Mangoes are here!!!

Mangoes are in full season here! Mangoes are one of the things I love about Pakistan. Well, not just mangoes - I love almost ALL of the fruit here. There is just something about it. My hubby has told me that there are many, many different types of mangoes. I never knew that. I just thought there was only 1 type of mango. All the fruit tastes better than what is available in the U.S. Mangoes in the U.S. are pretty good but I promise you if you tasted a mango from Pakistan you would never want a mango from the U.S. ever again. The first time I experienced a mango here, I was told that I wasn't eating it right. What? I don't eat it right? I can't explain exactly how they eat them here but let's just say your hands are dripping with mango juice and it's finger licking good.

There are many fruits that are available here that I had never even heard of before. If you are a watermelon fan, the watermelons are fantastic too!! So juicy and red!! Bananas are another one of my fav's here. They are quite a bit smaller than what is available in the U.S. but they are so tasty. I think Shakil and I can devour a dozen in a matter of 2 days.

The veggies here are pretty darn good too. I'm not a big veggie fan but when I came here I started consuming more because the taste is just so much better. When in season they have some really good carrots that are full red in color - they sort of have a sweet taste and when cooked they are just delicious. Right now we have the orange carrots that really aren't as good but still ok. I tell Shakil the veggies are organic and that is why they are tasting good and better for us.

Anyways, I LOVE MANGOES!!!

Until later...

Bye for now.

Our little fish...

Look at this little fish!! First time in the pool!
Last week we went to visit MIL and she informed us that her fathers swimming pool was ready. She had taken her friend and her friends' kids there just the evening before. Shakil looked at me and said, "let's go tomorrow"! I was all for it and of course very anxious to get baby Sara into the water for the 1st time too!

On our way home I wanted to stop at Liberty Burger which is a local burger stand that serves up some tasty spicy chicken burgers with fries and cole slaw all for the price of about Rs 60 which is about $1 - can't beat it, right? I usually don't eat over at MIL's because 1. she doesn't mind cooking "side of the road chicken" 2. she holds over food for days 3. she cooks any and all organs. Uhhhh...no thank you. Plus, all my MIL seems to cook is chicken curry and it basically consists of chicken, lots of oil and lots of water. I call it "chicken, oil, water".

Shakils' grandfathers house is about 1 minute from Liberty Burger and he asked if I wanted to just check out the pool. I was in a hurry because I wanted to get home in time to watch Oprah at 11 p.m. She was having the interview with Queen Rania of Jordan and I was interested in watching it. So we had some time and we stopped to check out the pool.

We walk to the back of the house and the first thing I notice is that it's green - very green! Yuck!!! Then we walk around the pool just looking inside and there was a little frog that had made the pool his home. Double yuck!! Now look back at my first paragraph - my MIL had taken her friend and friends' kids to the pool just the evening before. Ok, could they not see that the pool was disgustingly dirty?!?! Geez. Just the thought of letting my child swim in a dirty pool scares the begeebers out of me!!

Shakil talked to the watchman he said that the pool service people were coming the next day to clean and put the chemicals. The pool had just been filled and not serviced yet. We waited 2 days and then decided we'd get ourselves ready and go for a swim. I didn't bring my swimsuit here to Pakistan so I had to wear a pair of shorts/t-shirt which just feels yucky when you get wet. I MUCH prefer a swimsuit!! Anyways, Shakil had asked before why I didn't bring my swimsuit. Well, when I left the U.S. I was about 4 months pregnant and I didn't think I'd be doing any swimming - nor would I want to with my ever-growing stomach! :-) And.....you don't see many Pakistani women swimming here, in fact I haven't seen any at all swim. I think the funniest thing was when our servant saw me in the shorts and she said "knickers". You're wearing "knickers"!! I laughed and said, "yes, I'm going to swim in them". She later told me that she's never seen a woman in "knickers" as she called them. ha ha!

