pregnant thoughts

Of all the unusual (and mostly unhealthy) food I have consumed in the last 3 months, it wasn't until I wanted to eat a baked potato that made David exclaim, "are you a different person?"

apparently so.
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Yesterday I got a surprise delivery from my friend Jennie. She gave me my first baby present! It was so exciting. Presents! In July! Totally unprecedented. 


I would like to state that I have no intention of turning my blog into a mommy blog. That is just too much effort, and it is too much like scrap-booking (which I loathe). So you can all either make a gasp of horror or relief. Depending on your preference.
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The people in my Spanish speaking LDS ward have been waiting impatiently for 3 years for me to be pregnant. The first year and a half in the ward, everybody asked me if I was pregnant. Even men. I wondered if it was because of the high-waisted dresses I was wearing at the time (I have worn nothing but skirts the last year and a half..in retaliation). Then they all finally clued in and then stopped asking me if I was pregnant. Instead, they started asking me when I was going to have a baby. Or they would ask David. The joys of el barrio. Sigh..


So now I finally am going to have a baby, and I can finally fulfill the dearest wish of apparently every person in my ward. How nice for them. But I did enjoy finally being able to use the word "embarazada" in a sentence. Not that I can say much in spanish, but I DO remember that embarazada does NOT mean embarrassed. It means pregnant:)

spanglish quoting

Dear Senora Showalter,

I will never forget you and how you worked for 2 years at being my spanish teacher in Jr. High. Aside from the spycams and the fake money you passed out, the thing I remember most about your class is the word, "muy." Not only did I learn that muy = very, but I also learned how to say it. Like a cow says moo. Plus eee. Together this makes. Moo-eee. Or, alternately, mooie.

Gracias.

P.S. Your flowy pants are also extremely memorable. And the apron where you kept the fake money.

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I am inventing my own Spanglish phrases to use. They are muy helpful for sounding like a gringo/(a). The first phrase (the only one so far that I have remembered, at least) is:

many hands make muy rapido

this is code for: many hands make light work.

I think after two years of church in Spanish I can finally say that my Spanish has improved a sliver of a fragment.

most unlikely conversation

Setting: the steps in the church foyer

Date: two Sundays ago

Parties Present: me. Anna. Six missionaries.

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Anna doesn't speak English (picture a sixty something Salvadoran grandma). I don't speak Spanish. I do keep a spanish/english dictionary in my church bag though. Our weekly ritual is to sit on the steps of the foyer before church and attempt to have a conversation. I am there early because DH has meetings. She is there early because she feels like it..I guess.

Today I was attempting to explain that I like my glasses, but I don't like wearing them. My dictionary wasn't that helpful in figuring out how to say "wear" but we finally figured out it is llevar. Then luckily the six missionaries that serve in our ward boundaries showed up (early for their ward council appearance) and I immediately asked them to assist.

Me: "So I thought that llevar was to carry, not wear?

Missionary 1: "Well it means both."

Anna: "No me gustan sus zapatos."

Me: "Apparently she doesn't like my shoes."

At this point the dictionary has fallen open to a very special page. The words at the top of the page caught my eye--"bathing trunks." So naturally I ask the missionaries (one of which is a native spanish speaker) for more information. While most missionaries in the area learn Spanish, the native speaker has learned English.

Me: So what are bathing trunks? Taparrabo? Is that like swim trunks?

Missionary 2: {laughter...followed by incomprehensible rapid spanish}

Missionary 1: I think it's the word for speedo.

Me: like they bathe in a speedo?

Missionary 2: no, but it's like Tarzan's outfit.

Anna: Taparrabo? Tarzan? {cackle cackle}

Missionary 1: or like a loincloth

Then we all laughed for 10 minutes and they all learned that I cry when I laugh too hard.

Later DH told me that Missionary 2 told him to ask me what word I learned today.

