The Big Field Trip

We traveled from Bulgaria to Istanbul on an overnight train. It was fun even though I was feeling like my lungs were going to split any second. I was coming down with the swine flu (so my mom says). When we got to Istanbul, Cy, Cruz, Papa, Mama, and I were sick. We had the flu. I felt bad. I could barely talk. We just stayed inside our apartment and napped. After a few days it was G-O-N-E! We could go out and explore.

From The Big Field Trip – Istanbul, November 2009

Traveling in Istanbul is like a flash. We often went by metro. Mom had a metal pass that she pressed against a slot and took some money out of it. Sometimes she had to re-charge it in a machine that recharges them! The pass also lets us get onto trolleys, trams, funiculars, and ferry boats. We had to take ferry boats a lot because there is a big strait called the Bosporus that splits the Asian side of Istanbul from the European side! A funicular is a cable car that goes up hills in underground tunnels. We used the funicular called Tünel a lot because it was right by our house. It is the second oldest underground train line in the world. The oldest one is the London Underground, which we rode on a lot in London.

From The Big Field Trip – Istanbul, November 2009

Istanbul is like a mosque made of many mosques. When I was there I could hear many people in minarets singing the call to prayer at the same time. There was a minaret right outside our window and the call to prayer woke us up every morning. It sounded like it was right inside our kitchen. There was a call to prayer five times a day. We went to one of the biggest mosques in the world! Outside of the Blue Mosque there was a black kitten. She was cold so she jumped in my lap and started purring. In the Blue Mosque there was a huge red carpet. People with strange caps were paying on it. They were Muslims.

From The Big Field Trip – Istanbul, November 2009

From The Big Field Trip – Istanbul, November 2009

Even though we were only in Istanbul for two weeks, we learned a lot of Turkish. A man whose name is Alper taught us Turkish at our house. He didn’t want us to pay him anything. He just wanted to have the experience of meeting new people. Here is some of the Turkish I remember: Please is “loot-van”, no is “hire”, yes is “evit”, and hello is “merhaba”. Thank you is “to-shake-your-adedom”, goodbye (when you are leaving) is “oyster-column”, and goodbye (when someone else is leaving) is gule-gule.

From The Big Field Trip – Istanbul, November 2009

Of all the places we visited in Istanbul, the Princes’ Islands were the most interesting. We went to the Princes’ Islands on a ferry. We threw bread to seagulls the bread in mid-air with their beaks. There were no cars, trucks, or buses. Instead of taxis there were horse carriages.  We rode bikes all around the border of Büyükada, the biggest of the Princes’ Islands. I saw a crow flying with a piece of pottery in its mouth. There were also a lot of cats: big cats to small cats. On the way back, Cyrus and Papa saw dolphins jumping out of the water. I didn’t get to see them. I was disappointed, but I had a great day. I loved the Princes’ Islands.

Istanbul was fun. There are lots of new things to learn and places to see. I’ve only seen a tiny bit of Istanbul, because I was only there for two weeks. When I grow up I want to go back to visit Istanbul to explore more. I hope to find more surprises. Maybe next time I’ll get to spot some dolphins.

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Rajasthan Tour

India is crazy. There are stray dogs and holy cows (cows are sacred in the Hindu religion) roaming the streets, open sewers and trash everywhere. India is the country with the 2^nd most people, behind China. India’s population is about 1,198,000,000, so there are people everywhere. There isn’t a lot of privacy in India; people take baths on the street. Some people live in tents made from scavanged tarps and bamboo sticks, while others live in manisons. India is smelly, loud, religious, colorful, beat-up, delicious, crammed, friendly, and dirty; it is the wildest country I’ve been to so far.

From The Big Field Trip – India, December, 2009

We took a two week tour of Rajasthan, a state in Western India. We started in Delhi, the capital of India. My family and I loaded up a huge silver van with our many bags. We climbed into the van and met Mr. Singh, our huge Sikh driver, and his assistant. There were 10 seats in the huge van, so with Cruz, Bella, my mom, my dad, my grandparents, and I there were seats to spare. We also met our travel agent’s mother. We where going to drop her off at Agra, our first destination.

