100 posts

It is a bit of an anniversary for this blog today. 100 posts. Since it is an important round number, I thought I would write about something nice.


It must be the snow outside or this season’s mood I can’t help but get into, but I am just full of love at the moment. Love for my friends.

Usually, some of them would occasionally do something that might irritate me. Or that I might consider rude, ignorant or selfish. However, nobody annoyed or upset me for a suspiciously long time. (Except for Husband. And the child, of course. Oh, and the dog.) Maybe I am just getting softer and more tolerant with age. Oh, whom am I kidding, it is not going to last.

But, while it does….

My friends.

I know I talked about the importance of friends in my life already. But this Christmas spirit is contagious, even for an atheist. I just am full of this warm and bubbly feeling of gratitude and affection. This time, for my local friends.

My life would be pretty miserable here, in the UK, if not for these pretty ladies. The life of an immigrant can be lonely. Really can. You miss your culture, your family, your ways of doing things, your food, your social life. And yet, I realized a couple of days ago, sitting in a village café with one of my best local friends, that I have actually got some really nice ones, you know. Yes, it took me a while to collect them.

Because:

a) Brits are quite hard to get close to, compared to people from some other, more approachable, cultures.

b) I am quite fussy. I don’t like boring people. Even if they are nice. I also really dislike people who make things up, are pretentious or fake.

Yet, I have managed to find some really great local friends. Friends without whom my life would be pretty miserable.

They ask me for lunch on cold rainy days and feed me with tasty things. They pick my child up from school and take her to their place, so I could have a few more hours to run my errands. They baby-sit for me when I want to go out. They listen to me moan. They share morning coffee with me whilst husbands are at work, and they laugh at my jokes. They gossip and they advice on good shops and bargains. Most importantly, I realized that should I ever need help, they will be there for me.

They are the best. Don’t forget that I must shock them often. Despite having assimilated quite well, I am still from a different planet. I must sometimes appear rude, tactless or plain weird. And yet, they accepted me the way I am. I am just a very lucky girl.

PS. Go ahead, click that "borriing" box. See if I care. Warm and bubbly.

What’s the Russian for ‘funny’?

I thought it was time for another guest posting. This time, I would like to introduce a crime writer from Scotland, Bill Kirton. Since I am now toying with the idea that one day I will actually write a book (which might, of course, never materialize, like most of my great ideas) I started reading blogs, written by real writers.

I love the opening paragraph on Bill's website:

“This is what male crime writers often look like – upturned collar, the stare across the shoulder, the ‘would-you-trust-this-man-as-far-as-you-could-throw-him’ expression on the face. Well, that’s the way we have to look. The sort of things we do to our characters don’t go with cheesy smiles or concern for other people. Except that they do. Most crime writing’s about people – their fears, frustrations, excesses, their tragedies and needs. And, of course, their motives for doing the unspeakable things they do…...

For some reason, I always think of that photo when I read his blog. And I just love the way Bill writes. There is just something about it.

It is very easy to do a guest posting on my blog. You either have to get me to admire your writing, or just pay me. Now (as the joke goes) that we know what I am….I give you Bill Kirton.

******************
When Scary asked me to write a guest blog I was flattered. ‘What about?’ I said. ‘Anything you like,’ she said. ‘You used to teach French so maybe something about language and culture. And try to be funny.’ (We’ll ignore the kiss of death of those final five words.)

But she’s right. It’s the obvious thing to write about. The first time I came across Scary was when she wrote a comment on my own blog. She said something about not being a native speaker and my immediate assumption was that she was French. That’ll surprise those of you who know her but it’s a good example of how we perceive not the truth but something which makes sense through our own perceptions. My ‘foreign’ language is French and the top line of a French keyboard reads azertyuiop – so my first thought on seeing the letters ‘azery’ was a French connection. (Even though I live in Aberdeen and there’s been lots of oil-related contacts between Azerbaijan and Aberdeen companies for several years now.)

Anyway, so this blog has to be about language, culture – and it’s got to be funny. So let me get the serious bit out of the way first. I know next to nothing about Azerbaijan or indeed any of the former Soviet countries. My own politics (to the horror of my American friends) are vaguely socialist – but not in the way the Soviets interpreted (distorted) the concept. My socialism is that of Jesus (although I’m an atheist, too) – in other words surely it would be better if we all tried to help and respect each other’s uniqueness and beliefs rather than fighting. OK, serious bit over.