Now I can say "loincloth" in Spanish and know that I learned it from a missionary.

more hangman, a morbid affair

I made a hangman post a while back about its popularity in the primary class I teach.

But there is more to say.

Latest developments:

1) One kid (ok..its Hyrum) always guesses X and Z. Nearly every time. I think he's trying to murder the poor victim.

2) Now we are experimenting with the hangman victim. Last week everyone wanted it to be an old lady. She had wrinkles and reading spectacles.

I am teaching tiny impressionable tots about murder and cruelty to the elderly, it seems. Oh well. At least they'll be able to spell.

the invisible spider

There is a spider that lives on the wall above my desk. Sometimes when I'm using my computer, I see it out of the corner of my eye. Then I turn my head super fast and it is gone.

Possible explanations:

1. my eyebrow --could it be bushier than I realized? I am not a tweezer, after all. (While at the last ward camp out, I was trying to figure out what a bunch of ward ladies were saying (in Spanish) and I finally figured out they were talking about tweezing eyebrows and makeup tattoos. Ha. Some topics are more cross-cultural than I realized.)

2. my eyelash (but I don't think it is long enough to take the blame, alas)

3. a wisp of hair

4. a dent in the wall that is haunted

or

5. an invisible spider

It must be an invisible spider that turns visible every now and then to distract me. Except it never moves. Dumb spider.

the glory of rice pudding

I worship rice pudding. It is true. I don't recall ever eating rice pudding before moving to California (Going on 5 years!). It might have been one of those buffet dessert items at Chuck-A-Rama, but I don't remember trying it (or if I did, it was not worth remembering!) BUT then I started to shop for myself (after leaving home) and there was that one magic day in Safeway when I saw Kozy Shack brand rice pudding next to the sour cream...and I bought it. My life would never be the same.

Then came the many attempts at making rice pudding. There was the baked puddings, the stovetop puddings, the one time disaster of a crockpot pudding, and finally more precise puddings that used a thermometer. Some would curdle*. Some would be fantastic. But nothing could match the consistency of Kozy.

*Curdling is a thing of the past. The blessings of living at sea level combined with the delicate egg yolk conspired against me for too long, but now I have outsmarted them. I just keep the heat down:) (Custards are supposed to stay between 185 and 190 F during cooking time to prevent curdling.)

Then came the time when I bought Kozy pudding and it was awful. Yes. It tasted totally off. Then I was afraid to buy it for a while. Suddenly I wondered if Kozy pudding was really the ultimate.

Now after being in El Barrio going on 2 years, I have discovered Salvadoran rice pudding. There is a couple in our ward who like to make it to serve after baptisms (and sometimes go crazy and give it out after church--like last week!). They use a combination of sweetened condensed milk, regular milk, cinnamon sticks, and a lime--rind and all! No eggs! Fancy that. It is quick to make, none of the hours of reducing milk or anything laborious in that vein. Lucky is the one who chokes on a piece of cinnamon and finds part of a lime in their cup. Eat with caution. Oh, but the delight of rice pudding!

Incomplete LIST of rice pudding recipes attempted:

1. The baked rice pudding recipe I used comes from Betty Crocker Cookbook.

2. Simply Recipes: http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/rice_pudding/

This one I made notes. They go like this:

Turned out great--much more creamy than baked rice pudding. I kept the heat below boiling like she said, and the egg did not curdle. I think I will try sweetening with honey next time (less than 1/4 cup).
SO good. Try with 1/4 cup arborio next time, it was VERY thick. I put raspberries in it and it was so divine.

(I should point out that I used arborio rice instead of the short grain white the recipe called for. Had I used short grain white, it would not have turned out so thick.)

3) Crockpot: http://crockpot365.blogspot.com/2009/03/crockpot-rice-pudding-recipe.html

Notes:

it curdled. Using high heat after putting the egg in was a mistake--it might work on low, but I'm not sure I want to try it again when I have another rice pudding recipe that is great. (simply recipes)

4) Temperature measured: http://www.ehow.com/how_4830558_kozy-shack-rice-pudding.html

I can't exactly recall how this turned out. I think it worked ok, but by this point I had been trying to cut back on rice pudding (since I inhaled it at ludicrous speed) and only made this recipe one time.

