Cooking Lesson

Today I had my first cooking lesson. My neighbor came over to teach me how to make a local dish. It's a pastry kind of thing - and oh so yummy!! She cooked, and I watched and took notes.

It's made using thin sheets of dough, layered with different combinations of cheese, potatoes, meat, spinach, etc. I chose potatoes and cheese.

Here's how it's made (for all of you kitchen pros):
1. Boil 2-3 potatoes, whole and unpeeled
2. Mix together 3 eggs, half a container of yogurt, and about a cup of sunflower oil.
3. When almost done, remove potatoes from the pot. Peel and grate.
4. Mix potatoes with a block of cheese, crumbled. (I can't think of an Am. equivalent for the type of cheese I used.)
5. Brush oil on bottom of large round metal baking dish.
6. Lay one sheet of dough open on a flat surface and brush with the egg mixture.
7. Crumble potato and cheese mixture on top.
8. Cut the dough into 3 parts, and fold each one.
9. Place the rolled sheets of dough into the pan in a circular pattern.
10. Continue until 3 sheets of dough have been prepared.
11. Cook in the oven for about 45 minutes.

And VOILA . . . bon appetite!!!

Bumps in the Road

As many of you may know, we had to travel to a nearby city last week to take Mark to see an orthopedic doctor because of a shoulder injury caused by a skiing accident. The hospital experience was a great one, and Mark is on the road to recovery.

This blog is devoted to driving in the country in which we live. You must understand that while there are traffic laws here, they are very loosely enforced. Driving is really a defensive sport! There is always road construction going on between here and wherever "there" may be. Sometimes there is heavy fog. Sometimes there are road signs that don't make sense to us, so we have to guess at what they mean. Often there are quite impatient drivers who pass on blind curves or just "make a lane for themselves" if there's no other way around. And there are ALWAYS bumps, bumps, and more bumps in the road!!!!

Before heading out to the hospital, I remembered to get the camera. I planned to take a picture of one specific place on the trip there. It's absolutely gorgeous, and I've wanted a picture since the first time we drove past it. We finally arrived at THE place. I got the camera turned on and zoomed in. And wouldn't you know - the bumps in the road got worse at that very moment!!! Keep in mind that I was aiming for a place of worship that sits on the hill in the middle of the village, with the village that surrounds it. Also remember that I was sitting in the passenger's seat taking the picture through the windshield on the other side of the road. The following pictures show what I ended up with after focusing in very carefully on the previously mentioned target.

my first attempt

my second attempt

my third attempt - close but not exactly what I was going for

We realized that we were about to miss our opportunity, so Mark took the camera, rolled down his window, zoomed, focused, and snapped a picture himself. This is what we got after several more bumps on the road!!!

nice looking bright blue apartment building, huh?

On the way home, as we approached the village, I decided to give it one more try. I rolled down my window despite the freezing cold wind and just started snapping pictures as fast as I could. Finally, I got what I was looking for.

Ahhhh . . . isn't that beautiful?!

I've found myself really missing the wide, open spaces and peace and quiet of our most recent home. I used to sit on the back porch and read often, even when the air smelled of turkeys and cows! Here, we get wide, open spaces only when we travel from city to city. And this picture is only a glimpse of the views those trips provide. It's more and more beautiful to me each time we drive through the country. It reminds me so much of home, yet it's still so different. I'm grateful that my Father uses the beauty of His creation to renew my spirits and gives me the opportunity to breathe clean, fresh air every now and then!!

Valentine's Day

We are now residing in a place far away from home, but even here there is a day set aside for honoring the one you love. It is called "Beloved's Day" or something like that, and it is celebrated on Feb. 14, just like we do. Jewelers advertise sales on diamonds, men buy beautiful jewelry or flowers for their special ones, and things with hearts are sold all over the place. The thing about this Valentine's Day for us that made it so different is that we celebrated it with about 12 of our neighbors. Instead of a quiet "just the two of us" dinner, we went to a restaurant with our neighbors for 6 hours of food, music, and lots of laughter.

There's nothing quite like looking at a plate of foreign food in candle light and trying to figure out what it's made of, especially when your neighbors who grew up in this country don't know what it is!! We only ended up eating one strange thing - the rest of it was delicious!! The strange thing we ate seemed normal to us until the following day when an English-speaking friend described a few details that our neighbors failed to mention. We were told in the restaurant that it was something made with meat and spicy spices. It's rolled into little finger shaped pieces and served rolled up in a leaf of romaine lettuce. That seems harmless, right?! Well, what we found out the next day from our friend is that the meat is raw!!! YUCK!!! Apparently people believe that the spiciness of the spices actually cooks the meat - go figure! Needless to say, we'll be avoiding that food from now on.

We also tried our arms, hands, and legs at a couple of traditional dances. It was kind of like being the kid in high school who sees everyone else doing the electric slide but doesn't have a clue how to do it him/herself. These people learn to "play" these group dances from very young ages, so the movements for them are as natural as walking and running. For us, not so, my friends! Melissa did manage to catch on to a few steps after being practically dragged around by a couple of the women. Mark . . . well, the men's movements are a bit more complicated and rather comical (kind of a mixture between a rooster strutting and karate kid) . . . for him, it didn't come so easliy. Can you picture any of this??? I wish we could have captured it on film!!!

It was kind of strange to celebrate Valentine's Day with almost complete strangers, but, all in all, it was a really great night of getting "inside" the culture here.

Help Wanted!

Well, just when it seems things are going along quite smoothly with the crazy desktop ornaments we call computers . . . things stop going along quite so smoothly! We had such a moment this past weekend. While trying to update some things related to our e-mail program, we lost quite a bit of important contact information. For those of you who regularly receive messages from us, please just send a quick email message to us so we can re-enter the correct information. That will help us greatly!! It might be a while before we send out any more mass messages because it's going to take some time to get things organized again . . . so don't worry if you don't hear from us as quickly as you'd like.

Thanks so much for your help with this and your patience as we get reorganized!!