In which I eat real tandoori chicken

A trip to Lower Dharamsala was made today, and Brij took us to what he has proclaimed to be one of his very favorite restaurants in the area: a place tucked back behind the main road where he could eat every day and never get tired of it. I have no idea if the restaurant even has a name... I imagine it does, but that sort of thing doesn't seem to be so important around here.

Fresh meat market. Not my usual kind of place, but thankfully it wasn't exceedingly gruesome.

Real Indian tandoori chicken, naan, and fixin's.

We ordered tandoori chicken with naan and some rice, and as in most restaurants here, we got a plate of sliced red onions to go with the meal.

No, I do not eat much meat. I was feeling like I could use some protein, though, and I figured I'm in India – tandoori chicken is one of those things that just seems like part of the experience. Furthermore, as far as I can tell there are no such things as factory farms here, and none of the meat I've seen since I got to India has looked like it was on any kind of hormones.

Let me tell ya... it was pretty damn good. That poor little chicken, at least, did not die in vain. Its sacrifice was very much appreciated.

After lunch we moseyed through town and Marie and I stopped in practically every fabric store we saw – which was close to a dozen of them – because she wanted to have a salwar kameez (traditional Indian dress) made and I was looking for fabric for a chupa (traditional Tibetan dress). I think I found some that I really like. Since I'll be here a while yet I decided to sleep on it before I bought anything. I really wish we had fabric stores like these near home in the States. They're like candy stores for us textile-aphiles. Marie and I decided we'd go back down sometime, just the two of us, and take our sweet time perusing the fabrics when we didn't have other people to worry about boring.

Now THAT is what I call a selection of colors!

The pretties! Look at them!

On our way down to the bus/Jeep stop to head back to McLeod Ganj, we spotted this little gem. The photo op was too good to pass up.

Isn't this a nice pic, Brandi? It made me think of you. <3

In other news, my knee is nearly healed up, I decided to cover up some of the stubbornest dirt on my walls with what we'll call a mural, and Brij has given me two and a half more pages of Hindi vocab to study. There has also been talk of travel for the next few weekends, and hopefully it will involve dancing! Stay tuned for details.

A Most Exciting Breakfast

I have been craving "muesli with fruit and curd" for the last week and a half. I had some the first morning I was in Delhi and it was really good. For those of you Americans who don't recognize half the words in that sentence, it's basically granola with yogurt and fruit. Pretty yummy.

So this morning as Gill was leaving her building to go teach her class at Tibet Charity, I poked my head out my balcony door and asked her to knock on Marie's door for me. Marie had already made some oatmeal, but she accepted my invitation to breakfast anyway so I collected my things and we headed into town for some coffee "and whatever."

On our way up, we passed this construction site like we always do on our way up Temple Road...

... when we heard a CRASH and found bricks falling from the top floor. Everyone on the street stopped. The Tibetan women near us started "tsk tsk"ing and saying "very dangerous," with which we agreed.

We decided to walk on the other side of the road.

A few minutes later we arrived at the Moon Peak Cafe, which I had never been to in the month I've been in McLeod. We've heard good things, though, so we figured we'd try it out since I wanted a coffee.

The menu reads thusly:

That seems fair.

We sat at a table outside and had just gotten our omelettes and coffee when we heard a ruckus from near the restaurant door. There was a whole bunch of arguing and shouting in Tibetan, and a couple of the restaurant guys were trying to reason with this guy who was clearly under the influence of something. I managed to record the end of the tussle. I missed the part where he punched the picture window. Sorry.

One of the other patrons came over and tried to reason with him. I'm pretty sure she was from New York, judging from her accent and fearless, brazen attitude.

Another patron was caught a little too near the altercation and we invited her to come sit with us. That's how we met Suzanne, who comes from Maine:
 

Suzanne and Marie, practically unruffled by the morning's commotion.

The rest of the day was less crazy. My students took their Unit 2 test and so far have done... decently. I developed some stomach cramps around noon:30 and had to take a little while off; I wonder if I ate my larger-than-usual breakfast too quickly? Regardless, I'm ok now, and I even came up to town for a pedicure at a Tibetan salon (350 rupees). I left a 50 rupee tip because they wouldn't let me pay for the bottle of nail polish my oh-so-graceful self dropped and broke... I may not be going back there for a little while if only because of embarrassment. Oh well. So it goes.

Here, finally uploaded, is the video I took the day I hurt my knee, in case you want an idea of what it's like going from my room to Lower Dharamsala. I didn't start recording until about halfway through the trip; it takes roughly 30 minutes total. You should kind of get the idea, though. There's less to see in the upper half of the trip anyway.