Conflict Kitchen, located at Schenley Plaza in Oakland, is a “restaurant that only serves cuisine from countries with which the United States is in conflict. Each Conflict Kitchen iteration is augmented by events, performances and discussions that seek to expand the engagement the public has with the culture, politics, and issues at stake within the focus country. The restaurant rotates identities every few months in relation to current geopolitical events,” (quotation taken from the website). The featured country right now is Afghanistan.
The Carnegie Library will have a table with samples of materials pertaining to the featured country every other Tuesday, weather permitting. You can check the items out right at the table!
We were there on Tuesday, June 24th, with CDs, DVDs, fiction, non-fiction and children’s books from or about Afghanistan. Here is a sample of the items we brought with us:
What’s for Lunch?: How Schoolchildren Eat Around the World by Andrea Curtis
CDs –
The Art of the Afghan Rubâb by Homayun Sakhi, rubâb and Toryalai Hashimi, tabla. CD & DVD packaged together.
Song and Dance from the Pamir Mountains by The Badakhshan Ensemble.
Popular TV show modeled after “American Idol.”
Drama chronicling the true story of a young girl in Taliban-ruled Afghanistan who must disguise herself as a boy to save her family from starvation.
Based on the novel by Khaled Hosseini.
The Boy Mir – Ten Years in Afghanistan
Documentary following a boy named Mir as he grows into an adult in Afghanistan.
Restrepo – One Platoon, One Valley, One Year
Documentary chronicling the deployment of a platoon of U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan’s Korengal Valley.
Fear of Beauty, a novel by Susan Froetschel
Adult non-fiction –
Forbidden Lessons in a Kabul Guesthouse: The True Story of a Woman Who Risked Everything to Bring Hope to Afghanistan by Suraya Sadeed
Children’s fiction –
The Breadwinner Trilogy by Deborah Ellis, an international bestselling trilogy about refugee children under the oppressive rule of the Taliban.
The Breadwinner, Parvana’s Journey, and Mud City
The Wooden Sword: A Jewish Folktale from Afghanistan by Ann Redisch Stampler
Children’s non-fiction –
Afghan Dreams: Young Voices of Afghanistan by Tony O’Brien
Interviews and photographs of real children from Afghanistan.
The Carnegie Library will be back at Conflict Kitchen on July 8th from 11:30 to 2:00, when the featured country will be Venezuela.
Stop by!
-Joelle
*Staff photographs by Joelle Killebrew and Tara Goe
Eleventh Stack 
As Sharon Souza points out, “Conflict is the DNA of fiction.” Thank you, Carnegie Library, for sharing “Fear of Beauty” with so many readers in Pittsburgh and including the book for your day at Conflict Kitchen!
Thank you! It was our pleasure! We were hoping to show off the breadth of the collection by including materials from all over the library. People connect with issues in different ways.