From The Big Field Trip – India, December, 2009

We drove over windy roads, dodging holy cows. Cows are everywhere, from laying in the middle of the road to digging in trash dumps. The cows don’t belong to anyone; it is against the Hindu religion to kill cows, so cows that stop producing milk are abandoned to the street. Stray dogs drink from the open sewers on the street. There where animals everywhere. I saw many animals on the road: donkeys, cows, antelope, monkeys, dogs, a cat, birds, etc. People were also on the roads. Kids played cricket, an English game like baseball, on the cracked roads. Poor people dug through the trash dumps, searching for things they can sell and/or eat. Farmers walked down the streets, selling their colorful produce. Tuk-tuks (auto rickshaws) full of people drove by. We hopped from town to town, seeing sites along the way.

From The Big Field Trip – India, December, 2009

Most of the sites were amazing. We saw many forts; I was forted out by the end of the two week trip. About half-way through the trip I didn’t want to see any more forts – it was to much! The most spectacular fort was in Agra, called Agra Fort. It was built by a Mughal emperor. It had a moat, which was a river that was diverted to go around part of the castle, and two extra-thick walls, so if the enemy got over the moat and breached the first wall, they would be stuck between the two walls were elephants, tigers, wild boars, and other wild animals were kept. The wild animals were kept there to fight, entertaining the royal people. The stone carvings and inlayed stones in the Agra fort were astonishing; they were very intricate and flawless.

The Taj Mahal, also in Agra, was something else. It was huge and the 4 big reflecting pools around it made it seem bigger. The Taj Mahal’s 4 minarets almost touched the sky, and it’s the marble glimmered in the sun. The Taj Mahal was amazing, but the carvings weren’t too great. The baby Taj on the other hand, the carvings and inlays were incredible. The baby Taj was almost exactly like the Taj Mahal, but smaller (babyTaj). The carvings and inlays were a lot better in the Baby Taj than the Taj Mahal.

From The Big Field Trip – India, December, 2009

We ate at many restaurants; the varieties of Indian food was staggering, from aloo gobi (potatoes and cauliflower) to palak paneer (spinach and cheese, also known as saag paneer). North Indian food is very rich and spicy. It is usually eaten with rice or chapati, a tortilla-like food that you use as a spoon. The Indian food was delicious, but now I’m sick of Indian food – it’s a little too rich.

From The Big Field Trip – India, December, 2009

When we were in a small town called Mandawa, I met a kid named Krishna. When I first met Krishna, he gave me string for a kite I had just bought, then he ran off. The next day Krishna was at my Hotel, waiting for me. I went to his house and met his extended family. After I finished saying “Namaste” (hello and goodbye in Hindi – Namaste means “I bow to the god within you”) to all his family members, I went on the roof with Krishna. He had loads of kites, and he taught me how to fly them. All the kids in the neighborhood were out flying their kites, practicing for the big kite festival, that was on January 14th (one month from then). Krishna showed me how “cut” other peoples kites. You made your kite-string rub against the other persons string; the person who broke the other persons string won. Krishna was very nice; I really enjoyed flying kites with him.

We went to a Jain temple, it was fabulous. It was made from marble and was two stories high. It had lots of carvings of Jain stories in the temple. There were also many statues of Jain gods and prophets. We went to many temples, but they were mostly Hindu. We ended our trip in Udaipur, the town we’re in now and we will stay in for 2 months. I really enjoyed our tour of West India, it was fun and educational.

Tags:   Ancient Sites · Food · Hinduism · India · Rajasthan1 Comment

In Bulgaria, people hang up Martenitsas, which are red and white bracelets, to celebrate Spring coming. The white on the bracelets represents purity, and the red on the bracelets represents blood and ancestry.  The name “martenitsas” comes from Grandma Marta. In English Grandma Marta means Grandma March. She represents the month of March. People think of her as an old woman. If the day is cold and snowy, they think of her as a grumpy old woman, but if the day is warm and sunny, they think of her as a nice and loving soul.

