High school selection and Patishapta

An excited (read 'tense') mother, a very excited (read 'cool') son and a moderately excited (read 'chill and cool') father are currently on a school tour.

According to the system here, junior school ends at the age of 12 and on the basis of a final test and overall performance, the school gives "advice" as to which level of high school the child can/should attend. This means that one needs to visit schools in the area on "open days"and get a 'feel' for it. This day is also a source of lots of  information on basis of which one is supposed to make the right choice for their children.

Haha!

Not so easy....

Carmel School, Durgapur  (my school)

Having studied in one school my entire life, this step is new. Exciting no doubt, but there is an element of 'newness' and 'decision making' which makes the mother 'tensely' excited!

There is an element of 'growing up' and 'not so much to worry about' which makes the son 'coolly' excited.

There is an element of "I know she will handle it"and "just cannot understand what is there to be tense about" which makes the father 'chill AND cool'.

;-)))

Brochures from many high schools have been lying on the living room table for the last few weeks. It was as if having them infront of my eyes 24/7 would already help me make my decision. They were also kept there with the hope (high hopes) that the cool boy would absentmindedly pick up one and ask specific questions to the mother, thus opening up meaningful conversation. None of the above happened.
The mother also discussed this in details with colleagues and friends who are from this system. All answers put together and a few sessions with the school teacher helped her understand the 'system' better and also pacified her nerves to some extent. ( A few glasses of red wine while reading the brochures definitely helped too but let me not digress from the topic).
The choice has been narrowed down to two schools. 
The first open day is a very nice experience. As the trio enter school A,  A-junior though visibly shy at first starts showing considerable excitement.
Within 5 minutes he declares "this is the school I want to come to!"
The parents are really surprised because in 5 minutes they have only reached the central atrium after passing through the main door and one corridor. What is it that triggered such a confident choice? What have we missed? What did we not notice in our excitement?
He understood that we were struggling to understand the reason for his choice.

"Have you seen the cool lockers Ma? Fully electronic operated with own card!! I really want to study in  this school".

Of course!! THAT is the criterion to choose a school...
......and we were thinking of talking to the teachers, visiting the classes, going to the labs and THEN taking a decision......parents can be so "not-cool"!
;-))

The next open day made life difficult. 
Surprise!!!!!!School B also had fancy lockers. 
Electronic, own card..the whole lot!!
What a dilemma for the 11-yr old boy!!

Let him sort it out while I cook something nice.......

Patishapta

This is a typical Bengali dish--it is so traditional, so heartwarming, so authentic...........
Just as the winter is about to vanish mid January, Bengalis celebrate Sankranti with a huge platter of Pithe-Puli. These are extremely tasty and sweet objects which are hard to resist and contribute immediately to the mid region of one's body. Since we are very "calorie conscious" these days and do not allow a single extra calorie intake from what is prescribed by Mr. Atkins, we are gradually moving away from these recipes .To add to that, these recipes also require quite some effort, time and patience to make. In today's fast world, we do not have much left of these three. Hence these recipes are vanishing from our plates very fast.
Not from our hearts though.
As the patishapta melts in my mouth....I feel like saying..."WHAT CALORIES??"
This is purely a "Gift of Life".
;-)

Ingredients:
For batter:

• 1/2 cup Rice flour
• 1 cup plain flour
• 1/2 cup Semolina
• 1 cardamom powder
• 2-3 tbsp sugar 
• 2 cups milk

• Filling:
• 2 cups grated coconut
• 1 cup sugar/jaggery
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1/2 cup kheer/khowa/milkpowder/condensed milk(optional but highly recommended)
• 1/2 tsp cardamom powder

Ready steady cook:

• In order to prepare the filling, first cook the coconut and milk and sugar in a wok. Add the khowa/kheer.
• Keep stirring so that it does not stick to the bottom.
• The end product should be sticky and like a dough.
• Add the cardamom powder also. Mix well and let it cool
• For the patishapta batter:
• Mix all the ingredients together
• Add milk and keep mixing well such that there are no lumps in the batter.
• Keep it aside for 10 mins.
• Now in a nonstick pan, add little bit of oil
• Pour a small portion and spread it evenly (like dosa, but smaller)
• Add the filling in the center.
• Neatly fold the two sides 
• Let it cook over medium heat till it changes the colour from white to very light brown
• Serve with molten jaggery on top (optional)

School photo:(durgapurcityonlinemobile.bugs3.com)

Holiday-lag and Moong-Puli

Happy New Year to all!!!

