Haiti Dinner 2012

July 2009 – – – July 2012

Summer 2009 we started this tradition of making and enjoying Haitian Steak Frites one special night each July. This past weekend was our 2012 night. This dinner has come to seem sort of magical for our family, and raises interesting conversations while we eat it. Two things I want to try to remember about this year’s Haiti Dinner:

1. Owen’s profound and overwhelming verbal adoration of this meal. Sometimes K & O are so verbally expressive, in such over-the-top ways, that it is hard to believe they are for real. But, they are for real, and totally sincere when they say these things. Direct quotes from the dinner table Saturday night– all from Owen– “I just love this dinner!”; “This is the food of my ancestors and I feel like I’m eating with my ancestors right now. I mean, it’s like even though they are not here, it is like they are here.”; “This food is made with love. I feel like I’m eating love!”; “This is food of souls. It’s like my soul is filling up all the way up to Heaven with this food!” As for Kyle, he couldn’t get a word in edgewise with Owen going on and on… plus, Kyle was just slowly but surely eating up his entire delicious meal.
2. We talked about how this is a Haitian meal, but specifically how it is a meal of the “elite” of Haiti. As far as I am aware, this was Kyle and Owen’s first introduction to the concept of the “elite.” And while we didn’t get very deep into it, I could see that they registered the idea. As a sociologist who spends a great deal of time studying/researching/teaching/thinking about privilege/wealth/elites, this was a big deal to me— to begin explicitly discussing this concept with my boys. In the context of this particular dinner, with my particular boys, it felt like an especially note-worthy moment to me.