In My Hands Today…

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Partitions – Amit Majmudar

As India is rent into two nations, communal violence breaks out on both sides of the new border and streaming hordes of refugees flee from blood and chaos.

At an overrun train station, Shankar and Keshav, twin Hindu boys, lose sight of their mother and join the human mass to go in search of her. A young Sikh girl, Simran Kaur, has run away from her father, who would rather poison his daughter than see her defiled. And Ibrahim Masud, an elderly Muslim doctor driven from the town of his birth, limps toward the new Muslim state of Pakistan, rediscovering on the way his role as a healer. As the displaced face a variety of horrors, this unlikely quartet comes together, defying every rule of self-preservation to forge a future of hope.

Recipe: Brown Rice Savory Pongal aka Ven Pongal

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IMG_5277Last week, I blogged about the sweet Pongal recipe which I made as a neividhyam or offering to the Lord on the occasion of the festival of Pongal. That evening, I made the salted version for dinner. The method for both is quite similar and you can make both at the same time with little extra effort.

This is often eaten as a breakfast dish, especially in the southern parts of India. This combination of rice and dal will really fill you up and if you, like me, plan on having this for dinner, then go a bit easy as you tend to feel really full sometime after your meal!

Brown Rice Ven Pongal

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Ingredients:

  • 2 cups brown rice (traditionally made with white rice)
  • 1 cup yellow moong dal
  • 2 cups water
  • 2 cups milk
  • 2 tsps cumin seeds
  • 2-3 tbsps ghee
  • 2 tsps whole black pepper
  • 1 tsp pepper powder
  • 1 tsp grated ginger
  • 4-5 leaves of curry leaves
  • A handful of broken cashew nuts
  • Salt to taste

Method:

  • Wash the rice well, drain and keep aside. In a pressure cooker, lightly pan fry the dal till a nice aroma comes.
  • Add the rice, water, milk, salt, peppercorns and cook under pressure for 4-5 whistles.
  • In another pan, heat 1 tbsp ghee and fry the cashewnuts until they brown nicely. Remove and keep aside and in the same pan, fry the cumin seeds, and when it begins to splutter, add the curry leaves, grated ginger and pepper powder and fry for a few seconds. Remove from the flame and keep aside.
  • When the pressure reduces, open the cover of the pressure cooker and check if the rice and dal mixture has become mushy (it should look like a risotto at this point). If no, add more water and/or milk and cook it further till it becomes mushy.
  • Add the remaining ghee here and stir well. When it has achieved the right consistency, add the fried cashewnuts and the seasoning (cumin seeds, ginger, curry leaves and pepper powder) and mix well checking for salt.
  • Serve with sambar or coconut chutney

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In My Hands Today…

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The Templar Legacy (Cotton Malone #1) – Steve Berry

The ancient order of the Knights Templar possessed untold wealth and absolute power over kings and popes . . . until the Inquisition, when they were wiped from the face of the earth, their hidden riches lost. But now two forces vying for the treasure have learned that it is not at all what they thought it was–and its true nature could change the modern world.

Cotton Malone, one-time top operative for the U.S. Justice Department, is enjoying his quiet new life as an antiquarian book dealer in Copenhagen when an unexpected call to action reawakens his hair-trigger instincts–and plunges him back into the cloak-and-dagger world he thought he’d left behind.

It begins with a violent robbery attempt on Cotton’s former supervisor, Stephanie Nelle, who’s far from home on a mission that has nothing to do with national security. Armed with vital clues to a series of centuries-old puzzles scattered across Europe, she means to crack a mystery that has tantalized scholars and fortune-hunters through the ages by finding the legendary cache of wealth and forbidden knowledge thought to have been lost forever when the order of the Knights Templar was exterminated in the fourteenth century. But she’s not alone. Competing for the historic prize–and desperate for the crucial information Stephanie possesses–is Raymond de Roquefort, a shadowy zealot with an army of assassins at his command.

Welcome or not, Cotton seeks to even the odds in the perilous race. But the more he learns about the ancient conspiracy surrounding the Knights Templar, the more he realizes that even more than lives are at stake. At the end of a lethal game of conquest, rife with intrigue, treachery, and craven lust for power, lies a shattering discovery that could rock the civilized world–and, in the wrong hands, bring it to its knees.

2016 Week 4 Update

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I wrote myself a new jobscope and went back to Big B. I did get feedback from my previous boss and his first comment was “Do you really want to stay on given all the changes happening here?” Which was a valid point, some of the stuff I’ve been hearing over the past week have indicated that there’s trouble in paradise!

I showed Big B the jobscope I wrote for myself, and he did seem think there’s something in it. We’re meeting again today to discuss it further. The company which employes me has written to say they will be renewing the contract for another 3 months, which was what Big B also mentioned. Hopefully, by the end of February, I’ll have a better grasp of what is happening here. I have started to look for opportunities, but age is against me this time I know and it will be difficult….

On the home-front, things are going on well, the children are settling down in school, though a bit boring. I’m looking forward to the Chinese New Year long weekend in two weeks time for some R&R, more importantly sleep!

Have a great week folks!
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2016 Sec 1 Week 4 Update

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We’re almost at the end of the first full month of school and the children have never been more busy! They’ve adapted themselves quite well to the more demanding schedule of secondary school, but I guess we need to wait till the first tests to see really how well they have adapted to school….

One good news which started the week for us was that BB got into the Singapore Youth Flying Club for his CCA. This was his dream CCA and the one for which he chose this particular school as his first choice school. He went for his first CCA and they spent the time getting to know each other and playing ice breakers. I’ve heard from other parents that this is an expensive CCA, as we need to buy model planes and remotes for them which should cost a few hundreds each year. Also they will inevitably crash planes, so that’s money gone!

GG on the other hand, still has not gotten her CCA allocation yet, which should come out next week. But unofficially she has already started attending Choir when they practice. Her school is going to go into Show Choir this year and she is super excited about it. It involves dancing to moves while singing and this way she gets to do both her passions – singing and dancing! She has a CCA attachment for Choir this week, which in her case is a moot point, since she is already attending it. Also she’s been texting her teacher for costumes to be worn for the Chinese New Year performance next week, so she’s happy!

I also went for my first Parent Support Group (PSG) meeting at BB’s school on Friday. In their primary school, although I was a parent volunteer, it was mostly ad-hoc. We didn’t have a formal PSG and there was one person who used to liaise between the school and parents. The meeting on Friday was good as we met the principal and some school leaders so we were able to voice out concerns. I also met other parents which was good for me.