Best wishes for a happy and peaceful year ahead.

;-)

They should arrange it in such a way that one can start off with an hour, then two hours , then three, gradually building it up to the grueling eight hours per day!

Coming back to work after the New Year vacation is such a "culture shock" and this is doubled by the fact that the vacation was spent in India.

First of all, the body does not recognize the alarm clock any more. Hence early morning, the noise is unknown and irritating and the search for the "snooze" button is totally futile.

The quilt-force is much stronger than the will-force, hence I am sucked back into the warm quilt for 5 more minutes of sleep.
The five more mins somehow get extended to fifteen which leads to panic at the end of it.

After several attempts, I did manage to get up and walk towards the bathroom. But believe me, the body now works at a different pace. The hands are used to moving the tooth brush back and forth at a normal human speed while the eyes are used to admiring the tiny sparrow sitting on the window sill beside the sink (in India). 
My God! What a change! The electric brush rotated at thousands of rpm while the eyes were fixed on the clock and the mouth shouted "hurry hurry , we will be late" to the little boy who is also going through a similar culture shock.
"But Maaaaaa.......I am hurrying......"

Next the food. The body got used to paratha, upma, noodles, poha, etc as breakfast! My taste buds revolted loudly as the dry tasteless bread touched them. My stomach rumbled with anger, the pancreatic juices gurgled with frustration and my intestines curled up with indignation at the sight of this brown tasteless matter that they were supposed to digest! After all those days of spicy, tasty, mouthwatering stuff!! This is more than just "culture shock"!

Somehow managed to drag the body towards work. Once there, nothing more to complain. Within a few minutes, it started to feel as if I was always there.
Jet lag is taken so seriously. I demand that holiday-lag should get the attention it deserves!

;-)


Moong-Puli
Today's recipe is a difficult one. I tried it out for the first time. 
It is a festive Bengali recipe special for the "Poush Shankranti". These dishes require effort and time. In today's fast world, indeed that time is difficult to make. But I strongly feel we should keep these recipes alive, someway or the other.

Ingredients:

2 cups of yellow lentils (moong)

2 tbsp Rice flour

3 tbsp plain flour
3 tbsp sugar
1 tsp aniseed powder (saunf)

Filling:
1 cup desiccated coconut
1/2 cup milk
1 cup jaggery (palm sugar)

Oil to fry

Ready steady cook:

• In a nonstick pan, put two spoons of water. Add the lumps of jaggery so that they melt completely in medium heat.
• Add the coconut and stir.
• Add the milk, a little at a time so that the mix stays moist.
• Cook for about 20 mins till the whole mix is nice and sticky. This is the filling.
• In a separate pan dry roast the lentils, till they are light brown and the aroma comes out.
• Add water only enough to cook the lentils.
• Strain and let it cool.
• Now add the flour, rice flour, sugar and aniseed powder. Mash them together to make a dough.
• Pinch a ball out of it, flatten it between your palm and add the coconut filling in the center.
• Wrap it up and seal the ends.
• Pull the ends a bit to give it the traditional "puli" shape.
• Deep fry them till golden brown in colour.

Before

After

Serve with liquid jaggery  or sugar syrup.

A very tasty twist is if one adds jeera powder, red chili powder, salt and green coriander  to the dough. The taste is really nice. Salty and sweet , together!!! Try!

Fish Chops : No Generation gap there!!

Today, I was watching a movie called City slickers...a comedy celebrating mid life crisis. 

Ha ha!

[No need to calculate, I am not there yet!!;-)]

Even though a comedy by definition...(Billy Crystal takes care of that!!), yet it left a very content (something 'more than laughter') feeling at the end. Within a few minutes into the movie, I realized that I have watched the movie before. Continued watching it because I remembered it was a funny one. It was funny then and it was funny today. But yes, today the focus of the fun was different. 
(I could relate to so many other things in the movie.....no no....still not there yet!!)

Today the focus was not only on the pure nonsense laughter (which we also need) but on the laughter which can make your eyes shine at the end.

