My Onions

"Mes oignons" (my business). Frenchies can also often be heard using the expression "Te mele pas de mes oignons"(don't meddle with me). Onions are also the friends of the poor. Used to be is more accurate as they have gone 5 times more expensive within a week in India, a similar inflation occured in Egypt a few years ago and since the price never came down.
The pictures above are from the fifties and are set somewhere in Egypt near Alexandria and are a kind of documentation about an onion pickle factory. Those pictures were probably taken by a Greek Alexandrian by the name of Constantin Rittas. I own an extensive collection of his pictures. I also have a few of the portraits he used to do commercially for the Alexandrian beauties. Actually I wanted to do an exhibition featuring his works as I thought that they could do a good show about Alexandrian society from the 40's to the late 70's.
Retournons a nos oignons.
Onions are as important as bread for many around the world who survive mainly on a diet of those two ingredients. I heard about someone who claims that he always keeps a few onion bulbs and a big bag of flour just in case some global catastrophe happens. He says that onions are very sturdy plants, fast growing and that within a few days he could start eating from the bulbs he would have planted, and avoid dying of hunger. All this came back to me when I read that within a week onions have gone up in India from 5 rupees to 25. On the other hand though one should also notice what Fidel said to Hugo :
"The idea of using food to produce fuel is tragic, is dramatic. No one is sure how high the price of food will rise when soy is being used for fuel, with the need there is in the world to produce eggs, milk, to produce meat. It is a tragedy. One of many today."

I wonder where we are going.


Rabena Yostor


weddings and belly dancers by Constantin Rittas