In this first‑person narrative, Zach Selch recounts a post‑Gulf War assignment in Jordan where he was hired to survey concrete companies. While driving a small, air‑condition‑less manual car through the desert during the hot summer Ramadan, he picks up a Bedouin hitchhiker who invites him to break the fast in his remote village. Selch describes the makeshift village setting, the communal preparation of the Iftar meal, and the cultural protocol that the honored guest receives a whole stewed chicken. As the chicken is passed around by the 50‑person gathering, Selch humorously realizes he must eat every piece to survive the social pressure. He ultimately devours the chicken with childlike delight, thanks the hosts, and returns to his car for a four‑hour desert drive back to Amman for a drink, a shower, and sleep. The story highlights the intersection of professional duty, cultural immersion, and the generosity of Bedouin hospitality during Ramadan.
Chapters
So right after the first Gulf War, I got out of the Army and I'm living in Jordan, and a multinational corporation hires me to do a survey of the concrete companies in Jordan. So I rent this little tiny car with a stick shift and no air conditioning, and my plan is I'm going to drive around the whole country and look for big construction sites, and I'm going to follow the mixing trucks back to the batch plants and document them. And to complicate things, It's Ramadan, and you can't buy or consume food or beverages during daylight hours, and it's one of the years where Ramadan falls in the summer, so the days are really long and hot. So I'm driving around the country, taking pictures of batching plants, and after about 3 weeks, I end up at the very last little kilometer of road in Jordan, and I cross it off my map. And I'm done. And I'm in the very southwest corner of Jordan, and I'm heading back home. So I point my car north, and I figure I have about a 4-hour drive through the desert, and then I get home and I'll have a drink and a shower and sleep in my own bed. And as I'm driving, I see a hitchhiker, and it's not a German tourist with a backpack, it's a Bedouin man, an old man sitting by the side of the road with a And I wave him into my car out of the 110-degree heat, and we drive north together. And he points to his little village, which is essentially a group of shacks and huts and tents with sheep and goats and donkeys and camels by the side of the road. And he says to me, he goes, come in and eat. And I say, it's Ramadan, I can't. He goes, do you fast? And I said, no, but you fast, you're my host. I can't eat if my host is fasting. So he says, come in and break the fast with my family. And I think, as much as I don't wanna drive through the night through the desert, and as much as I really wanna get home and have a drink and sleep in my own bed, this is an opportunity of a lifetime to break the fast with a Bedouin family. So I go in, And picture a big building, cinder blocks, dirt floor with a carpet over it, and a corrugated fiberglass ceiling. And there is a chair, a single chair on one side of the room, and at the other side of the room there's a plastic table and a dung fire and jerry cans of water, and the women are making dinner. And there's a flurry of activity. He makes me sit in his chair. And And kids go running to tell everybody in the village that there's a guest here, and somebody brings a chicken in. And within a few minutes, there are about 50 people sitting on the floor looking at me, and it looks like they're expecting me to deliver a keynote. And my level of Arabic really doesn't allow me to speak more than, you know, a few sentences. And for about 2 hours, we stare at each other. And then they call to prayer, and then we sit down on the floor for dinner. And they bring out this big platter of white rice that is studded with shreds of chicken and slivers of almonds and raisins. And I understand this is the regular scheduled meal for the clan to break the fast. But at one end of the platter is an entire scrawny stewed chicken that has been cooked in yogurt sauce. And I realize that this is intended for the honored guest. And while everybody else is going to be eating rice, I will be dining off of chicken. So I grab the chicken in my right hand and I tear it and I thrust half of it to the old man and I'm like, Mmm. And have some chicken. And he goes, no, no, no, you have to have it all. So I try another old man, and I try the oldest lady in the room. And now I'm getting a little desperate, 'cause I realize I'm gonna have 50 people eating rice, and I'm gonna be eating this valued community commodity here that's all for me. So I'm carrying the chicken, and I'm trying to give it to kids, and I'm trying to give it to pregnant people, and I'm passing it back, and they're all passing it back to me. And within seconds, everybody in the village has actually handled my dinner. And the chicken looks like it's been through a commercial shredder. And I realize there is no way that I'm leaving here alive if I don't eat every last shred of this chicken. So I sit down and I start eating chicken. And I eat it like a 5-year-old eating a big bowl of chocolate ice cream. I'm going, yum, yum, yum, yum. And I'm patting my belly and I'm smiling. And I'm eating this, and I'm trying not to think about all these people who have touched my dinner. And I get it down, and I lick the bones clean, and I thank everybody profusely, and I get back into my little tiny manual car with no air conditioning, and I drive 4 hours through the desert back to Amman to my stiff drink and a bed and a shower.