A small message lingered on.......

"There is this ONE thing in life which is the most important and it is upto YOU to figure out WHAT!"

....resonated with my thoughts today.

[Extra information: today the weather is dark, gloomy and rainy. Researchers have found out that the weather can have a significant effect on human emotions...so the credit of the above banter goes to ....

No, I am not there yet!!] ha ha!

The boy (ok, double digits now but still far away from the teens) has recently learnt "sarcasm".  
The eyes have started rolling, the shoulders shrug themselves atleast five times in one sentence, facial expression can oscillate between funny and sarcastic very easily, hands go up in air as a sign of 'Oh no, not again!' and the words chosen to reply back can be significantly sarcastic!

Mama listens, gets furious, scolds.
'khali mukhe mukhe kotha, amra mayer mukher opor konodin kotha bolini!!' 
[You are replying back, we never spoke back to our moms like this!!]

But when the mercury drops to a normal level, Mama rethinks. Some dialogues do bring a smile to her lips.  Only some!

Generation gap was always there.However, nowadays it has doubled its impact by also bringing in a technology gap with it. Whatever WE say, THEY are always a step ahead. 

You do Facebook? Ewww.....that is so "last generation"!

You do Whatsapp? OMG ....That is so "what parents do"!
E-mails??  "Seriously"? How can you spend so much time 'typing'?
This generation is in such a hurry that they have replaced 'would' with 'wud' , thereby saving time to type TWO FULL ALPHABETS!! I have no clue what they are using this extra time for......
;-)

Amazing what parents of today need to do to keep everything in balance. 

We did not have a TV at home till I was sixteen. Correct, sixteen years old! 

When the TV finally came, somehow my mom felt that I should be banned from watching Chitrahaar .

(Wikipedia: Chitrahaar is a Bollywood songs television program on DD National, most widely watched in the 1970s.The word literally means 'a garland of pictures')

Of course not all mothers thought the same. So next morning at the school bus stand, I was the poor soul with no knowledge of Chitraahar, while my lucky priviledged friends who were allowed to watch chattered away in glory. I don't think my mom needed to worry about anything called 'peer pressure'. All my mom needed to do in order to implement the ban was only make her eyes REAL BIG and say " AMI bollam to dekhar dorkar nei, byas! [I told you not to watch, thats it]"

THAT dialogue is so "last generation" dialogue now.....

;-)

[At the dinner table last night having khichuri ]

A-junior:  Is the khichuri recipe in your book? It tastes really nice.

Me (obviously very happy after hearing this):  Yes, I think it is.

(Now taking it a step further..)

Why do you ask?  Will you make it later from my book? for your family when you grow up?

A-junior: No! we dont have to MAKE it. I will take a picture and just print it....3D.

Forget everything I said before....let us enjoy "Macher chop" which has not been affected by the generation gap...my father loves it, I love it, my son loves it too.

Fish chop

The first fish chop I can still remember (because of its heavenly taste) is one that was made by mashi , my friend Putku's mother, in Durgapur.  I can still 'taste' it! 

Ingredients:

2 cans of Tuna

2 chopped onions

3 boiled potatoes
1 tbsp rice flour

1 tbsp ginger mince (I like to use minced ginger and not paste)

1 tsp chopped green chilis

chopped coriander

1 tsp of cumin powder
Salt

Oil to fry

Ready steady cook:

• Mash the potatoes and the fish from the can.(drain the fish before if it is in water or oil)
• Mix in all the spices mentioned above.
• Heat 1 tbsp oil in a nonstick pan. Add the chopped onions and fry them till they change to light brown colour.
• Add the fried onions to the mashed potato mix. Add the chopped coriander, minced ginger, chilis, rice powder, cumin powder and salt. Mix well.


Now prepare the coating.
1. Some plain white flour
2. One egg beaten
3. Bread crumbs. 

• Take one round ball of the potato-fish mixture and flatten it in your palm.
• Gently press between your palm to make it into a flat oval shape. 
• Roll it in the flour, dip it in the egg and then roll it in the bread crumbs.
• Repeat for all pieces and once done keep it in the refrigerator for an hour or so.
• Deep fry them and serve with mustard sauce (or the Bengali Kasundi) and sliced onions.

A Big Mac or Borar-jhol?

