It’s a peculiar thing, this persistent European impulse to share their essence with me – be it saliva or finger residue – as if communion is best achieved through the transference of bodily fluids. I’d like to tell you it’s a one-off phenomenon, a curious cultural exchange gone awry, but naw. I know a pattern when I see one, and I have questions.
Take my recent visit to the Cu Chi Tunnels in Vietnam, for example. Imagine me, all 6’1”, 225 pounds of determined traveler, squeezing through spaces clearly designed with a slimmer and shorter prototype in mind. The average Vietnamese man was five-foot-four, 115 pounds at the time these tunnels were built, and it was likely snug on them. My shoulders brushed dirt walls, my knees kissed the earth, and I emerged on the other side baptized in sweat and the same claustrophobia that makes my aunt Jackie want a window installed on her casket when her time comes. The reward for not passing out underground, for my knees not buckling during the 30-meter duck walk, and for only busting my head one was a few pieces of cassava, a root so shy, it hides its flavors under layers of starch and nothingness. They served it with a side of what can only be described as minced peanuts, and as I reached my arm – the one not torn apart by mosquitoes – to dip my unbitten piece into the bowl, I saw it – her hand. A German woman, seated across from me, dipped her already-bitten cassava chunk into the shared bowl like it was the most natural thing in the world.
My elbow locked mid-reach, my hand recoiling as if I’d almost brushed it against shit. Surely, I thought, the others would rise up in collective revulsion, ready to defend the sanctity of untainted minced peanuts. But no. One by one, they followed her lead, dipping and double-dipping and going in with raw fingers to sprinkle nuts on their root with the carefree abandon of people who’d clearly never heard the phrase “don’t put your germs in the communal food.” There I sat, the lone dissenter, unable to hide the repulsion of that part of my face between my eyebrows and soul patch, clutching my untainted cassava like a lifeline.
This wasn’t my first brush with moist European generosity. A few years ago, I hosted a dinner party in a small town and tacked the invitation to a telephone pole: “Dinner. Mediterranean. Tonight. Come.” Seventeen strangers showed up, and we sat cross-legged on the floor, sharing stories and slapping arms when good laughs came. We were like old friends. It was beautiful, chaotic, and exactly the kind of thing I’d do again – until it wasn’t.
Mid-conversation, as I listened intently to the person on my left, the woman on my right – a French expat from Menton – called my name. I turned, expecting a question or maybe a compliment on the baba ghanoush I suggested she order. Instead, her hummus-coated fingers, glistening with olive oil and possibly backwash, darted into my mouth before I could process what was happening. I froze, unsure whether to gag, scream, or politely chew.
“You like?” she asked, as if this was a perfectly normal thing to do.
I did not like.
I grew up so few rules, but one I remember being written on a wall was “Don’t eat after anybody.” I probably wrote it on the wall. Even after receiving the sacred Cootie vaccine in kindergarten then again in third grade, I’d maintained a strict no-swapping policy. I mean, at least in most places. So how did I become a magnet for cross-continental contamination?
It’s not that I don’t appreciate the sentiment behind these moments. There’s a certain earnestness to it, a misguided attempt at intimacy that’s almost endearing if you squint. Maybe they see it as a gesture of trust, a way of saying, “Here, have a piece of me.” But here’s the thing: I don’t want a piece of you. I want the peanuts, the baba ghanoush, the cassava, unsullied by whatever you had for lunch, whoever you kissed, and wherever you put your fingers when you thought all heads were turned.
Communion is beautiful, but some things are better left unshared.
