they've lost the narrative so bad

Interesting hmmmm

Title. Have at it. These are personally my two favorite cuisines of the Middle East so I'm curious to see what people think

الأكل مو مجرد وسيلة للبقاء، بل هو لغة صامتة تحكي قصص الشعوب. إذا تأملنا في المطبخ الشعبي لأي دولة، نقدر نفهم منه أشياء كثيرة: جغرافيتها، تاريخها، طريقة حياة أهلها، وحتى نفسيتهم وطريقة تعاملهم مع العالم.

البعد الجغرافي: الطبيعة تفرض نكهاتها

البيئة تحدد وش يطبخ الناس. في السعودية مثلًا، الصحارى قيدت الزراعة فاعتمد الأكل على اللحم، التمر، والخبز. ما كان فيه وفرة أرز ولا خضروات متنوعة، لذلك تشوفين أكلات مثل “القرصان” أو “الجريش” تعكس بيئة تعتمد على الحبوب المخزنة واللحم. بينما في اليابان، كونها جزر محاطة بالبحر، انعكس ذلك في مطبخ غني بالأسماك والأعشاب البحرية، وهذا خلا الأكل بسيط لكن صحي وخفيف. أما المكسيك، فخصوبة أراضيها الزراعية سمحت بانتشار الذرة والفلفل والطماطم، وصارت هذه المكونات جزء لا يتجزأ من هويتهم.

البعد التاريخي والسياسي: الأكل شاهد على المعاناة

الاحتلالات والحروب تترك بصمتها حتى على المطبخ. في فلسطين، طبق المسخن المعروف ببساطته (خبز، زيت زيتون، بصل) يذكرنا بندرة الموارد زمن الاحتلال. الهند مثلًا تأثرت بالاستعمار البريطاني، حتى صار عندهم طبق “تشاي” (الشاي بالحليب) اللي أصله من التأثير الإنجليزي لكنه صار رمز وطني. وفيتنام، بعد الحرب الطويلة، طلع عندهم طبق “بان مي” اللي يدمج الخبز الفرنسي (من الاستعمار) مع مكونات محلية، كأنه قصة صراع وتعايش في طبق واحد.

البعد الاجتماعي: الأكل كوسيلة للترابط

طريقة التقديم نفسها تعكس المجتمع. في السعودية والخليج، اجتماع العائلة حول صحن واحد مليء باللحم والرز يعكس ثقافة الكرم والجماعة. بينما في فرنسا، عادة الجلوس لساعات طويلة على طاولة الطعام مع عدة أطباق صغيرة تعكس تقديرهم لفن الحياة والوقت. وفي كوريا الجنوبية، أطباق جانبية كثيرة (البانشان) مع الأكل الأساسي توضح قيم المشاركة والانسجام بين الأفراد.

البعد النفسي: الأكل كملاذ وهوية

الأكل الشعبي يعطي الإنسان شعور بالانتماء. لما الفلسطيني ياكل مسخن أو الأردني ياكل منسف، هو ما ياكل بس وجبة، بل يعيش لحظة تأكيد للهوية. وفي الدول اللي مرت بأزمات، الأكل الشعبي أحيانًا يصير “علاج نفسي” يربط الناس بجذورهم ويعطيهم أمان. مثل البورش في أوكرانيا، اللي يعتبرونه رمز وطني يعبر عن صمودهم. حتى في أمريكا، أطباق مثل “ماك أند تشيز” أو “فرايد تشيكن” صارت مرتبطة بالراحة العاطفية (comfort food) لأنها تعكس الحنين للأسرة.

الأكل كمرآة جامعة

لو جمعنا هذه الأبعاد كلها، نفهم إن الأكل مش بس وصفة أو مكونات. هو نتاج جغرافيا تحدد المحاصيل، تاريخ يترك أثره في المكونات، مجتمع يصوغ طريقة تقديمه، ونفسية إنسانية تبحث عن الراحة والانتماء.

الأكل هو أصدق كتب التاريخ، لكننا نقرأه بألسنتنا لا بأعيننا. 🍲✨ كل طبق شعبي يخبرنا قصة: عن أرضٍ وناسٍ ومعاناةٍ وأفراح. السؤال هو: هل نقدر نقرأ تاريخنا وهويتنا من مائدة طعامنا؟

I've never been a fan of Saint Levant tbh and something about Kalamantina really bothered me but since I heard a remix of it on tiktok, I kinda fell in love!!! It was an afrohouse remix by Z4YED. Now I am invested and I'd love to know what's your favorite song of his? Also, does anyone listen to Naïka?