Parenthood is fun. (yipppppeeeeeeeee!!)

..But it is definitely not simple.

The complexities are not in the process of feeding, caring, changing diapers, feeding (again), changing (again).....
Parents who are in this stage please do not be angry. You have no clue what is coming after this. Enjoy the feeding and the cleaning......
;-)
The complex part is how to 'react as a parent'? Nowadays, these little (or not so little) human beings called children, just know it ALL. There is almost nothing new to add to their immense exposure through google and hence their extreme confidence of 'knowing it all'. As a parent (who claims to be a friend as well), it becomes very difficult to come up with the correct reaction which is able to balance both roles properly. In some cases, when things are assumed to be too friendly, I have to remind him I am a mother first!!

Really not that simple anymore.

I am sure my parents struggled too, in their own way....but my parents were "only parents" when I was growing up. They became "friends" much later in life. I have no complains because I am extremely glad with the end product they created. Hi Hi Hi....

Problems were different. Reactions were different too. 'Simple' reactions like "the big eyes glare" from Ma just worked like a miracle. (Believe me, my mom has real big eyes!). Those reactions do not exist anymore. Neither do those problems. But like everything else in life, struggles are also relative. Times change, struggles change, reactions change. 
However, I feel that the  'delta'  stays the same.

All those years ago, my mom struggled to keep her calm when I was late coming home from school (No mobile phones those days). She paced back and forth in the garden with her eyes fixed on the road.

I struggle when my son is late in sending me the message " I am home" on Whatsapp. I am at work and keep checking my phone (under the table) during the team meeting.

The basic concern of both mothers, even though so many years apart is still the same. No matter where technology takes you, once a parent, always a parent (even with the 'friend' cap on!).

Going back to the 'reactions of a parent'.....

Yesterday I saw A-junior doing something on our home computer. This is a Mac computer (and we payed for it with a kidney and an arm) and he was not allowed to touch it till a few months back. By allowing him to use it, I have bestowed upon him a huge sense of responsibility and trust. I keep reminding him of that whenever I get the chance! So seeing him press the keyboard with unnecessary force and indifference was not a pleasant sight for me.

Me:  "ashte ! ashte!.... taka poyshar mormo bojho, Mac ta kharap hole? " 

[ Gently!! Gently! ..Try to understand the value of money..what if the Mac is broken?"]

A-junior: I have money in my Piggy bank!!

Me: Oi diye Mac kinte parbe na!! [ You cannot buy a Mac with that money!] 

A-junior (smiling wickedly): Of course, I can!!....A BIG MAC  is only 2.97 Euros!!

I laughed a lot ! It sounded hilarious in the context of things. But am not sure whether that was the right 'reaction of a parent' ! Maybe I had my "friend" cap on......

;-))

Borar Jhol: 
Long time back Ma used to make something similar but with mustard paste...not JHOL, but JHAL. (will share recipe later). These recipes are very difficult to make these days. Too time consuming and too patience consuming. But believe me, all the pain is worth the taste at the end.
Steaming white rice with Bora-r jhol! Give it a try.
Warning: Keep enough ingredients for frying some extra boras, if needed. Do not be upset if half of them already vanish into your stomach while frying.

Ingredients:

Bora: 
2 sliced onions
1 cup gram flour
1 tbsp rice flour
1 tbsp Kalojeere (kalaunji)
1 tsp Ajwain
1 tsp red chilli powder
salt, turmeric
Oil to fry

Jhol (Curry):
2 chopped tomatoes
1 chopped onion
2 cubed potatoes
10-12 curry leaves
1 tsp mustard seeds
1 tsp grated ginger

Ready steady cook:

• In a bowl mix all the ingredients from the 'Bora'.
• Heat oil in a pan. Deep fry the bora in groups.
• Keep aside on a kitchen tissue to soak the extra oil  (this step really helps making you guilt free). 
• In a separate pan add one table spoon oil.
• Add the mustard seeds and chopped chillis. Let them sizzle for a while.
• Add the onion. Fry for a while. Add the potatoes, grated ginger and the curry leaves.
• Cook till the potatoes become light brown in colour. Add chopped tomatoes.
• Add salt and turmeric. 
• Cover and cook on low heat till potatoes are cooked. 
• Add a cup of water and bring to a boil.
• Add the bora (pakoras) and switch off the heat. Cover it for a while.
• Add a small spoon of ghee before serving.(Optional) 
• Serve hot with rice.

