Final Reflections

Three Cups of Tea, written by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin, discusses the origins of the Central Asia Institute and its quest to improve lives while giving surprising incite into the Middle Eastern culture. I was surprised by the number of facts about the history and culture of Pakistan and Afghanistan were slipped into my mind by the end of the book. I really think that I learned a lot about the variety of beliefs and attitudes in the Middle East. It is always tempting to read about people half a world away and lump them into a huge category. I realize that this is stupid; Pittsburgh and Cleveland are only a few hundred miles away, but talk to any Steelers fan and they'll tell you the 1000 reasons why Pittsburgh is better, and in the Middle East, the differences are much bigger than which team to root for or what to call a hoagie. Mortenson did such an excellent job of describing the individuals as well as the independent groups involved in his story that it is impossible to lump them together.

The end of the book isn't really an end as much as a giant "to be continued..." notice, and I wouldn't want it any other way. I can imagine how much such a simple thing like clean water can mean to a community over there, and I'm glad to see that improvements are continuing to be made. One thing I noticed towards the end of the book that I did not like, however, was an increased disdain for the U.S. government. I think that one reason that the government can't get a lot of their goals done is due to a lack of support from the types of people they need most. Mortenson's refusal of government funding may have made sense to him, but the government obviously knew that they needed someone with Mortenson's experience to make their goals a reality. Not that the government is infallible, but, in this case, I think Mortenson should have considered his options more carefully.

I think that the Pakistani and Afghan people Mortenson helped prove Mortenson's theory that education will fix a myriad of problems in the Middle East. People like Jahan and Tahira show how in even one generation, a basic education opens so many doors. The two women both intend to educate themselves further in order to benefit their home. Their astounding ability to break cultural barriers and achieve their goals could have only originated from the confidence that a basic education gave them. If, in a few years, Mortenson's success continues, hundreds of similarly minded women will be able to continue his work, and due to this ripple effect, education, acceptance, and eventually peace will hopefully be available for all of the Middle East.

Parma and Genoa

Here is the thing about finding out how things you eat are made: Sometimes, you just don't have a mad desire to know. Like whenever my Grandma says something like, "is the chicken okay" and I say, "Yes, why?" and she goes into a long description of how she ran out of broth and had to use orange juice instead. Don't get me wrong, it still tastes fine and I'm a hungry kid that will eat any of the delicious meals made for me, but it can be sort of puzzling.



Anyway, for a long time, I have had an aversion to ham. It is one of three foods I refuse to eat. For all of you who are saying things like, "What's wrong with her? Ham is the best!" let's recap what we learned about ham:



1. Pigs destined to be ham were fed on whey. That is Parmesan cheese by-product. Yum.

2. Curing ham was difficult because they had to find places to keep it from rotting. The chance of rot is just not good.



So, if nothing else, I have two very plausible excuses next time my father says I'm a disgrace to my heritage for not eating ham. Thank you Mr. Kurlansky!



I was really quite depressed to hear that Venice's refusal to accept the changing of the times lead to its decline. I think that its so frustrating to see people hold on to an illusion of pride for so long that they end up hurting themselves and others. That means you, 72 year old members of Congress. Genoa was smart enough to acknowledge that the Atlantic had surpassed the Mediterranean in importance. And, crazily enough, the discovery of the new continent responsible for this change was a result of someone's quest for spices. They weren't looking for salt though, and I have to admit that I was disappointed that salt wasn't behind the discovery of America. Clearly, this book is starting to get in my head.

MARCO!!! polo... MARCO

Okay, I know that several of us have been talking about salt-tasting parties, and I would just like to throw out a hilarious mental picture for you: All of us are all dressed up carrying around wine glasses with a bit of salt in them, swirling them around and saying posh things like "Hmm... Mined in Egypt. Excellent taste taste and a nice, deep color, however it is a bit gritty...." Quite a funny scenario. You can't deny that these ancients were very into their salt quality. The mine's location, the grain size, the color, the taste...

I was exceedingly happy to see that Venice came up in the book. Venice has to be my favorite city ever (I totally plan to live there and learn to be a glass blower or a CIA agent, whichever has better health benefits), and I have been so disappointed that it hasn't come up yet in our Roman studies. Never fear, though, everyone's favorite salt book is here!

I had know idea that the Seven Seas were near Venice, or that Venice built salt ponds. Of course, the real genius was the Venetians' trading ability. It kind of sounds like they used the Walmart plan: They sell one or two things cheaply and without expecting a profit and people will be more likely to shop their for things the store can make a profit on. And just as Walmart is scarily good at gaining buyers as Venice was at attracting merchants.

As an added bonus, we got to read about Marco Polo. Not only did this guy get an awesome game named after him, he got to tag along with his father and uncle to travel the world. How cool would that be, to had been on another continent when most people still thought the world was flat! Lucky Marco got to see the world and learn how to turn salt into cash from everyone's favorite monopolizers the Chinese!

Finally, we are up to the Romans. Clearly, although all Emperor were an excellently salty bunch, Deocletian was the saltiest Emperor ever, and probablly deserves the title Salt King. Vote Deocletian!!!