I am a british turk, and live in the uk. Turkey is a majority muslim country, although technically secular, and while friday prayers are important, and many people do go to the mosque, in turkey friday is a regular working day.

Now here in england, a christian country, the holy day is sunday. Im not sure if this is uniquely british, but even though the uk is an increasingly secular society, our shops pretty much all have to shut at 4pm legally (petrol stations are generally open, but thats it). Our postal service also comes to a near standstill on sundays. Only some of our post offices are open on sundays, and even then its a half day at best. That bit in harry potter where the uncle screams "no post on sundays" isnt just a meme, royal mail will not deliver to us on sundays, although evri and amazon will.

The law that makes sundays lame in the uk is called sunday trading law, and we came so close to getting rid of it during the 2012 olympics, but unfortunately 13 years later its still part of life in the uk. Personally i think its ridiculous. I grew up muslim here, and i have never been allowed a day off for my holidays, though my uni was happy to let me leave class to pray. I'm looking for a job, and i personally am happy to work on sundays if my christian colleagues can't, in the same way i would happily cover saturday for a jewish coworker, as long as i get my 2 days off, I'm happy. We have a lot of muslim immigrants and 2nd+ generation muslims who would probably be fine working sundays.

So, is friday treated as a normal day in your country, or does the government put restrictions on businesses and services?

as it looks from the poll, public opinion across the region was broadly ambivalent, shaded less by conviction than by indifference.

source: https://arabindex.dohainstitute.org/AR/Documents/The-2022-Arab-Opinion-Index-in-Brief-EN.pdf

I've heard alot of conflicting views on Turkiye, and want to get an idea on how you perceive that country. I think the vast majority of us have a love-dislike relationship with it, but wish the best for them despite the political and even civilizational conflict that brews between the Middle East and Turkiye.

What?

If i have company and i want it to operate arabic speaking region, would you want it to be called brandmena.com or brandarabia.com

It has almost been 15 years since the tunisian street vendor Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire. The uprising that went through various arab countries since has changed matters... for worse? For better? How would you describe the outcome for each affected country in few words?

I'll start, feel free to correct me:

Tunisia: Probably the only thorough success. Based on a functioning system that already existed prior to the protests, a short rebellion brought democratic change and the country nowadays is stable. A favorable outcome of the spring?

Syria: Can almost 15 years of civil war be considered a success? Yet the dictator was overthrown in the end but those events are too recent to determine what will happen to the country post Asad. Spring outcome yet to be determined?

Libya: The initial rebellion was short and Gaddafi fell within a year. But since then there is no stability at all - instead years of civil war that turned Libya basically into a failed state. Situation was shit but stable before, now it's just shit. Spring failed on all levels?

Egypt: Again, the president at the start of the protests was overthrown after a short time. But this did not lead to immediate stability. Egypt had 4 different heads of state within the first 3 years. Since then the system seems to have stabilized, but the state of the democracy resembles the pre-revolution status quo. So... it was kinda shitty but stable before and nowadays it's a different kind of shitty, but still stable? So spring stalemate?

Jemen: Similar to Libya, a failed state nowadays. Again, spring failure?

I Know that: - the Zionist army was much larger than the Arab army - the zios had the world's most modern Military Technology in the world (at the time) in abundance aswell. - Some Arab leaders were pro British and lacked the passion to fight for Fellow Palestinians

But still, if the Arabs never made any armistice, peace deal or truce with the Zionist settlers.. what would happen? Would the Arabs eventually Drive them out? Could American US send troops to help the zios?

How long does it take to deep fake war scenes ?

Why didn't they annex all the kurdish areas into one state instead of splitting us into different borders when we are the same people? I can't help but always think about how much better it would be if all of us Kurds at least lived within the same borders. I feel like a lot of these conflicts you see today likely wouldn't have happened. It's heartbreaking that the people that share the same blood, heritage and language as me either have a better quality of life with more opportunities and a better passport, or worse quality of life and worse passport all because of westerners carving out borders on our behalf. Or there are now Kurds who speak Arabic in their daily lives and Kurds who now speak Turkish or Persian in their daily lives. There are tribes and even families who live on opposite sides of the border. Look at the border between Niseybin and Qamishlo and tell me that's not sad lol. Look at the kolbars in Iran and how they have to smuggle across to Iraq to make a living because their area is the poorest in Iran, if they aren't shot dead or freeze to death in the mountains. I cried so much when I saw a video of when they found a young man that froze to death just trying to get food on the table.

I know very, very well that we're not the only ones that suffered as a result of border splits but I think that our example is definitely up there. I wish my people weren't split up by foreigners and then tried to be assimilated in their newly-formed states.