A little local Ongole bar

Of coarse Ongole has some nice western style bars in some of the hotels and fancier restaurants but I wanted to show you what the smaller local bars look like. You may notice some red stains on the walls, though they could be blood it is probably just the beetle nut juice that Indians like to chew and spit. It stains their teeth as well as the walls red.




The beer is Royal Challenge and though there are several to choose from this is my favorite. Though the more popular King Fisher beer is also good. This beer costs slightly less than $2 and you can get fried snacks for 30 cents. Most Indians favor water and whiskey/gin/brandy with some club soda or 7 up. India has tried to outlaw beer a number of times and recently has just decided to tax it heavily. I believe I read that it has a 300% tax on it, though I could be wrong about that.

How to dig a bore well, Indian style

First you can see that they are well underway at this point. The well is already about 20 feet deep. They drill out the first 15 -20 feet with a screw like device that goes fairly quick. Once they get to the water level though they have to switch to a laborious pounding device that slowly works it’s way down.




You can see the platform they have set up to work on. As they bore deeper the platform settles down until it hits ground level then they must add another 5 feet of casing on and start the process over.





You can see the piles of sand, they make these slowly by getting about 1/2 foot worth of sand then hauling it up to deposit it. It was about 98 degrees this day and they were trying to get done before the afternoon sun really started beating down. They finished two 25 foot wells in about 7 hours just beating the worst of the afternoon heat.

Jenneli is much better

A few people asked to make certain Jenneli was ok. I'm sorry I didn't update sooner to let everyone know she is. Her Deli Belly only lasted a day and she took care of it quickly so within 2 days she was 100%.

Sadly I've been having a tough time getting pictures uploaded so that's my excuse for not getting something new up. Hopefully tonight or tomorrow I'll get them up and have a few blog posts.

A quick wrap of of the past week though: We have 2 people from EWB-Houston here to implement the washstations, AnnMarie and Bryan, Jenneli and I should be out of Ongole and back in travel mode by the end of this week, the lab reports on the wells came back, and the best news of all... It's cooler! The temperature is back down in the mid 80s and the monsoons have started. We had some increadible weather to mark the occasion and quite a bit of rain.

How to make Gongura Curry

Bindu’s aunt, we call her Amma, kindly showed me how to make Gongura Curry! This hands down is my favorite food, so far, in India and Amma makes it the best! To have her show me how she makes it is a huge honor and with any kind of luck I’ll be able to make it when I get back. Though unfortunately it might be a little hard or challenging to find all the ingredients :( The process is pretty straight forward and I provided ample pictures to help along the way. So here it goes:

Amma’s Gongura Curry!

You’ll need Gongura leaves, which may be hard to find. Its English name is Roselle. It’s basically a spicy form of spinach, I’m not sure if you can just use spinach, if you try it please comment on how you did!!!!!!!!!!! (Seriously all help would be greatly appreciated!) You’ll also need thotakura (Amaranth) and pope leaves

Ingredients:

Gongura leaves (Roselle) - 6 cups (I couldn’t actually measure it, you should look at the pictures)
Thotakura leaves (Amaranth) - 6 cups (again look at the picture, but it was half this half Gongura)
Tomatoes – 4
Green Chili (hot, without tops) - 10
Onions (small red) - 3
Red chili powder – 1/3 cup (hard to tell see picture)
Salt – 1/3 cup (again hard to tell see picture)
Water – 1 liter
Parsley – a small bunch

From the pictures you can kind of see what’s going on. You need to chop up the onions and mix everything together (except parsley). She added the ingredients in the same order I listed them. After that put it on High heat with a stir every 5 minutes. After 8-10 minutes add the parsley. Cook it for 25-30 minutes.

After it’s cooked you’ll need to strain out the water, but save it, and mash the contents of the mixture. It took her about 8 minutes to mash it completely. It should look something like the picture. Salt to taste.

Next you also need to cook the spices that will go in it. You’ll need the following for that:
3 tablespoons of oil
1 red dried pepper
1/4 cup lentils (Please see picture, it has other stuff in it too but I don’t know what)
1 sliced onion
1 bunch of leaves (she said pope, but I don’t think that’s what they were, I think they were curry leaves. She used about 15.)

Mix on high heat till reaches a nice redness, it took her about 8 minutes to do that.
Mix it with the main pot when it’s finished the mash.
Your done! Eat with some good basmati rice, or even plain white rice.

It’s the best!

Please email me or leave comments, I’ll update the recipe as people tell me how they did!

Spicy Chicken!

