their native land. (2011a: 126) Dhofaris are not a “minority” and their lifeways, including building styles and food choices, are under their control. In examining these articles on Qatar, it is clear by comparison that Dhofaris, specifically haklis, live in cultures where people have less disposable income, but more control over their own lives and make more consensual decisions involving both men and women. On one hand there have been fewer decades of people living in permanent homes, and on the other hand, fewer foreigners means less panic over foreign influences and less need to perform “traditional” lifeways. Sobh and Belk state that in Qatar, “Honor, public face, and social approval are of paramount importance and moral worth is largely judged by others” (2011b: 322–23). In addition, “Women embody morality and virtue in the Arab-Islamic culture” (2011a: 129). None of this reflects Dhofari lifeways. A Gibali (male or female) may be judged by others, but that opinion is not “paramount.” A hakli makes decisions based on public opinion, family opinion and what they want to do. These distinctions are important, because when it comes to houses, Sobh and Belk argue that the family home is “a domain for retreat and conspicuous consumption” (2011a: 129). Further, “The majlis in the Qatari and other Gulf societies means honor. Honor, or saharf in Arabic, is a revered masculine quality in the Arab-Bedouin society, and is essential for men to acquire respect and reputation” (2011b: 335) and We identify the significance of privacy and gender segregation as anchors for identity, both national and religious. Maintaining these anchors seems to help Qataris resolve cultural tensions and conflicts to which they feel subjected … [and] counters pressures toward a reverse acculturation in which hosts are numerically overwhelmed by guests. (2011b: 317) Houses do not carry as much psychological weight for Dhofaris. A home is, of course, a place of safety and privacy, but there are still many people coming and going and the majlis does not mean honor here. A lot of writing about the Arabian Peninsula focuses on ways in which people have lost touch with the practices and beliefs of their parents and grand-parents. It is worth highlighting that Dhofaris are still maneuvering between customary and new/ modern lifeways and foodways. Cultural understandings of bodily privacy There is little physical interaction between Gibalis unless one is greeting or feeding/holding a small child. Gibalis are taught to be in control of their physical

158  Purity, privacy and danger presence at all times; once a person is grown-up it is assumed every movement and/ or glance is planned, never “unthought” or made “by accident.” There is a sense, almost as developed as a dancer’s, as to where a person’s body is in relation to their surroundings. For example, men throw their cell phones on the mats and even if the lantern is off and there is no moon, I’ve never seen a man step on a phone. A man might misplace his cigarettes but the box is never found crushed. Babies are almost always held in someone’s arms unless sleeping, but once children get to be around two years old, or earlier if a younger sibling is born, physical contact lessens. Small children are greeted with cheek kisses and handshakes. Adults will sometimes sweep a child up onto their laps or into their arms to kiss them, but I have never seen adults hugging, i.e. each person with both arms around the other person. Small kids hug and drape themselves over each other but will not usually rest against an adult unless they are both looking at a cell phone or the child is falling asleep. When walking or while standing, Gibali men will sometimes hold hands as a sign of affection but grabbing a man’s hand (i.e. not letting go after a handshake) is sometimes a way to signal asking for a favor. Good friends can grip the upper arm of a friend when trying to make a point and it’s normal to give a man a “hand up.” If indoors, Dhofaris are more comfortable, both physically and psychologically, with their backs to a wall. You can see the same dynamic in elevators, where Dhofaris will press themselves against the wall, shoulder to shoulder, rather than face the doors. Even if there is only one or two people, they will place themselves against the wall, not stand in the middle of the space. For Gibali men, the more formal the occasion and the less the men know each other, the more important it is to keep a perfect circle shape to a gathering. At cafés, men strive to keep clear sightlines; for example, at a rectangular table, the men in the middle of the table will push their chairs back so that the circle shape is preserved. In houses, the majlis is set up with seats around all the walls so men will naturally be in a circle, but adjustments will be made to ensure the senior man/ men sit(s) in the most comfortable/ prestigious position: the place from which a person can easily see everyone, as well as the door and have the best benefit from the AC. Spaces in corners, next to doors and with limited sight lines are less prestigious. If a group of male friends are meeting at night, each man, except for a little shifting if someone needs to pray or to get into a closer circle for eating, will stay in the same spot for several hours. He might occasionally “check out” of the group and concentrate on his phone but he does not move.12 For those sitting on mats, as each new man comes, everyone slightly adjusts to keep a basic circle shape. For those in chairs, they will stand up to move the chair and/or offer the chair to the newcomer. Close male Gibali friends can lean against each other, i.e. a man can rest his head on the shins of another man. If there are pillows, men will sit on one, or recline against it or a piled-up blanket. Gibali men will tie their masar around their knees to help brace their back. Showing the bottom of the feet is rude in daylight and or public situations, so men usually tuck their feet under them. Men can lie on their side (not stomach or back).

Purity, privacy and danger  159 Dhofari women keep a slight distance between each other although good friends will sometimes rest their heads on each other’s shoulders, but I have never seen women holding hands in public. In the salle, the less close the relationship, the straighter the women sit and the more general the conversation is. When it’s close relatives together, bodies relax, women lean on cushions and several conversations can run concurrently. Women on a beach or on a picnic in the mountains keep a perfect circle shape with little space between them; I always have the impression of wagons circled against outsiders. Once, sitting in the open area in front of a house with male relatives and children, the women started off sitting a foot or more apart from each other, but as the time passed, the men left and children disappeared to play together, the women drew closer and closer together until we were all almost touching shoulders, much closer than male friends or relatives normally sat. When sitting around a platter to eat, it’s better not to be touching anyone, even if it is only an inch or two of space and one should never touch another person’s food unless there is a specific reason to help, such as taking out fish bones. Food should never be thrown at a person for any reason. In general, one should never interfere with a person’s body while eating. Consuming food requires specific concentration and while general chatting is fine, there should be no arguments, fighting or telling stories to produce a lot of laughter, nor should anyone be hit or startled.

Avoiding dangerous foods Omani government and foodways: laws, health messages and pricing The Omani government has funded all sorts of initiatives and created policies and rules to enhance public safety and health, including putting street lights all through the mountains in the last ten years, paving roads, erecting street signs and laying brick pavers in front of streets and in parking lots to cut down on dust. There are also programs to support public health with clinics in small towns and lighted walking paths so it’s easy and safe for women to exercise. Salalah has a municipal pool with very inexpensive swimming lessons for (separately) men and women. There are government food safety inspectors who check restaurants to make sure standards are maintained and new regulations are enforced, for example, shawarma stands must now be enclosed by glass or clear plastic, not in the open air. At road-side restaurants, tea must be served in paper, not plastic, cups and given to customers on a tray, not hand-to-hand. Several restaurants which sold madhbi (meat cooked on heated rocks) ad hoc were closed and then re-opened with government-mandated designs. There are also messages sent out via various social platforms warning citizens to be careful, for example some have photos of expired food that was taken from grocery store shelves. Some warn against illegal markets (unsupervised selling of foodstuffs and/ or meat) or foreign foods. It is sometimes difficult to tell if the messages are from the government or a person who has created an official style

160  Purity, privacy and danger post warning, for example, that some kinds of Jell-O are made with pig products. Grocery stores hang signs warning shoppers to check expiration labels. In the fall of 2019, the government mandated price hikes on cigarettes, soda and energy drinks. This was seen as a passive way to improve citizens’ health. Islam and safe food selection in Dhofar Writing about Islamic practices in Dhofar is like writing a book about fish and having to explain that fish live in water. Islam shapes every facet of Dhofari lives. It’s a given that all food sold in restaurants and grocery stores is halal (permissible according to the edicts of Islam), especially that all meat sold is from animals who were slaughtered in keeping with Islamic tenets. The government inspectors of municipal slaughtering locations check for both cleanliness and religiously correct killing. Although foreign restaurants are opening in Dhofar (e.g., Mexican, Thai, sushi) and there are expanding types of food, e.g. from the Philippines, in grocery stores, this food diversity is under the umbrella of government control which ensures that all food is halal. The two most well-known food taboos in Islam are pork and alcohol. I don’t know any Gibalis who have tried either. There is religious tolerance in Oman; the government has set aside land both for religious buildings and graveyards for different faiths. This tolerance includes a food tolerance; you can buy St. Valentine’s Day hearts, chocolate Easter eggs, Christmas candy canes and Diwali treats, but no item in any grocery store or restaurant has alcohol or pork.13 Besides what it eaten, it is taken for granted that everyone knows and abides by practices given in the Qur’an, the Hadith [accepted sayings of the prophet Mohammad] and the Sunnah [the traditional legal and social customs and practices] for how to eat, for example, saying bismallah (in the name of God) before beginning to eat or drink anything and Alhamdulillah (praise be to God) when finished eating. Eating and passing food and drink is done only with the right hand. All meat is well-cooked. The whole community adjusts to Ramadan. Only closed-off restaurants in hotels are open during the day and prepared food is sold only in the late afternoon. There is no eating or drinking in public; non-Muslims can eat as they like at home or behind locked doors in offices. People often fast on other recommended or holy days but will continue their regular lives, for example, sitting with people who are eating. In “The Imagined ‘Consumer Democracy’ and Elite (Re)Production in Yemen” (2005) vom Bruck discusses the tensions between piety and lavish consumption, specifically addressing the issue of buffets at parties at hotels (265). Here in Dhofar, tension over piety can show up in clothing issues, for example, in whether the parents will allow a daughter to wear a tight-fitting, white, Western-style wedding dress or not. Yet, piety is seldom connected to food in the way that vom Bruck describes in Yemen: “distinction (and thus taste) is moralized because the goods consumed are moralized” (268). Dhofaris do not see that “consumption is often a highly moral activity” (268).14 As long as the food is halal; that the above Islamic precepts, such as eating with the right hand, are met; that

Purity, privacy and danger  161 guest protocols, such as serving guests quickly and encouraging guests to eat, are met, the host has fulfilled both social and religious duties.15 It is a happy accident that my non-desire to cook perfectly matched the inclinations of the Dhofaris I became friends with. It’s not fair that I get delicious meals while only contributing Pringles, juice, soda and water but there is a common perception in Dhofar that most western foods have pork, alcohol or both. Although it didn’t help start or sustain our friendships or working relationships, my not wanting to cook for them was a clear bonus because I am usually the only person they know who lives outside their food production/ cooking networks.16 To refuse food I had made would be inhospitable, but to eat my cooking would introduce doubts about safety as I might make something haram (proscribed in Islam). Dhofari friends know that I understand and respect Islamic dietary rules but, well, anyone can make a mistake. There might be a sauce I brought from outside Oman and I didn’t KNOW that there was something haram in it and… When bringing presents back from trips, I make sure gifts such as chocolates had a clear list of ingredients and/ or are labeled halal. For picnics and meals I always bring packaged food such as cookies. Every Dhofari knows all food purveyors will abide by Islamic principles so if I bring a package of cookies that the men haven’t seen before I explain that I bought them at a local store. It is only after years of knowing me that the Gibali men will accept minor medicines such as cough-drops without grilling me about ingredients. Safe food selection abroad Many Dhofaris are well aware that they are living in a food-controlled area and that once they leave the Arabian Peninsula, pork and/ or alcohol might appear in any dish, but some Dhofaris have a hard time believing that pork is so prevalent in Europe; I have heard many “but don’t they know it’s unhealthy?” type of comments. One common error is ordering a dish that is “safe” in Dhofar without realizing that the dish has been changed to be acceptable in an Islamic context, for example tiramisu which is alcohol-free in Dhofar but made with rum, brandy, or marsala in Europe and North America. Other potential hazards are mojitos (just soda, mint and fruit in Dhofar), baba au rhum, sausages, and bacon (which is made from turkey meat in Dhofar). Another problem is not recognizing that a word, such as ham, means meat from a pig. Further, serving raw or under-cooked meat is only done in hotel restaurants in Dhofar, so some Dhofaris are not used to being asked, “How would you like your hamburger?” A standard fallback is eating only chicken dishes.

