Neighbors and Nepalese cooking

The Nepalese or our school in particular seem to be very keen on holidays. We were told last minute again that we have a four day holiday which was nice.

We decided to go to Syangja for a night an catch up with the other volunteers which was nice. We got the jeep down the hill but sat on the roof this time. I loved this despite spending the journey clinging on for dear life and being terrified, as the views were incredible. We spent the res of the afternoon n the bazaar, getting some treats which we then ate sitting on the roof of the other volunteer's' house. There were amazing views across th while of Syangja town and the hills surrounding. There was a fair in the centre of which was apparently visiting for a few days which was loud but it was still very peaceful. Kopula, the lady who cooks for the others made us a very big but delicious meal of dahl bhat but also chips, cauliflower and eggs. Both Alice and I were still pretty full from eating so much at the village parties but it was very nice. The following day we braved walking up the hill, back to our village. It was no actually too painful and very good training for our three week trek in April. We usually take around 2 hours t walk down so we were delighted that we made it to the top in just over an hour and a half!

We spent the next few days relaxing in the sun, planning lessons and going for walks. Amrita appeared on Monday with some ingredients , a blender and a pan telling us we were going to make Sel Roti. Sel Roti is a Nepali bread which is in the form of a ring which they seem to serve at all the dances and parties. It is made of rice, ghee, flour, water and sugar, as far as we could tell. She mixed all the ingredients and blended it to make a liquid mixture. She then put a ridiculous amount of oil in a pan and poured a ring of mixture into it. She then flipped it over with metal sticks. We then had a turn but it was a lot harder than it looked and we ended up with some very strange looking bits of Sel Roti. She then showed us how to make a Nepalese dish of chickpeas and tomatoes to go with it which was delicious. It was a fun afternoon and amazing how much you can interpret with hardly undertsnadning a word eac other are saying.

Overall, it was a nice relaxin holiday and fun to learn some more cooking to add to our repertoire.