From The Big Field Trip – Bulgaria, October – November 2009

When Bulgarians make their martenitsas, they make them for their friends and family, never for themselves. In early spring, they make martenitsas in their homes by braiding red and white strands of wool together.  On March 1^st they are given out to friends and family or people they want to meet. The martenitsas can also be bought at stores and markets. If someone gives you a martenitsa, it is like saying, “I wish you health, good luck, happiness, and friendship.”

When you get a martenitsa, you put it on until you see a stork, a swallow, or a blooming tree. Storks, swallows and blooming trees represent spring coming.  Then you tie your martenitsa on a branch of the first blooming tree that you see.  You can also put the martenitsa under a rock, and if a worm comes to it first you get good luck. On the other hand, if a spider comes to it you get bad luck. If an ant comes to it first you’ll get good luck, but you’ll have to work for it.

From The Big Field Trip – Bulgaria, October – November 2009

The first day we arrived in Bulgaria, we saw martenitsas hanging on tree branches. Martenitsas, martenitsas, martenitsas! Some of the trees were full of them! There were dozens on every branch. Until I arrived in Veliko Turnovo I didn’t know the tradition about these red and white bracelets. I learned about them from Georgi, our guide. Georgi makes martenitsas for his friends and family every year at the end of winter. A lot of friends give him bracelets; sometimes he gets so many that his wrists are full of them.

I think martenitsas are awesome, including the spider part. When we get back to Santa Fe I am definitely going to celebrate the arrival of Grandma Marta by making bracelets from red and white strands of wool. I am going to give them out to my friends on March 1^st to wish them good luck, health, happiness, and friendship.

Tags:   Bulgaria · Celebrations · folk tales2 Comments

This is a Traditional Bulgarian Folk Tale. Our language teacher’s husband, Petko, told it to us. Petko told us that Bulgarians are very clever, they have morals and hidden morals. 

                  Once upon a time there was a very large man-eating brown bear. It had been eating people from a village nearby its lair so the villagers sent their bravest men to track down the bear and kill it. The men followed the bear’s footprints to its lair, high up in the mountains. It was a small tunnel descending into the bear’s den in the mountain. A man named Gyuro decided to crawl into the tunnel (it was to small to walk into). He tied a rope around his waist and crawled in headfirst. After a while, when Gyuro didn’t come back, they tugged on the rope nervously. When he still didn’t come out, they pulled and pulled until they dragged him out, a man without a head.  “Didn’t Gyuro have a head?”  One of the men asked.  “Of course! Or did he?” said another man. All of the men argued for a bit, and then one said “Let’s go to Gyuro’s wife, she’ll know!” So they went back to the village. They found Gyuro‘s wife out beating rugs in front of her house. They told her the story, and then asked her “Did Gyuro have a head?” She thought a bit, and said “Good question.” She thought a bit more then exclaimed “Ah, I know, Gyuro bought a hat last year, so he must have had a head!”

From Bulgaria

The End

The Moral of this story is never go into something Headfirst (especially man-eating bear caves) without checking it out first.

 Or

The hiddden moral: If you do something stupid, people will question your intelligence.

Tags:   Bulgaria · Story1 Comment

One of the most difficult things about traveling is learning different languages. It’s uncomfortable when I am sitting next to strangers on an airplane and I want to speak with them, but I don’t know if they speak the same language as I do. Sometimes I get nervous when I walk down the street and somebody starts to talk to me, and I don’t know if he’s mad at me because I don’t understand him.

When I walked down a street in Sofia, somebody stopped me in my tracks and said something to me that I did not understand. He was speaking n Bulgarian. It made me feel uncomfortable. I wish I could have said that I did not speak Bulgarian, but I couldn’t even say that.

