Looking to buy cherries, in Arabic

or anything really

On a Wednesday morning, I went to Jerusalem to walk along the stalls of the Mahaneh Yehuda market and listen to people speak Arabic. I’d been craving the high of saying something to someone in this language, but mostly I just wanted to start engaging with it in some way ASAP.

If you have any emotional roadblocks when it comes to learning a language, the fastest way to get over them is straight through.

Or something.

the sandwich shop

On the way from the train station to the market, I spotted a new fancy-looking sandwich shop. A guy at the counter was stuffing a baguette with vegetables and herbs. I didn’t want a baguette but could use a couple of minutes of air conditioning, so I went in and said, in Hebrew, "Hey you guys are new here?"

Instead of answering, he grinned and gestured to the girl next to him behind the counter "She also speaks Russian."

What the fuck. I know that I have an accent but people don’t usually identify it as a Russian accent and that’s exactly how I like it.

The girl turned to me and said in Russian: vy govorite po russki? “You speak Russian?”

I don’t like to feel cornered into speaking Russian, so I mumbled something and quickly left the shop. Air-conditioning or not, I won’t be coming here again.

the market

Instead, I go to the market and listen to people speak.

Except people don’t speak here, people yell.

People yell Anavim esrim shekel kilo!! “Grapes 20 shekels a kilo!!” very loudly. People yell mostly in Hebrew but it sounds like everybody here has an Arabic accent. That’s because most sellers here are either Arabs or Mizrahi Jews (i.e. Jews who came to Israel from Arab countries and whose native language is also often Arabic.)

But I’ve learned my lesson in that sandwich shop. I decided that unless I hear someone speak Arabic I won't address them in Arabic. If they’re an Arab, I don’t want to just assume they want to speak Arabic with me.

And if they’re a Mizrahi Jew, I can’t assume that either. It’s not common for Mizrahi Jews to speak Arabic in public even if it’s their native tongue, as their relationship with Arabic might be even more complicated than my relationship with Russian. In the 20th century about 900,000 Jews fled or were expelled from Arab countries and most of them gave up speaking Arabic when they came to Israel.

I hear that it's changing now, as the younger generation is starting to reclaim their Arabic to reconnect with their roots and to be able to talk to their grandparents in their native tongue.

Finally, I came by a produce stand whose owner was speaking Arabic to the owner of the neighboring stall. I consider buying a bunch of bananas, or a box of cherries. But I don't know how to say either bananas or cherries in Arabic. I have come here unprepared.

The seller sees me slow down and asks in Hebrew "Ma at tzrikha khamuda?" (“What do you need honey?”)

“Ani akhzor od me-at" ‘I'll come back,” I reply, also in Hebrew (and add to myself "...when I find out how to say ‘cherries’"). I realize I’m pretending, in my head, that the only way I can buy food here is if I speak Arabic, that otherwise nobody would understand me. I like this game. Speak Arabic or stay hungry.

Now I just need to find a place where I can sit comfortably, maybe watch people go by, and make a list of words I need to know.

A few steps off the main market street I find just the sort of place I’m looking for.

the café

There are several round tables inside. They’re all occupied by old men wearing shorts, knee socks, and baseball caps. They’re playing cards. You can see that they come here every day and that they take their cards seriously (they write their scores on pieces of paper.)

Outside, a few meters away from the entrance, there are a couple more tables (mercifully in the shade). Several men are sitting there, apparently taking a break from playing cards.

Not a single tourist or a hipster with a laptop in sight. That’s my kind of coffee place.

The sign above the entrance says, in Hebrew, "IRAQI TEA AND COFFEE MALABI ORANGE JUICE CORN ON THE COB.” No punctuation.

The owner (a bald guy with a long beard) is leaning on the counter looking outside. I think the owner must be an Arab (it just seems more likely that an Arab would own a café offering authentic Iraqi coffee and tea) and consider briefly ordering my coffee in Arabic but quickly let go of this idea.

I order my coffee in Hebrew. He goes back inside and a couple of minutes later brings me a small cup of what looks like regular Turkish coffee.

I thank him and ask: “What is special about Iraqi coffee?”

"Oh. That’s just a mistake in the sign,” he waves. “Only the tea is Iraqi, and the coffee is just regular Turkish coffee...”

Heh. It's not a mistake. This is what linguists call a "structural ambiguity." The word “Iraqi” on that sign can be interpreted as either describing the noun immediately following it (“tea”) or the two following nouns joined by the conjunction ‘and’: i.e. “coffee and tea.”

I take my regular Turkish coffee to the empty table outside and start googling the names of various fruits in Arabic. I already know how to say “I want X, please”… I just need to figure out how to say what I want. The problem is that Google Translate only knows Modern Standard Arabic, which is quite different from most spoken dialects of Arabic. I don’t know if I can trust it with my fruit.

The bearded owner yells "Yossi ham leha?" "Yossi, are you hot?" to one of the old men outside, and his "h" is deep and throaty like the "h" in Arabic which again makes me think he is an Arab, but again there is no saying for sure.

There is honestly no difference between all these people, cultural or linguistic, so it feels frankly obscene to try and separate who's an Arab and who's a Jew here like I’m trying to do now. All they want is coffee (or Iraqi tea.) And to play cards.

Methinks those Gen Z American students who try very hard to paint our conflict here as one between white oppressors and brown aborigines would get very confused if they came to this café here.

The owner nearly got into a fight with someone. Some dude came, and after a brief verbal exchange (I didn't hear in what language) they started shoving and pushing each other. All the old men in baseball caps sprang up from their card tables to pull them apart. One of the men sitting outside wearing a kippah yelled to the owner, without getting up, "Ahmaaaad!!"

That’s pretty much the only way you can distinguish Arabs and Mizrahi Jews. A Jew will sometimes wear a kippa. An Arab will sometimes be named Ahmad.

cherries it is

I decided to buy cherries. The word for cherry, according to Google Translate, and hopefully in Palestinian Arabic, is karaz.

By the way, it is related to the English word ‘cherry’ which came into English from the Latin ceresium (through French). And both the Latin ceresium and the Arabic karaz most likely originated from the Turkish word for cherry kiraz, because Turkey and the area around the Black Sea were where cherries were first grown.

(Now I’m reminded of the giant cherries that grew in my grandmother’s dacha in Southern Ukraine, also in the Black Sea region.)

I go up to Ahmad who is leaning on the counter again watching people, to pay for my coffee. But Ahmad doesn't accept cards and I stupidly didn’t bring any cash.

He says, in Hebrew “Al tidagi. Ze alai” (“Don’t worry. It’s on me.”)

I thank him and decide to come back here soon, with cash, and try his Iraqi tea. And maybe try to not overthink it next time and just speak to him in Arabic.

Then, armed with the word for “cherries”, I go back to the main market street.

But I can't find that produce stall. I see a stand that looks like the one I saw earlier. The guy is still speaking Arabic to his friend. But I don’t see any cherries. I stand in front of the stall not sure what to do.

I fear that I look stupid, so I quickly grab the thing that’s nearest to me — it’s a celery root — pay, without saying anything in any language, because apparently, I’m still playing that game where I’m not allowed to speak to sellers in a language other than Arabic and leave the market.

A random Ethiopian spice shop on Mahane Yehuda. Totally unrelated to the story. I just got excited when I saw the sign in Amharic. This is a dangerous place for easily distractable people constantly on the lookout for a sign from the universe.