# Question about Amish



## Pefird (Nov 10, 2009)

Hello.
I want to write a story about a runaway Amish woman. I just don't know that much about them. For instance how might a runaway be punished? How would a typical runaway behave. If anyone knows anything that could help I'd appreciate it.


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## IrishBard (Nov 10, 2009)

mate... you're looking in the wrong place entirely to ask for amish lifestyle


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## Big Beautiful Dreamer (Nov 10, 2009)

Amish youth are permitted and even encouraged to have a "running-around time," called _rumschpringe_, before their baptism, which can be anywhere from ages 16 upward, some choosing not to be baptized until 22 or 23, although that is rare. During the _rumschpringe_ they experiment with wearing "English," or non-Amish, clothes, putting battery-operated radios and fancy decorations on their buggies, going to movies, drinking beer, and sometimes sharing an apartment and "living English." After this running-around time, approximately 85 percent of them join the Amish faith with baptism.

If someone was a runaway because they chose to stay English after their _rumschpringe_, they could continue to live outside the Amish community and still visit their family and friends with no penalties, although individual family members might choose to cut them dead.

If, however, someone chose to run away after having been baptized, they would be subject to the _Meidung_, or shunning.

Someone under the _Meidung_, also called the _bann, _could not eat at the same table with an Amish person. The Amish person cannot speak to the person under the _bann nor take any item from the shunned person's hand. Family members who wish to sometimes get around those proscriptions by, for example, laying one tablecloth over two adjoining tables.

If someone already baptized ran away, the family would grieve, and would wait for word to filter back to them that the person was living English, but would not pursue the person and would certainly not bring in the police. "It's not our way," you would hear them say. 

Only in the case of an Amish person who is known to be mentally disturbed, and who runs away and is found by an Englischer or non-Amish person, would anything be done, and only then if the Amish person was found by someone who knew something about the Amish and had an idea whom to contact.

The largest Amish communities are in Ohio, Indiana, and Pennsylvania. John Hostetler (might be spelled Hostettler) has a good nonfiction overview of the Amish, although I can't recall its title.

Feel free to post on the Story Writers' Forum again if you need specific questions answered, and I'll be on the lookout._


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## Pefird (Nov 11, 2009)

I thought this was entirely the right place to inquire, because it will be a weight gain story. Possibly with some feeding or even force feeding involved, but I'm not sure. 

I wanted the character to be Amish to explore a little bit of those forbidden desire issues someone who grew up with strict moral and religious rules would have to deal with. A sort of "dirty girl" story. I was trying to see if growing up Amish would lend itself to her gaining weight outside of the Amish community. Maybe she has a tendency to cook at home more and a tendency to make meals that are quite large. And then maybe if she has this roommate that's a skinny little woman then the Amish woman would "over-cook" and feel bad about throwing away the leftovers. And so the Amish woman would feel somehow compelled to eat them rather than through them away. I don't know if that might be in their culture or maybe something else. Some other sort of compulsions she might have. Some compulsion someone outside her Amish community might be able to twist to make her eat more. Something like that.


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## tankgirl (Nov 12, 2009)

....Try Catholic.


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## Big Beautiful Dreamer (Nov 20, 2009)

Many Amish people have large families and are used to cooking for community gatherings. If you put her with a non-Amish roommate, you could realistically have her cooking lots of good homemade food, which the roommate would eat little portions of. The Amish girl could then indulge on the plentiful leftovers, both because they're tasty and because she feels guilty/lonely. 

Amish typically respect an individual's privacy to the level of being unlikely to comment, at least to the girl's face, if she returns to her community displaying a significant weight gain. On the other hand, because she hasn't had the cultural exposure that non-Amish have, if while she is living in the "English" world she becomes friendly with an FA guy, she would likely not be taken aback when he compliments her fuller figure.

Popular Amish foods:

shoofly pie
frankfurter rafts (hotdog-mashed potato casserole)
yummasetti (a ground beef casserole, very rich and fatty)
roasht (chicken and stuffing)
pickled beets
butter bread
molasses cookies
homemade noodles
bean soup


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## Durin (Nov 20, 2009)

I know several Mennonite folks and they are usually skinny or very very heavy. Amish folks are not what you would call fat phobic.


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## KuroBara (Nov 22, 2009)

Big Beautiful Dreamer said:


> Popular Amish foods:
> 
> shoofly pie
> frankfurter rafts (hotdog-mashed potato casserole)
> ...


 
This sounds luscious!! Is there an Amish cookbook somewhere?


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## Big Beautiful Dreamer (Nov 30, 2009)

Lots of them. Try farmers' markets, also eBay or just google. Many of the recipes will say "makes 12 dozen" or some feeds-a-crowd number.


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