When we were on the airplane from London to Bulgaria, I was terrified. What was I going to say to the woman beside me who was speaking in Bulgarian to me?  Luckily she was from London and spoke English too. When she said, “Oh, do you speak Bulgarian?” I said “No. Do you?”

She said, “A little bit. What’s your name?”

I said, “Bella. What’s yours?”

She said, “Niki.”

Then I felt brave, happy, and excited too, because she was going to teach me Bulgarian. She taught me how to say “hello” in Bulgarian. She said say “zdra-ve-te”, and I did. I’ve been in Bulgaria for six weeks now, and I’m still not good at speaking Bulgarian, but I’m getting the hang of it.

When you’re traveling you should learn some basic words because they will come in handy. I think it’s important to learn numbers, letters, and words like “hello”, “good-bye”, and “I don’t understand”.  I also think it is important to know how to say “thank you”. In Bulgarian thank you is “blah-goo-dar-ya”, but you can also say “merci”.  In Spanish thank you is “gracias”, in Portuguese it’s “obrigada (o)”, in Arabic it’s “chokran” ???? and in French it’s “merci”.

From The Big Field Trip – Tunisia, March, 2009

In Bulgaria it is important to know the head signals too. Shaking your head  from side to side means “yes” and nodding up and down means “no.” Learning this is very difficult. Once someone asked me if I understood Bulgarian, and I shook my head. So he kept on talking in Bulgarian.

When I got to Bulgaria, I did not know how to speak any Bulgarian except for what I learned from Niki. The hardest part about learning Bulgarian is they write very differently than we do. My name is spelled like this in Bulgarian ????e??!

I learned languages in many different ways. Mom has been speaking Spanish to me since I was born, so in Peru I was fine speaking in Spanish. My understanding of Spanish helped me learn Portuguese in Brazil and Portugal because these two languages are very alike. When we went to Brazil, my family and I took Portuguese lessons. Cyrus and I took one lesson before Mama and Papa took another lesson. We took lessons from a professional young lady. Inãe was very patient and very nice. I even learned by reading books and listening to people on the sidewalks chattering to each other.

From The Big Field Trip – Brazil, December, 2008

I learned Arabic and French in Tunisia. I took lessons from a young lady named Fadoua, who taught us French. Sometimes she taught us arts and crafts because she was in college studying art. Yousef was a friend of ours from Tunisia who took us to the Sahara Desert. He spoke Arabic, French, English, and Italian, and taught us some Arabic.

From Bulgaria

I am learning the Cyrillic alphabet in Bulgaria. I listen to Bulgarian language podcasts with my family. My mom taught me how to say “goodbye”. You stay it like this “do-veezh-de-ne”. Both of my brothers have shirts that have the Cyrillic alphabet written on them. Mom quizzes us on the Bulgarian alphabet and animal names every day. I read signs on the streets. Ventzi, our Bulgarian teacher, has taught us names of animals. Bird is “petitza”. Now I can go to the grocery store and say “pet mlyako molya”. (They will give me five cartons of milk). There is still a lot more that I need to learn, but at least now I know how to say “ne razbirum Bulgarski”, which means “I don’t understand Bulgarian”. That gets me out of a lot of difficult situations.

From Bulgaria

I still have many languages to study, from Turkish to Hindi to Thai. I’ve got an adventure in front of me and lots to learn.  In the past year that we’ve been traveling I’ve felt scared of learning each new language, but now I know that I can learn to say some basic words and that will help me to communicate with people in tricky situations. Now I feel brave and excited to learn new languages.

Tags:   Brazil · Bulgaria · Fear · Language · Tunisia2 Comments

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzip! Splash! Uh, oh, my turn. I walk to the edge of the cliff, then jump.