This is my friend Unjaneyana (Unjanu). I’ve grown to know him because he makes absolutely the best deep fried spicy check the world has ever known! I literally have it every evening if at all possible and after probably 15 dishes I have yet to get tired of it. He is also one interesting individual. He’s getting married on the 23rd and I might be able to attend the wedding! He said that up till a few months ago he was trouble but that he has changed his ways and decided to settle down. (You’ll have to ask me about him as I have lots of stories)

I'm actually taking a break from blogging right now so I can go have some spicy chicken!

Providing Water & Wash Stations

Jenneli took this picture of Raghu and I on the bus heading out to the villages. As always I have my precious water with me. We went out to the villages several times this week as the projects are starting to ramp up. It feels good to be working on the projects and seeing forward motion. We went to CPPP to hunt for well locations and after a couple trips and help from SDRWC we have 3 test wells being dug. We’ll know next week after we are able to test the water whether or not it will be suitable for drinking. You’ll also have to wait for the pictures of the well being dug. Trust me it’s worth it to see. (I forgot those on Jenneli’s computer)

Our relationship with SDRWC is also going very well. Joseph, the president, even let me know he reads the blog! He has been very helpful with all kinds of project related work and without his negotiation skills and reputation with the villagers I’m not sure we could get much of anything done. He also speaks great English and also has taken us out to dinner a few times which I enjoy as it gives me the opportunity to ask all the questions about India I’ve stored up.

The wash stations at SRP are also coming along. Jenneli and I visited the site with Raghu to work with the villagers on exactly where to put them. What we thought would take several hours in the heat, turned out to only take 20 minutes as the villagers had some great locations very close to where we thought they might work out! As soon as we get the go ahead from Ann Marie we can begin construction. We want to start as soon as possible as it’s the dry season right now and by the first week of July it’ll start raining and slow down everything. I should also add that this was Raghu’s village and it was a lot of fun to see his community.

Bindu's Engagement party

Bindu had her engagement party and as mentioned earlier poor sickly Jenneli wasn’t able to attend. Though the next day she had improved and was back to 100% (or close to it) by Sunday. The party was held at Bindu’s house and though a small space they had more than 50 people attend! Because of the limited space I wasn’t able to take as many pictures as I wanted but I do have a couple for you. Like a wedding Bindu got dressed up as well as had henna on her hands and feet. Food is served to everyone and the couple exchange rings. Everyone seemed very excited to be there and as always the food tasted excellent!

For more information about Indian engagements and Indian weddings as a whole you can go here: http://weddings.iloveindia.com/indian-weddings/pre-wedding-functions/engagement-rituals.html

Doom strikes Jenneli!

Yesterday morning Jenneli started feeling ill and by 2pm she was full on not well. I won't go into details as they aren't pretty but she is doing better now after some antibiotics and some other drugs. I'm pretty sure it was just a bacteria infection and she should be 100% tomorrow. The worst part about it was that she had to miss Bindu's wedding engagement party! :( I'll blog about that soon with some pictures. We still don't know what could have caused it since I didn't fall ill but it could be that I have some anti-bodies built up from the past month.

Odds and Ends and some Pictures!

I thought I might take a moment and share with you some more Indian culture with a few photos and some explanation:

You might have thought making food with a mortar and pestle was ancient history but you would be wrong. This could also be why the curry is so good here! I also passed the craftsman that hand carves the mortar and pestles. He is always busy so there must be a steady demand. I can't imagine them breaking.









I've talked about Indian toilets before but if hear is a picture if you haven't seen one.








Yep that's me! I'm wearing a dhoti because it's the coolest clothing I can get and not offend the natives. In larger cities I can wear shorts but inOngole it's best to wear pants. I usually don't wear the dhoti out of the house because I haven't mastered the wrap and it has a tendency to come undone. Plus I think people can tell it's not done right. Hopefully in the coming weeks someone will clue me in.






Those would be water buffalo, I'll have to blog about the crazy ongole cow they have here at a different point. The water Buffalo lounge around and basically just act like cows in the town. You'll see
them laying in the middle of the street or munching on some food off to
the side. You might also see a couple little pigs in the front. This is
also right in front of ourapartment.

It’s beginning to cool off!

I’m not sure if you can share in our appreciation of this image. If you look closely it reads 87 F! After almost a month of constant temperatures in the 90s-100s day and night it finally got into the 80s last night. Today has been cooler as well being in the low 90s. I can’t tell you how happy this makes us. It’s brought welcome relieve from the oppressive heat and we are once again thinking about actually doing some exploring that doesn’t involve finding a cooler place.

EWB – San Diego – The quest for clean water.

As part of our volunteer work Jenneli and I are helping Eric from EWB – San Diego finish a water project. Earlier EWB - San Diego had implemented a plan to provide clean drinking water to a small village. They had most of it constructed and were well on the way to finishing when they discovered the well they wanted to use to supply it was contaminated. So with the infrastructure done Jenneli and I, with Eric’s guidance, are trying to find a new well location that will supply the clean water. Unfortunately it’s harder than it sounds.

