In My Hands Today…

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Secret Daughter – Shilpi Somaya Gowda

6905012On the eve of the monsoons, in a remote Indian village, Kavita gives birth to a baby girl. But in a culture that favours sons, the only way for Kavita to save her newborn daughter’s life is to give her away. It is a decision that will haunt her and her husband for the rest of their lives, even after the arrival of their cherished son.

Halfway around the globe, Somer, an American doctor, decides to adopt a child after making the wrenching discovery that she will never have one of her own. When she and her husband, Krishnan, see a photo of the baby with the gold-flecked eyes from a Mumbai orphanage, they are overwhelmed with emotion. Somer knows life will change with the adoption but is convinced that the love they already feel will overcome all obstacles.

Interweaving the stories of Kavita, Somer, and the child that binds both of their destinies, Secret Daughter poignantly explores the emotional terrain of motherhood, loss, identity, and love, as witnessed through the lives of two families—one Indian, one American—and the child that indelibly connects them.

Recipes: Stir-fry Potatoes

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2A couple of weeks back when S’ cousins came home for dinner, I had made this potato dish which was inspired by the simple potato stir-fry from the northern state of Uttar Pradesh. This is a very simple dish to make but is slightly heavy on the masalas used. It was super yummy and since then BB & GG have been asking me to keep making this. This dish is a keeper and goes very well with any rice and dal combination as well as with any roti or Indian flatbread. When I make it for lunch, BB also takes it with him to school, as a filling for a sandwich.

1Potato Stir-fry, UP inspired

Ingredients:

  • 4-5 medium sized potatoes, scrubbed and washed well
  • 2-3 tbsps oil
  • 1 tsp cumin seeds
  • ½ tsp fennel seeds
  • ½ tsp ajwain seeds
  • Salt to taste
  • ½ to 1 tsp red chilli powder
  • 1 tsp Amchur or dry mango powder
  • ½ tsp coriander powder
  • 1 tsp cumin powder
  • ½ tsp garam masala powder

Method:

  • Wash and scrub the potatoes well. Then slice them into thick slices and then cut vertically into 1 inch sticks and slice the sticks finely. Wash well and keep aside.
  • In a pan, heat the oil and when the oil is warm, put the dry masalas one by one – cumin seeds, then fennel seeds, caraway seeds and stir for a couple of seconds. Then add the salt, red chilli powder, turmeric powder, asafoetida, dry mango powder, cumin powder and coriander powder and stir for a few seconds.
  • Then add the potatoes and stir and mix well so that the masalas mix well with the potatoes.
  • Cover and cook on a low flame for around 10-15 minutes or until it is almost done.
  • At this point, add the garam masala powder, stir well and cover to cook for another 5 minutes.
  • Check for seasoning and switch off the flame.
  • Enjoy the potato stir-fry with rice or any flat bread

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In My Hands Today…

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The House of Bilqis: A Novel – Azhar Abidi

9780670019410-usA haunting novel about a mother and son and the emotional consequences of leaving home

Bilqis Ara Begum, an aristocratic widow, is dismayed when her only son, Samad, marries Kate, an Australian girl, and settles in Melbourne rather than returning home to Pakistan. Though Samad attempts to persuade his mother to join them in Australia, she insists on remaining in Karachi even while Pakistan is facing turmoil. It’s 1985. The mullahs and the generals are in control, and an insurgency is beginning in Kashmir. Meanwhile, Bilqis’s servant girl, Mumtaz, enters a relationship with Omar, a young man caring for a neighboring house. Omar is an intense man who resents Pakistan’s class system, and his frustration leads him to the freedom movement in Kashmir. But Mumtaz is in love and willing to sacrifice her honor to be with him.

The intertwining stories of Bilqis, Samad, and Mumtaz offer a powerful and nuanced portrait of Pakistan in the modern era-a place of conflicting loyalties, rich with history and culture, and plagued by violence. Abidi’s precise and elegant prose illuminates the struggle between a mother and son to reconcile their love for each other with their love for home.

Parenting: Importance of Breakfast

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We all know that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. We’ve also heard the adage “Breakfast like a king, Lunch like a common man and Dine like a pauper”. Breakfast which literally means breaking the fast between dinner and the morning is one meal which should not be missed.

 

There are reports from the Healthy Child website which say there are around 20 – 30% of teens who do not eat breakfast before going to school.

 

The first meal of the day is very important in providing energy to your teen for their activities in school. School work takes up a lot of mental energy and those who don’t fill up adequately before going to school may find their energy dwindling down before recess and a chance to eat food.

 

I am very particular that BB & GG eat something to fuel up before school and so far they’ve not disappointed me here. But somehow since school started this year, they both on different days would decide that they are full from the previous night’s dinner and so don’t want breakfast. Nothing I say would make them change their mind. It’s not because they sleep on and wake up late and so there’s time for breakfast. They are ready much earlier than S but would prefer to use their phones to eating, though on days when they do eat breakfast, they do both simultaneously.

I usually give BB & GG the analogy of a car with no fuel which can’t run for long on reserve fuel when they don’t want to eat breakfast before going to school. I also believe that without a healthy and hearty breakfast you will not be able to concentrate in class which will hamper performance in school. This is because those who miss breakfast lack the glucose which is needed for neurotransmitters to function properly in the body.

I sometimes suspect most teens (and BB & GG) skip breakfast as a way to reduce or control their weight. This tactic actually backfires on them as a study found that teens who ate breakfast daily had a lower Body Mass Index or BMI and gained less weight compared to those who skipped breakfast.

 

So this, in essence, is why breakfast is the most important meal in a day, not just for teens, but for everyone. Does your teen skip breakfast? What do you do to make him/her eat a good breakfast before school?

 

In My Hands Today…

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Letters from Thailand – Botan, translated by Susan Fulop Kepner

234388Letters from Thailand is the story of Tan Suang U, a young man who leaves China to make his fortune in Thailand at the close of World War II, and ends up marrying, raising a family, and operating a successful business. The novel unfolds through his letters to his beloved mother in China.

In Tan Suang U’s lively account of his daily life in Bangkok’s bustling Chinatown, larger and deeper themes emerge: his determination to succeed at business in this strange new culture; his hopes for his family; his resentment at how easily his children embrace urban Thai culture at the expense of the Chinese heritage which he holds dear; his inability to understand or adopt Thai ways; and his growing alienation from a society that is changing too fast for him.