Week Ending 18 November

We are feeling so blessed this week by the arrival of Charles Eugene Hurst (8lbs 7 oz; 21.5“) who joined our family at 1:30 Tuesday afternoon, November 13.  We are so excited he is finally here!  What a beautiful boy!!  That brings our total to six precious grandsons.

We are so proud of Briana and Philip inviting this gift from heaven into this world and into their home.  He is a blessed child, they a blessed family. 

 We were very happy to see Henry accepting and gently holding and teaching his new little brother.  In the hospital Henry held him for nearly an hour and began teaching him about life:  water is like milk but is clear!  Henry also tried to teach Charlie to snap his fingers and couldn’t understand why he couldn’t do it.  And Henry later exclaimed that he (Charlie) smells like pepperoni!  Elliott is also accepting but more interested in playing than being concerned about his new brother.  They returned home Wednesday and, with Briana’s mom helping, are quickly developing their new routine.  Right now, for Charlie and Briana, that is eating every couple of hours.  Precious times.  Relative to this, other events of the week are truly mundane.

Friday morning my good friend and Hindi teacher Nirmla Dass shared her breakfast with me.  She made this delicious chole (chickpea curry) and dosha.  It was so delicious, I am going to try making some myself.

That evening we attended Synagogue with our friend Justin.  He was just ordained to the Melchizedek Priesthood a few weeks ago and is trying to get ready to serve a mission.

Saturday we worked all day and then, around 4:15 called an Uber to head for Old Delhi for a fascinating street food walk.  (Neither of us got sick btw.)  We started in the Hindu part of town.  First stop was Manohar Dhaba which is known for its unique fan shaped"Japani" Samosas.  "Wale" (pronounced wala) means a seller or vendor of something e.g."Japani Samosa Wale."

 

Here is the kitchen.  Dish washing was happening on the ground behind the counter.

Here is a Japani Samosa (a little potato in the middle) with chole and pickle on the side.  It was delicious.

Next stop was a tikka (fried potato patties) stand in the electronics market.  They were delicious too .

We walked past the Gurudwara Sis Ganj Sihab built in 1783 to commemorate the martyrdom site of the ninth Sikh Guru, Guru Tegh Bahadur.  The street was filled with a Hare Krishna procession.  Among other things orange robed priests were throwing bananas from a flatbed.  We caught one and were hit by another.

We turned down a narrow ally to find this shop selling malpua, a sort of fried sweet milk pancake.

The guy next door was making something interesting too.  Not quite sure what it was.

Back out on the street we found the "Lemon Wale" selling an interesting Indian version of lemonade.

Besides lemon and sugar, it is made with black salt (with a sulfur taste) and masala.  It reminded us of a spicy Gatorade.

Next we walked into the Muslim quarter, down toward the Jamma Masjid, India's largest mosque, where we found non-veg food.  Some of our group stopped in this shop. That is our guide explaining the dish we were about to try.

Here they served a dish of slow cooked buffalo meat with warm chapati--beef is strictly forbidden.  The white is fat, added on purpose!!!  Obviously we avoided that.  The buffalo was surprisingly tasty and tender though.

This handsome boy was working in the shop, clearing tables and staring at us.

 The rest of the group went to the "Dream Restaurant" where they serve only chicken.

 They are known for a "butter chicken" dish of roasted chicken with a butter, pepper and cream sauce.

Next stop was Hira Lal (Red Diamond) Chaat (snack) Wale where we had kulle chaat.  Its an interesting combination of fruits and vegetables.  That night we had hollowed out chunks of musk melon and pineapple stuffed with masala, black sulfur salt, lime juice boiled chickpeas and pomegranate seeds. It was delicious and unlike anything we have ever tasted before.

We ended the evening with a couple of more sweets.  One was a sort of bread pudding with cooked condensed milk (above) and the other was chana dalh halwa, a sweet mush made of lentils or chickpeas.  Grant loved the latter and had two servings.

Sunday morning was our Malviya Nagar Ward Primary Presentation!  Nirmla, our Primary President, made lots of phone calls and we had many children there.  They did beautifully.  We were especially grateful to have Elder Cheng from Kentucky to play the piano for us. Sure love those kids!

Aryan and Rehana are two of our darling Valiants.

In the evening we had a stake Mission Preparation activity.  We started with a "White Handbook Relay."  The first task was to button and unbutton a white shirt.

Next, the youth had to use their sweeping skills.

Finally, they had to flip a roti.

Elders Epuri, Mekala, and Gola are from south India.

After the relays, Elders Gola and Mekala, the Assistants to the President, answered questions about serving a mission.  They did an excellent job.  They are very impressive young men.

 Front row left to right are the Pecks, our office couple, Sister Hansen, the mission president's wife, Sister and President Ramakrishna, our stake president, the Skidmores, a MLS couple and me.  Behind us are a few current missionaries and a bunch of future missionaries.  Great people!

For more information about what we are involved in and what is going on in India, visit the web page that we manage at mormonnewsroom.in