Notes 1 For example, a boy might sleep for the first years of his life in his parent’s room, then in a shared room with brothers, then move to a room that his sisters have decorated for him and his wife, then to his own house which was decorated by his wife and daughters. Thus the middle-class North American/ European view that a person has control over their home environment does not always obtain. I know men who planned their

162  Purity, privacy and danger majlis in detail and men who refused to do so, leaving all the decisions to the women in the house. On another note, mine is usually the first non-Islamic/ non-Omani house my Gibali friends and informants have seen, so there is as much interest in how I have arranged things as I have for their houses. One commented, “of course we can see you are Christian.” So I looked around my majlis trying to figure out what proclaimed my religion amidst the sofas, cushions, books, paintings, knickknacks, rugs, and woven baskets. The answer was a 4-inch high, metal candle holder in the shape of an angel. 2 Cleaning not associated with mealtimes can be simply picking up pieces of trash, quickly removing stains and crumbs from coffee tables, tidying newspapers, removing kids’ toys and clothes, i.e. dealing with objects to create physical order. 3 Baths are usually seen as unsanitary as a person is viewed as sitting in their own dirt. In addition, finger- and toenails should be cut short because long nails are seen as trapping dirt next to a person’s body. 4 Scent on a woman’s body is seen, as in many cultures, as a way to attract men so Dhofari women will usually not put on perfume when going shopping or being in mixed gender public spaces, but will usually wear it at home with women guests, when going to visit women or when they will be alone with their husbands. Men usually wear cologne when going in public. As one male informant told me “shwayya attar” (a little perfume) is necessary to cover up any male body odor/ sweat. 5 Kanafani also mentions how scent is linked to prestige, in that when you are sprayed with perfume after a visit, other people will notice the scent and comment, so the perfume becomes a kind of advertisement for the host’s generosity and taste (1979: 298). I have not seen or been told about this kind of behavior in Dhofar. When being sprayed with perfume after a wedding or visit dinner, iftar or Eid gathering, the hosts don’t mention the price or brand of the perfume. Guests sniff appreciatively but I have never heard anyone comment on the price or brand. 6 This law is suspended in khareef, when every car is muddy. But in good weather, even trucks carrying animals are well-kept. 7 Most of the cleaning is removing dust with a soft cloth. Only minimal water is used from a small bucket, not a running hose. 8 This assures privacy but also allows men and women who are not related to eat together in secret. Dating or extramarital affairs are strictly forbidden in Gibali cultures, but some men take a second wife in secret. If a woman covers her face as she enters the restaurant, sits in a closed room (which can be locked from the inside) and whispers, no one will know who is there. 9 The majlis can be used by women also. Within families, people know who is usually where and when, and most families have a group set up on some form of social media to alert people of what is going on in the house. When I visit one female friend, sometimes I have tea with her in the majlis, sometimes in the salle, depending on what other family members are doing. 10 Bedrooms are, from an American point of view, oddly less off-limits than kitchens. It’s rare to visit someone in their bedroom, but I have done it a few times. Brides arriving at the groom’s house are brought to the bedroom/ suite where all the female guests can come see the bride in her finery and sometimes photos of the room decorated for a bride are circulated on social media without identifying names. 11 A reader might think, well just move a chair into the kitchen. Many Dhofari houses don’t have wooden or plastic chairs for sitting, except possibly in a child’s room where there is a small desk or chair for homework. The salle and majlis usually have sofas or large upholstered chairs. 12 If a man gets up and moves his position within the group, it is seen as strange/ noteworthy. There will be nothing said out loud, but “thinking” [negative speculation] as to why the person moved – does the person have “a touch” [a problem or sore spot] with X or does he need something from Y? And why wasn’t he smarter to “hold himself” or wait to ask for a favor until he was alone? Is he trying to “show himself?”

Purity, privacy and danger  163 Several times I have had something important to discuss with a man or know that two men in the group have a serious issue to talk about, but no indication is given; one must wait until everyone else has left of their own accord before there is a private conversation. 13 The only place that sold pork was a small grocery store next to the Royal Oman Air Force base which catered to expats who worked at the base. There was a tiny room in the back with two deep freezers with pork products. When the store moved location in 2012, it no longer sold pork. One large grocery store sells pork in Muscat. The room is tiled in a different color than the rest of the store with a huge warning sign: NonMuslims ONLY. 14 As discussed in Chapter 4, some Dhofaris are currently trying to change the expectation of offering food to people who come to pay condolences after a funeral, wanting to modify what they see as the party atmosphere of having a buffet with rice and meat. The suggestion is that bereaved families should only serve coffee and dates. This is supported by some people saying that the tradition of killing animals was formed because people often walked long distances to pay their respects and needed to be fed, which is no longer the case. Others do not agree with this change. The dialog is couched in terms of “it is better,” not “I am a better person or Muslim than you if I do this.” 15 I use “host” for both Gibali men and women. The fact that even unmarried women not only can, but must, greet and serve men is an important distinction between the hakli groups of tribes I do research with and some other Gibali-speaking tribes and nonGibali-speaking tribes in Dhofar. In some tribes, even a married woman would never be allowed to greet men who were not her brothers or uncles, but in the tribes I work with, if there are no men in the house, the women must take over all the hosting duties. 16 I am hesitant to bring foods which had different flavors than food normally eaten here such as dill, brie, hollandaise sauce, pumpkin spice, sharp cheddar cheese, and bitter orange marmalade. The few times I tried to introduce home-made items such as oatmeal cookies, the reaction was strongly negative: “like eating sand” was one term used. When I offered a Dhofari friend nachos, I got the same look I make when I am offered cow’s intestines: “I am so happy you like that, please don’t try to make me eat it.” In the same way, I try to avoid eating or being given abalone, which most Dhofaris view as a delicacy. I appreciate the time and energy it takes to find abalone but I view them as less palatable than car tires.

References For a full bibliography, list of food terms and several short essays on foodways, please see my webpage: Come From Away, https://mariellerisse.com Aubaile-Sallenave, F. 2006. “Bodies, Odors and Perfumes in Arab-Muslim Societies,” in The Smell Culture Reader. J. Drobnick, ed. Oxford: Berg. 391-9. Julier, Alice. 2015. “Family and Domesticity,” in A Cultural History of Food in the Modern Age (The Cultural Histories Series). Amy Bentley, ed. London: Bloomsbury Academic. 145-64. Kanafani, Aida Sami. 1979. Aesthetics and Ritual in the United Arab Emirates. unpublished dissertation, University of Texas at Austin. Nagy, Sharon. 1998. “Social Diversity and Changes in the Form and Appearance of the Qatari House.” Visual Anthropology 10(2): 281-304. Nagy, Sharon. 2006. “Making Room for Migrants, Making Sense of Difference: Spatial and Ideological Expressions of Social Diversity in Urban Qatar.” Urban Studies 43(1): 119–37. Sobh, Rana and Russell Belk. 2011a. “Domains of Privacy and Hospitality in Arab Gulf Homes.” Journal of Islamic Marketing 2(2): 125-37.

164  Purity, privacy and danger Sobh, Rana and Russell Belk. 2011b. “Privacy and Gendered Spaces in Arab Gulf Homes.” Home Cultures 8(3): 317-40. Sobh, Rana, Russell Belk and Justin Gressel. 2010. “Conflicting Imperatives of Modesty and Vanity Among Young Women in the Arabian Gulf,” in Advances in Consumer Research 38. D.W. Dahl, G.V. Johar, and S.M.J. van Osselaer, eds. Duluth, MN: Association for Consumer Research. vom Bruck, Gabriele. 2005. “The Imagined ‘Consumer Democracy’ and Elite (Re)production in Yemen.” Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 11(2): 255-75.

8 Generosity

Introduction My interest in foodways evolved in part from an odd contradiction I have observed over the last 14 years when having picnics with the Gibali men in the research group: the men both hate to waste food and always make much more than is necessary in case anyone comes along by chance. A useful term for this discussion is spretzetura, originally meaning work without visible effort. In the context of Gibali life, it means that one should be open-handed, without ever drawing attention to that fact. This social pressure to be generous can result in a lot of low-level food waste. For example, when I was on picnics with Gibali men, they would open a can of evaporated milk and use only a small amount. I decided to bring the mini, single-serving containers. This was met with several compliments, “What a wonderful idea!” Since compliments usually are given when someone has made a mistake, I stopped bringing them and we went back to cans (see Risse 2017). I have known and worked with these men for over ten years, so I asked straight out, “Why are the bigger cans better?” Their blank looks told me that I was getting to a core belief – they are used to me asking questions and are usually quick with an answer. When they can’t answer, it means we are talking about something so fundamental, they have a difficult time explaining it, like trying to clarify what air feels like. One man said, “But if someone comes…” The idea was that if a can was open, people could pour as much or as little milk as they wanted, but if one had to open a container, someone might feel guilty about opening 2 or 3 and thus have their tea with less milk than they wanted. As the hosts, the people who had set up the campsite and made the tea, it was incumbent on them to make it easy and effortless for guests to eat and drink as much as they wanted. The need to have a lot of everything is balanced by the simplicity of what few things are required to be seen as a good host: a tea kettle, a few glasses, a liter of water, sugar, milk and tea bags are the only essentials, but one should have enough of everything to allow your friends or guests to feel that there was plenty for all; a person could put 3 tea bags and 8 spoons of sugar in one cup without comment. Similarly, if making dinner, there should always be more food made than the men could eat, to be sure there would be some if more men decided to stop by. Once a man made only enough dinner for me and the men we were with.

166  Generosity The man who cooked was complimented on being “so smart” as to make the right amount, meaning it was not smart to be so stingy. If the food is not eaten at the picnic site and people will return to town too late to give it away, the leftovers are carefully set out for wild animals. This chapter focuses on the how and why of giving (what is given is described in Chapter 2) to show how people make food choices to be generous, while attempting to deny any personal generosity. In the cultures of the Gibali-speaking tribes I work with, both men and women use food as one aspect of creating a good reputation but to be seen as trying to accrue personal merit cancels both the religious and the societal benefits. The other side of generosity is food waste. Often more food is produced than can be eaten, thus people eat in a way to keep leftover food “clean,” meaning in a suitable way to give others. If there are no people to eat the excess, it should be set out for animals in a specific manner so that the food is never mixed with sand or dirt. Further, on picnics or when camping all unused liquids (tea, water, soda, milk, etc.) should be poured into the ground. The Gibali understanding is that food should never be thrown away but always given away in a hierarchy of people, animals, then earth.

Importance of being generous, but always hiding generosity In Salloum, Salloum and Elias’ Scheherazade’s Feast: Foods of the Medieval Arab World (2013) they state that “From pre-Islamic times to the present, Arab custom holds the virtues of generous hospitality in the highest honor and esteem” (9).1 Sobh and Belk, sometimes with additional authors, have written several articles about hospitality in terms of inviting guests into private homes on the Arabian Peninsula, particularly Qatar. They argue that “There is also a general consensus among Muslim scholars that hospitality and generosity toward guests are an integral part of faith in Islam” (Sobh, Belk, and Wilson 2013: 446). In The Food of Oman (2015), Campbell writes that “Omanis take great pleasure in eating and sharing meals, and dining is not seen as a solitary experience, but a daily celebration and reinforcement of relationships” (16). Generous is often used as a positive marker of people from southern Oman.2 But generosity, especially with food, should always be hidden. I found Appadurai’s “Gratitude as a Social Mode in South India” (1985) helpful for highlighting a different attitude in a different culture. He states that, “The major form in which Tamils show their gratitude for something given them is by making the appropriate return gift, at the appropriate time and in the appropriate form,” as “gratitude implies appreciation, appreciation involves acknowledgment, and the only significant acknowledgment is return” (240). Further: What is verbally and nonverbally expressed at the time of the initial act of generosity is not what we call a statement of thanks, but an acknowledgment of the social relations of giver and receiver, and a tacit promise of future return. Thus one common way of expressing appreciation for an act of

Generosity  167 generosity is to say that one will never forget this act (nan ithai marakkave matten). (241) For Gibalis, the “return” is created at the moment of giving food, as generosity creates a religious benefit. There is an immediate, unspoken and unacknowledged exchange; the person who receives knows that they have helped create hasanat (discussed below) for the giver, that there is no need to “return.” If people who have received X from Z, they can give A or B at a later date, which will create a religious benefit for them, but there is no need to specifically recompense Z. Since the repayment occurs at the moment of giving, there is no need to ever mention the exchange again. To do so would be not only to lose the benefit but to make oneself appear silly and childish. Thus it is a hallmark of Gibali cultures to never speak, much less boast, about a positive action done by oneself. Specific information about food generosity, for example, a fisherman giving part of his catch to relatives and neighbors, is never discussed in public and I only gained examples by repeated questioning and years of observations. A Gibali would never say, “I am generous”; there is always a level of disavowal in terms of the person only doing what everyone else does or the person doing what was modeled by a parent, such as “My mother always did like this.” When I would cite an example of food generosity back to the Gibali who did it, I would be told, “All the people do like that,” but if I said the action was done by another informant, I would be told, “Ma shaa ‘Allah [As God wills it, or by God’s will] that is a good person.” Since I have worked some of the Gibalis in the research group for a long time, they know that I am trying to understand their culture and are patient as I drill down with repeated questions. I knew one informant’s family only ate rice and fish at lunch; it was only after I circled around and around this issue that I got to the reason. The informant’s family live on the coast but have many relatives in the mountains, who would often come down to the coast to shop and transact business during the day. The informant’s parents knew that the various relatives rarely had fish in the mountains so they made the decision to always have fish at lunchtime so that relatives in town for the day would have the chance to eat fish, as visiting relatives would never eat at a restaurant. The practice had been going on for decades. As chair of a committee at my university I decided to make things easier for colleagues at a noon meeting by buying pizza. I thought this was funny (food is usually never served at meetings) so I told a Gibali friend (X) the story that night as we were sitting with X’s Dhofari friend (Y). X and Y listened impassively as I laughed and explained how I showed up with six boxes of pizza. Then X said, “Oh, you are kareema [generous].” I froze. To be given a direct compliment by a Gibali man usually means you have seriously messed up. I ran through what I had said and realized that this was not “Marielle follows her cultural rules, how amusing,” but “Marielle just bragged about herself (when she did not in fact do anything generous as pizza is not a suitable lunch) in front of a person she doesn’t know well.”

