One of the social activities for women here in Azerbaijan is cooking – they love having guests and feeding them. And apparently this starts at a young age. They cook much more than I did as a teenager. I have a group of girls that comes over every couple of weeks and we cook together. We have made everything from mashed potatoes to salad and pizza (an American version and an Azeri version) to cake. And I love it! I’m exploring new food (I’m growing!) and giving these girls a place for social interaction (and I thought there was nothing to do in Northern Michigan). There’s no special focus on English, we just spend time together and speak whichever language they want – there’s one girl who knows a decent amount of English so she usually speaks it with me, while the others know very little English so we speak Azeri. We spend a couple hours preparing everything, we eat together, clean up, and then end the day with tea. And thrown in the midst of all that is an insane amount of picture taking. I love the fact that the more time I spend with these girls the less I think of them as Azeri and more as just teenage girls. Everyone has their thing, but it’s not related to their nationality – there’s the one who’s always in charge, the one sneaking a bite before it’s ready, the one trying to escape the work, the one taking pictures, and the one who goes along with everything…. Now if only I could get them to try the American food that I bake…
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