We had been going on a tour all day. We were somewhere outside of Lencois, Brazil. We had been to Devil’s Hole, a pool so deep that its water looked black. If you held the water in your hands, it was brown. The pool wasn’t that big but it was hundreds of feet deep and there was a huge, steep waterfall feeding water into the pool. It had a steep zip line going into Devil’s Pool. People were flinging themselves off the waterfall and into space, and, instead of falling, they were yanked along by the zip line, like helpless kittens being kidnapped by an owl in a strong wind. There was no way I was going on that thing. I swam in the pool instead. I swam under the waterfall, which was a mistake because it pushed me underwater. It was fun, I did it again. Then we got into our guide’s car and continued our tour of Chapada Diamantina National Park.

From The Big Field Trip – Brazil, December, 2008

It was a really fun, adventurous day. I fed monkeys and ate many mangoes from the trees. I got within three feet of a viper with poison so deadly it could kill an adult in two hours. Its mouth was full of frog, but still. I got close to enough take good pictures, only backing off when my mom told me to. You don’t see one of those every day! I stuffed myself with Brazilian food from a buffet, which was delicious.  We went into a cave that looked like it was on the moon. There were no plants at all. My parents had to sign a slip that said it wasn’t their fault if anyone died. The cave was awesome! It had loads of stalactites and lots of alien insects like huge millipedes, blind grasshoppers, and tarantulas. I got as many close-up photos as I could, including a great one with Bella and a millipede. 

From The Big Field Trip – Brazil, December, 2008

Then we walked until we came to a crystal lake. It was very clear so we were going to snorkel. Then I heard the zip. It was another zip line. I could either climb down a 40 foot cliff or fly down the zip line, which cost 5 Reals (about 3 dollars). It went across the lake, almost, and landed in it. I decided to do it with my dad. It seemed like it would be fun. We paid and the owner strapped us to the zip line. I had on a harness, which was connected by a carabineer to a rope which was connected to the zip line (which made the zzzzzzzzz sound).

From The Big Field Trip – Brazil, December, 2008

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzip! Splash, went my dad. My turn. Gulp. I walked to the edge of the plank, looked down at the dizzying drop, then jumped.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz, went the line. I was flying!  I held on tight to the rope, being yanked all over (or so it seemed). My heart was in my throat and then my strength seemed to leave me. I couldn’t hold on any longer so I braced myself and then let go of the rope, expecting to fall into the shallow water a long way down. Nothing happened. I felt a huge jolt, but I was still moving through the air.  I looked up to see that I was connected to the zip line. Of course! Then something yanked my feet back. Ker-splash! I hit the water. I got up and unhooked myself. “I want to do that again!” I told my dad. 

From The Big Field Trip – Brazil, December, 2008

That was one of many times I was nervous about doing something, then realized it was OK and/or fun when I “let go of the rope”.  Whether it’s talking to someone in a foreign language or walking around town by myself, I find out its OK.

Tags:   Brazil · Bulgaria · FearNo Comments.

Sofia is a city of people. People live in apartments that are drab gray blocks of cement. Trains rumble by on iron tracks, and people look out of the windows and talk in Bulgarian. Dull black wires bring electricity to people.

From The Big Fieid Trip – London and Sofia, September 2009

Sofia is also a city of trees. Brown tree trunks line the streets like hundreds of statues. Leaves with all the colors of the rainbow float down to cover the sidewalks like a warm blanket. Chestnuts in a spiky cover hang on chestnut trees ready to fall.

As I wandered in Sofia, I noticed that the trees were full of seeds; big and little, circle and oval, they all scattered far from the parent tree. I saw crazy teenagers throwing chestnuts at bikes and trains. A maple seed with curved wings fluttered to the ground like a spinning parachute, and I picked it up. I split the seed open and put it on my nose so I looked like a rhino! Cruz did the same with papa’s help.

From Bulgaria

As I stood beneath a mighty walnut tree, I spied a dry walnut (stored by a lucky squirrel) hidden in a knot-hole. I reached up, standing on papa’s shoulders. I heard the “chip! chip!” of a squirrel chattering at us!