168  Generosity So for the next ten minutes X called me “generous” and asked Y to agree that I was “generous” as I desperately tried to duck and weave, repeating that in the States pizza is a good lunch, that my colleagues were not Omani and hence did not require rice and meat, that this was funny and that I was not at all generous and have never been generous. Ever. In my life. X finally let it drop – point proven.

Types of generosity This section comes from terms used by Fieldhouse (1998), who defines “balanced reciprocity” as “between people who are social equals and have some kind of personal relationship, does involve expectation of return (perhaps delayed), and takes account of the value of the gift” (89). He uses “Generalized reciprocity” to mean exchanges in which “records, mental or otherwise, are not kept” (89), which corresponds to my terms planned and unplanned generosity. For Gibali cultures, I have added a fourth category: required generosity. Generosity as a positive attribute is open to both Gibali men and women. Different genders may have different options for giving food, for example a man might give a liter of honey while a woman might give a cake, but there are similarities, for example, men can give cow or camel milk, women can give goat milk. Also, food is not the only or best way for a person to be magnanimous. Required generosity “Required generosity” might seem like an oxymoron, but I use it to refer to the specific times in which Gibalis are expected to offer a lot of food to guests and/ or to give food away. Because of cultural and familial pressure, there is no one way to be judged as a good person if one does not offer guests as much as possible. Selfishness is a serious fault in Gibali society but as most, if not all of the attendees, will know the financial situation of the hosts, there is the expectation that people will provide what they can but not go into debt to provide lavish buffets. In houses, this means having a variety of food on hand for yearly events such as Eid; celebrations such as weddings, graduations, the birth of a baby, or family members returning from a stay in hospital or an overseas medical trip, a honeymoon; funerals; or a party given for a woman if she returns to her family’s house after being divorced. The basic requirements are tea (usually served with milk, sugar and spices), Omani coffee, flat bread (qibqab) and Omani halwa.3 For these events, it is also expected that the family will “slit,” meaning kill a camel, cow or goat, sometimes several animals depending on the number of people expected. The killing is usually done the night before or the day of the event; sometimes the meat is butchered and cooked by family members but often the meat and bags of rice are given to a restaurant and cooked off-site.4 Some prepared platters of rice and meat are brought to the house for guests, others are given to neighbors and relatives. The work of creating the event is carried out in tandem by both male and female members of the household with men, for example, deciding which animals to

Generosity  169 slaughter (or buy), women and men deciding how the platters are distributed, women deciding what the accompanying dishes will be, making sure there are enough supplies on hand and setting out the drinks and sweets beforehand. For wedding parties held outside the house, required generosity means making sure enough food is ordered for catered events. For male parties, this means a tent set up in a flat area with a buffet of rice and meat, fruit, salads and sweets and expat male waiters who offer Omani coffee, tea, juice and water. For smaller women’s parties in rented rooms, this means female expat waitresses offering a rotating selection of drinks and sweets.5 This is followed by a buffet dinner that is as lavish as the household budget allows. There should be plenty of leftovers, which are then put on platters or plates and delivered to neighbors and relatives. Food generosity is required at all times and from all people. Ciezadlo (2011) writes “We tend to speak of food in benevolent terms, as the social glue that binds us together. But in the wrong hands, food can be a weapon.” In some cultures, serving unpalatable food is a way to show unhappiness (see for example Stoller and Olkes 1986), but this does not happen in Gibali culture. From Yemen, Maclagan (2000) gives examples of women fighting husbands by either not making food or serving food in a rude way to guests in order to shame their husbands. Weir gives similar examples from Yemen, as well as examples of tribal men going to the area of a tribe they are in conflict with at the time of the midday meal, forcing the host tribe to lose money and animals by feeding them (2007: 21, 47, 206). Weir refers to these and other examples such as the requirement of giving an animal as penalty for a tribal transgression as “punishment by food” (215). I have never heard of similar accounts from Dhofar. When I have asked Gibali men about women “fighting” with food, the answer was always that if a wife was unhappy she should go to her father’s house. Gibali women answered that it would be beneath their, or any woman’s dignity to serve bad food or show rudeness to guests. Two women mentioned that if they were angry at their husband, they would show it by making a delicious meal and then refusing to eat with him. Balanced generosity By balanced generosity I mean people using food to repay a debt or receive a benefit. For example, teenage boys often play football in the late afternoon. They might arrive home hungry and ask for food outside regular meal times. A sister can then implicitly or explicitly use cooking skills as a way to arrange certain favors, such as being driven to visit friends or to go shopping. Sisters will cook for each other for altruistic reasons, but also for favors such as borrowing a party dress. Brothers may offer to bring dinner home from a restaurant or treats such as ice cream out of kindness or in exchange for help with homework. This kind of compensation is never used with parents, whom children are obligated to take care of. If a father asks for tea, a daughter would not respond, “I will make it if you…,” but between siblings there is a certain amount of leeway. Bribery is seen as very negative in Gibali culture and independence is highly prized, so the Arabic word for bribe (rashhua) is not used. The framework is that as a gesture of kindness X decided to make Y dinner and, as a gesture of kindness

170  Generosity (not pay-back) Y has decided to take X to the mall – these are two kind people who are making a mutual decision to help each other, not a briber and a bribee. Generalized reciprocity: unplanned Unplanned generosity with food happens frequently in Gibali culture. Planned generosity, as I explain below, is when people make deliberate food choices which lead to them giving cooked or uncooked food away to others. Unplanned is when people end up with too much and give it away from the impulse of generosity as well as the knowledge that the food will go bad if not shared. While it is possible to buy fruit and vegetables by the piece, most common produce is bulk, for example in bags of several kilos or boxes made of rough wood or cardboard without tops called “flats”. People will buy a large amount, then transfer some to plastic bags and give them to relatives and neighbors. “We have too much,” is a constant refrain between neighbors and relatives as they hand over produce grown on their own land (such as findal, sweet potatoes), bought produce (such as apples), fish, and cooked food such as rice with meat or a cake. As explained above, it is important in Gibali cultures for a meal to be large enough for the people expected as well as any chance visitors. Thus, there is not much concern over portion control – having “just enough” is seen as having too little. Further, if an animal is killed, often all the meat will be given away or cooked the same day.6 This kind of generosity can create an interwoven circle or can stay one-sided. The important point for the giver (male or female), no matter what the actual words are, is creating a feeling of “Thank you for your kindness in accepting this food which otherwise would not be eaten.” For the receiver, the tone is “Thank you for your kindness, of course I don’t need this food, but I will accept it so that I don’t embarrass you.” This kind of generosity can stretch out over years (for example a wealthy neighbor regularly sending plates of food to poorer neighbors), can happen occasionally, or happen only at certain times, such as neighbors exchanging plates of food at Ramadan. In some cases, it is never repaid. As I have explained elsewhere, it is important for Gibalis to be detached from material goods, so to give concentrated attention to a gift of food is ridiculous (Risse 2015). To immediately repay by returning the plates with food or sending over produce can set up an unpleasant upward spiral of counter-exchanges that negate the goodwill. The correct method is to show solidarity and friendship in any number of ways not necessarily relating to food. Generalized reciprocity: planned Planned generosity is when people make a specific effort to buy or make food that is not for the general use of their household. This occurs frequently when Gibalis living in Salalah visit relatives in the mountains or in smaller coastal towns. They will bring large sacks of rice, bags of sugar, fresh fruit, bottles of juice, etc.

Generosity  171 Men will also bring such supplies to relatives who are staying with livestock away from settled areas. Masking economic activity As discussed in Chapter 2, with the constant movement of foodstuffs and prepared dishes, it’s difficult to tell the value of what is moving around. Items are sold according to economies of scale. It would be embarrassing to sell, for example, a small bag of limes. With goods in large quantities such as fish and cow’s milk, some are sold and some are always given away. Retail cost is only one factor. Usually the item given is not vital, in that most families receive items that they could afford to buy but being given the item has several benefits.7 Firstly, receiving something frees up cash to buy things which require cash, like gas and electricity bills. Secondly, having food items delivered to the house saves the time and effort needed to procure them and, most importantly, folds the family into levels of interconnectedness. To be considered as good, Gibalis should try to remember who has given them what, while simultaneously forgetting everything they have given.8 In some cultures, there is some informal score-keeping of X did Y so I should do Z in return. To ever mention that one has done a favor in the past is seen as rude in hakli cultures because, while a person has lost the monetary benefit, one has gained the religious and societal benefit of giving, in addition to, sometimes, a financial benefit. Open-handed giving creates a positive reputation which can lead to advantages in other areas. For example, people selling a plot of land near their house, will be more looking for a good price, but also a family with a positive reputation. If a man is poor but generous, men will come to his son’s wedding to give gifts of money.

Food generosity while hosting, guesting and eating Good hosting at home In some cultures, being generous with food means giving guests certain kinds of foods such as the most traditional, expensive, or difficult to make or source, or foods that are expensive, lavishly decorated or displayed, that are the favorite of the guest and/or served in large amounts. In Gibali cultures, hosts are deemed generous (hence “good”) if they immediately offer guests the basics of tea and any kind of sweet and/ or fruit (e.g. coffee and dates, tea and basbousa) while downplaying any inconvenience or “work” involved. Further, good hosts must make guests feel at home, meaning comfortable to eat and drink as much as possible.9 It is the speed, grace, and readiness of offering food, not the innovation, monetary value, amount or selection. Secondly, good hosts make sure that guests only relax. When I go to visit someone in an Omani house, the most important rule is that I can’t do anything. To go to the kitchen, pick up dirty dishes, etc. is to imply the hosts are not gracious. The reverse is that when guests come to my house, I can’t let guests put

172  Generosity their dishes in the sink or take a soda from the fridge. I don’t like this set-up, either totally passive guest or a harried hostess, constantly checking that everyone has enough tea, but this is how it is. Lastly, Sobh, Belk and Wilson argue that in Qatar There is no longer any survival imperative underwriting hospitality … Thus, one conundrum that the present study seeks to understand is why hospitality rituals have continued and grown in importance in these Arab Gulf states when they are no longer strictly necessary. (2013: 444) This is not valid in Dhofar. Many people still live in rural conditions in which the “survival imperative underwriting hospitality” is operative. Gibali men in my research group know that if their boat runs out of gas or breaks down, they may eat and sleep in the majlis at any coastal house they find; in the mountains, any person may go to any house for help. Dinner is given to any and all guests; the hospitality rituals are necessary not simply to make someone feel welcome but essential for Gibalis to feel safe in approaching a stranger’s house when they are in need. Good hosting outside the home The same rules are in play outside the home. The guests should enter to see the restaurant table/ rented room prepared: water, juice, soda and finger-food set out, with hot drinks quickly offered. Guests should never be allowed to clean or carry anything except their own plate of food. If a group of friends are meeting for a meal, the bill is paid by one person – with no attempt to keep track of who ordered what at what cost or who paid last time. On picnics, the host/ first person to arrive should park his car in the best position to screen from wind and respect sightlines for other cars. If one or two people are coming, he will sit in his chair and enjoy the view; if more people are coming he will unfold a large plastic mat and set out Kleenex, then (depending on the time) either relax or make a fire. As people come, they should be greeted as they walk up to the mat with each person calling out a welcome. There is a second round of greetings once they sit down, with a specific greeting to each person, then the newcomer should be offered drinks and snacks. There is often a third, slower and longer, set of greetings and perhaps drinks will be offered again. Then the previous conversation is resumed or a new one starts. Good guesting My secret weapon for being a guest is that I am teacher, used to those classes when I finish everything I need to say, no one has a question and it’s six minutes to the end of class. I can’t let my students go early, so I have to find a story to tell: a Greek myth that relates to what we are reading, a comparison between a character and a movie the students might have seen, a cultural point. I can patter

