I almost over slept this morning! I was really lucky though because right when I hit the road I was able to catch a rickshaw. My luck grew even more when I was given my assignment for the day: BAKERY! I was really excited, but then I realized something: Americans use a different measuring system and baking is all about measurements.
When I arrived, I realized something else that put a small damper on the day: no one in the kitchen spoke English. Now normally I have been ok with being in the dark, but this was the first time I entered this kitchen, I was confused on the measuring system, and I did not know anyone in the room. It took about twenty minutes for me to understand my first assignment which was to make five trays of 90 fudge cookies (that is 450 cookies). This was a pretty easy task, but took me about 2 hours to complete. I was so happy to be done with it when they pulled out white looking dough and mimicked making balls of dough again and placed five trays in front of me.
After a long morning of making cookies, I finally found a chef that spoke English! Once I found him, I was not letting him out of my sight. I explained to him that I wanted to learn more about the bakery then just cookies, boy did I not know what was coming. He was so happy to hear this that he gave me a special assignment before lunch. I was to make chocolate cake! One catch, look at the recipe he gave me below:
- 96 eggs
- 3 kg of grain sugar
- 20 gm of gel
- 200 ml of water
- 2.6 kg of flour
- 400 gm cocoa powder
- 90 gm of baker powder
Now, as Americans, what would you do if you were handed this recipe? First of all, 96 eggs?! Are you serious? I ended up making 18 cakes for the hotel, and I had a great time doing it – needless to say I can crack an egg like a pro now.
Once I filled the cake rings and placed the cakes in the over (and in the process had cake mix all over my uniform – see attached photo below) I was directed to my new favorite place in the hotel: the chocolate department.
Now, I am not a chocolate person, but this was amazing. I was literally making truffle chocolates. The other trainee that was with me in the chocolate department has NO idea what to do in a kitchen. Chef gave her a bowl of about 3 pounds of dark chocolate to melt saying to put 30 seconds then stir to make sure the chocolate doesn’t burn. 45 seconds later, the trainee returns saying the chocolate is still not melted and she doesn’t want to burn it – you can’t make this stuff up.
The chef then realized that I kind of understood what to do in a kitchen so he gave me more responsibility. Soon enough, after I melted the chocolate with burning it, I was upgraded to his assistant for the rest of the afternoon. I started to learn about how chocolate truffles are made: first a coating of chocolate, then adding the truffle, then more chocolate. I made about 200 chocolate truffles today – it was amazing! I was eating chocolate alllll day, yum!
I had a little extra time before running off to go art shopping, so I went to the bread department to learn about the breads. It was so cool. I learned about the different types of bread, how to mass produce them, and the chef even let me make the onion loaf! I mean, these people are crazy with the responsibility they are giving me.
After finding a beautiful painting of Lord Ganesha (the Indian Elephant God), Peggy and I celebrated with a traditional North Indian dinner. The dinner included chole (a chickpea curry that you eat with your fingers and bhatoors – North Indian fried bread very similar to poori) and my new favorite, pani poori! The dinner was so delicious and really nice and filling.
When driving home in the rickshaw (clearly where I do most of my reflections because I always mention rickshaws) I realized that Indian people are not really attached to their children. Now I understand that what I just said is a very strong and broad statement, but I believe for the majority of Indians it is true.
The traditional view of family by Indians is very strong. Indians say that their cousins are their siblings. That is right, Indians believe that your father and mother's children are your only siblings, that your cousins are your brother and sisters as well! That explains why Indians have such large families. They consider their first cousins AND second cousins as siblings, then third cousins are considered what Americans to see as cousins! That is crazy!
Weddings in India are HUGE so huge that you invite all your families family -- now keep going until you reach your 5th cousin. I asked how many people were in a small wedding: 500 guests! THAT IS HUGE imagine that bill? Then I asked how many guest were at a big wedding: 2,500 guest - o.m.g. I do not even know that many people. The engagement ceremony - where most brides meet their groom from the first time (arranged marriages are still the most common here, I was asked if I was going to have a love or arranged marriage. I laughed thinking it was a joke, whoops). The next ceremony, the wedding, is one month after and cannot be during the month of the bride or grooms birthday. Also, the wedding can never be held on the 13th.
Anyway, Indians have many children and large extended families. The children themselves have a sense of family, but really spend little time with them. The majority of children are rooming around with the friends, hand in hand. The children are free to go and do as they please. Now, the majority of the children I see doing this are in the lower class, but lets be honest that is the majority of Indians. There are children walking around at 10:30 pm with their friends like it is 9 am. They are chasing one another and almost getting hit by rickshaws! It is truly crazy.
Another thing I finally connected today while speaking with Peggy which cracked me up. The United States to squirrels and rabbits is India to cows, goats, and dogs. Seriously. Peggy and I started to talk about the condition of the streets and I asked her if the livestock had anything to do with the bad filth. She laughed and said that they do no damage, just like in New York. I couldn’t even hold it in this time, I just yelped with laughter. I explained that in New York City livestock do not live freely and are not even allowed. Peggy was SHOCKED. She really couldn’t believe that there are no cows or goats on the streets of New York.
Once I realized that this shocked her, I told her that stray dogs and cats are also absent in New York (to an extent, but seriously it is INSANE here). Again, she was shocked. She said she couldn’t imagine a place with no stray dogs running around. I explained how upsetting the dogs make me, again she was confused. “Why would that upset you?” I explained how I view animals almost like people! Especially when I see a dog that reminds me of a friends dog, or just a sweet looking one. My heart just breaks. Peggy still could not understand why the dogs on the street upset me.
That is when I realized that squirrels are like dogs to Indians: they have no owners yet people feed them, they run across the street yet no one hits them (most of the time), they really only come in three colors, and you would never touch one. When I told Peggy that in New York we had squirrels she was grossed out: “rodents” she said! RODENTS? You have livestock! Huge animals that poop and clutter the roads. But I realized, as weird as livestock is to me, squirrels are weird to Peggy.
It is just so funny to see the different areas of the world, something that is so normal to some people is an alternate reality to others.
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