The Sound of Music......lingers on....and on....and on....

No, A-junior has not stopped his cheeky comments and I have not stopped enjoying them either...

But I have been focusing a bit on "HijiBiji"--my first Bengali book....hence could not pen down my thoughts here.

On top of that there was the summer vacation.

......and on top of that, A-senior was traveling for work!

.........and on top of that.....let it be. 

I am back. I still appreciate "The Gift of Life", everyday.

;-)

Austria.

This country which I visited for the first time, definitely deserves a blog post. 

There are some places on Earth where the moment you set foot on, it brings back your faith on many things. This was the feeling I had when we reached our small village Kleinarl in Austria.

Snugly set between rugged mountains, gentle slopes, lively waterfalls, narrow roads and beautiful flowers...this village is a life size version of the painting we all made in our childhood. Mountains, river, birds, sun peeping out................restores faith in everything good, unpolluted, pristine!

I found it prettier than Switzerland. It is still left with lot of untouched freshness. Still very new to my eyes and not immediately recognizable (thanks to Bollywood) with "Ah , I know that fountain! Govinda danced around it in Jodi No. 1" or "That's the cow that Sharukh Khan and Kajol patted in Dilwale". Jokes apart, far less commercialized.

I would definitely want to go back again for another vacation to Austria.

The first day, after a very long drive of almost 12 hours, as we checked into our vacation house, we were informed that there is a "summer festival" in the village. Local people dressed in traditional Austrian dress gathered in the village center to celebrate with beer, music in the background, talking loudly, singing and some dancing as well. We sat down to enjoy with some beer as well. It is the ambience that creates the magic. Normally I do not like beer at all...but I had no clue how and when I ordered my second. The church bell in the distance took me away to some faraway land where I was also dressed in that traditional attire dancing to the tune of something that A-senior was playing on a guitar (ahem!). A-junior was trying to ....trying to...
'Ma, can I have another chocolate ice cream?'....brought me back to my senses...

'No you cannot!, you just had one!!'
'But it is vacation Ma!!'

The view from the balcony was the highlight. I really wondered if I should go anywhere else or just sit around and laze for the rest of the week, absorbing the beauty around me! Whether it was the long walks by the stream or the cycling paths or the garden chair...there was beauty all around. Even going to the supermarket around the corner of the street was like going for a sightseeing trip. It had a tiny waterfall, a wooden bridge, pine trees, wild flowers and a log cabin..all within those 100 m between the house and the super market.

Everything around me were perfectly synchronized with each other...and there was the sound of "peace" everywhere. I just cannot stop writing now.......bear with me.

One of the other highlights was Salzburg with its smell of " The Sound of Music".

Once upon a time this movie was shown in my school..one of the very first 'romantic' movies we were allowed to see, shortly followed by "The Roman holiday".Seeing these movies at an age when 'romance'  was THE thing to be curious about and THE thing which was not freely discussed--these movies are very special. These two movies are capable of triggering nostalgia at any point of time. So taking the "the sound of music" tour in Salzburg was so very special that I did not hesitate to sing the song Edelweiss or Do re mi full volume with our tour guide!! They were definitely "few of my favourite things"...Thanks to Whatsapp, I could even share this beautiful moment and experience with my classmates with whom I had shared the movie together in our school blue skirts all those years ago!

Remember this house??

Most of you know what a big foodie I am.( the word 'big' has no double meaning, by the way).

Food was fabulous. Schnitzel was the highlight of course, and the sausages and the ice cream and the cheese cake and the lamb and the....uff!

Yes, we did walk a lot and cycle a bit. This was not so much intentionally done to lose the calories from the above intakes (refer to photos above), but this is what you do in Austria. The land of mountains demand that you walk, run, cycle, ski, trek and climb.....so we did.

A-senior and A-junior

But in one specific case even though we had the energy we actually did not have the right shoes (I see that 'what an excuse' smirk on your face!)

The day went like this.