Generosity  173 on and I don’t mind telling stories that make me look silly. So, by happy accident, I am not that bad a guest because in Gibali cultures, guests should be chatty and self-deprecating. Food is not the point of gathering, it’s the sociability that eating together provides. A good guest should talk and partake, or make a show of partaking, of what is offered without comments or complimenting.10 Good guests should neither refuse anything offered nor ask for something not offered.11 They should make “the weather nice” by keeping up a pleasant demeanor, making jokes, responding to all questions and never speaking about someone who is not in attendance unless it is to inquire about someone’s health. When leaving a house after being invited for a meal, guests should signal that they want to leave and, at least once, allow hosts to talk them out of it. Then there should be an extended “thank you for visiting us” and “thank you for having me,” with hosts sometimes trying to give presents (such as a thobe or jar of honey) and guests trying to refuse. Hosts should try to walk guests to the front door or the guests’ cars while guests try to keep hosts sitting/ in the house. The more the power imbalance and/ or the less the people know each other the more time and effort is put into making the good-bye drawn-out. However, when leaving a house after a party such as a wedding, it is sufficient if a guest gives a brief comment or raises a hand towards the host. After a picnic, there is no need for guests to thank or even acknowledge a host. Men stand, say yella and walk towards their cars. Generosity while eating Three aspects of generosity come into play while eating. One is the monitoring of others’ consumption. This is most notable with guests, in that the more distant the relationship, the more necessary it is for hosts to force-feed. A close relative or friend might only take a small piece of baklava (sometimes that term is used, or the more generic halawiyat, sweets) but a first-time guest, after finishing a crème brûlée, dish of ice cream with fruit, a piece of chocolate cake and some Omani halwa, will be handed an éclair and told that she must eat it because, “You ate nothing.” A guest for dinner must be given meat and every attempt must be made to give them the choice cuts.12 Often a whole small animal is cooked and set onto of a large platter of rice. The host will then carve out portions and set them on the plate or in front of the guest, then offer specific parts such as the liver.13 For Gibalis, all energy must be put into making sure others have the best pieces, never arranging food for personal benefit. With dishes in which the meat, chicken or fish is mixed in and the group is sharing from a platter, people eat starting with what is in front of them and working outward and forward in a triangle shape. However much you covet your neighbor’s portion, you must never look or make any signal towards wanting anything else. Even between close friends, Gibalis will attempt to give the best pieces of meat to others. If the meat, chicken and fish is piled on top on the heap of rice, you can pick a good piece and toss it in front of another person who is eating. However,

174  Generosity given the shame of wasting food, the meat had better land on the platter or the thrower will be scolded. If the person doesn’t want it, the piece can be tossed to another person or back on top of the pile. A second type of generosity is that Gibalis are careful to eat in such a way that the left-over food is “clean,” meaning suitable to give to others because it is not touched by people’s hands. For example, on a picnic, most, but not all, of the prepared food is put on the platter. If more is wanted, the rest is poured out, if not, it is left covered for others. When eating from a platter, you eat only from what is in front of you, so the extra food is left as a mound in the middle. At restaurants, food is moved with a clean spoon onto plates and eaten, so whatever is left on the serving dish is “clean.” If there are pieces of fish, they will be portioned out with one fish per person or shared between two; if someone wants more, they check if there is left-over fish from another person before they start to eat a new fish. A whole chicken or fish is eaten section by section, starting in one direction so the leftover parts are intact. For example, with a fish, one should start at the tail and work forward, or from one side, leaving the other side whole. A third issue is that when there is insufficient food, people will eat slowly, take small bites and proclaim a heretofore unseen fastidiousness. I have heard of many examples of siblings, for example, racing to eat the most of a favored food item, but when it’s a situation where there is not enough food, in all the cases I have seen, Gibalis will eat token amounts (to show group solidarity and avoid other people attempting to make them eat) very slowly so that others can have as much as they want. I have seen men who can go through most of a roast chicken in a matter of minutes take a few tiny pieces and declare that they are full when they feel there is not enough to go around.

Food generosity while sharing and disposing of food Presenting and receiving In handing over food, the moment of giving is done as quickly as possible. There is no mention of the cost or difficulty of procuring the item and any kind of clean container (e.g. plastic bag, recycled glass bottle, etc.) can be used. In some cases there is truly an excess, for example a lime tree covered with ripe fruit, and it is imperative to not waste food, from both the religious perspective and because older Gibalis, especially those who grew up in the mountains, remember food scarcity from their youth.14 It is better to simply hand over bags of ripe fruit to others, even strangers, then to allow it to spoil. The best way to give is before asked for it. This allows givers to feel that they have not only been generous, but that they have saved someone from having to lose face, and receivers to feel that they are so valued that they are provided for without having to ask. One important point is that while Gibalis are open-handed, they reserve the right to make the decision to offer or not.15 A family might, for example, leave the door to the majlis open at all times so people may come in and, among family

Generosity  175 members, certain things may be taken without asking, such as clothes. But no one should take food without asking, for example removing fish from another man’s fish trap or fruit from a tree. Generosity only works if the person is freely giving. The giver should make the conscious choice to give away something that has a monetary (cultural or physical) benefit. A receiver has the right to ask, but the choice must always stay with the giver, i.e. a giver might decide at any time to not give prepared food or foodstuffs, at which point the receiver has no recourse. Hence, there can be circumstances in which it might seem, to an outside observer, that a person should give but doesn’t. There might be a “story,” such as the product was already promised to someone else, but Gibalis create their own reputations and if a person wants to compromise theirs, it is their right. They might redeem themselves later; they might not. Sharing hierarchy: relatives, neighbors, friends, miskeen The sharing hierarchy is that foodstuffs and “new” (freshly made) prepared food should be given to humans, starting with those in the same house, close relatives and neighbors, then friends. The next tier is known miskeen (“poor,” usually male expat laborers) lastly, unknown miskeen. In town, extra prepared food is given to relatives and neighbors. Platters of rice and meat are the most common prepared foods given, but bread, sweets, pitchers of fresh fruit juice, etc. are also given. For example, at a wedding celebration in the bride’s house, before she was brought to the groom’s house, there were nine different desserts made for a group of 20 women. After the guests had eaten, the rest was distributed onto plates and brought to all the neighboring houses. Every effort is made for all eatable food to be given to a person. On picnics or while camping, Gibalis will walk to other picnickers or flag down passing cars to offer food to strangers. If it is a small amount of food, or half-eaten or no longer aesthetically pleasing, it is given to known miskeen, meaning poor or disadvantaged people. This happens in all situations. For example, if there is a catered lunch at a business, after the invited guests have eaten, the cleaners, messengers and tea assistants will be called to eat (and package to take home) all the leftovers. Some Gibali men know, for example, the expat men who work at a nearby gas station or men building a house and will give them leftovers. After fishing or camping trips, almost all uneaten food and drinks are given away, for example, to the expat men who stay near beaches where fishing boats are put in and earn money by helping load, unload and clean boats. The last level is giving to an unknown miskeen. This usually happens when eating at a restaurant. The food not eaten is made into a “parcel” (thin foil boxes in a plastic bag) and when they are outside the restaurant, someone simply holds the bag out, arm extended, and looks around the area for an expat. If someone is interested, they will approach and the bag will be handed over without words. The random hand-off looked odd to me at first, but it works within Dhofari society as 1) Gibalis will rarely if ever eat “old” food, 2) there are a fair number of expats with low salaries who will accept and eat this food and 3) everyone is

176  Generosity working from the framework (explained above) of eating in a clean way. People receiving a bag of food will know, for example, that there might be whole slices of pizza, not slices with bites taken out.16 At the end of camping trips, left over staples, like sugar and rice, are tied in bags and left out of reach of animals so others may use. Unopened bags of chips, cans of soda etc. are left in a tied plastic bag for the municipal workers who empty the trash bins placed on most beaches. One final point is that food for hired expats who work in the house or with animals is not seen as “sharing” or “giving” – food is their right. Shepherds, for example are given a monthly salary, plus an additional sum to pay for food. Maids or nannies who live in the house eat before, during or after family meals, usually in the kitchen and either food they made for themselves or exactly what the family is eating. Some families will sit the nanny with small children at a separate table at a restaurant, but she is always given food and a drink. I have heard stories of maids suffering from lack of food, but no examples from Dhofar. Food waste: animals and earth Food that is not suitable for humans, or if there are no other people around, is usually carefully given to animals. In town, some people will bundle leftover food into the garbage, but many Dhofaris make the effort to spread waste food, for example leftover rice, on a piece of scrap wood or plastic next to the small dumpsters. Others put leftover bread on the top of walls or other high place for wild birds. When it is time to leave after a picnic or camping, left-over cooked food is carefully spread on rocks for wild animals and birds. Food is never spread on sand or dirt as that is seen as unkind to the animals. If there are not rocks, the food is left on pieces of plastic. A few times when I have tried to pick up the plastic that leftover food was placed on, not wanting to leave litter, I was told to leave it. The men in the research group pick up all the trash from campsites, but it is judged worse to put leftover food on sand than it is to leave plastic bags. Sometimes cats (on beaches) or foxes (in wadis) will come within a few yards of a campfire to make it clear they would like a handout. Left-over liquids are poured on the fire, to stop the wood from burning so another person might use that wood to make a fire, or poured into the ground. Some food is wasted but I see a concerted effort to get edible foodstuffs passed down the food chain so that they are useful to someone or something. When I interviewed a fisherman about unwanted fish (too small or not used for bait) he explained that they were tossed in the ocean or given to cats which haunt the jetty. Everything has a purpose, everything has a place.

The tacit benefits of generosity The advantage of generosity is never the receiver’s thanks or any public acknowledgement, but a private, religious benefit. Sudaka is a voluntary charity given to people who are in need, including poorer members of one’s extended family

Generosity  177 and neighbors, and objects such as food, cash, jewelry, clothes, etc. Sudaka is normally given at the end of Ramadan (Eid al Fitr) but is also given throughout the year. Sudaka produces hasanat, an undetermined/ undeterminable religious benefit that accrues to the giver. Hasanat will only be added if the thing is bestowed with no ulterior motivation and no possible benefit to the giver; the giver must be giving with a clean heart and with respect to God. Also the thing given must be clean (halal); no hasanat will be given, for example, for something that was stolen. Lastly, the donor should avoid telling anyone about the donation and/ or asking for recognition from the receiver. Hasanat and sudaka are vital for understanding Gibali life because knowing that good behavior has a (hidden) benefit that is repaid after death means that social pressure to be open-handed is backed up by a silent, personal advantage for both small and large actions. A person doesn’t need public thanks or recognition for acts of kindness. When I asked an informant if he sold any of the small crop he grew he said, “No,” because “the money is worth less than the religious benefit.” Showing generosity with food in Gibali culture is not about the food itself but about the actions and imputations – as long as the basics are covered, a person is not judged on what they give so much as the when, how and why. At one party I attended, the hosts brought five cakes. When it was time to serve dessert, two went to the majlis (men’s and visitor’s sitting room) and three to the salle (women’s and family’s sitting room) as all the children were in there. There was no discussion of which cake should go where or why – it didn’t matter who ate what as long as the guests were presented with a choice of dessert. There is marginally more value in a home-made cake, but the important point is that there is cake – store-bought, made by the maid, a sister or a daughter, a cake that is delicious, slightly stale or tasting of chemicals. The guest has been given cake and a drink; the hosting family has demonstrated required generosity and all protocols are now satisfied. The fact of the cake is a physical manifestation of good-will and is far more significant than the taste of it. Another way to explain the lesser importance of the food itself is the phenomena of Gibalis explaining positive intentionality without actually giving anything as a mark of friendship. This has happened to me several times; for example, one man in the research group had food that he planned to give me but because of a mix-up, it was left in his car overnight and he had to throw it out. He spent about fifteen minutes explaining every detail of this story because the fact that he had made an effort to give me food was an indicator of friendship, not the food per se. The when means having food to give people at expected times, such as Eids and weddings; for such events and others (e.g. a child’s birthday), Dhofari women take photos and post them on Instagram and WhatsApp to show: “we are all ready, we have everything.” To be judged as “good,” a family must also always have food on hand for visitors who show up unexpectedly. When a guest arrives, the host must immediately arrange for someone in the house to make and bring tea and/ or coffee, fruit and sweets. Normally this is done by the maid or women, but in some cases younger men or the host himself will make/ bring the

178  Generosity refreshments if there is not already a platter set out or thermoses of freshly made tea and/ or coffee. The importance of how is that the food must be given without fanfare or the givers drawing attention to themselves. There should be constant checking of guests’ plates and cups, offering food from the table, calling for more food to be brought in, and refusing to eat until all the guests have food and drink. This is connected to the why, which must be “to help others” and never “to make myself look good.” When bringing food to other people, “We have extra, do us a favor and take this,” should be implied, even in cases where the food was specifically purchased to be given away. Lastly, being generous is not related to the cost of the food; for example, there are many grades of rice reflected by a wide price range but neither hosts nor guests ever mention the quality of the rice. Although cost is not mentioned, one aspect of the food can be highlighted: the freshness and/ or province. Saying that the samn (clarified butter), milk or meat is from “my”/ “our” cows, the milk or meat is from “my”/ “our” camels, the meat is from “my”/ “our” goats, or the fish was caught the day by the host or relatives signifies that effort was undertaken to bring the freshest and best for the guests. Thus food is one of many signals that indicate the complexity of social connections. For example, at one Gibali wedding party the guests sat in the salle being served coffee, tea, juice, fruit and sweets by the bride’s sisters. One woman pointed to the array of ten different kinds of desserts and told me that they were all made by one of the bride’s sisters-in-law who lived in the house. That array signaled several points. One, that she is a good cook; the desserts were delicious. Secondly, that the sister-in-law is a good woman who devoted hours of time to make food that could have been easily bought; this shows her respect for and commitment to her husband’s family. An additional layer of meaning reflects back on the bride’s family – they were good to this new addition to the family. In Gibali culture, a woman had no obligation to make such an effort for the bride’s (a sister-in-law’s) wedding and if the woman had wanted to show off her cooking prowess, she could have made one or two really fancy desserts, such as an extravagantly decorated cake which would draw a lot of attention. The sweets were modestly set out on plain glass plates meaning the focus was on the family’s reputation, not her own. The result is that the desserts were read, by Gibali women and me, that the sisterin-law to the bride was happy with her in-laws and felt so well-treated that by her own choice she undertook the work of providing desserts. No one in the household would code this as positive treatment of the new daughter-/ sisterin-law being repaid by a lot of sweets but various kind people doing various kind actions. Hence, food is not the only or most important method of showing or creating solidarity. In 12 years of picnics with three different groups of Gibali men, some men never made any contribution to meals, neither bringing food nor cooking. This is never commented on; these men were never teased or made to feel in any way that they were not fully part of the group. The value of their friendship has nothing to do with supplying food or cooking.