So, can someone writing in Scotland say things which sound funny to an Azerbaijani or a Russian? I mean, if you were all in a theatre and I fell about like Mr Bean, Norman Wisdom or Jim Carrey, that might work – but all I have here are words. So does language-based humour translate?

Because words aren’t just labels, they’re things, truths. We all know that Eskimos have a whole range of terms for snow – they need them. But why do Russians (apparently, and correct me if I’m wrong) have separate expressions for light blue and dark blue, making them not shades of the same thing but two distinct primary colours?

It used to be ‘I think, therefore I am’. Not any more. Our words and accents can give away our social class, religion, intelligence, nationality – all sorts of secrets. Take our lovely host, Scary. She’s open, upfront, witty, funny and honest about all sorts of things but sometimes her words get her into trouble – she writes them with one intention, others read them through different perspectives and form opinions of her that may be miles from the ‘truth’ of who she is. (By the way, she wanted me to say something nice about her – so that’s it.)

OK, so language is a vital part of how we perceive the world and the way we express who we are. It’s about perceptions. But so is humour – it’s about perception.

Arthur Koestler said it depended on what he called ‘bisociation’. Usually, we hear and experience things in a single context and there's no surprise or disorientation involved. But with bisocation, you get a second, totally different context and it’s the suddenness of the contrast between them that triggers the laugh. A cry often heard in the old melodramas was ‘You scoundrel, you deserve to be horsewhipped’. It had a clear, single context. But look at the Groucho Marx version. ‘You scoundrel, I'd horsewhip you if I had a horse’ – two completely different contexts.

So much for language then. What about culture?

If the ‘foreign’ culture has a different set of references, can bisociation work? Well, yes – and to an even greater degree. To begin with, let me give a personal example. First, you need to know (my apologies if you do already) that when the French call to attract attention in a crowd, for example, they tend to yell ‘Coucou’. In English, the equivalent is ‘Cooee’ (pronounced coo-eee). An acquaintance (who should have known better) saw a friend of hers in the distance amongst the crowds outside Notre Dame in Paris and called out ‘Cooee’. The punchline (of this true story) is that the French word for testicles is couilles, pronounced coo-eee. I leave you to form your own scenario of a mostly French crowd reacting to a woman shouting ‘testicles’ in front of a medieval cathedral.

We pretend to resist national stereotypes, but the tired (but persistent) British cliché is that Germans have no sense of humour, Italians cry a lot and pinch women’s bums, and the French have disgusting lavatories. Equally, all Polish people are plumbers and Russians love being thoroughly, catastrophically miserable. (It’s something to do with the Steppes and Tchaikovsky apparently). Pasta in English is chips, French bread isn’t really bread because you can’t slice it, most continentals have got a word for queue but don’t know what it means, and so on. So what are the chances of me being funny with an Azaerbaijani who doesn’t speak English? How can I tell him/her that:


Twas brillig and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe.
All mimsy were the borogoves
And the mome raths outgrabe?

Or how can I convey to a Russian with no English the truth of Ogden Nash’s observation that:

A shrimp who sought his lady shrimp
Could catch no glimpse,
Not even a glimp.
At times, translucence
Is rather a nuisance.

The effects depend so much on specific words.

But I’ll end with an actual joke and a surprising revelation from a friend who taught Russian. He was talking (pre-Glasnost) with his Russian language assistant. A shortened version of the joke he told her was as follows:

After a business meeting, two men relax with a round of golf. One is a club member, the other his guest. Afterwards, the guest wants a shower but has no towel, so the friend lends him his golf towel. (These towels are very small). The guest hurries into the shower and, still in the cubicle, he hears female voices outside. He’s obviously come into the ladies’ rooms by mistake. He’s in a dilemma. He has to hurry to catch his plane and the women aren’t in a hurry to leave so he’ll have to walk past them. But he only has the small towel. Should he use it to cover his private parts – thereby having the embarrassment of having to actually look the women in the eye as he leaves – or should he cover his face and just run past them? He decides to cover his face and rushes out. The three women are naturally shocked. The first says ‘How disgusting. Well, at least it wasn’t my husband.’ The second says ‘No, you’re right. It wasn’t your husband.’ And the third says ‘He wasn’t even a member of the club.’


But the point of telling you this joke is that the Russian to whom my friend told it had already heard it back home, where the whole context obviously wasn’t a golf club and the punch line was ‘He doesn’t even live in the village’.

So maybe humour can free us. Maybe we share more things than we think. Maybe the curse of nationalism and separateness can be overcome. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if, faced with how absurd life is, we could all just enjoy it, and keep laughing at it?