From Bulgaria

After that we said, “Sorry for taking your lunch, but thank you!” Oak trees were raining acorns, and squirrels were leaping and dancing as they gathered them up. I saw seeds in pods, cotton, purple fruit, spiky shells, berries, parachutes, and flat banana pods. Everywhere I looked there were seeds. 

 From Bulgaria

 Trees are living things. They get minerals and water from the ground through their roots. They use energy from the sun to turn carbon dioxide and water into sugar. This happens in the leaves, and it is called photosynthesis. Trees grow and then reproduce. When their flowers are pollinated they grow seeds.  Seeds are baby trees with food and nutrients so they can start to grow. They need enough food to live until they grow leaves and roots.

Seeds are made in all different shapes to help them disperse. Disperse means move away from the parent tree. If seeds did not disperse, when they grew they would be all crammed together, and they would have to fight for minerals, light, and water. Trees can’t move. Trees depend on other things to move the seeds like animals, people, gravity, and the wind. Some even get moved by the sun! When their pods dry up their seeds burst out of them like a spring had pushed them out. Seeds can even be dispersed by a wild teenager chucking chestnuts at trains!

From Bulgaria

For my project I took a lot of time to observe seeds. I threw seeds up in the air to see how they moved. I collected as many different types of seeds as I could and took them home to observe them. I drew their outside appearance then cut them open and drew their inside appearance. I drew details like color and texture. I described each seed in words. I read about seeds on the internet and saw a lot with my own eyes. On the internet I learned that poppies have very small seeds. The top of the poppy is like a rattle with really small holes. When the wind blows the poppy around, the rattle shakes, and poppy seeds go flying out. The whole seed experience was a lot of fun, especially standing on papa’s shoulders to get the dried walnut out of the tree.

From Bulgaria

As part of my project, papa and I made Baklava out of walnuts. Baklava is a great tasting desert that is made in Bulgaria. We made it because it has a lot of seeds. Walnuts are are the seeds of walnut trees. The sheets of phylo dough are made from the seeds of wheat, which is a grass. Here’s the recipe that we used. It is best to eat it with ice cream!

 BAKLAVA

INGREDIENTS: 

1 lb.  pastry sheets (phylo dough)

1 cup of butter

1 lb chopped or ground walnuts

1 tablespoon of cinnamon

1  cup sugar

1 cup water

1/2 cup honey

1. Grease a baking pan with melted butter
2. Layer 8 pastry sheets with melted butter brushed between every two sheets
3. Mix the chopped or ground walnuts and cinnamon and spread 1/3 of the nuts over the pastry sheets
4. Cover with 2 pastry sheets and brush with butter
5. Add another 1/3 of the nut mixture, spread evenly
6. Cover with 2 pastry sheets and brush with butter
7. Add remaining nut mixture, spread evenly
8. Cover with remaning pastry sheets with melted butter brushed between every two sheets
9. Cut the bakalava into diamond shaped pieces
10. Bake until golden
11. Make syrup form sugar  and water. boil & add honey. simmer for 20 minutes.  let cool.
12. Spread syrup over cooled baklava & soak for 24 hours!

From Bulgaria

Tags:   Bulgaria · Recipes · Seeds · Trees3 Comments

Chili peppers and their cousins the sweet or bell peppers are almost everywhere. From Eastern China to Mexico, there are peppers. Peppers play an important role in many cuisines world-wide.

Chili peppers were being cultivated in Peru more than 6,000 years ago. From the coast birds brought the seeds inland. Chilis are not spicy to birds, slugs, snails, and frogs. Birds eat the chilis and the seeds go through their digestive system unharmed. The chilis have a chemical called capsicum which slows digestive systems.  Most mammals crush the chili’s seeds when eating them, so they can not germinate. This is why chilis have the defense of spiciness to most animals. It’s sort of ironic that chilies are spread around the world by humans, who are not intended to eat them. 

