Lazy Saturday, January 18, 2014

It thundered and threatened and even poured rain off and on all day.  I wore my usual short-sleeved tee-shirt and felt a wee bit chilled from time to time.  However, that felt so good for a change that I didn't put on a shawl or change to longer sleeves.  The fragrance of whatever flowers are blooming now was heavy in the air, almost as if someone were spraying a strong floral perfume at us.  I was very grateful for the break from heat and dust.

My first task of the morning was preparing an eggplant and ground beef stew to "cook" all day long in my Wonderbag, which I had purchased just before leaving the States.  John was skeptical that it would actually function as advertised, but I thought the worst that could happen would be undercooked stew which I could then finish on the stove.  So, I browned the ground beef--called mince here--peeled and cubed the eggplant, chopped the onions and green peppers, and peeled and diced some tomatoes, and then dumped everything together into a big lidded pot.  (John had screwed its handle off so it would fit in the WB.)  I brought everything to a boil and left it bubbling for 5 minutes as instructed and then put the pot into the WB, and carefully closed it up as tightly as I could.

On the stew was cozily inside the WB, John and I decided to call Ray and have him take us to The Blue Heron, a popular meeting place for expats here in Arusha.  This is the type of place we usually do not frequent, but a former student had recommended it as a nice oasis for reading and relaxing.  It wasn't raining as we drove to The Blue Heron, but soon after we were seated in the garden and given menus for lunch, it began to pour, so we had to flee and take refuge on the front terrace.  All tables under cover were full, so we sat in lounge furniture and tried our best to eat daintily from a low coffee table.  I thought we did admirably, and enjoyed my stir-fried chicken dish very much.  John had some sort of fish, which he said was delicious too.  My discomfort at being in such a wazungu spot was lessened by the presence of some local Tanzanian families and both African and white children.

There are huge greenhouses just outside Arusha for growing flowers which are then flown to Europe overnight to be in the flower markets there in the morning. So, roses are very cheap here--about $3 to $4 a dozen--and every table at The Blue Heron had a bouquet of roses on it.  It's nice to have roses here instead of snow at home.

I didn't go into the shop, but from the website, you can click on the photo and seen what I might have bought had I gone shopping.  http://blue-heron-tanzania.com/shop/

We returned home in late afternoon and then needed to prepare for dinner, to which we had invited Megan and Donna.  Given the paucity of the items stocked in our kitchens, Megan and Donna needed to bring along their plates, and forks.  I had bought some more spoons, so we were safe there.  Our menu was eggplant stew, rice, tomato and cucumber salad, carrot sticks, and fruit salad for dessert.  We also pooled our granola bar and Donna's candy bar, cut each in four pieces, and enjoyed a bit of sweetness with our coffee.  The big "disclose" was the moment I delivered the stew from its Wonderbag womb: it was still hot and perfectly done after 9 hours of just sitting there.  I'm hooked!