Wise Words 22/1/12

Over the weekend Sam and I got our chance in the kitchen. Earlier in the week Sam and Julina were talking and she mentioned something about wanting to make pizza, but not being sure how to make pizza dough. Sam told her I knew how and could show her, so the plan was born to have a pizza night on Saturday. Somehow the topic of apple pie also came up – I think because it just seems “American” and people have only ever seen it in movies. So Sam decided to bake an apple pie. It was a busy day in the kitchen. We spent the afternoon preparing dough and chopping up veggies and all the toppings for our pizzas. Sam and Miesenya worked on the apple pie. And Julina finished up a batch of yogurt.

Here at the house there are a number of entrepreneurs. Julina has a fruit tree business. She grows avocado trees from their pits and there are probably a hundred of them in small planters in the backyard. Also they make and sell their own yogurt – made fresh every day. It's sweet and tangy and really creamy and extremely popular. All day long people ring the bell and buy yogurt cups for 50 kwanzas (approximately 50 US cents). The soccer players who practice at the stadium across the street flock over after their games, groups of people stop in after choir practice, and of course tons of small kids and adults too, who come by at all hours for a cup. So Saturday was a day filled with activity and that evening we feasted on pizza and apple pie. Both were quite a hit. The following evening, Sunday, as we sat down to dinner we realized that there was literally nothing to put on the bread. Someone went to the shop to buy butter, but there was none. Thankfully we discovered a block of cheese that we hadn't used on the pizza the previous night and so we had bread with cheese and tea. Everyone remarked how sad Sunday's dinner looked compared to our feast the previous night. As Julina ate her dry bread with cheese she told us about a saying there is here. It goes something like this: “When you dance on a rock, every once in a while step down off the rock and dance on the ground so you don't forget how to dance in the dirt.” True words of wisdom. Parting Shot: “Yogurti!”