Generosity  179 Women will say offhand about a sister or aunt, “She can’t cook,” with the same tone used for saying “She can’t drive.” Some women can, some can’t – all women should be able to do the basics of getting food in front of guests as required by the culture but plopping a tea-bag in hot water and putting store bought cookies on a plate covers that necessity. Good guests mirror this attitude by not placing any undue attention on the food. Too many comments might be construed as negative. Repeatedly praising something might cause the hosts to worry that there is a problem or the guest is making fun of them.17

Notes 1 Stephenson, Karl, and David have an interesting take on the aspect of hospitality in “retailainment” (11) in their article Islamic Hospitality in the UAE: Indigenization of Products and Human Capital”: Given that the hospitality industry is a social and cultural institution, “hospitality” should then closely represent the ethnicity and religious dimensions of the host culture. This concern relates to issues of national and cultural ownership, where hospitality should be viewed, to some extent at least, as products of the UAE and specific Emirates. It is thus ethically and politically appropriate that nationals are positioned in key service sector roles within the industry, especially to deliver and manage hospitality (and tourism) products as well as to represent their country and ethnicity … The UAE hospitality industries face problems concerning the hiring of experienced and professionalised staff, especially those who are naturally attuned to the socio-cultural nuances of the society in which they operate … The ethnic division of migrant labour is paramount, where cursory observations reveal that UAE’s hospitality industry is staffed significantly by expatriates from such countries as the Philippines, India, Thailand and Sri Lanka. (2010: 11) The same issue obtains in Oman. 2 A British officer in the Dhofar war wrote, “[Southern] Omanis were wonderful people to live with. They were superbly honest: I never had anything stolen from me while I was there and it wasn’t as if there were no opportunities. They were generous to a fault and … they didn’t take themselves too seriously” (Gardiner 2007: 58, see also Risse 2015). 3 Omani coffee is made from roasted coffee beans that are ground, then boiled (plain or with spices), then other spices and flavors (cardamom, ginger, rose water, etc.) are added. Omani halwa (the Arabic word for sweet) is made with sugar, water, clarified butter, cornstarch and flavorings such as cardamom, saffron, sesame seeds, almonds and cashews. 4 See Chapter 4. 5 Instant coffee with cream and sugar, Omani coffee, water, juice, “red” tea (chai ahmar, black tea with only sugar added), “milk” tea (chai haleeb, black tea with milk and sugar) served with snacks. 6 In the past when game animals were killed, the meat had to be eaten or preserved by air-drying and boiling in fat to keep it from going bad. Now meat is given away in plastic bags of pieces of raw meat on the bone or cooked (boiled, grilled or mageen, strips of meat that is air-dried for a few hours and then cut into smaller pieces and boiled in fat). Cooked meat is almost always given with rice. If the animal is killed for regular consumption, part may be refrigerated and eaten over the next few days, but if the animal was slaughtered for a specific purpose (Eid or a celebration), then all the meat is eaten or given away. I have never heard of people freezing part of a slaughtered animal. 7 Some items, such as abalone and honey, are appreciated because they are rare, difficulty to obtain and/ or thought to have health benefits. For example, a bottle of

180  Generosity high-quality local honey given to someone who is sick is valued more than the monetary equivalent in expensive chocolates. 8 Having a bad memory for prices is an unexpected advantage in Gibali cultures as I have been commended more than once because I said that I forgot the price of something. For example, when asked the price of cookies I brought to a picnic, I said I had forgotten and this was interpreted as I was pretending not to know so as to not showoff that I had bought expensive food to share. 9 This can lead to the point of allowing destruction. Children of guests who are misbehaving are often protected by hosts who tell guests, for example, “you will not scold him.” 10 Complimenting food is acceptable if coached, for example if X points out that Y made a certain dish, one should compliment Y as there probably is a (sometimes not explained) story, such as this is Y’s first time in cooking for guests or Y made it specifically for the guest. In general, one should be careful of praising an object in Gibali cultures as admiring X can be interpreted as the speaker declaring that they want to be given X. One way is to build-in the refusal, such as, “That is a lovely thobe, too bad that color would look bad on me.” 11 Dhofaris are aware of dietary restrictions caused by diseases such as diabetes and hosts will allow guests to refuse food and drinks on that basis. A regular guest will be offered the right kind of food which will be kept on hand (e.g. sugar-free cookies). An unexpected dietary limitation will send hosts into a small frenzy of, “We didn’t know, we don’t have X prepared,” while the guest is similarly frenzying back, “Of course it is not important, I am not hungry, I only want some tea without sugar,” which should quickly resolve itself into peace. 12 Amusing, but unhelpful and untrue, generalizations about these practices abound, such as Fox’s (2018) comment regarding “the gargantuan hospitality of the Near East where if the guest does not finish the enormous dish of sheep’s eyes in aspic the host is mortally affronted.” In traditional Gibali cultures, guests were sometimes offered the head of an animal to eat the brains, but one could, and still can, always politely decline. 13 For meals which are segregated by gender, the food is the same. For example, at one dinner I was invited to, both the men in the majlis and the women in the salle had an entire goat on a platter. A Gibali woman took a knife and a large, flat, metal spatula and divided all the meat for the women. This is in contrast to Yamani who explains that in the group of elites she studied in Mecca, whole animals were pre-carved for women’s gathering as it would not be considered “chic” for a woman to carve (2000: 180). 14 There is little composting – uneatable food/ food waste is either thrown away, given to livestock or set out for wild animals. The idea of using food waste to grow more food is not taken into consideration. 15 A related point is that kitchens, storerooms and sometimes even refrigerators are sometimes locked, but this is to keep small children from, for example, playing in the kitchen unsupervised and lighting the stove or unhooking the gas pipe. 16 I am describing what I know of Dhofari societies but am not arguing this happens only in Dhofar. One night on a beach in Muscat, the Gibali men I was with carefully packaged up our remaining food, then called to a non-Omani walking by, offering him the food. He walked over and took the bag. 17 Another aspect of being a good guest is teasing out the cultural signals. A female Dhofari friend invited me to her house for dinner, which turned out to be delivery from KFC. She picked KFC because it was a Western restaurant and thought that I would be more comfortable eating fried chicken than a meal she had made. It was a decision based on kindness.

References For a full bibliography, list of food terms and several short essays on foodways, please see my webpage: Come From Away, https://mariellerisse.com Appaduari, Arjun. 1985. “Gratitude as a Social Mode in South India.” Ethos 13(3): 236-45.

Generosity  181 Campbell, Felicia. 2015. The Food of Oman: Recipes and Stories from the Gateway to Arabia. London: Andrew McMeel. Ciezadlo, Annia. 2011, April 25. “Eat, Drink, Protest: Stories of the Middle East’s Hungry Rumblings: Buying Peace, One Feast at a Time.” Foreign Policy 186. online article: https://foreignpolicy.com/2011/04/25/eat-drink-protest/ Fieldhouse, Paul. 1998. Food and Nutrition: Customs and Culture. Cheltenham, UK: Stanley Thomas. Fox, Robin. 2018. Food and Eating: An Anthropological Perspective. Oxford: Social Issues Research Centre. online article: http://www.sirc.org/publik/foxfood.pdf Gardiner, Ian. 2007. In the Service of the Sultan: A First-hand Account of the Dhofar Insurgency. South Yorkshire: Pen and Sword Military. Maclagan, Ianthe. 2000. “Food and Gender in a Yemeni Community,” in A Taste of Thyme: Culinary Cultures of the Middle East. Sami Zubaida and Richard Tapper, eds. New York: I.B. Tauris Publishers. 159-72. Risse, Marielle. 2015. “Generosity, Gift-giving and Gift-avoiding in Southern Oman.” Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies 45: 289-96. Risse, Marielle. 2017. “Understanding Communication in Southern Oman.” North Dakota Quarterly (Special Issue on Transnationalism) 84(1): 174-84. Risse, Marielle. 2019. Community and Autonomy in Southern Oman. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan. Salloum, Habeed, Muna Salloum and Leila Salloum Elias. 2013. Scheherazade’s Feast: Foods of the Medieval Arab World. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press. Sobh, Rana, Russell Belk, and Jonathan Wilson. 2013. “Islamic Arab Hospitality and Multiculturalism.” Marketing Theory 13(4): 443-63. Stephenson, M.I., Karl, A.R. and David, E. 2010. “Islamic Hospitality in the UAE: Indigenization of Products and Human Capital.” Journal of Islamic Marketing 1(1): 9-24. Stoller, Paul and Cheryl Olkes. 1986. “Bad Sauce, Good Ethnography.” Cultural Anthropology 1(3): 336-52. Weir, Shelagh. 2007. A Tribal Order: Politics and Law in the Mountains of Yemen. Austin: University of Texas Press. Yamani, Mai. 2000. “‘You Are What You Cook’: Cuisine and Class in Mecca,” in A Taste of Thyme: Culinary Cultures of the Middle East. Sami Zubaida and Richard Tapper, eds. New York: I.B. Tauris Publishers. 159-72.

9 Changes in foodways

Introduction Foodways in Dhofar have changed considerably over the past 50 years.1 Informants in their late 40s who grew up in the mountains remember the frequent hunger of their early childhood as they lived traditional lives, hauling water up from wells and herding livestock. One Gibali informant remembers that he was 16 years old when he first drank cold (refrigerated) water. As Julier states in “Family and Domesticity” in A Cultural History of Food in the Modern Age (2015), one of the global, modern transformations in domestic life is that children “were increasingly viewed as precious dependents in need of nurturance rather than little adults who could contribute materially to the household” (150). In the past, Gibali children were part of family food production systems in ways that no longer are relevant. This moment – like all moments – has food tastes and choices changing with some (not necessarily from the older generation) lamenting that the change is too fast and others (not necessarily from the younger generation) lamenting that the change is too slow.2 To frame the examination of which foodways have changed and why, six important, recent changes in foodways are discussed: cooking, employing in-home help, increasing choices of food types and dishes, presenting/ showing off, dieting and monetizing. The issue of women’s changing roles as cook is discussed in the sections Who Cooks (Chapter 3) and Foodways and Gender (Chapter 5).