Why I would never move to Singapore

La cucaracha, la cucaracha,
ya no puede caminar
porque no tiene, porque le falta
las dos patitas de atrás.



Back in Baku, I lived on the 5th floor of an old building. Below us, on the 4th floor, there was a mad, but reasonably clean family. However, the family above was filthy. I know that because I often shared lift rides with the woman and her smelly rubbish bins.

For many years we had an ongoing battle with cockroaches. Every time the filthy neighbour would finally spray some anti-cockroach stuff, they ran down the drainpipes- right into our flat.

Fortunately, I have not seen cockroaches in the UK. Not the fat, glossy black type I am talking about. OK, I once noticed a cockroach at work, but it looked tiny and pathetic compared to those in Baku.

During the university years I would spend nights working on a project. I sat in the kitchen, under a bright pull-down lamp, carefully drawing endless lines with black ink on an A1 size board. And, as the night fell, they came out to play on the kitchen floor. I once witnessed something that could have been a cute picture, should the actors have been say, cats. Or dogs. Or any other animals- as long as on no more than four legs. It was a family having a nice time. There was the hugest, fattest and glossiest daddy cockroach, a slightly smaller mommy, and a couple of little baby roaches. Babies played close to the mother, while daddy searched for food.

I could never kill those black cockroaches the way my father did- by stepping on them. They were way too big and made that nasty popping-cracking noise. So I used my own method. Not anyhow more humane, yet effective. I would boil a kettle and just splash the bastards. That night, I murdered the whole happy little family.

The filthy neighbours eventually immigrated, and an Indian family moved in.
Whether they are too hygienic, or their food is just too spicy for Azeri cockroaches, but my mother has been enjoying a cockroach-free life for a few years now. And I have not seen any more of them for years, either here, in the UK, or back home. Yet, wherever I am, I always glance down as I walk into a bathroom at night. You just never know what might be running under your feet when you switch the light on.

On a trip to Singapore, a friend of ours was telling us we should move there for a while. Just think- she said- you could have a housekeeper… your life would be so easy here…

Hmmm...- I thought-…tempting, very tempting.

However, at a dinner that night, she told us about cockroaches in Singapore. They sounded terribly similar to my childhood friends. Only bigger. Most importantly, they could FLY. If there is one thing that is worse than a big fat black cockroach, it is a big fat flying cockroach. So, I decided to stay in the UK. As far as nasty insects are concerned, this country is not that bad. At first, I thought British homes were completely creature-free. I was naive, of course.

Because, in British homes, we get spiders.

Allegedly, the huge ones we see in our houses are the male spiders. They normally live outside, but come in the homes by accident- desperately looking for a girlfriend. Boys, eh.

Husband likes spiders. Should he come to rescue me from one (or the other way around), he would try to catch it in a glass and set it free. He also thinks my fear of them is pathetic. And these days, after many years and after many, many spiders, I normally cope OK. Especially since I discovered that even the biggest ones do not make any noise when you squash them.

However, there was that one morning I had to wake husband up.

He was not very happy; it was too early and he was deeply asleep. He mentioned how attractive he finds independence in women. How tired and sleepy he was. And many, many other things. As he stumbled into the bathroom, half asleep, he crouched down next to the bath, and stared at the spider. The spider stared back.

Finally, husband spoke.
This is the biggest fucking spider I have seen in my entire life.
- - he admitted thoughtfully. And then tried to wash it down the drain. Like that was going to work. I get paid for planning things to fit into spaces. I knew the spider was way too big. As the water pushed him down, we could see his long hairy legs grab hold of the edges, pulling himself back out- in a fast and furious fashion.

In the end, husband had to butcher the guy with my foot file.

Still, it is winter now, and there are no spiders, flies or wasps in my lovely home. Just a large smelly dog snoring next to me. But that is quite different.

About good looks, Cherie's mouth and Putin's torso

Wow, cool. Steven Seagal has just cut a huge boob open ( on a dead girl) and took a chunk of silicon out.


My mother is concerned about this posting. She is concerned on two levels, both equally important:

a) She is worried I am stepping into politics, and, as some of us know too well, it is not a wise move.
b) She thinks I might appear really stupid. Because saying what I am about to say here is not something smart and serious people would say.

But I think:

a) I am not into politics enough to discuss it on this blog. I would have to feel strongly about it, hope I could change something and be a little less cynical than I really am.
b) So what? I am just messing about.

