Traditions...hospitality..."What's ours is yours"...

While in Sheki I take photos and think of topics that I would talk about in my blog later...There are two things that I want to touch upon today...firstly about photos lower that I took in summer in Sheki...

As much as we try to convince our mom not to bother we know that she would still prepare pickles that we love so much during summer...and here we are...famous :) Sheki white cucumbers (that I wrote about earlier on my blog here) and lavish tufts of herbs and greens are bought and later pickles are ready...but who says that we wait for winter...we start enjoying them as soon as they are ready and mom always says "See, you didn't want me to bother...its the same story each year :)))..."

famous :) Sheki white cucumbers...
lavish tufts of herbs and greens...ready pickles...

Just as my mother many women in Azerbaijan especially in the regions still prepare their own pickles and do other home made food stuff during summer for their families to enjoy during winter...I wrote about this on my blog earlier here.

The second topic that I wanted to mention today is about the theme of my today's post...

When we visit Sheki for just couple of weeks in summer almost all the households and relatives we visit want to treat us with something, give presents, so that we, the guests, do not leave with empty hands as we say here...so they start thinking about what they can offer, what they can surprise us with, people who came from capital or elsewhere...they really think about it and get concerned...and...usually the solution is that they start treating the guests with their home made pickles and jams and give guests more to take back home and enjoy during winter...they give healthy stuff to children of the families telling parents how good one or the other fruit is etc etc. The idea is to share with guests what they have...there is a good saying in Russian "чем богаты, тем и рады" that web translated for me as "what's ours is yours" which is what I am trying to describe in this post...An example of touching and sincere gesture of sharing and hospitality.