Changes: cooking There are many changes in how food is kept and cooked, with the introduction of electricity throughout the Dhofar region in the 1970s and 80s. Instead of cooking on wood fires or small gas-rings, homes were built that had 4- or 6-burner stoves with large gas tanks, refrigerators and deep freezes. Slowly other kitchen machines have come into use, such as mixers, blenders, toasters, and coffee makers. During a presentation in one class, a student showed a photo of a butter churn and asked if students knew what it was. Some did, some didn’t. In another presentation, students were showing the difference between Dhofari houses in the

Changes in foodways  183 past and present. Photos of the “modern” house had covered parking, a pool and a large table for eating. In my classes and in Dhofari society at large, there are different points on a continuum between traditional and modern foodways with some people moving between different points within a day. A man might have a mother who churns who own butter, herds goats, tends her own garden or has never made a meal in her life. He might butcher a goat with male friends on a weekend and take his wife to a five-star hotel for dinner during the week. A woman might cook for her family over a fire on a lunch-time picnic and drink cappuccino in a café that evening with friends. Thus while methods of cooking are changing, there are still people who use old-fashioned procedures. For example, in the past, heated rocks were often used to cook meat or fish (madhbi). Although I have been at picnics where this has been done and most picnic cooking is still done over a fire, most men now use various accouterments such as tinfoil and tongs. Men will still cook in a traditional way, for example burying potatoes in sand and covering them with heated rocks, but they are clear that they are doing something old-fashioned for the “taste” of it. Once a Gibali man I know put a heated rock in a pan of camel milk, as was traditionally done, not so much for the taste of the milk, but he wanted the smell he remembered from childhood.3

Changes: in-home help Another major difference from the 1970s is that almost all families in Dhofar have help with the cooking; with a live-in full-time cook, a maid who cleans and cooks some of the meals, a person who comes every day for several hours to cook and clean, or a person who comes in to cook only one meal. All cooks, maids and household help are expat, usually from Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, or Sri Lanka.4 As Julier explains, “Global migrations in Asia meant that women from poorer regions and countries often found domestic employment in wealthier households” (2015: 151) Usually women live in the house and work full-time; men live outside the house and come in for a few hours.5 Some maids/ cooks will stay with a Dhofari family for over ten years, going home for a month each year; others will work for a few months or a year and then return home or move to a different family. Julier states that: Until the twentieth century, the majority of the world’s households were shaped by a need to produce food and goods within small to midsize communities. Trade and commerce were part of everyday life, but the productive nature of family was integral to its continued existence. Eating together, both in routine daily meals and special communal occasions, was a hallmark of group membership. While most families did not eat together at every possible instance, the majority organized their labors in a way that allowed them to consume the main meal of the day communally. (2015: 148)

184  Changes in foodways Further, Because the spread of industrialization and technology has been more rapid in some regions and countries than in others, the contemporary trajectory of family life has been mixed between longstanding maintenance of agrarian-based households and rapid transitions in wage-based consumer households … Positively, globalization offers increased communication, knowledge, and cultural transmission, but negatively, people in household units are often at the mercy of market logics that determine how their work and time are configured, where their meals are made, who is expected to make them, and at what costs. (147) For her, a key change is that “families became dependent on the income that generated money necessary for buying goods” (149). All of this is true in Dhofar, but the idea that people “organized their labors in a way that allowed them to consume the main meal of the day communally” (148) is still accurate in Dhofar. Having an expat make the food has not changed what is eaten (rice and protein), where (sitting on the floor or ground), how (a communal platter, food eaten with hands), or when (main meal at midday). There is some experimenting, for example using imported Tabasco hot sauce and making cheesecakes, but no huge changes in the definition of what a meal is.

Changes: food choices and tourism Food choices have expanded dramatically in the past few decades, with some Gibalis folding new ingredients and dishes brought, made, or sold by expats into daily traditional meals. For example, one informant described “new food” as “olive oil, hummus, salad with lettuce.” Large grocery stores are one vehicle of food changes, adding new products because of requests from Omanis who have been overseas and expats with buying power who want to eat certain items or brands. Other items appear in Dhofar because it is a standard in the store’s home country (such as Carrefour selling foie gras) or that type of cuisine is having a global impact. I have not met any Mexicans in Dhofar but several grocery stores sell black beans, refried beans, quesadilla kits, etc. In the last ten years, some of the major differences in grocery store offerings include a much wider selection of yoghurt, cheese and milk, including soy and almond milk. More fruits and vegetables common in North America, Europe and Australia have appeared, such as blueberries, raspberries and gooseberries. Also there are types of cake mixes and niche ingredients such as molasses, golden syrup, walnut oil, juniper berries, and BBQ spice. The situation is similar to the food landscape in Qatar, as Nagy explains in “Making Room for Migrants, Making Sense of Difference: Spatial and Ideological Expressions of Social Diversity in Urban Qatar” (2006): While the fast-food restaurants flashing neon at most major intersections appeal to the range of nationalities, many other restaurants cater to the

Changes in foodways  185 palates of south Asian, Filipino, Egyptian, or African residents. The supermarket shelves are stocked to satisfy the range of tastes, everything from tortillas and poppadoms to vegemite and peanut butter. (119–20) There are moments when there is a significant, noticeable food change in Dhofar, such as the opening of McDonalds.6 The blending of old into new works in various ways, such as McDonalds is almost exclusively a place where children eat. You often see a table in the food court at the one mall at which the Dhofari adults are eating rice and meat with the children eating Happy Meals. Pizza has made inroads, but Pizza Hut is seen as not better than other chains such as Pizza Inn or pizza made at a local restaurant. At the café I go to, Dhofari men who have lived in Europe often walk to the Carrefour to buy fresh croissants to eat with their coffee, a custom which has been copied by many other men so that it is now the accepted thing to do. Men will sometimes walk around the café with a container of mini-croissants, offering them to friends. More formal, sit-down restaurants are also places of food innovation, especially those in hotels, as few restaurants serve meals usually eaten by Dhofaris at home. Medhat’s on-line article “The Top Restaurants” (2017) lists seven places, six of which are in hotels. Two are mixed Asian (Chinese/Japanese/ Thai), three have various choices (e.g. pasta, grilled steaks, noodles with vegetables), a steak house, and a Lebanese restaurant. TripAdvisor’s first restaurant under the heading “Local Cuisines” in “Restaurants in Salalah” (2020) is the Oasis Club, whose food is described as “Bar, European, British” – not exactly Dhofari. Cohen and Avieli’s “Food in Tourism: Attraction and Impediment” (2004) helped me think about how the issues of food choices and tourism intersect in Dhofar. They argue that “‘local food’ becomes acceptable only if it is to some extent transformed” as “local food” can be an attraction if it is “nutritious, hygienic, accessible, culturally acceptable” (756, 757).7 Tourists want some novelty, but not too much novelty.8 Thus “Tourism-oriented culinary establishments constitute environmental bubbles” (769). In Dhofar, some restaurants are set up for tourists, such as one decorated with the caps that Omani men wear,9 but all restaurants have both locals and foreign customers. Dhofaris might choose not to go to a restaurant because it caters to tourists or expats, but they are welcome to come. For example, two restaurants and most restaurants in hotels serve alcohol, but Dhofaris visit and drink non-alcoholic beverages.10 Another example is that there was a popular Yemeni restaurant near the beach (now closed) which employed expats from various countries, but no Yemenis. It served pieces of grilled meat on wooden skewers, foul/ ful (fava beans cooked with oil and a variety of ingredients including spices [e.g. cumin], herbs [e.g. parsley], garlic, onion, tomatoes and lemon juice) and brick-oven baked Yemeni bread, available plain or with honey. It was, so to say, just sufficiently exotic for tourists in that it was open air, had many Dhofari customers and uncommon elements such as the hand soap was small cardboard containers of laundry detergent. The food was fresh and cooked

186  Changes in foodways in plain sight – tourists came for the food and the atmosphere, some Dhofaris came for the food and some to watch the tourists who were watching them. It was always fun to hear occasional comments by Dhofaris about the tourists and comments (in German, French, etc.) by tourists about the Dhofaris. Another issue of food choices and restaurants is identity politics. I once saw my tailor as I was coming out of a restaurant near his shop and asked him, “Do you ever eat here?” He looked at me as if I was crazy. The restaurant was on the opposite side of the Indian/ Pakistani divide from his ethnicity. “I eat there,” he said, pointing to the restaurant next door. There are a lot of “tells” for restaurants if you know the culture and are paying attention. For example, some Pakistani and Indian restaurants are named for cities or regions of the country. Other clues are how the name is written (e.g. only in Arabic, in Urdu, in English and Hindi) and environmental language such as calendars with photos of famous places, wall hangings with parts of the Holy Qur’an, or small statues of deities. As Cohen and Avieli state, the menu is the “principal means of presentation” (2004: 770). So that, for example, restaurants that cater to North Americans/ Europeans have translations of instead of transliterations of items and are divided into appetizers, salads, main courses and desserts. Indian-managed restaurant menus are divided into vegetarian and non-vegetarian options.

Changes: food presentation and showing off11 With the opening of stores selling decorative home goods such as HomeCentre and CentrePoint, how food is displayed and given has changed. Dhofaris have always tried to have ornamental trays, coffee pots and cups for guests, but in the last decade Dhofaris have been introduced to all sorts of gastronomic niceties such as decorated cupcake papers, elegant cupcake and cake stands, fancy chafing dishes, elaborate paper gift bags and similar items that can be used in giving and selling food. For example, instead of bringing a neighbor a plate of brownies (a recently introduced food item), a woman can now wrap each one in silver cellophane, tie it with a gold ribbon and affix a small flowered sticker with her name. The presentation of the plain and wrapped brownies is very different but they are equivalent as gestures of generosity. Further, with social media, food can now be used to signal status and wealth. Roseberry refers to “the uses various groups make of foods and food preferences in marking themselves as distinctive from or in some sense like other groups” (773) and states that people can fashion “themselves through consumption” (1996: 773). One way is to carry or post photos of store-bought coffee which usually cost at least 2 Omani Riyal (OR, about $5). This signals a significant amount of disposable wealth, especially as one sometimes sees a person with the cup 2/3 full at different times in the day. The coffee is not actually drunk; it is carried around to show that the owner can not only afford it but has the means to get to such cafés. Photos of Starbucks’ coffees show that the person has traveled, or elaborate meals show that the person is eating in a restaurant etc.

Changes in foodways  187

Changes: diets, disease and nutrition Another change is a growing awareness of the connection between food and health in terms of weight loss, disease prevention and control, and vitamins. In the last few years, several businesses such as Smart Diet, Dr. Nutrition and Diet Nutrition have opened in Dhofar advertising “scientific” weight loss. There are storefronts which sell supplements and offer counseling, diet plans and weekly “weigh-ins” to help reach or maintain a healthy weight. Weight gain, and the often-accompanying diabetes, was never a problem in Dhofar until the advent of selling cheap sweets that occurred from the late 1970s onward.12 Alyaarubi states that: Oman is similar to the other Gulf countries in its rapidly changing patterns of behaviour, a consequence of the oil business and industrial boom. Our ancestors used to wake up early, have a good breakfast and burn plenty of calories during the day. Later, they would have an early dinner and a good night’s sleep. Now we tend to get up late, have little or no breakfast, a lunch with heavy carbohydrate content and late dinner. A sedentary lifestyle and lack of exercise is becoming the trend. (2011: 345–46) Further, Junk food in Oman is relatively cheap and widely available. In 2004, the Ministry of Health studied the food habits of school children in Oman. They found that 95% of schools sold chips, 79% cheese sandwiches, 78% biscuits and 57% cakes. These changes in eating behaviour and attitudes towards food and exercise have disturbed body metabolism and resulted in an energy imbalance with more energy being stored and less energy consumed. The best example of food habits that affect diabetes control is the heavy lunch with high carbohydrate content that leads to a high excursion of blood glucose levels lasting until dinner time and carrying on to overnight … Patients also tend not to follow the dietary advice strictly and do not comply with medications. (346) The result is that “In 2000, the age-adjusted prevalence of diabetes among Omanis aged 30–64 years reached 16.1% compared with 12.2% in 1991” (343–44). A related issue is a lingering cultural belief that it is good if children are overweight: According to Dr Saif al Yaarubi, a senior consultant at Sultan Qaboos University Hospital, “It is recommended to parents to eradicate the cultural norm that having an obese child is healthy and a sign that the family is wealthy. We should tackle this issue from an earlier age (“Growing Number of Diabetes Cases,” 2014)

188  Changes in foodways On a more positive note, there is a trend towards better understanding of the importance of vitamins for overall health, especially for women, who can run the risk of low iron because of many pregnancies and low vitamin D because of lack of exposure to the sun. Testing for vitamin levels is becoming more routine, with women telling each other what their results are and encouraging each other to get themselves and their children tested. Supplements are now widely available. Ten years ago, it was difficult to find even a basic multi-vitamin; now pharmacies carry many types.

