Burned toast? Why would anyone eat burned toast? you ask. That's a question only folks today would ask . . . Marash Girl is tempted to be sarcastic and answer, "Because they didn't have cake!" Or perhaps they ate the burned toast because they knew that if they ate burned toast, they'd find money. At least that's what kids were told during the depression and post-depression years (late 1930's, 1940's) in the good old USA.
When Marash Boy was a young 'un in Springfield, Massachusetts, his grandmother, Turvant Dakessian Sanjian (a survivor of the Armenian Genocide, born in Marash) would promise him that if he ate the toast that had burned, he would find money. He believed his grandmother, because his grandmother's words always proved true. Whenever the toast was burned (and why it would be burned so often, one can only guess -- perhaps the bread slice was too fat for the slot in the pop-up Sunbeam toaster of the day and did not "pop up" as quickly as it should have -- perhaps someone had gummed up the works by sticking a knife into the toaster to salvage the stuck toast and instead of spearing the toast, had speared the delicate wire basket holding the toast, ensuring the burning of future toast, or perhaps someone had set the dial incorrectly for the slice of Menzmama's home made, home sliced bread), Marash Boy ate it, and soon after the eating, would head out with his grandmother, following the trails through the wooded back lots, and as sure as shootin' (to use an old cowboy phrase), Marash Boy would find coins along the trail.
Now how could that be?
I much prefer your grandmother's theory!! According to my grandfather, it put hair on your chest. That was all well and good for him - the one who ALWAYS burned the Syrian bread, but not so good for his six little granddaughters who had to grow up worrying about that!! ;)
ReplyDelete