"Let nothing human be alien to me"- Terence

Friday, February 19, 2010

New Yoker On Qat

Good article by Joshua Hersh, though I might be biased to anything that quotes me, even with such a sarcastic, snark-laden bit.   Here's Hersh's close.


Eventually, my taxi arrived at the journalist’s house, and he offered me some qat. Friedman wrote that he had tried qat—he stopped chewing after fifteen minutes, he said—and I wasn’t going to let him out-Yemen me. Breaking off the small, soft leaves, I chewed on them, three or four at a time. No major revelations, although my notes got a little sloppy, then ceased altogether. Later I was told that it sometimes takes a few sessions before you really “get it.” I’ll have to give it another go.


2 comments:

  1. I have nothing intelligent to add, other than to note the disquieting shade of green I am turning after seeing you quoted by The New Yorker.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'd be curious to do a follow-up with the students and see what their take was on the qat issue. Would it fall along a traditional conservative-liberal/standard drug-use conversation? Or would they understand the vast cultural differences?

    ReplyDelete