We headed over to the pool and walked around to the back of the house met the watchman and Shakil asked if the pool was clean and he said yes!! I of course needed to check it out for myself and yes, indeed it was - very clean!! I don't have a swimsuit for baby Sara yet so she had to swim naaaaaaaaaked! She's going to kill me when she gets older and sees the pics of her skinny dipping at the mere age of 4 1/2 months! ha ha!! So I stripped off baby Sara's clothes and handed her to her daddy. Shakil scooped her up and slowly lowered her into the pool. I expected a cry from her or something - some sign to let me know that she was scared - but NO! Baby Sara wasn't the least bit scared at all. Shakil lowered her to her shoulders and she just loved it. We of course didn't submerge her but we had such a good time walking around with her in the pool and letting her kick and splash. We're going to take her again this week on Shakil's days off. :-)

Until later...

Bye for now.

Where does YOUR chicken come from??

Food has always been a big issue for me here in
Pakistan. It's probably one of the biggest issues for me. I'm just not used to the way it's handled here. I mainly eat chicken here and that is the same in the U.S. as well for me. However, chicken is handled a heck of a lot differently here in Pakistan. On my first trip here in 2004, I only stayed for 2 wks, got married and I really didn't pay attention to a whole lot of what was going on around me. I guess you can call it marital bliss. :-) The second time I came here was in 2005, I spent 5 months. So yes, I did learn a bit more while here and I noticed a hell of a lot more about what's going on!

I'll never forget when I told Shakil that I needed some chicken and some other items. I had planned a dinner to make and it called for chicken. He went to get the chicken and when he came back with the chicken it was warm. Now I don't know about you guys but I really don't want my chicken to be warm when I buy it unless it's already been cooked. That wasn't the case with this chicken. The chicken was still raw and as Shakil would say, "It's fresh honey". Yeah, it's fresh alright but I just couldn't eat it or even cook it for that matter. Call me crazy but I just couldn't do it. You see the cheaper chicken is available right on the side of the road, hence the name I call it "side of the road chicken" (you can see "side of the road chicken pic up above). It's not really on the side of the road (wait, yes I've seen it) but most is available within the bazaar. You just walk up to the guys selling the chicken and you pick out which one you want, it's weighed and they slaughter it right there in front of you, feathers out by their hands, cut up and ready to go for you. Uhhhhhhh....no thank you. Call me spoiled if you want but I'm just used to my chicken being nice and clean on a foam tray wrapped in cellophane and available at my local supermarket.

After that chicken experience I told Shakil that I never wanted the "side of the road chicken" anymore. He started getting what is called "K&N Chicken". K&N is known for having clean chicken that has been hygiencally handled. On the front of the package it says "Clean and Healthy Chicken" and on the back they have proper handling guidelines for chicken. It is clean chicken and in comparison to what you can get "on the side of the road" or in a local market it is very clean.

K&N'S Chicken
After that chicken experience I told Shakil that I never wanted the "side of the road chicken" anymore. He started getting what is called "K&N Chicken". K&N is known for having clean chicken that has been hygiencally handled. On the front of the package it says "Clean and Healthy Chicken" and on the back they have proper handling guidelines for chicken. It is clean chicken and in comparison to what you can get "on the side of the road" or in a local market it is very clean.

So here I am with my 3rd visit here and I've been here over 9 months now. I came here in September of last year and I was in in my 4th month of pregnancy. I was even more contientious about the chicken and other food items. I did go out to restaurants to eat and out of the 3 times I've been here I've only gotten sick with the food 1 time but it was a really bad time. I was in the hospital getting an IV drip for dehydration and a really strong dose of antibiotics. It was horrible and I've never experienced anything like it in my life. I think one time of getting sick is pretty damn good though considering how they handle meat here.

After my pregnancy I told Shakil that I would start eating the chicken that came from a supermarket here. NOT the "side of the road chicken" but a supermarket where it's all handled and cut up inside. That was me making a compromise because the K&N chicken IS a bit more pricey and its been working ok. I don't know what is up with the beef here. It has a completely different taste and I can't eat it here. Anytime I've made beef here at home it has some strange taste and Shakil does agree with me. They cut up the beef on tree stumps and they even cut up other meat like mutton on there as well. If I see them doing it I get all weird about it too. I know this is how they do things here and I'm not "knocking it". I'm just not used to it - that's all.

