cardamom chai.

One afternoon last week I awoke from a nap and lay in our darkened bedroom, feeling too depressed to move. 

We are nearing our one-month mark, and the realities are settling in.  Some days are just so, so hard.  It’s not one particular thing; it is everything added up … the dirt, the poverty, the brokenness around us, the power outages, the pollution, the appliances breaking, the traffic, the noise, the loneliness, the humiliation of feeling like an incompetent foreigner, the homesickness, the physical exhaustion of carrying our children everywhere … everything.

So I got out of bed, and went to the kitchen to make chai.  We had tried it once before, and had some tweaking to do.  I pulled out two pottery mugs I bought the day before, and in the peace of a quiet kitchen, heated the milk, added pungent cardamom and cinnamon, strained the tea, and mixed it all together over the gas range. 

When I carried David his steaming mug I realized I felt much better.

The simple act of creating something comforting and lovely in the midst of a harsh world made me happy.

I am trying to find more of those things: lighting a candle in the living room, closing the windows and turning on Christmas music when the noise makes my blood pressure rise, baking cookies in my tiny convection over, sipping coffee with a friend, marveling at the colors and intricacies of the handmade South Asian cushions and blankets and wall hangings I see, stopping and noticing the bright plants and flowers the gardener places on the apartment grounds. 

I find myself searching out beauty in a new, almost desperate way, and rejoicing in it when I find it.  I have so much respect for the people in this culture, who, in the midst of their clamorous and dusty world, work hard to create lovely food and clothes and crafts.  Their bold colors and their creativity make me love them all the more.

Cardamom Chai for two

1.5 cups milk

1.5 cups boiling water

2 green cardamom pods, crushed

1 stick cinnamon bark

1 heaping TBSP strong black tea leaves

sugar to taste

In a small saucepan, heat milk to a boil; remove from heat and add crushed cardamom pods and cinnamon bark; cover and set aside.

In another saucepan, add boiling water to tea, boil several seconds or until tea is desired strength.

Strain tea into teapot.

Pour milk through a cloth-lined strainer into teapot

Mix, and return to stove, bring back to near boiling

Pour into teapot, add sugar to taste (in the South Asian way, we drink ours quite sweet)

Serve and enjoy.