After some initial googling, we decided to visit this beautiful lake near our house -Jagersee. It was a very warm day and was the last day of our vacation. I put on this pretty skirt with a pair of light pump shoes, both A-junior and senior had short pants with strap shoes and we set off for the lake visit. The lake was stunningly beautiful complete with crystal blue water with a white swan swimming in it. I am sure the first photo of this blog captures a glimpse of the beauty I am talking about. However, after a few photo session clicks, we noticed a narrow dirt road on one side of the lake where many cars were going. A man was sitting there with what appeared to be tickets. The cars stopped by him, got a ticket and moved on into the mountains. The Bhattacharyas got excited too. A-senior immediately went to get the car from the normal parking lot while I waited close to that road with A-junior. Suddenly the man with the tickets came up to me..." well ..ahemm....actually ....are you planning to go up?"

I happily said "yes!!" assuming that he will be happier to sell another ticket.

He said , "Well...hmm...I think you are not suitably dressed for that!, it has a car drive of 4 kms and after that there is a trek of 2 hours to the other side of the mountain!"

I mumbled a 'thank you'. But by then the car was there and there was no turning back ...so we got the ticket and drove on. He smiled.

At the end of the 4 km drive through a very narrow muddy road, we came to a parking lot.

As soon as I stepped out of the car, my dress hit me like a shock wave. All around us were people fully geared up for the trek...shoes, walking stick, water bottle, rug sack--the whole package!

The Bhattacharyas looked so out of place..as if we were invited to a fancy evening party on the mountains!

These hikers also gave us the 'looks'!

Not to be snubbed, the Bhattacharyas decided to at least go a few steps on the hiking path. So we did.

Within a 100 meters we realized that the ticket -man was right! No way can we go further with our ballerinas and strap shoes. We posed around for a few more photos while a few of those fully geared hikers crossed us (totally zapped look in their eyes). Finally we traced our steps back,got into the car and came back the way we went. I waved at the ticket man. He smiled , his eyes clearly said 'I told you so!'.

A beautiful country. Definitely want to go back. With the right shoes this time.

;-)

Non-consensus and Dal Tadka

With the 40's, the eye liner came into my life.  A new addition to the almost-non-existent make-up kit ! Remember how my mom mistook the dark lines so carefully drawn on my eyelids as "dark circles due to some liver problem"?. Shocking!

The journey from one end to the other was initially very smooth but as time went by, the motion of the eyeliner brush on the eyelids became more jerky....do not ask me why....bad people call them wrinkles. I do not care. Apparently.

Anyway, this is not a post to talk about eyeliners or wrinkles or age. But it will definitely talk about wisdom....which somehow deserted me when I volunteered as a group leader for the school trip. What was I thinking?

11 yr old boys....off for a day trip in a theme park....ME volunteering to lead a group!!

I had also volunteered for a school trip few years back. It was difficult at that time as well, but this time when I came back from the trip, I was totally "kaput"!

Ah, then I realized, this time I went with the eyeliner on!! [No need to calculate anything!!]

Being in charge of five such boys (including my own) can be quite challenging. No matter how much wisdom you have, challenges can come in from any corner and every corner.

The trip started off very well. The bus was ready. We, the volunteer mothers were given some basic instructions and off we went, kids happily waving good bye to the parents who came to see them off. The ones with the "wisdom" of not volunteering (shhhh;-)

The theme park, Efteling is about 1.5 hrs drive from the school. Clearly the patience span of a 11-yr old is nowhere near that number. So after the first 30 mins, when the 'yeaaaahhh school trip' euphoria passed over, one persistent question popped up almost every 5 mins "when do we reach? , How long?,  How far?" ....

We, mothers tried our best to maintain a straight face, a calm mind and a cool head and kept on answering, "an hour left.....55 mins.....50 mins..... so on". Wisdom helped a bit.

On reaching the park, within the first 5 mins I realized that I needed a strategy. Immediately after the entrance, at the very first crossing, two of them said 'left', the other three said  'right'. 
I said (smiling strategy), let's take the right, look at the park map first and decide which rides to take. Two faces became unhappy already.
As soon as we reached the map,

Two  said 'roller coaster first'!

One said 'boat ride'!

Two said ' we want to eat first'!

No consensus . 

I managed somehow (change-the-topic-strategy) and went to the first ride that I saw with the belief that if I can put them in that, I can get atleast 4-5 mins of thinking time to plan my next move (buy-some-time-strategy).