Yesterday I had told Shakil that I needed him to get some chicken and some other items. I asked for chicken breasts. I was going to cook them up and make some chicken sandwiches. He told me he'd go to the local supermarket and get a whole chicken and have them separate the breasts. So yeah, that's fine. I told him when he got home to just toss them in the fridge because I was going to cook them in a while. Well he immediately put the chicken the freezer and Tara's red flag went up. I opened up the freezer, pulled the chicken out and the chicken was HOT. Yes, raw HOT chicken. I went downstairs and told him that I couldn't eat that chicken. Here we go again...with the "it's fresh honey" that's why.

Chicken that comes from the supermarket is not HOT. I was telling Shakil that if I didn't know any better I'd think that he got "side of the road chicken" and just put it in the shopping bag from the supermarket because he got some other items as well from the supermarket. I see a smirk on Shakil's face and I immediately ask to see the receipt. He hands me receipt that is like a month old - nope that didn't work. I asked again for the receipt and he handed it to me. There was no chicken breasts or whole chicken on that receipt. I asked him again "did you get that chicken from the supermarket"? He says "yes" right to my face when he was LYING!!! I was soooooooo pissed. He had gotten the "side of the road chicken" and put it in the supermarket bag to cover up what he'd done. All because it was just a little cheaper!! Argh!!!! I was furious because he lied about it. Why couldn't he just be honest??? His answer, "because you wouldn't eat it". Well shit all I want is some honesty. Can you believe that? An argument over CHICKEN!!!!

Later that evening he got the K&N chicken and all is well here! ;-)

Ok, I've blabbed enough about chicken....

Until later...

Bye for now.

Updates and such...

Sobia and masala dosti tell me its time for an update!! ;-)

Things are going pretty well here despite the heat! It is getting so hot here these days. Everyday it is 105 plus degrees F. However, Shakil thinks the monsoon is coming sooner. We've been having some strong storms blow in every week. It's nice because it cools the place off. You can almost feel the steam coming off the ground. I'm in a sauna - at least outside that is.

I'm having a heck of a time getting Sara on a schedule and that is what I've been working on. We started her on cereal after the pediatrician told us to. We are using Nestle Cerelac and it is just plain rice cereal. I've stopped it for now since Sara still has a pretty strong extrusion reflex and she is getting what she needs from her formula. I will try her again on it in a couple of weeks. I definitely don't want to force her on it.

So back to the schedule...I never knew it would be so hard for me to stick to a schedule but I've done pretty good over the past few days. Sara will not let me just put her in her bed and she'll go to sleep. That's just not happening - she screams. I generally have to wait until she is so sleepy and then rock her to sleep. Then I've heard its not good to rock her to sleep because when she wakes up in her crib she'll be scared. I'm wondering when I'll be able to just put her in her bed and she'll go to sleep.

The other day Sara was soo cranky and just wasn't having anything that I was doing for her. I just put her in her bed and she cried for a few minutes and was out like a light. I've read that some say it is ok to let them cry it out but she is still so young to me - 4 months old.

Things are going ok between the MIL and I for the time being. So there really aren't any updates in that regard.

Yesterday we took Sara to Micky D's. Yep, we take our 4 month old to McDonalds! :-) She just loves (or so we think) to look around. There is so much going on at the McDonalds. The one we go to is always plenty busy. I look forward to the day when Sara can have something there! After McDonalds we headed over to visit with my MIL. MIL informed Shakil that there was cheesecake there and that was an instant "let's go" from me! Cheesecake here is just not the same as it is in the U.S. It's ok but I just don't know what they do to it. I LOVE cheesecake - it's my ultimate weakness!!!

Well 2 nights in a row that Sara has gone to sleep at 11 p.m. Last night she slept until 4 a.m. and I suspect the same thing will happen tonight. I better go so I can catch a few hours sleep.

Until later...

Bye for now.