After the afternoon prayer, the houses of Kuwait kept a fixed appointment called “shay al asr”. The head of the household was back from work, had eaten and prayed, the older sons likewise, and the woman of the house had finished her rest after lunch. So everyone gathered — men and women together — in one sitting.
What was put out
Tea, coffee and nuts, and with them something sweet: gers ageeli, birr al walidain (the ilba), sometimes baydh al gata, or khanfaroosh — a fried disc — or luqaimat, or sub al gafsha, or dates.
And the fruit had its own instruction
Usually raggi — watermelon in Kuwaiti — and sometimes battikh, the melon. The head of the household would say “aflishu al raggiya” or “aflihu al raggiya”, meaning cut it into suitable pieces and serve it. A phrase now said as a joke, which was then a plain instruction.
What was said in the sitting
The father spoke about his work and what had happened in it, and urged everyone to strive. The woman of the house spoke about the household and what it needed, about her view of what she had served at rayoug and lunch, and what she intended for dinner. The sons and daughters spoke about their hopes, and about the neighbours and relatives.
Which made the sitting the running of a household, not only a rest: it held a budget, an assessment of the food, and the arrangement of what came next.
It did not survive
The writer says the custom has not lasted, replaced by scattered gatherings after lunch that keep some of its features without matching it for togetherness. The difference is not in the tea but in the appointment being the same one for everybody.
Photo: slices of watermelon on a plate. By Rameshng, CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons.
Source: Dr Saud Mohammad Al Osfour, “Dreesha Turathiya: afternoon tea, an old Kuwaiti custom”, Al Qabas, 31 October 2019.
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