5) This one is untested, but highly recommended by some people in a chowhound thread: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Raisin-Rice-Pudding-762

I need to make this one.

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As a final note, I must remark how much I adore puddings and custards of all kinds. DH doesn't care as much about pudding as I do, but we try not to let that be an issue in our marriage. But he can surely attest to the fact that more often than not when I'm feeling like dessert I'll say, "I want a pudding."

hangman

Hangman is a favorite game in my primary class. There is one five year old girl that speaks so quietly I must strain my ears to make out what she says. Then there are usually five rowdy boys that are six or seven years old who have all manner of noisy things to say. But on one front they are all united. Hangman.

The construction of the hangman platform has become nearly as important as solving the puzzle. First, I draw the hangman platform. Next, I add wavy lines underneath to indicate hot lava. The hot lava was the first modification requested by my morbidly creative charges. It has become a regular addition.

Today, instead of guessing a letter, several kids wanted to come up to the board and further imperil the hangman. One boy came up and drew a shark with lots of teeth jumping onto the platform. Next, another came up and drew an electrical storm. One very large cloud overhead with several zigzag lightning bolts reaching downward. But he did not stop there. He added spikes to the base of the entire platform except for a tiny area large enough for him to slip through into the hot lava.

I can't wait for next week.

THE Ward Campout

DH and I went on the ward campout this weekend. Have you ever gone camping with a lot of native mexican and salvadorean families? Me either. And I learned some very important things:

1) Don't worry about being hungry. There is always food. Even if they tell you initially you will be on your own for breakfast, don't listen. Everybody will bring so much food that you won't even notice you forgot the pumpkin loaves and hard boiled eggs (that were supposed to be your breakfast) on the counter at home.

2) As Sarahi told me, there are no light meals in a Mexican home. All meals are big. There are no "light" breakfasts in Mexico.

3) Salsa. (or Chimol, did they call it? I googled it and it is the name for Salvadorean Salsa.) Araceli did nothing but make salsa. Always chopping, adding to the bowl. And we ate it. Yum. She cut up tomatoes, onion, jalapenos, cilantro, and squirted lime juice into it.

Then there was the other salsa. Hermana (sister) Garcia had roasted jalapenos and tomatoes at home, and brought them to camp. She also brought a very coarse mortar and pestle (very heavy). She peeled the jalapenos and tomatoes, and crushed them together. It was hot! My mom would have died coughing. Hermano (brother) Garcia claims that the salsa tastes better when crushed in the mortar, when compared to mixing or chopping in another bowl.

4) How to cut vegetables REALLY tiny. Now I am going to be the master chopper woman, after watching the pros.

5) The art of grilling. They sure can fire up a grill! At Mexican groceries, you can buy meat from the butcher sliced very thinly. It's thin enough that you can tear it apart into strips with your hands. I learned how to clean a grill too--you scrub it with an onion! Maybe everybody else knew that except me.

6) Grilled scallions (green onions). They grill them and then just chomp away at the white parts. As I was told repeatedly, onions are good for the lungs. Apparently.

7) I asked one woman if she uses tomatoes with every meal. It was met with a resounding YES! And she also uses pinto beans and perhaps (corn) tortillas with every meal too. Then I asked her if she eats the same thing every night. She laughed (of course, since it was a joke) and said no. I have yet to discover her cooking variations however. Hermana Garcia's kitchen hopefully will not be shrouded in mystery for too long.

8) They sure know how to party! DH and I were tired and dirty by the time we were done with breakfast (more like brunch). Everybody else was like, "Aw, you are going home? We were going to go party at the beach." And they were 20 years older than us!

The end.

the dismal pianist

Something happened last Sunday that I never thought possible.