Changes: monetizing food Julier argues that an important change in global foodways is that: The function of the domestic household was more centered on consumption, negotiation for services, social reproduction (child care), and emotional support for both dependent children and wage earners. Caregiving, which included feeding the family, became a naturalized extension of women’s activities. Reliance on the marketplace for goods also created a gendered dependence whereby women did not receive wages for their labors within the home, and men were excused from them by the nature of their work outside the home. (2015: 149) It is interesting in Dhofar that modernization has brought some women back into the kitchen, as what was previously expected labor “within the home” has become a work choice to earn a salary. As discussed in Chapter 3, some Dhofari women no longer see cooking as a necessary skill and some woman would often cook and give away food but there are now many chances for women to sell their handiwork in addition to other home-based businesses such as selling make-up, vitamins, clothes (every day and fancy abayahs and dhobes), doing henna, bukhoor/ oud (incense), and majmars (clay incense burners).13 I can’t recall the book, but I remember a man writing of going up to a rooftop in a North African country and being yelled at by women – rooftops were their territory. Men could walk openly in the streets but should not been seen on rooftops. That scene is similar to the home-catering landscape in Dhofar. Managing restaurants is male work; baking/ cooking at home to sell outside the home is female work. This type of job is well-suited for women as it can easily accommodate cultural norms for female modesty. For example, if she has social media the photos are only of the food, if she sells in-person she can cover her face. She also does not need to use her real name; most women use a teknonymy/ paedonymic such as Umm Ahmed (mother of Ahmed). She can post photos of food with a phone number but communicate only by messages so she doesn’t have to speak to a stranger. Further, home-catering can be adapted for activities women might want to/ are expected to do, such as helping children in exam time, taking care of sick relatives, visiting relatives, etc. If they are busy, they can simply not look at or

Changes in foodways  189 answer phone messages, not sit at a road-side stand, etc. There are enough other choices to take up the slack and their not providing that particular food will not create life or death situations. Also, there are a lot of choices for women who would like to enter this market.14 Some sell only one type of food, such as traditional bread, sweet breads for guests, or cakes. Others specialize in a variety of appetizers or main courses, such as pasta or large trays or platters of rice and meat. Some women will sell foodstuffs such as mussels or seasonal fruits. Lastly, a woman who cooks as a job can help create wealth not just for her, but her family if sisters/ daughters/ aunts join her and brothers and sons deliver and/ or sell the food, earning payment for their services. This is possible by using smart phones with location finding services. For example, buyers will “drop” their location in a WhatsApp message and the delivery person can drive directly to the place, ring the outside door, hand over the food and collect the money from a child so that buyers (usually female) and drivers (usually male) never meet. As of now, there is no government regulation and in a small community there is, not yet, a need. Women usually buy from women they know or who have been recommended to them. A woman selling old or bad food will not have customers. An expat man cooking as a job in a restaurant will not see or know his customers, but women will post in social media about good (and bad) food bought from a woman running an at-home business. The underlying belief is that a woman will cook food to sell as if she is cooking for her family, carefully adhering to strict standards of safety and purity. The most common methods for selling are Instagram, festivals, running a store and road-side stands. Some women advertise their personal bakery/ catering companies on Instagram. These have photos of the food and the name of the seller, usually a teknonymy/ paedonymic, phone number and, perhaps, a brief description of the items. Orders are placed via messages and delivered by male relatives of the cook or hired expat men. Accounts can be used for years or opened only at certain times, for example when she wants to sell mussels she has collected or sweets for an Eid. The local government has set up a series of women-only shopping fairs in halls where women can rent small booths for a nominal fee and sell food meant to be eaten immediately or taken home, in a milieu of small booths with women selling clothes, beauty products, and oud/ bukhoor. There is also an annual city festival where women can rent booths selling packaged or homemade food, in addition to traditional hearth-cooked breads. Some women do branding of their food with personalized stickers/ bags/ drink cups and gain a local reputation so that women will go to the fairs specifically to buy food. Sometimes if an Instagram account and/ or selling at fairs is successful, women will buy and run small store-front businesses which sell, almost exclusively, sweets such as mini-cheesecakes, brownies, cupcakes and chocolates, often with cakes for sale by special order. I have not seen a store in which women cook in public or even in the rented space. The stores usually have only refrigerated display cases. During the monsoon tourist season and Ramadan, some women sit under small tents next to main roads. The tent gives protection from the sun and is

190  Changes in foodways open on all sides with a table covered with food the women have made such as bread, rice and meat dishes, cooked vegetables and/ or sweets such as basboosa (coconut cake) or carrot sweet (a dish made of grated carrots with sugar, not carrot cake or a carrot salad). Some dishes are kept in large chafing trays and individual portions are scooped out into thin metal boxes, but normally the food is on plastic or paper plates and covered with clear wrap. Sometimes the women themselves sell what they have made; sometimes the women sit behind the table and male relatives walk to the cars, take orders and accept payments.15 The last type of selling, usually done by older women, is to simply lay down a mat and sit with traditional bread wrapped in a plastic bag. This is done next to roads or outside of stores and a woman might do this for a few hours every day or only during certain seasons. Even if the store sells what she is selling, there is no attempt to move her. A woman has the right to a small part of sidewalk or open space and she is not seen as taking away profit but adding a valuable service as people will come to that store to get goods (that they could buy anywhere) and the fresh bread that only she is selling.

Coda - July 2020: a brief overview of foodways in Dhofar during the Corona pandemic The Omani government has done a fantastic job of disseminating information to all citizens and residents about the Corona virus. There were regular news bulletins (in Arabic and English) with not only clear instructions (e.g. how to properly wash hands, explicit directions for all delivery services about how to sterilize containers, rules for contact-free hand-over, etc.) and information (e.g. what are the symptoms of Corona), but also the rationale for the government’s actions. There are daily updates of the number of cases in the Sultanate and where to go for medical help. All official government notices were in same design, font and color so it was easy to spot official messages. On March 14 the government announced (effective March 15) that all government and private primary and secondary schools were to close for the year, although some international schools were allowed to remain open with distance education. It was announced March 17 (effective March 18) that all mosques, barber shops, beauty parlors, gyms, sporting events, tourist sites, restaurants, traditional markets would be closed; restaurants would only open for delivery with safety precautions; airports were restricted so that only Omanis could enter the country, and no Omanis could leave; only clinics, grocery stores, pharmacies, and eye glass stores could remain open.16 On April 28 there was the first wave of reopenings: car repair, boat repair, workshops, stone crushers and on May 31, government offices were staffed at 50%. However, in June cases increased dramatically and as I write (in mid-July) there is talk of everything except grocery stores closing again. My research into foodways in Dhofar was been hampered by the Corona virus, but I tried to continue my work while also asking: what food-related events, issues or changes could I notice?

Changes in foodways  191 First, the government did its best to stop hoarding, with regular announcements that there was sufficient food and announcements and photos of fresh fruits and vegetables purchased from India. There were announcements about the illegality of price-gouging in stores. For examples, please see my website (https:// mariellerisse.com) where I have posted many examples of food-related government images. As things got worse and numbers of infected people increased all customers had their temperature checked before entering a grocery store and all grocery store carts were sanitized before each use. All customers were required to wear a mask and gloves; free hand sanitizer was available in several locations. Masks sold out quickly in March but then supply chains righted and there were always boxes for sale or you could buy just one for a nominal price before you entered the store. Grocery stores (during my once-a-week shopping trip) were well-stocked with all the basics: vegetable oil, rice, meat, fish, basic fruits and vegetables such as onions, potatoes, carrots, cucumbers, apples, oranges, bananas, etc. However, there are fewer types of fruits and vegetables (especially frozen ones) and some non-Omani, non-essential foods ran out, e.g. cheddar cheese, types of noodles, sauces, and chips. In terms of my research, all meetings with informants and friends stopped. This was difficult but necessary and it meant that I didn’t have the chance to watch people cook at home or have long conversations about food preparations. One informant kindly took pity on me and we met sitting six feet apart on a windy beach to go over types of fish. I’d tell him a name of a fish in English, he would look it up on his phone, see the photo and tell me the name in Arabic and Gibali. If not for the virus, I would have gone with the research guys to fish markets and meat markets to get more details. I hope to later do a short essay on these topics for my website once there is free movement. Before Corona, I had no examples of men using Instagram and WhatsApp to advertise home catering businesses, but during the lockdown I saw two examples, a man selling khalta (a sour/ spicy dip for cooked meat made from vinegar, lemon/ lime and spices) and one selling cakes. Men also started to use social media to sell fish (cleaned, cut and delivered) and lobster (during the time it was in season) because the fish markets were closed. These ads explicitly state that safe hand-over procedures will be followed. The government has also created an online fish market to help buyers and sellers find each other. During every Ramadan, Dhofaris buy and make food to give to others, especially those in need, but during Ramadan 2020 in particular, people were extending extra efforts to make sure everyone had sufficient foodstuffs, however there was less distribution of prepared food. One informant mentioned how Ramadan was “so different” because there was no sharing of food for iftar as usual, although uncooked meat and packaged food were still given. What I have heard anecdotally is that family and neighbor supply lines continued but there was more care taken in hand-overs and that some Dhofaris whose workplaces were closed were using their free time to bring in extra food supplies by working or supervising on their farms, fishing etc.

192  Changes in foodways Another change that I heard from several people is that Corona changed family dynamics, in that men (who were usually out every night drinking tea with friends) often stayed home and while people missed working, seeing friends, shopping and visiting family, there was an unexpected benefit in that fathers, husbands, brothers and sons now ate meals and sat talking/ drinking tea with their families at home or on picnics.

Envoi I have met a Gibali man on a research project not related to food dozens of times over several years. We meet in public, usually at a restaurant and sometimes I don’t eat, sometimes I eat a little, sometimes I get a full meal. He usually gets half a spatchcocked chicken served with some hummus, a handful of fries and a little pile of cut onions with parsley. Then one night, when I was almost done writing this book, he sat down with a hotdog. I was horrified. Years of observations, note-taking, interviews, thinking and writing about food and there was a Gibali man eating fast food for dinner. As I watched him I thought, can I pretend I am not seeing this? Can I pretend that this is a metaphysical hotdog? Do I need to put in a footnote? How much rewriting is this going to entail? Do I need to go back and re-interview people? To ask about his food choice would be rude, but to not ask would mean me wondering about some of the major assumptions presented in this work, so I stated, “I have never seen you eat fast food,” then (to be ethnographically correct I should add, there was a hint of a wail), “You are eating meat from an unknown source.” He looked at me, “It’s chicken.” Oh. A chicken hotdog. So some of my assumptions were holding. Then he said, “I don’t have time to eat.” And ethnographic peace reigned. Watching someone take a bite, chew and swallow while stating they were not eating fits with my reflections on Gibali foodways: food equals rice and meat. Culinary changes will come to Dhofar, some like the McDonald’s will be subsumed into daily life, some may have more far-reaching and disruptive effects. This book describes and reflects on the current situation and changes in the last ten years. The future is yet to be written.

Notes 1 Discussing the interior areas, Boxhall writes that “Rice, ghee, dates, and goats’ meat provide the Bedouin’s only sustenance, except (and very rarely) for gazelle meat” (1966: 217) and on the coast there was, “tunny, king-fish, bonito, and shark … turtle, oysters, clams, sea urchins and limpets” (217, 218). In “Notes on the Omani Kitchen: Eating with Tradition” (2018), Popp notes that “Until recently, dates, lemons, a few vegetables, rice, wheat, water and bread formed the basis of the Omani diet in the impenetrable interior of the country,” with a goat on feast days, sometimes dried fish and on the coast “fresh fish, fruit, and goods imported by sea.” See Chapter 3 for a brief overview of past foodways. 2 Roseberry’s comment that some aspects of food culture “could be seen to represent an attempt to re-create, through consumption, a time before mass society and mass consumption,” (1996: 774) made me reflect about what I have seen in Dhofar. I think of

Changes in foodways  193 Dhofar as being in a state of pre-food nostalgia, in that Dhofaris often talk about how society, people, family relationships etc. were “better” in the past; I have never heard anyone say that the food was better. 3 Similarly, in the past, the most common medical treatments were cauterizing and honey. Medicinal branding is used much less frequently now, but I know several men who have had it done and believe it is efficacious. Honey, especially wild honey from Yemen, was used for many aliments (see Rodionov 2012). Although bottles of honey are still given as gifts, easy access to modern medicine means that honey is now used for lesser ailments such as a sore throat and as a preventative measure. See Chapter 2 for more details. 4 This is in contrast to de Regt’s statement that, “A small number of traditional elite families in Sana’a still make use of Yemeni live-in domestics” (2009: 569); vom Bruck (2005) makes the same point. For a short discussion of expat cooks on the Arabian Peninsula, see Al-Hamad (2016: 10). 5 A Dhofari women with several children will bring her maid with her, for example, if she goes to visit her sister. The maid will stay in the kitchen or in the salle, helping to watch the children and/ or make, serve and clean up after the meal. 6 The opening of McDonalds led to a certain amount of what Elie terms “‘let’s save them from modernity’ syndrome” (2006: 158) from some Dhofaris and expats. There were huge lines for a few days, then it became just one of the choices alongside KFC, Subway, ChicKing, etc. 7 “Culturally acceptable” (757) is a good point, covering for example what animals might be eaten in different cultures (e.g. cats, dogs, reptiles), what part of an animal might be eaten (e.g. feet, tongue, organs), methods of preparations (raw, well cooked) and level of spiciness. 8 On one hand I understand, as MacCannell says, the “search for authenticity of experience” as expats, tourists and researchers try to find the “real” Dhofar (1973: 589). They take as their mantra: “The touristic experience that comes out of the tourist setting is based on inauthenticity, and as such it is superficial when compared with careful study; it is morally inferior to mere experience” (599). I am always happy when I am drinking tea with a female friend in her house or outside of town with the research guys, listening to their casual talk and eating food they have made. On the other hand, that “authenticity” comes at a price – always saying yes to invitations even if I am exhausted, sitting still for hours, having no control over what is eaten or when, trying to get my clothing and posture correct, and endlessly attempting to be as generous as hakli people are. 9 This is not like a casual American restaurant with baseball caps on the wall, a clothing item that is also used commonly for decoration. It’s like a local walking into a restaurant in a small town in Montana decorated with cowboy hats, causing the locals to wonder why are you ruining (by punching holes in them for hanging) perfectly good hats of the kind I am currently wearing. There’s both a sense of wasting something important and making fun of something personal. 10 I was struck by Stephenson, Karl, and David’s comments on the “halal revolution” in “Islamic Hospitality in the UAE: Indigenization of Products and Human Capital.” They write that: Shari’ah-compliant hotels have traditionally existed in such countries as Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. Nonetheless, the potential growth of such hotels could also relate to the rise of Muslim travellers in the region. Islamic hotels contain such features as traditional uniforms for hotel staff, dress code for female staff, markers indicating the direction of Mecca, female and male prayer rooms, prayer mats and prayer beads (“tasbi”), halal food with no pork, conservative television channels, art that does not depict the human form, and beds and plumbing placed away from facing Mecca. (2010: 13–4)

