From Argentina to India ..while visiting Regina

Last weekend I had a great trip back to Regina. It's now been eight months since I left. It was a trip I thought about for over a month, but only really decided to go a couple days before the weekend. I went with three Regina bus tickets in my pocket and came back with them. Right now in my mind, Regina is the best city to get a ride in, and Edmonton is still the best city in which to be a pedestrian. While leaving the new, modern STC station and walking to the local city bus stop, I ran into a former work colleague and minutes later I was offered a ride.

I had just taken Ravi Khalsa's discovery tango workshop in Saskatoon the previous week, and then arrived at the New Dance Horizon dance studio to take it again (actually for the third time). It was great to see friends from Regina, to be in a delightful dance studio, and to play with the tango. It's a funny dance that is often about improvisation and always about communication. I am always intrigued about how I find myself faced with parts of my personality that are challenges in my 'real life' or non-dance relationships and communication. I had to laugh when I saw my stubborn side come out when trying to work on the Boleo. In previous classes I have often found it hard to trust my partner. I had a crazy thought this week that I should study and compare the Argentine tango and language learning. Two things I am caught up with at the moment.

Now how I managed to get to India was actually by staying at my East Indian friends' house. At one point I was told that a guest is like god and I felt very special. Jayshree prepared a delicious meal for me and then we watched an East Indian film called 'Amal'. I like East Indian films, but I never knew that when you watched one with some lively East Indians there is a delightful, shall I say 3-D experience. The film is not Bollywood, probably majoritarily in Hindi, but it has a great unexpected ending, and really brings you to live the life of a friendly rickshaw driver.

For your own East Indian experience, here are my notes on an Onion Pakora recipe, apparently a monsoon season favourite:
Finely chop with a hand mixer: 2 onions, 1 potatoe, 1 jalapeno pepper, 3 cloves of garlic, 1/3 of a fresh ginger root, and a bunch of cilantro.
Next, mix 4 cups of Chana (chickpea) flour, 1tsp curry powder & garam masala , 1/2 tsp chili powder, cumin & coriander, 1/2 tsp salt & sugar and 1 &1/2 tsps baking soda.
Add approximately 1/4-1/2 cup of water while mixing to make a cup cake-like consistency. Also add about 1 TB hot oil.
Prepare oil to deep fry small spoon fulls of dough to make small meatball like pakora. Cook for about 1 minute until a dark brown. Serve with Tamarind chutney or Mango chili sauce.
Enjoy !
P.S. If anyone has other chickpea flour recipes please share. The smallest chickpea flour bag was 2kg