I was the best pianist available to play in primary!!!!! (Let us recall that my talent, notwithstanding the 10 years of piano lessons I had (and rarely practiced), remains small. I can't play hymns unless I practice every day for 3 months and memorize where my hands go.) So, being the "best" available isn't saying much!

Basically, nobody in my ward plays the piano. That is, except for a couple teenagers, a couple missionaries, and 3 or 4 (white, non-Hispanic) people (using politically correct census terminology) that have other callings. Music is just not a part of Hispanic culture. There is no choir either. Singing is not their strong point..but they sure try!

So usually someone from the singles ward comes to play the piano during primary, but they weren't there. And the missionaries weren't either. There was NOBODY. We sang one song A Capella (two P's or one?), and then I realized there was finally a need for my minuscule talent! I could play the melody. So I offered to play one hand, one note at a time. And I did:)

I noticed that most of the songs we sang had flats in the Children's Songbook. Why is that? Why are there no sharps?

Hurray! I played the piano in church! And I even remember the order of flats. And the circle of fifths. :)

the cuteness of babies

The best thing about going to a Spanish speaking ward is that the babies are cuter than you could possibly imagine. Latino babies are way cuter than boring white babies. DH loves Latino babies, and has requested that when we have kids, that we have a Latino baby. I told him he married the wrong woman, and he will be stuck with boring blond white babies. Alas. It's just as much his fault as mine.

ps. If you have a boring white baby, don't feel slighted. I know you couldn't help it. Boring white babies are cute too:)

the pink distraction

A few weeks ago in el barrio (the ward), the missionaries were speaking. Can you guess how many missionaries come to my ward every week? Ten. Four sets of Elders, and one set of Sisters (Hermanas). Since there are really too many to keep track of, I say ten because there were ten missionaries who sang in the primary program last October.

One of the odd things about being in a Spanish speaking ward is that the missionaries don't have very good Spanish. The amount of Spanish language learning that would take a missionary in Ecuador (total immersion into Spanish) 3 months, takes 3 times as long for the missionaries in my ward. They have too many people (like me--a bain to their existence!) who talk to them in English--including many of the investigators they teach.

But on this particular Sunday, while the missionaries were speaking in sacrament meeting, there was a pink distraction. A little girl with a pink dress and pink bow was running around the aisles, crawling under benches, snuggling up to random people on random benches, tripping, giggling, and occasionally running back to her mom before taking off again. This went on the ENTIRE meeting. I had lots of opportunities to check and see if she was wearing any other pink items, but her tights were white, and her shoes were black, alas. I think she might have had a pink undershirt on though.

una experiencia en el barrio espanol

I go to a spanish speaking ward now. Does that mean I speak spanish? Not quite. Since joining this ward, I have had some funny experiences. Two of which occurred today:

1) I attended Relief Society today. I was glad that today was a lesson from the manual, so I could just read the lesson in english. I sat next to a new woman in the ward (similar situation: her husband speaks spanish but she doesn't). We were whispering in the back getting to know each other during announcements (which we can't understand), when all the sudden we hear, "HELLO, NEW PEOPLE!" The RS president was waving her arms trying to get our attention to introduce the new sister. The new woman then stood up, red faced, and introduced herself, while I stared into my lap. It's hard to know when people are about to introduce you when you don't understand what they are saying. But it was pretty funny. Relief Society spanish style is louder for sure.

2) The teacher got up to begin the lesson. I started reading the lesson, and looked up to see the everyone in the room with their eyes closed and the teacher still speaking. I thought, "oh, she must be praying." Slightly confused, I closed my eyes too. But she kept going on and on. "This is a really long prayer," I thought. I heard her mention the name "Johnson" twice, and remembered seeing that name in the lesson manual. I opened my eyes and realized she'd just been reading a long quoted story in the lesson manual, and had probably asked the class to close their eyes. When I told DH about it in the car on the way home he burst out laughing.