It was a ride on a medium sized Dolphin shaped thing.

One said 'Too childish'

Two said 'Cool'

One said ' I have motion sickness'

One said ' I told you I am hungry'

I shuddered at the thought of what the next few hours  would be like. 
I used my interpersonal skills (negotiation strategy) to the maximum and finally could get all the boys on that ride, including me! As soon as the spin started, kids (as we know they are) immediately shrieked with delight forgetting all disagreements they had! Phew.......

We moved on to the next. However, being the peak season for school trips in the country, each of the rides had a waiting time of 45 mins on average. Just stand and wait. Not easy for 11-yr olds!

By then, one of them had also started eating candies to solve his hunger problem. I have never seen a kid eat so much candy. The mother-in-me started off by trying to reason with him to which he seriously said "it's ok"! My face must have changed contours and my voice must have gone up by a few decibels ...A-junior hurriedly came up to me and said in Bengali "ma tumi jeno abar oke boko na" [Mom don't scold him like you scold me!]

Good reminder A-junior. I am sure at that moment he was thinking, "why did MY mom have to volunteer?"

;-)

Lunch time.
Two said, " french fries".
One said," chocolate waffle"
Two said, "Not now, we are full".
The school lunch coupon which allowed only french fries saved me this time to establish consensus.
After lunch, I was offered this innocent looking white candy. I vaguely remember A-junior shaking his head may be to warn me not to accept it. I should also have been aware since the white thing was called "fireball". But I was in a fun (trying-to-be-a-cool-mom-strategy) mode so I accepted it graciously and ate the candy with a smile on my face. It was so sour that first it killed all my taste buds, threatened to bring out the acids from my small intestine and within moments the interior of my mouth was robin blue. I hid my shock and laughed (hide-your-feelings-strategy). It definitely helped in the bonding. While the boys laughed with me and walked ahead, I desperately searched for a garbage bin.

One in the group was very confident about the park from the very start. He kept on saying "I have been here many times, this is my 12th time so I know all about this park". I appointed him as our tour guide only to realize within a few minutes that he had no sense of direction! We walked around the same ride twice, our tour guide completely oblivious to the fact that we were going round and round. He also refused to take any ride because of " I have already done it so many times!". At one point of time, one of his friends challenged him...and poor boy ....he finally said, he does not like doing these rides because he is not comfortable. Clearly not the 12-times-done-the-roller-coaster-guy!

I bought some chips and waffles to dilute the situation. We both sat and chatted over Minecraft while the other four waited in the line for a super roller coaster ride...everything was under control again.

Okay, so with the lack of  consensus, we ended up doing a limited number of rides ...but the boys were super tired.

Cannot describe the mother's tiredness!!...My vocabulary is not adequate to describe how "kaput" I was feeling.  The eyeliner had definitely vanished!
However, I have to admit that it was big fun too...to become a part of the "cool gang" with weird candies, unlimited hunger and limitless energy!   The gift of life!!

;-))

Dal Tadka

Today's food will be simple.  A simple dal tadka that my family loves, specially my mother- in-law.

I used:

1 cup whole red lentils

1 cup black urad dal

1 large onion chopped

2 large tomatoes chopped 

2 green chilli

2 tbsp Ginger-Garlic paste

1 bay leaves

2 tsp garam masala powder

1 tsp coriander powder

1 tsp whole cumin seeds

1 cup chopped coriander

2 tbsp cream

Cooking oil /Butter/Ghee

Ready steady cook:

• Mix and soak the two types of dal overnight.
• In a pan/pressure cooker, boil the dal with half the tomatoes, half the onions, 1 chilli, 1 tsp ginger garlic paste and one spoon coriander powder.
• Heat ghee/butter in a heavy bottom pan and add the bay leaves and whole cumin.  
• When the flavours hit your nose, add the chopped onions and the garlic ginger paste. Saute for a while till onions become light brown and then add the tomatoes. Add the coriander powder and garam masala powder .
• Add the boiled dal and bring the whole mixture to a boil. Add salt to taste.
• Mix 2 tsp of cream. This is optional. But C'mon, a little bit of cream and ghee once in a while will not harm you.
• Switch off the heat and add a spoon of ghee. Garnish with chopped coriander leaves.