A Random Essay on Kebabs

These days, one of our favorite places to end up after a night out is Best Kebabs. Sure, the name is simple and straightforward, maybe because the owners don’t really know much English (even though they obviously know what college kids want at three in the morning).But its cheap: £2-4 for a chicken Kebab (I can’t think in dollars anymore, its too painful), and I like the feeling of a bunch of Americans and Brits eating in a shop right along with Palestinians and Bengali. It’s very United Nations, if half the United Nations wore sequined Euro outfits and sang Justice after clubbing.

I also like the fact that when I chose to study abroad in London, I had absolutely no idea this is what it would entail. I pictured fries from a late-night “chipper” and getting used to the taste of vinegar instead of ketchup. Ending up in East London in 2008 is a strange mix of Harlem’s danger, Bleecker Street’s urban youth scene, and LA’s waves of immigration. When I walk down the street, I can hear the Bengali version of Spanglish—mothers telling their children “No!” followed by a string of indiscernible sounds, or businessmen asking “What do you want?” to a customer whose pointing and gesturing mutely. At Best Kebabs, our regular server Caleb understands only the numbers one through nine that correspond to menu choices; when it comes to a side of chips or a kebab without lettuce, we have to go to the owner (Caleb’s dad), Mori.

The British kids who’ve taken a liking to us—which is really more of a strange mix between friendship and amusement—don’t seem to think much of the East End and the cultural milieu taking place here that I can’t seem to get over. I wonder, and I’m quite convinced, in fact, if at home we notice our Mexican immigrants serving us at McDonald’s as little as they notice the Palestinians serving them at Best Kebabs.

At home, immigration is a big debate. We wonder what effect legal and illegal immigration from South America is having on our country and what we should do about it. In my hometown in New Jersey, our half-white/half-black division has been shaken up by 4,000 new immigrant households. Parents argue over public schools and taxes and the use of the Spanish language, while kids grow up in bilingual classrooms eating peanut butter and jelly one day and taquitos the next. The historically poorer African Americans in my town have been mostly pushed out by immigrants who can pay higher rent after working as day laborers in construction, landscaping, and housekeeping. The town is in a critical state of flux, and I’m not sure any of my friends who eat at Domino’s on Saturday nights have any idea.

In the UK, immigration is also a national talking point. Riding the tube into central, I read a feature article in the Observer on “homegrown terrorism,” the idea that second- or third-generation Brits of Middle Eastern descent are more of a danger to London subways than anyone in Afghanistan right now. The report analyzes tons of figures and testimonies in trying to understand how these British-born Muslims can wage war on the same people they shared a second-grade classroom with. They find no definitive evidence except to say that any of the Eastern-looking people we see on the street at any time could be getting ready to attack us. That is their conclusion.

So I eat my Best Kebab at 3AM on Saturday nights and I make polite conversation with Caleb and Mori. They nod and say “the American” in my direction, which leaves me unsettled. The Brits, they carry on with their talk of seeing Amy Winehouse wandering the streets of central. I think, “this is what studying abroad is,” recognizing the similarities and differences between their idle chatter and our own. But, like the Observer, that doesn’t make it any clearer to me why being “the American” at Best Kebabs could be a danger to me, or how I should view the illegal gardener when I go home to New Jersey. So I’ve landed in East London in 2008 and am more thoroughly confused by the world around me than I was in New Jersey in 2007, but I can promise you this: I never would have eaten a Best Kebab with a bunch of Euro teens ignoring Caleb if I were sitting at Domino’s in Red Bank, New Jersey.