I told you before I was a shallow person, and that I liked good looking people. I like to surround myself with pretty things. Even my Rottweiler is devilishly handsome.

And I can easily dislike someone based on their looks. And I am sorry, but I feel the same way about politicians. I mean, just look at Putin. How can anyone be liked when he has a face like that? A Russian friend of mine, by the way, tried to convince me he was a sex symbol back in Russia. A sex symbol. That, I guess, explains his apparent confidence behind the naked torso photos we were all unfortunate enough to see in the news.

So I just wanted to show you this photo- for those of you who happen to read this blog but have no clue where and what Azerbaijan is.

This is our first lady.

How about that?

Don’t you think having such a good looking first lady is something to be smug about?
In fact, I would argue that Azeries have one of the best looking first ladies in the world. Never mind Mrs Obama’s arms.

Not only does Azeri first lady look good, she also seems very civilized. She wears short skirts and does it elegantly. Do you realize how cool that is for a Muslim country? Every time I see a picture of her, I think of that scary old man who was trying to lead the country in a completely different, burka-wearing direction. Again, just look at this guy. See what I mean? Appearances matter.

A friend of mine, a bigger patriot and a passionate revolutionary deep inside, was outraged.
Anyone with that much money can look this good!- he spat out.

OK, I said, I appreciate that. But I still think it is pretty cool, considering what we could have ended up with. So, I was proudly showing her photo in Russian Harper's’ Bazaar to my English friends, who for a while had the first lady with a mouth that did not look human. Neither did it look like a mouth. Plain scary, if you ask me.

Thank you for sending me your thank you card.

Tonight, we are watching Public Enemies, with Johny Depp. Oy, mama.


I was clearing my handbag this morning. Occasionally, it just has to be done.
Out came old receipts, spare contact lenses, a few coins, one headless little girl made out of Hama beads ( No, not Hamas. Hama. Those little coloured beads children play with), a few letters from school asking for more donations, a pair of shades….(who I am kidding?) and thank you cards.

Oh, crap.- I thought. Kept carrying them in my bag for weeks now, forgetting to hand them out.

If you come from Azerbaijan, or any other country that is not so obsessed with sending cards, you would probably think what’s that?

A thank you card is a completely useless, money and time wasting middle class thing to do. What you must understand, Brits are crazy about cards. I remember in Baku, I could not wait for my New Year cards to arrive and it was magical. But that was once a year. OK, for my birthday, too. That’s twice. Also, when we were little girls, we just wrote some cute postcards and secretly dropped them in each other’s mail boxes. Fair enough, we were 10.

In the UK, it is a different story. Adults happily play those games. I spent £8 on 16 thank you cards for all the presents my child received for her birthday. After the party, instead of relaxing with a well-deserved glass of wine, I sat there, equipped with a pen and paper, noting down whose name was on the card, as my child tore the wrapping paper off each parcel. So that I would not embarrass myself later, when I thank someone for a toy they had not given. Because, it would not do to simply say “thank you or your generous gift.” No way! That would be cheating.

But this is just what has to be done around here. And it is not just the thank you cards. Brits love their cards- for any occasion. Went to visit someone? Send them a “thank you for the wonderful time” card. Someone died? Must send their family a card. Someone got sacked? No worries, there are ‘sorry you lost your job’ cards available, too.

And Christmas is the worst. Of course, it is a lovely feeling to see a card land on your doormat. There is something special about it. That element of surprise, that moment of guessing who it might be from. I personally love the stamps.

But there is absolutely no fun in getting Christmas cards from your colleagues- all the way from the other end of the open plan office. The cards are cheap and ugly. The writing is hasty. It is obvious that they do not give a crap about you and your well being during the festive season. Sometimes, someone will forget you. And as you give them their card, you know they will return in a few minutes, sheepishly handing one back. Magical. And then you get to gather all your cards, most of them from people who don’t really care about you, and proudly decorate your mantelpiece with them. Now everyone can see you have a huge lot of friends who love you. A bit like Facebook, really.

Azeries don’t do cards. We prefer gifts. I guess it is a sign of a civilized culture when people are satisfied with just cards. Say, it is your friend’s birthday. Back home, there is no way you would show up with a card. Even if it is a fancy handmade one if you paid £3,50 for. Here, in the UK it is totally acceptable.

