European Tour?

Two Saturdays ago (July 21st), we went for lunch with the zone leaders, Elders Ram and Kumar, to talk about the branch missionary fireside that was to be held the next evening. We went to a nearby Nilgiris store (grocery store) to buy a few things for the refreshments, and spontaneously we decided to take a quick trip to Europe. (Shhhh, don't tell the mission president.)

We began our tour in Italy.

We have absolutely no idea what got into Elder Kumar. He jumped over the fence and started pushing the tower over! We called to him, "Stop! Stop!" Luckily, he stopped just in time before it fell over.

Hmmm, actually, it doesn't look too bad. Maybe, it could become a tourist destination some day.


We decided to move along quickly before someone found out what Elder Kumar did. Paris sounded like a good option.







Elder Ram, what on earth are you doing? We know the Eiffel Tower is magical and it brings out romantic feelings, but what is this?? Elder Kumar was a bit embarrassed and didn't know what to say.

These missionaries are hard working, dedicated missionaries. Maybe, they have been working too hard!



Ahhh!!! Paris in the summer time. We have always thought it might be a nice place to visit.


Obviously, we didn't go to Europe. We came across these minatures on the way to Nilgiris after we had lunch at Subway. Elder and Sister Tiefenbach and Elder Kumar had seen these before, but Elder Ram had not.

On one blog, we mentioned that there are not many trees in the city. Well, some places have trees, and others do not. The miniatures are in an area called Race Course, which is more upscale than the area in which we live, and this area definitely had more greenery.



This is one example of the many contrasts we see in Coimbatore. In some areas, we see big houses with trees and a bit of a yard,

and other places, we see small shanty houses crammed together with only enough space between the rows of houses to walk. These two houses were less than a five minute drive from each other.

Another contrast we often see is technology amidst poverty, such as the satellite dish on this small house. Many of the houses in Coimbatore are attached to each other, as this one is. This is the back of this group of houses. We walk by these houses on our walk to the Nilgiris store in our area.









While many of the streets are paved, some are dirt paths between the rows of houses. The dirt is very red here; it reminds us of Prince Edward Island in Canada. The trees between these rows of houses offer some privacy from the neighbours across the street, but in reality the people in India don't seem concerned about privacy. They can't have this concern because of the crowding.

This closeness may have some benefits. For example, we have noticed that child raising is more of a community effort here - at least we have noticed it in the church. Parents don't seem offended when another adult tries to correct their child. Everyone seems to take responsibility to ensure that the children are watched if the parents are busy in a meeting or busy talking to someone.

The shops also provide another example of the contrasts we find here. In this store, you can get fresh chicken . . . This is a little too fresh for us. We prefer to buy our chicken from the supermarket where the meat cutting area is refrigerated.











Or, you can walk a few blocks farther and buy freshly made pizza. We like the delivery vehicles. This land is definitely a land of contrasts.









If we don't want fresh chicken or fresh pizza, we can always eat the fresh cinnamon rolls that Sister and Elder Tiefenbach made. Yummmmm...... they were good. We took some for the weekly missionary district conference.







Fresh naan bread is also an option. Sister Tiefenbach found a recipe on the internet. It was easy to make, but time consuming. Naan is a bit different from some of the other Indian bread because it uses yeast as a rising agent. Some breads are unleavened.

Of course, we can't eat naan by itself, so we made butter chicken. We bought a package spices that is specifically for butter chicken, and we followed the recipe on the back of the package. Well, as most of you know, Sister Tiefenbach didn't follow the recipe EXACTLY; she reduced the amount of spice by half. It was still too spicy, so we added some fresh lemon juice and more curd, which is like Greek yogurt. The lemon and the curd cut the spice, and enhances the taste (at least it did for us). We enjoyed the meal. We eat with our hands for some meals, just to get the whole experience.

We had leftovers, so we invited Elder Kumar and Elder Vinck to drop by our apartment after their last appointment for the day. We had eaten about 1/3 of the butter chicken. It was gone by the time the elders were finished eating. Elder Ram, who is Elder Kumar's companion, was in Erode on another assignment, so he missed the butter chicken and naan.
We had District Conference yesterday and today. We will do a separate blog for that early in the week.

And so the sun sets on another week in Coimbatore.