194  Changes in foodways Most of these are examples are valid for all Dhofari hotels; I am not sure about the placement of beds and plumbing. Alcohol is only available in a few hotels, with bars usually in separate outbuildings or tucked away at the end of a corridor and/ or behind several sets of doors so that one could never end up in a bar accidentally. Thus there isn’t necessarily a “revolution” in Dhofar but policies set out from the very beginning that hotels should follow Islamic principles. 11 See also the discussion of Images in Chapter 6. 12 In response, the government has created a series of well-maintained, well-lit walking paths next to main roads so that Dhofaris have easy access to safe places to exercise. 13 Julier maintains that “the development of new technologies and commercial products did not significantly change the number of hours women spent on household labor. An increase in standards and expectations as well as new caring labors kept women tied to domestic work” (149–50). While that is true in many places, that statement is not representative of Dhofar as houses are large but easily managed with, for example, one majlis, one salle, one kitchen, communal bedrooms for parents and young children and for (same-sex) children of around the same age, all tiled floors with floor drains (easy to flood and mop), not much furniture/ knickknacks, no yard work and normally at least 5–10 adults to split the work and/ or cost of hired help. 14 There are a few expat women who also sell food, for example Egyptian women are believed to make the best stuffed grape leaves. Some also sell liters of special drinks such as fruit juice with spices. From my limited knowledge of these women, they do less advertising on social media and gain business by word-of-mouth. 15 There is a clear segregation in that, by main roads, women sell prepared food, bread, processed food such as chips, and sometimes small bundles of wood used for campfires. Only men work in the road-side stands selling fruit (such as melons), vegetables (usually potatoes and onions) and grilled meat. 16 When all stores except food stores were closed, the hypermarkets cordoned off or turned lights off in the housewares, clothes, computer, appliance sections to prevent people from browsing for fun. But if you needed a particular item, you could get permission to enter and get one item; this reduced the stress of worrying about getting a replacement if something broke.

References For a full bibliography, list of food terms and several short essays on foodways, please see my webpage: Come From Away, https://mariellerisse.com Al-Hamad, Sarah. 2016. Cardamom and Lime: Flavors of the Arabian Gulf, the Cuisine of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman, Qatar and the U.A.E. Singapore: IMM Lifestyle Books. Alyaarubi, Saif. 2011. “Diabetes Care in Oman: Obstacles and Solutions.” SQU Medical Journal 11(3): 343–8. Boxhall, P.G. 1966. “Socotra: ‘Island of Bliss’”. The Geographical Journal 132(2): 213–22. Cohen, Erik and Nir Avieli. 2004. “Food in Tourism: Attraction and Impediment.” Annals of Tourism Research 31(4): 755–78. de Regt, Marina. 2009. “Preferences and Prejudices: Employers’ Views on Domestic Workers in the Republic of Yemen.” Signs 34(3): 559–81. Elie, Serge. 2006. “Soqotra: South Arabia's Strategic Gateway and Symbolic Playground.” British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 33(2): 131–60. “Growing Number of Diabetes Cases in Oman.” 2014. Y Magazine https://www.y-oman. com/2014/11/tipping-scales-diabetes-oman/. Accessed May 2019, no longer available. Julier, Alice. 2015. “Family and Domesticity,” in A Cultural History of Food in the Modern Age (The Cultural Histories Series). Amy Bentley, ed. London: Bloomsbury Academic. 145–64.

Changes in foodways  195 MacCannell, Dean. 1973. “Staged Authenticity: Arrangements of Social Space in Tourist Settings.” American Journal of Sociology 79(3): 589–603. Medhat, Gehad. 2017, October 8. “The Top Restaurants in Salalah, Oman.” Culture Trip. https://theculturetrip.com/middle-east/oman/articles/the-top-restaurants-in-salalahoman/ Nagy, Sharon. 2006. “Making Room for Migrants, Making Sense of Difference: Spatial and Ideological Expressions of Social Diversity in Urban Qatar.” Urban Studies 43(1): 119–37. Popp, Georg. 2018. “Notes on the Omani Kitchen: Eating with Tradition.” Just Landed. https://www.justlanded.com/english/Oman/Articles/Culture/Notes-on-the-OmaniKitchen Restaurants in Salalah. 2020. TripAdvisor. https://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurantsg298419-Salalah_Dhofar_Governorate.html Rodionov, Mikhail. 2012. “Honey, Coffee, and Tea in Cultural Practices of Ḥaḍramawt,” in Herbal Medicines in Yemen: Traditional Knowledge and Practice, and Their Value for Today’s World. Ingrid Hehmeyer and Hanne Schönig, eds. Boston, MA: Brill. 143–52. Roseberry, William. 1996. “The Rise of Yuppie Coffees and the Reimagination of Class in the United States.” American Anthropologist, New Series, 98(4): 762–75. Stephenson, M.I., Karl, A.R. and David, E. 2010. “Islamic Hospitality in the UAE: Indigenization of Products and Human Capital.” Journal of Islamic Marketing 1(1): 9–24. vom Bruck, Gabriele. 2005. “The Imagined ‘Consumer Democracy’ and Elite (Re) Production in Yemen.” Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 11(2): 255–75.

Index

Abalone 39–40, 51, 53–54, 56, 59, 67n40, 82 Animal 36–37, 45–50, 57–58, 60, 103, 105–109, 131, 134, 166, 168–169, 176, 179n6 Asseda/Asida 102

Drinks 82, 84, 88–92, 100, 102, 104–106, 116, 121, 148–149, 169, 172

Bee 44–45, 109; see also Honey Belk, Russell 26, 100–101, 119, 150–151, 156–157, 166, 172 Bird 59, 176 Boat 36, 38–40, 50–55, 67n39, 172, 175 Breakfast 14, 84–86, 187 Bread 74, 80–81, 84–87, 91, 112n14, 131, 140 Bride 1–2, 13, 104–105, 175, 178

Farm 43–45, 72, 110, 135 Fish 13, 20, 25, 36, 38, 40, 50–55, 62, 72–74, 79, 85, 87–88, 92–93, 108–109, 115, 119, 124–125, 149, 151, 167, 174–176, 191 Frankincense xvi, xviii, 6, 20, 35, 71–73, 109, 128, 137, 147 Fruit 90–93, 99–100, 102–106, 110, 115, 122–125, 140–141, 161, 170, 171, 174–175, 184, 191

Café 121–124, 127, 152–153, 185 Camel 21, 35–38, 45–49, 55–58, 103, 106–108, 141 Celebration 19, 38–41, 101, 103–105, 107, 120, 131, 141–142, 166, 168, 175 Changes in culinary practices 182–191 Chatty, Dawn 19, 37 Childbirth 131 Children 6, 10–11, 17–19, 38–42, 47, 57, 60–62, 78–79, 81–82, 84–86, 88, 99, 101, 107, 110, 114, 117, 120, 123, 131–132, 134–137, 141–142, 148–149, 157–159, 169, 182–183, 185, 187–189 Cow 12, 38, 45, 47–49, 57–58, 72–73, 106, 108 Crops 42–44, 56, 73 Dates 42, 71, 73, 89, 100, 102–103, 106, 131, 140, 171 Desserts 1–2, 90–91, 125, 175, 178 Diet 73, 133, 136, 140, 187 Dinner 6, 58, 63, 73, 83–88, 90–91, 99– 104, 114, 121, 124–128, 135, 140–141, 147, 150, 165, 169, 172–173, 187 Disease 50, 78, 187

Economics 25, 48–49, 55–57, 62–63, 72–74, 93, 171 Eid 41, 55, 60, 101, 103–104, 177

Gender 24, 99, 117, 136–142, 157, 168, 188–190 Generosity xv, xviii, 63, 165–181 Goat 19, 23–24, 35, 45, 48–49, 56–58, 60–61, 73, 88, 101, 107–108, 183 Groom see Bride Guest 2, 6, 13, 25–26, 84, 88–91, 99–101, 104–106, 108, 114, 116–117, 127, 148, 154–155, 165–166, 168–169, 171–173 Halal 62, 77, 123, 160–161 Halwa 1, 86, 90, 103–105, 168, 173 Haram 25, 93, 161 Herd 12, 37, 45, 47, 49, 56 Honey 44–45, 60, 84, 87, 109, 132, 193n3 House Design 74–76, 114–117 Iftar 61, 89, 101–103, 142, 191 Images 82, 105, 141–142, 151, 159, 177, 183, 186, 188–189, 191 Islam 5, 25–26, 41, 58, 90, 101–104, 108, 123, 131, 139, 146, 150, 156–157, 160–161, 166

Index  197 Kabsa 85, 92 Kanafani, Aida Sami 83, 92, 106, 109, 116–117, 147, 150, 152 Khareef xvi, 9, 35–36, 38–41, 43–44, 46, 49, 54–55, 80, 120, 123, 151 Kitchen 63, 76–80, 82–85, 88, 92–93, 99, 102, 109, 114–116, 128, 147–151, 154–155, 171, 182, 188 Luban see Frankincense Lunch 19, 41, 73, 80, 83–88, 92, 103, 114, 127, 148, 167–168, 187 Madhbi 13, 107, 124, 159, 183 Mageen 103–104, 107 Marriage see Wedding Mishgak 110 Monetize 56, 171, 175, 188–190 Morals 25–26, 157, 160 Morris, Miranda 9–10, 22, 24, 73 Mourning 60, 106–108 Nagy, Sharon 120, 155, 184 Nutrition 72, 74, 78, 185, 187–8 Odor see Smell Oud xviii, 100, 137, 188–189 Photos see Images Picnic 36, 38–41, 85, 87, 108, 116, 124– 128, 141, 151, 154, 165–166, 172–176, 183, 192 Predators 57–58 Privacy 146, 150, 152–159 Purity 128, 146–152, 189 Qabooli 85, 92, 105 Qahwa 89, 100–101, 105 Qatar 26–27, 100, 119–120, 150–151, 155–157, 166, 172, 184

Ramadan 5, 9, 41, 61–62, 77, 80, 86, 89, 101–103, 142, 153, 160, 170, 177, 189, 191 Restaurant 40–41, 78, 80–82, 87–93, 108–110, 115, 118–125, 127, 134–135, 139–142, 151–153, 159–161, 168–169, 174–176, 184–186, 188–190 Samn xvi, 6, 25, 41, 48, 56, 60–61, 71, 73, 78, 102, 107, 110, 125, 131–133, 153, 178 Seafood 50–55, 74 Shellfish see Seafood Smell 92, 99, 109, 126, 128 Snack 84, 86–87, 123, 125, 139, 172 Sobh, Rana 26, 100–101, 119, 150–151, 156–157, 166, 172 Suhoor 101–102 Sweets see Desserts Tea xvi, 1–2, 14, 73, 77, 84–90, 102–107, 122–124, 140–141, 147, 149, 165, 171 Tourism 120, 123, 184–186, 189 Vegetable 41–43, 60–62, 73–74, 83, 85–87, 93, 102–103, 110, 123–126, 132, 170, 191 Vimto 81, 89, 103, 109 Waste 117, 147–148, 150, 165–166, 174, 176 Watson, Janet 3, 9, 22, 24, 72, 106–107 Wedding 1–2, 13, 39, 41, 48, 60–61, 78, 90, 104–105, 107–108, 136, 160, 168–169, 171, 173, 175, 177–178 Yemen xvii, 3, 24–26, 87, 109, 119, 160, 169, 185