Husband does not subscribe to the whole card issuing policy. We went to see our friends who relocated to a new area. The Azeri in me bought them a little housewarming gift. The Brit in me- a new home card to go with it.
Husband was not impressed.
-This is just so middle class wannabe!- he exclaimed, as I balanced the card on my lap in the car, writing quick wishes inside. – You will want some fish knives next!

But since when would any sensible woman listen to her husband when it comes to social etiquette? That would just lead her into a world of shame.

However, there is hope. I understand the latest fashionable thing to do is to declare you don’t do Christmas cards this year, and are actually going to donate the money to a charity instead. I love this one. Think about it! Nobody will know. And you can spend that money to buy more presents for people you actually do care about. Result!

They all said it is great so it must be true.

So this Russian friend called me the other day and said she had a spare ticket to go see the Endgame if I wanted to join her.

You see, at this point, a sensible person would ask:

What is the play about?

Instead, I asked:
- Where is it? ( “Covent Garden”- she said. I thought: nice location, good shops, great food all around)
- How much? ( Can’t afford any expensive cultural stuff when Christmas is around the corner. Culture can wait.)
- When? ( babysitting issues)

Once I got the suitable replies to my questions, I simply said yes. I said yes before I looked the Endgame up online. Once I read the description, I sent my friend an email.

- Ni-iiice!- I said to her- Sounds happy!
- It may be quite heavy- she replied- but, apparently, a smooth and rewarding performance.

Smooth and rewarding. I forgot I was dealing with a Russian friend. Russians find depressing stuff rewarding. It is a cultural thing.

But, even for her, it proved too heavy. I was pleased about that. I quite like this friend and was worried she would claim to have enjoyed this nightmare. More importantly, I was worried she would say she understood it. Which would make me look really stupid for not having a clue.

Whoever I have been telling about this horrific experience, exclaimed in one voice- Oh! But that is by Samuel Beckett!
Yes, haven’t you heard? He is in fashion. I also remember seeing 5 very bright yellow stars, and the words "pure delight" underneath. However hard I try to think of a polite way to describe this 1 hr 20 minutes of torture, pure delight would not be my choice. But what do I know? I am:

a) Foreign (always use this excuse, just in case I am actually wrong)
b) Not a theatre expert.
c) Someone who spent years watching enough depressing Soviet stuff, so probably just bored of it all.

Anyway, if you would ask me what the play was actually about, I would just have to admit that I have no idea. As far as I understood something nasty had happened to the world outside. There was nobody and nothing else out there, but that poor bloke with no eyes, who also happened to be paralyzed from the waist down. And his servant, who was the only one who could walk. However, his legs did not bend. (For some bizarre reason the public found that fact terribly amusing.)

They both seem to hate each other with passion, but of course, they are stuck together. No, they were not married, as far as I could tell.

You are probably thinking: So? Is that it? Ah, well.... Not quite. In the corner of the stage there were two large garbage bins. You know the kind, the outside bins with lids and black plastic bags inside.

So it turns out the bins contained the elderly parents. Who had no legs at all. The father kept asking for a treat, like an old dog and the mother suddenly died in the middle of the play. Clov, the servant on unbendable legs, walked up, looked inside the bin, confirmed she was pretty dead, and tied the plastic bag before placing the lid back on the bin.

I won’t bore you too much. If you are curious enough and have time to kill at work, you can read it here.

I can not remember anything else happening, besides a lot of shouting and some painfully long speeches by the blind guy.

There you go.

I am not just telling you this to amuse you. I think it is my duty to warn you to not see this play if you happen to have an intellectual Russian friend who might offer you some tickets. 5 stars! Only 75 performances in London! Hurry! Do not miss this “pure delight”, just in time for Christmas, when you might,accidentally-despite everything else screwed up in this world-be getting into the festive spirit.

I can not think of anything more painful I had attended in my entire life, except for the concert of Herbie Hancock a few years ago. I am not a huge fan of Jazz anyway, despite being Azeri. Azeries love Jazz. We even produced some famous Jazz musicians, like Aziza Mustafa-zadeh, should you be interested to know (no idea why you would be, but just in case) But normally, I love any live music. It takes a lot to make me get up and leave, and sit outside, waiting for the others. It felt like someone got inside my head and was methodically sawing my brain into tiny bleeding pieces.

As husband and the others emerged, I was convinced they all thought I had no taste and no understanding of beautiful music.

- I am so sorry- I said- I could not stand it any longer, I was going to die.
And everybody laughed and admitted they did not get it either. Sometimes, you see, someone has to say it first. Even if all the critics in the world think otherwise.