(no subject)
Happy Easter! It's been a great day. Hope yours was filled with grace and/or chocolate eggs and/or relaxation.
My adventures, continued:
Friday Night: Saira introduces me to Pulp Fiction. We make stir fry and chocolate orange muffins. Her mom arrives about 10:00 pm, exhausted but smiling. She pulls a crazy amount of stuff out of her modestly sized luggage, including sofa cushions, a case of tea biscuits, and a special pan for making roti. (Disappointingly, she apparently doesn't think she is good enough at making roti to teach me properly. Saira will have to learn from her grandmother next time she is in Pakistan and pass it on.)
Saturday: Day two of Saira's four-day weekend, so I slept late again. Saira and I make french toast for breakfast. Presently we all go shopping, hitting both the "Indian store", where Saira explains all the stuff I don't recognize, and the supermarket, where I dream of domestic bliss in an apartment with B. Saira and I make white bean curry/chili for dinner and watch Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, which I had also never seen and which was truly excellent. Later we decide to make challah, two enormous whole-wheat loaves in four-stranded braids. True to form, we finish baking it at 1:00 am.
Easter Sunday: I go to the city by myself (managing not to get too lost) to meet up with Meg for church. We go to St. Augustine on a recommendation from one of her relatives. The building is beautiful, with radiant stained glass, and the congregation is friendly and racially diverse. I very much enjoy the homily, which helps me realize again how Jesus can help me move through my fear and anger into joy. We meet up with Saira at the zoo. She shows us all the best stuff, including somewhat cheeky pandas, tiny tamarind monkeys, and several different varieties of turtle and tortoise. (I've always had a great fondness for tortoises; maybe they're my spirit animal.) We all have a good talk over lunch.
As we get off the metro, Saira and I randomly run into my old biogeochemistry teacher, Alex. I knew he moved to DC, but I never thought I'd find him even if I tried! He tells me about his work as a climate change adviser for Congress, which heartens me greatly. When we get home, Saira shows me The Darjeeling Limited. Toward the end of the movie, Steph calls and I brag to her about what a great time I'm having. We have some of the biryani her mom cooked (it was delicious, and I'm sorry I missed the making of it). Then we all talk about what Karachi is like and Benazir Bhutto and gun control issues. Saira and I have ice cream, and then B calls all too briefly, and then Saira and I talk more about Important Things before bedtime (that would be about now).
Tomorrow we might meet up with Cara and do some thrift store shopping, or just hang out. Tuesday it's on to Madison to see Lucy and Debbie and their kitty... woot!
I will leave you with my father's Bad Pun of the Week (which also happens to be festive): If this is the day when Jesus rose, why don't we call it Yeaster? Har har har.
My adventures, continued:
Friday Night: Saira introduces me to Pulp Fiction. We make stir fry and chocolate orange muffins. Her mom arrives about 10:00 pm, exhausted but smiling. She pulls a crazy amount of stuff out of her modestly sized luggage, including sofa cushions, a case of tea biscuits, and a special pan for making roti. (Disappointingly, she apparently doesn't think she is good enough at making roti to teach me properly. Saira will have to learn from her grandmother next time she is in Pakistan and pass it on.)
Saturday: Day two of Saira's four-day weekend, so I slept late again. Saira and I make french toast for breakfast. Presently we all go shopping, hitting both the "Indian store", where Saira explains all the stuff I don't recognize, and the supermarket, where I dream of domestic bliss in an apartment with B. Saira and I make white bean curry/chili for dinner and watch Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, which I had also never seen and which was truly excellent. Later we decide to make challah, two enormous whole-wheat loaves in four-stranded braids. True to form, we finish baking it at 1:00 am.
Easter Sunday: I go to the city by myself (managing not to get too lost) to meet up with Meg for church. We go to St. Augustine on a recommendation from one of her relatives. The building is beautiful, with radiant stained glass, and the congregation is friendly and racially diverse. I very much enjoy the homily, which helps me realize again how Jesus can help me move through my fear and anger into joy. We meet up with Saira at the zoo. She shows us all the best stuff, including somewhat cheeky pandas, tiny tamarind monkeys, and several different varieties of turtle and tortoise. (I've always had a great fondness for tortoises; maybe they're my spirit animal.) We all have a good talk over lunch.
As we get off the metro, Saira and I randomly run into my old biogeochemistry teacher, Alex. I knew he moved to DC, but I never thought I'd find him even if I tried! He tells me about his work as a climate change adviser for Congress, which heartens me greatly. When we get home, Saira shows me The Darjeeling Limited. Toward the end of the movie, Steph calls and I brag to her about what a great time I'm having. We have some of the biryani her mom cooked (it was delicious, and I'm sorry I missed the making of it). Then we all talk about what Karachi is like and Benazir Bhutto and gun control issues. Saira and I have ice cream, and then B calls all too briefly, and then Saira and I talk more about Important Things before bedtime (that would be about now).
Tomorrow we might meet up with Cara and do some thrift store shopping, or just hang out. Tuesday it's on to Madison to see Lucy and Debbie and their kitty... woot!
I will leave you with my father's Bad Pun of the Week (which also happens to be festive): If this is the day when Jesus rose, why don't we call it Yeaster? Har har har.