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Africa was a long way from home. I was there for more than five years. As I struggled with new places, new people, new sounds, new language, I found myself wanting the things I knew – something familiar, anything familiar. In that season of new I found the old, the comfortable, the familiar; I found it in the kitchen and in the community of sharing meals.
I made a friend in Africa who had learned how to make tortillas. They were not all that different from the local flat bread, called chapatis, but these were indeed homemade, flour tortillas. She could take the local flour, the local shortening, a bit of salt and some warm water and roll out her tortillas, with a hand-carved rolling pin. She would heat them on the stove and fill the house with the smell of home. They were the best tasting flour tortillas this homesick girl had ever tasted… and that is something, since I have a Southwest heritage full of wonderful tortillas.
As I made strides in adjusting to the new culture, I found myself seeing my own culture from a new perspective. I found myself seeing the world for how big and vast it really is and for how small and connected it really is. My friend and I shared cooking tips with each other. We exchanged meals regularly. She would share African flavors with me, and I would introduce her to my American favorites. Most often, though, we would share her soft, homemade tortillas with a steaming cup of African tea and find community, find friendship.
We shared life, often in the kitchen, and she taught me to find patience and joy. And when my son was not yet walking she would come, set him beside her as she kneaded and rolled out her tortillas and then we would eat the them together, accompanied by sweet African tea. Before I returned home to America she shared with me her gift of making tortillas.
I’m getting better at making homemade tortillas. As I’ve re-adjusted to this American life of busyness and fast-food, I once again find myself searching for the things I knew – the familiar. And once again, in a season of change, a season of new – I find the familiar in the kitchen. Covered in flour, feeling the dough give just enough as I roll out the tortilla, I find it, realizing that home is only as far as my kitchen.
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- Reply by emilyclaire on May 09, 2011 at 1:40 pm
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Thanks for the taking the time to read it. I appreciate your thoughts.
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