HW 34: Cultural Differences

In Baghdad Burning, Riverbend mentions that gold is very big in family savings in Iraq. The way she makes it seem is that, people have gold to sell, because the price of gold never changes. So when people get married, the man gives the woman gold jewelry, also known as a “mahar” or when a baby is born the gifts are usually little golden trinkets that the parents can either keep or sell. Riverbend explains “People began converting their money to gold-earrings, bracelets, necklaces-because the value of gold didn’t change. People pulled their money out of banks before the war, and bought gold instead.” (Riverbend 100) This is why gold has such a big role in family savings, because gold is the savings, there is no money. Riverbend then discusses the custom of evening tea in Iraq. “In the evening, most Iraqi families gather together for “evening tea.” It’s hardly as formal as it sounds… No matter how busy the day, everyone sits around in the living room, waiting for tea.” (Riverbend 108) She says that the tea in Iraq is not like having tea here. Here, we use teabags, in Iraq they go through a three-step process just to make tea. “Tea is so important in Iraq, that it makes up a substantial part of the rations we’ve been getting ever since the sanctions were imposed upon the country. People drink tea with breakfast, the drink tea at midday, they drink tea in the evening and often drink tea with dinner.” I don’t know about you… but I didn’t know that tea was such a big thing.