First of all very few areas are suitable for wells, there can be contamination from livestock, trees, fertilizer, ponds and human activity. So after some searching and a couple site visits we may have found a suitable location unfortunately it’s on private land and we’ll need to figure out how to negotiate access. Luckily SDRWC the local NGO can help us do that! If all works out we’ll be drilling a new test well in the coming days!

Mangos – They’re what’s for dinner! … and lunch and breakfast

I’m sure everyone has had a mango before but I have to tell you they really are 100x better here. In fact they are so juicy and flavorful that you can eat the peal here. Our landlord first recommended that I eat the peal for the fiber. I was weary at first but he was right, it’s not bad at all. So because mangos are 10 cents each and incredibly good we eat them all the time, for snacks as well as meals.

The pictures show what the mango vendors look like as they go up and down the road yelling out “Mangos” (though in Telegu). I also included a picture of some mangos we got in a village that’s known for their mangos, in a region that’s known for it’s mangos. Not only are they 2x big as normal mangos they truly are 2x as good making them 200x better than the normal mangos I get in the States. It will be a sad day when I have to pay $1.50 for a sub quality mango.

Ants clean house

As most of you know Jenneli and I are not the tidiest people you have met but we are getting better and the ants are helping us with some negative reinforcement. In Pasadena we could leave an item of food out or throw something in the trash without a second thought. Here if it is organic at all the ants will start swarming it in a matter of minutes. For example I made scrambled eggs for breakfast and forgot to wash the pot. The following pictures demonstrate the aftermath. This happens with garbage too so we have to be really good about making sure our trash ends up outside as soon as it’s ready to be tossed.

Carnivals - It's a little surreal here

Bindu, Lavina and Rokesh took us to a carnival last night! It was exactly like I always wanted a carnival to be. 10 cents to get in, 20 cent rides, and all the games were 20 cents. It was a little odd though. If you notice in one of the pictures you'll see prizes. If you look closely they are not your average stuff animals. They are mostly kitchen goods. Normally this would have seemed strange but Jenneli and I are very short of kitchen goods so being able to throw rings for soap and shampoo seemed like a great thing! We could really use these things!

The fair food was also great with all kinds of spicy food and sweets. I bought some cotton candy for 10 cents but because of the heat and humidity it got a little messy. We went on a few rides, got a little sick, luckily nothing that a little bit of walking around couldn't fix. Jenneli commented that it seemed like a fair out of the 50s and I have to agree. Being able to buy soda in glass containers for 8 cents does seem to be something out of a rockwell painting. We won a basket, a comb, some packeged henna, pencils, and a few other misc goods. I really wanted a thermose but could never get the right ping pong score to get it.

We had a great time and I'll have to thank Bindu, Lavina, and Rokesh again for taking us out! To think that 5 people can party for 2 1/2 hours at a carnival and only spending 10 bucks! I want to go again, we could use another bar of soap!

I want a puppy

This is Bindu's family dog Scooby, that I've referenced earlier. He gets all excited and I have no idea how he stays cool as I'm about to fall over from the heat. When this adventure is over here and Jenneli and I figure out where we are going to be living I'm determined to get a german shepard and name him Crom! :)

Mineral Water

In an attempt to ward off the evils of bacteria and all sorts of nasty problems like malaria (Michael, you do not get malaria from water), Jenneli and I drink bottled water. Obviously from the picture we go through a lot of bottled water. That's only a small portion of the bottles we have stacked up, there is a whole other closet full. I keep wanting to tie them all together in a raft and float it in the pond next to the house! We drink about 4-6 liters a day. Sealed mineral water costs about 20 rupees, which is about 50 cents. It's basically our biggest daily expense. I noticed that the 3 shops we buy water from have greatly expanded the ammount of water they stock. I'll have to tell them a few days before we leave that we will be gone and not able to buy all the bottled water they have for us.

Henna - it's fun!

Bindu and Lavina (sorry about the probable misspelling) came over and did a little henna for Jenneli. Since I was there they also did a small design on my hand. The plants that actually make henna are grown in this area and I believe it originated in this part of the world. It was neat watching them crush up the leaves and make the putty they use to apply it. We were supposed to leave it on for an hour, which Jenneli dutifully did, however I took it off after 45 minutes or so, that's why Jenneli's is much darker. You'll notice that Jenneli's fingertips are colored and that's very typical in designs.

I should also add that Bindu and Lavina had a great time playing with Jennli's computer. They were using iphoto to take crazy pictures of themselves.