Day 5 - Sunday, June 15th

We had yet another great sleep and ate a snack type breakfast at our own house before journeying to PB’s house. We piled into their vehicle and drove about 15 minutes to their church, Bangalore Presbyterian. There was not much traffic at this time of morning (8am), but it picked up through out the day.

We had a wonderful time at the church, which meets on the second floor of a building.....a mattress maker is on the first floor. There were about 40 people there and worship was wonderful. Two brothers led the praise time, again singing many of the praise songs that we knew and loved. Paul Billy preached and then we had coffee and stayed for Sunday School. The people in the congregation were very friendly and didn’t complain at all when we asked to take photos. We enjoyed talking to many of them and learning of their stories.

After church we returned home to change clothes and then the two Arnold families set out for lunch. PB had said that “You haven’t been to Bangalore unless you have been to Impes”. Michael and I had wondered what Impes was, and exactly how you spelled it. Well, when we got there, we discovered that it was short for Hotel Imperial!!! It is a long-standing restaurant and has excellent food. PB told us that there were certain things that the restaurant was known for, so we let him order for us......he did a GREAT job!!!! We started out with Kebab Chicken (fried after being marinated in a certain spice) and Teethiti Quail (small pieces of meat that had been marinated and cooked with curry leaves). Next came Butter Chicken Sauce (WONDERFUL and creamy) to eat on steamed Ghee rice, followed by Parotta bread. I looked up information on this bread and this is what I found......It is made with wheat flour, eggs and oil (high in cholesterol). These are mixed together, rolled into balls and allowed to sit for 4 to 5 hours. The balls are rolled out into pancakes and then the pancakes are stretched and flipped until they are paper thin. The large thin pancake is now stretched lengthwise to make a long tube with many thin layers. This tube is rolled into a spiral, tucking the end of the tube into the center of the spiral. Finally, this spiral is rolled flat and the bread is cooked on a griddle. They will often place the cooked bread onto a piece of paper, fold it over and smash it before serving. The result of all of this is that the bread is very fluffy and has lots of light layers to it. Ok.....back to the meal...... We finished the meal with lime tea which was wonderful. It had just a slight sourness to it and is supposed to be good for the digestion.

On the way back to the car, we stopped by a fruit market. It was amazing to see all of the different types of fruit and even more amazing to see how they displayed it. The round fruits were stacked on top of one another to form a pyramid, while the bananas were hung on their original stalks. Grapes and other vine-type fruits were hung from the ceiling of the stall. We enjoyed seeing Lychees.....they are round and have lots of tentacle looking stems coming off of them and look sort of like spiders......not at all like the canned ones that we buy!!!

We spent the rest of Sunday afternoon in our house, reading and relaxing. We had another visit by monkeys and one of the neighbors brought out bananas to feed them so that we could photograph them easier. It was funny to see one person feeding them while the man on the other side used a stick to shoo them away. Obviously not everyone feels the same about their presence.
At about 6:30, Paul Billy drove us to the State Buildings which house the government for the state of Karnataka . The buildings are built from hand carved granite and are beautiful. They are normally left unlit at night, but are lit up from 7-8 pm on Sundays. There were many families there, some had brought picnic meals and were enjoying the sight of the beautiful buildings. Across the street was the High Court building. It was also a wonderful building, but the view was distorted because of two brightly lit, very tall buildings behind it. These were built by one of the millionaire business owners (Kingfisher Industries) in India and some people were upset because it distracted from the beauty of the High Court building. We laughed at the motto inscribed over the entrance to the High Court......”Justice for All – Real and Speedy”. The first part sounds great, but the last phrase seems a bit cheesy!!

We returned to the house and Shirley had fixed yet another meal....this one a bit more simple, and fortunately, smaller!!! It was a rice and lentil porridge that was fairly bland when eaten by itself, but she had also made a Chutney of coconut, corriander, onion, turmeric and chili. These ingredients were all blended together and molded into a large ball. We cut off sections of this ball and stirred it into the porridge. There were also several dishes of fruit on the table and we sampled cherries, green almonds (taste more like a bean than an almond), pomegranate seeds and Mangosteen. The rind of the Mangosteen is about ½ inch thick and is a deep reddish- purple color. The fruits are in sections inside the rind and have a citrus flavor, with a bit of peach as well. They were both interesting and tasty!!!