Grandma...or why we may return 50 pounds heavier...

Grandma Sinha is one funny woman. She is very friendly and very talkative. She is one of those women that you just love. In a way, she reminds me a bit of the mother from "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" and something that is very important to her is making sure that we get enough to eat! In fact, I'm quite sure we offended her yesterday when we couldn't take another bite! It is very important to her to show their Indian Hospitality, and oh boy does she do a good job. We start the morning off with tea, dried fruits (nuts) and biscuits while sitting on the open air porch.


About an hour after that we had a delicious breakfast of omelets, toast, papaya, apple and pomegranate with fresh made orange juice. As you can imagine, we were pretty stuffed by then, especially since neither of us usually eat breakfast! She then had us each take two sandwiches to the clinic in case we got hungry before lunch. Then for lunch we had a delicious assortment of curried vegetable dishes with rice and naan (Indian bread) Here's the funny part, she is always very concerned we have not had enough, so we end up with these massive servings! Then when we say "stop" "that's enough" or "no thank you" she will say "Okay, but just a little bit more, it is good" and give us another big serving. That was where we hit a slight roadblock, the food is delicious, but we both had a little bit of a traveler's stomach, so at lunch we both had our servings, and literally couldn't eat any more, but we had not finished our plates. At this point, Grandma Sinha became quite alarmed and had to ask if we did not like the food. Oh dear! She was also concerned to hear that we had not eaten our sandwiches! After lunch, she pulled Laura aside in private and was very concerned, asking if there was a problem with the food. Laura reassured her that the food was in fact very delicious, but she was so full that she could not take another bite, and even went so far as to tell her to feel her stomach to see how far it was sticking out. At that point, I think she was convinced. :) After we returned from the clinic, we were happy to see that there was a smaller dinner of soup and vegetables, which we were able to eat every bite of, much to the pleasure of Grandma Sinha. Today we are gearing up for some more great food, making it probably a good thing we are not here longer then we are, it is so delicious that I know we would come back two very round Lundquists. Which speaking of, the name Lundquist is very humorous to the Indians here, as are "Brayden" and "Laura." Fun to see the difference across cultures.

Today we showed Granda Sinha and Dr Sinha pictures of our family, which they enjoyed a lot. They loved the red rock in the back ground of Brayden's family picture, and liked the Christmas decorations in Laura's family picture. They did find it humorous that there are 5 girls in Laura's family, and 3 grandchildren who are also girls! Well, we are about to head out on the day, we read in the newspaper that it is supposed to be very hot today! Whew! Luckily it is not as humid as we thought it might be, Patna is in the dry region of India, although you would not know it from seeing the Sinha's beautiful garden! We'll check in later!

Everything is so pretty here, even the driveway is beautifully painted!