Entry 5
In an interview with Andrea Shalal-Esa, Diana Abu-Jaber stated that “food is such a great human connector, it’s so intimate. … Let the food be a metaphor for their experiences.” Food is a subject that comes up all throughout her book Crescent. The book dives into the culture and perspectives of its protagonist Sirine and other members of the Arab-American community. It goes along with various subjects and turning points in the novel as a bonus, there are recipes at the end with full descriptions of the meaning behind them. What Abu-Jaber means by the statement above, is despite the fact that everyone has different experiences, lives a different way of life, and struggles, food is the one thing everyone can relate to. Because it is impossible to understand someone else’s perspective or experiences, without experiencing them for yourself, the best-case scenario is to be specific when explaining it. That’s what many of these readings do, they are written in a very distinguishable way so it is as if the reader is in their world. With food, it’s easy to do that. Everyone needs to eat and different cultures have different foods to reflect on them. With the recipes, the reader can get a taste of what that means (pun intended). Even then it doesn’t have to be one of the recipes or any specific dish, such as the Ramadan feast, (which sounded really good and I kind of want to try it) it can be the most simplest of things. In the book, Han gives Sirine a basket of apples as a means of affection, even though that didn’t go as planned because Aziz took credit for it and Sirine later cheated on Han with him, the point is it still counts. I can easily talk about food with my friends, especially all the food we miss eating since going to college.
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