The Calm Before the Storm

Hello,

Last night James randomly left, so Kumari had to do all of the cooking. I spent most of the evening in the kitchen with her, Durga, and Sasheela. She made a typical vegetable curry which consisted mostly of okra, and then she started to make something out of the leaves of the drumstick tree. We have a drumstick tree out front (they really are everywhere) but it hasn’t had any drumsticks since they had to cut it back for the power lines. I had tried the leaves before in a sambar, and they were pretty good though a little bitter. Kumari, even though I had tried some before, seemed convinced that they wouldn’t suit me and that it would give me “loose motion” and only let me have a little bit. She cooked it in oil with some spices, several chilies, and fresh coconut. It was amazing and I kept insisting she give me a normal serving. It was good at the time, but, like usual, Kumari was right and this morning was a little miserable.

After dinner we tried to get some work done on the computer since the power was off all day, but the internet was failing miserably, so we finally decided to make it an early night. When I woke up, James once again was not here, and I found Kumari angrily cooking. She is starting to get incredibly fed up with him just leaving whenever he feels like it. Hopefully they won’t need him for too much longer; he was only hired when Xavier got sick and Kumari had to take over what Xavier typically did. After breakfast I ran a couple errands on foot, and took Venky and Prithivi along with me. Prithivi is the biggest talker ever, and for the first twenty minutes or so I tried very hard to understand everything he was saying, but when he didn’t even stop to take a breath I slowly gave up. Poor Venky couldn’t get a word in even if he wanted to.

When we got back someone was holding a meeting in our main room and all the kids were playing quietly outside. It is some kind of get rich quick scheme that Kumari’s distant relative is involved in, and Kumari let them meet here. Thankfully Kumari and Xavier aren’t involved. The meeting set up camp right in front of my door, so I’ve been trying hard not to come in and out because they immediately stop what they are doing to stare; so for now I am kind of trapped in here. Hopefully it won’t last much longer.

The rest of this morning should be pretty quiet, but this evening after lunch we are taking the children to some park that is pretty far away. We have to take an auto there, which costs money, so the kids never go unless they have a visitor. I’m saving up my energy for what is sure to be an exhausting outing. I’m glad, though, that this is how I will be spending my last full day with the kids, since Monday and Tuesday they have school.

Peace,
Robby