One of the transformations after marrying Curry Boy is the opportunity to experience a different way of life. Whenever I go back to India to visit family and friends, it is another extreme way of life. This time, still found it difficult and full of SURPRISES.
Corona? There’s no Corona in India.
On this trip, we first flew from Germany to Helsinki to stay one night for a flash tour, then took a 8-hour flight to New Delhi. Lucky enough, we both got Covid.
It started with a strange feeling in the throat, followed by fever, cough, and general fatigue, just like the feeling after a vaccination. ‘Oh my god! Could it be that?’ We can’t care too much, we have to catch the train immediately after landing, take more than 3 hours to another city, Chandigarh, and then visit uncle and aunt’s family after arriving.
We told them, ‘we both feel unwell, maybe it’s Corona.’ They responded with a smile, ‘Corona? There is no Corona in India, only the common cold.’
My aunt knew we were visiting, so she prepared a lot of different dishes, including fried potatoes and fried vegetables, but I really lost my appetite. I barely ate one or two pieces of fried food and a little curry, and I couldn’t eat anymore. I felt extremely sorry. My aunt couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed when she saw that we ate so little.
We crawled back to the hotel, stayed in a well-cooled air-conditioned room with the blanket rolled up tight all night. The next day, we took a 4-hour taxi back to Curry Boy’s house.
It was really a long way to go.
4-Hour, Not Highway.
Don’t think that these 4 hours are all on flat highways. There are many road sections in India that are not paved and was extremely bumpy. The last hour or so is a mountain road that turns around and around, because Curry Mom and Dad live in a small village on a mountain.
Feeling dizzy and nauseous, we managed to get back home without throwing up.
We took a rapid test immediately after returning home. Ha! No surprise, the second line appeared super fast. At first, Curry Mom thought it was a common cold and told us no need to take the test. After the 2 lines shown, she immediately kept two-meters distance.
Fortunately, the house has a newly built second floor. So we went to the second floor for isolation, with separate bathrooms and toilets. Food was distributed on the first floor for breakfast, lunch and dinner. After 5 days, tested it again, got one line, we were free.
Simple Village Life, Burn Your Own Trash
Curry Parents live a very simple village life. The land is their own, they grow vegetables, freshly squeeze milk from the relative’s cow, homemade butter and cheese, self-sufficient, and only drive ten minutes to the small market to buy other necessities when required. There is no garbage disposal service here, and all garbage has to be burned to ashes by yourself. I, as a city girl, bring nothing to the house. At most it is garbage such as packaging bags and tissue paper.
Curry – Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
For those who are used to living in cities, village life is hard to imagine.
To me, the hardest part to adapt was eating spiced curries for all three meals, everyday. Speaking of curry, maybe you all know that there is no such thing called “curry” in India. The dishes are made with different vegetables, different spices. They all have different names in India. But for foreigners, they are all curry.
Curry Mom also took good care of me. Knowing that I wanted bread for breakfast, sometimes she would buy bread and jam for me. As for lunch and dinner, I can’t run away. It must be curry, with Chapati or rice or another kind of flatbread. But they don’t actually eat rice so much. I heard that they will feel unwell if they eat too much. They only cook rice for me, a foreigner. In addition, don’t think that Indians eat Naan at home. It’s restaurant food, because it needs to be baked in a Tandoori oven, which is impossible at home, so North Indians mainly eat Chapati.
To be honest, when I am sick, I just want to eat light food, such as stir-fried vegetables with garlic, steamed tofu, and simple scrambled eggs with tomato. Unfortunately, even if you have money in India, you may not be able to buy them. Somehow, after three years of absence, Curry Mom seems to cook with more oil and chilli. Maybe this is just my illusion. Although I brought pasta, sesame oil, oyster sauce and soy sauce to India, because of the quarantine, I couldn’t go to the kitchen to make my own meal, which only made the whole India trip more challenging.
Make 20-30 Chapati in One Meal, by Hand
Curry Mom’s dishes are delicious, but they are inevitably oily, because oil is used to sauté spices to make Masala, it’d not taste good if used too little oil. As a novice, I can see that there are quite a few steps to cooking Indian food, especially making flatbread like Chapati. It really needs to be kneaded and shaped one by one before baking. For example, Curry Boy often eats 4-5 chapati in a meal. And for a family of five or six, 20-30 pieces of chapati are required for one meal. Even if Curry Mom has a pair of motorcycle hands and is skilled in cooking, it still takes a lot of time.
A Tradition: Firewood Cornbread
Even so, sometimes she cooks Makki ki roti over a firewood! The stove room was filled with smoke, and my eyes were watering outside the door. I watched her sitting on a small stool, making dough from the corn flour ditch water that she had grown and ground herself, and then grilling it piece by piece with firewood to form a flatbread. It is thicker than Chapati and has no taste in itself. It’s usually served with curry (Sarson ka saag) made of mustard greens, and I was very full after eating a piece. Curry Mom does have a gas stove, but making cornbread has to be traditional and flavourful, not to be after for convenience, but to make delicious ones.
What a meal, isn’t it?
Every time I go back home, calm down, and reflect on my life in India, I realise that there is nothing wrong with their life, that is their way of life. Everyone has a different way of life, right? As a troublesome city girl, I can’t help complaining to Curry Boy, magnifying the inconvenience and uncomfortable. I really wanted to eat different dishes, such as Western food and Chinese food; I wanted a strong shower head to take a refreshing hot shower; I really wanted to go to the city to live my city life.
Sometimes I feel India is not modern, and it’s true, India is a developing country, but it doesn’t mean that the local people are unhappy. This is very important. Curry Boy often says: ‘They have far less material than us, but they are happier, and urban people have more problems.’