I love finding out the origins of everyday words, so the ancient origin of the word salary was quite exciting. I think that getting paid in salt would have been sort of rough. If you got even a tiny hole in your pocket, or if it just rained really hard on your way to the bank, then you would find yourself very broke very quickly.

At first, I thought that salting greens sounded fairly ridiculous, but then I started looking at today's salad dressings. Most of them contain salt. Plus, sometimes I put parmisian cheese on my salad, and that's a fairly salty cheese. Really I think we just took the Roman's idea on that one and went crazy with it! And now, we even have Cesear dressing!

I liked reading about the purple dye. Last year for Mother's Day, I dyed a scarf for my mother and then used salt to make a pattern because the salt crystals would suck up some of the dye. For any of you who choose to try this at home: Do it outside. It is very messy. Trust me.

I was really excited to read about the Celts in this section. I feel like they got a really bad wrap in our Roman video, what with all the mystic curses and all. I mean, they were getting their land and all of their rights taken away from them, so it definitively makes sense for them to be a little on the cranky side. Plus, I saw some really cool Celtic sites while I was in Ireland (I was at Newgrange, which is like the Irish Stonehenge except it was enclosed and a burial ground and held up a lot better. That's a picture of it, way up there!) so I feel like, as far as an ancient people I've never met go, the Celts and I are kinda buds.

Also, I thought that it's very cool that the Celts and the Egyptians are so similar. They both preserved bodies with salt. Also, both cultures had religions that seeped into other areas of their culture (such as government). I guess that this really shouldn't be that surprising, because, as I am now well aware, salt was a very important and rare resource once upon a time, and most ancient cultures' religions that we've learned about were integrated into everyday life on a very basic level. Still, it's very nifty.

Unfortunately for me, the Celts also invented ham. For such a smart people, I feel like this must have been a horrible mistake! "I do not like green eggs and ham. I do not like them, Sam I am." And I really can't believe I just quoted Dr. Seuss. Yuk!

Also, I am very proud of this Mark Kurlansky fellow. I commented on how he has apparently written a book on cod also, and now I am suspecting him of sneaking in some of his previous research on the subject into this book as well. Sneaky, sneaky. I approve!

Sodium Cities of Africa

After our Egyptian unit, it was easy to understand why the Egyptians would find salt so important. Their burials demanded the preservation of the body, and mummification used salt, so it would make sense for salt to be viewed with importance. Personally, I think that inventing salted meat such as delicious, chewy jerky is more valuable to present day, but bunches of archaeologists would probably argue with me on this one. Silly doctorate holders, one bite of deer jerky and they'd change their minds.

Really, I thought that learning about the other areas of Africa was more interesting, most likely because we haven't studied it before. I can't imagine having entire cities made out of salt, or having words to describe different salt compositions. It's strange that an area with so much desert would still value salt so highly; I would think that avoiding salt would help the Africans stay hydrated, but clearly that isn't the case. Still, I think if I was in a massive camel caravan traveling for weeks across a desert, I would pack massive amounts of H2O and leave the NaCl at home.

The thing that really impressed me about this article was that salt has still been a pretty big deal to Africans in modern times. After they were introduced to purified salt, they would add impurities to get a different taste. Salt seems like a strange thing to be picky about, but I guess that I'm pretty picky about the fat content in milk, and it sounds like some of these salts are entirely different compounds, so perhaps that preference makes more sense than mine. Also, they had a quote from a 1957 cook book that talked about reusing salt! My grandma is the queen of saving food and recycling (she was born during the Great Depression, so she has all sorts of nifty tricks for making a bottle of soap last for six months and stuff), but she doesn't reuse salt.

On a side note, did anyone else notice that this author also wrote a book about the importance of cod?! This guy's mom must have been a chef and his father must have been a historian. He has some crazy interests, but I bet he would rock at jeopardy. "Pepper during the Persian Wars for 400, please!"

Yum!

At first, when we were given a book on salt, I was sort of worried. Salt is a food, and food is really and truly awesome, but a whole book on one seasoning seemed rather excessive. Also, salt reminds me of several particularly irritating chemistry labs, but I'll not get into that. Fortunately, my worries were actually unnecessary, because salt hasn't always been so commonplace. The poor ancient Chinese did not have potato chips at the nearest store, so salt had a whole other meaning for them that it does for people today.

It's a little ironic that a substance that people today are told to cut back on was so lacking in ancient people's diets. Today barely-salted health food may be the way to go, but the Chinese realized that they needed salt to stay healthy, it was an important money maker for the government, and the price of salt changed with the economy. In a way, salt was like ancient gasoline. They fought with wars over it, and even had to drill for it like they had to drill for oil. In some ways, things haven't really changed much over the past few thousand years, although until people have to pay taxes in gasoline, I suppose it could get much worse.

In other ways, it's astonishing how quickly the ancient Chinese were able to change their ways of thinking. For example, Li Bing took only four hundred years to go from being a governor to a flood god. That would be like people today worshiping the Puritans or the residents of Jamestown, and really the closest people come to that is celebrating Thanksgiving. Another impressively quick turn-around was their view on natural gas. It went from being a demon to a source of energy in about two hundred years. That is ancient ingenuity at its finest.