Shopska salad                                         From Bulgaria

 Chili peppers are valued because they are high in vitamin C, they add spiciness and flavor, and they are addictive (with enough capsicum, your heart beats faster, making chilis addictive). Would you rather have a pot of beans or a pot of beans with chili peppers? Somewhere along the line a mutation occured which turned off the spiciness in the pepper, creating the sweet pepper. Both kinds of peppers were being cultivated in the Americas for thousands of years before they travelled around the globe.

The chili pepper (and sweet pepper) explosion all started back in the early 1500’s, the beginning of the Age of Exploration. When European ships sailed to the Americas (Peru, Mexico, Brazil etc.) they brought new discoveries back to Europe. These included potatoes, tobacco, tomatoes, corn, and chocolate!  Among these new commodities were peppers. The Portuguese are said to have first brought peppers back from the Americas.  

From Bulgaria

Chili peppers first traveled from the Iberian Peninsula around the coast of Africa.

The Travel of Chilis around the World by Cyrus Kirkman

Anyway, chilis went around Africa to India and then – BOOM! At that time everyone wanted to trade with India, so when chili peppers got there they spread all over. They spread to China and Thailand to the Middle East and Eastern Europe. The chili peppers went through Bulgaria to get to Hungary when the Ottoman Turks ruled much of Eastern Europe. Traders brought them to Tunisia in Northern Africa (it would be hard to bring them through the Sahara). Within 50 years of their arrival in Spain, they were being cultivated in kitchen gardens all over the world.

From Bulgaria

Chili peppers actually first spread throughout Europe as an ornamental houseplant; they are quite nice looking. In Bulgaria I saw three different colors of chili peppers on one small plant; they looked like lights on a Christmas tree. They were purple, red, and yellow. However, in Bulgaria today chili peppers and sweet peppers are included in almost every traditional dish that I’ve tasted so far. In Bulgarian outdoor markets, I’ve seen stalls overflowing with peppers of all colors, shapes, and sizes. About half of the produce here is peppers.

From Bulgaria

In the cuisine of every country we’ve visited, chili peppers were included. We’ve learned how to make lots of chili dishes. From stuffed peppers in Peru to harissa (a spicy chili paste) in Tunisia. We saw colorful, dried chili peppers hanging from stallsin Tunisian souks (markets), similar to the ristras we hang back in Santa Fe. We smelled the overpowering aroma of Peruvian chili peppers simmering in water and vinegar (to reduce their heat).  We bought fish and shrimp in a smelly Brazilian seafood market to make moqueca, a spicy seafood stew (see our photo below).  We roasted Spanish padrón peppers on the grill and sprinkled them with sea salt. We bought many Bulgarian pepper seeds to plant when we get home. I can still remember the smells, noises and sights. In Turkey, India, Thailand, and Vietnam (the countries we are going to next) chili peppers will be in many traditional dishes. Here are some recipes we’ve tried in the places we’ve been to so far…

Peruvian stuffed peppers

http://peruvian-cuisine.blogspot.com/2009/03/hot-delicious-and-very-unique.html

From The Big Field Trip – Brazil, January/February, 2009

Brazilian Moqueca (seafoodstew) above.

http://brazilian-food.suite101.com/article.cfm/moqueca_fish_stew

From The Big Field Trip – Tunisia, March, 2009

Tunisian Harissa Sauce

10 dried whole red spicy chilis, stems and seeds removed
2 Tablespoons olive oil
5 cloves garlic
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground coriander
1 teaspoon ground caraway
Water

Cover the chilis with hot water and let them sit for 15 minutes until they soften. Place the chilisand remaining ingredients in a blender and puree until smooth using the chili water to thin it. The sauce should have the consistency of a thick paste. Serve with bread and mayonnaise. In Tunisia, they topped harissa with canned tuna and olives, but I prefer to keep those off.

Bulgarian Stuffed Peppers

http://easteuropeanfood.about.com/od/appetizers/r/friedpeppers.htm

From Bulgaria

Bulgarian Pork Kapama

Ingredients for 6 servings:

1 kg pork

6 Tb. oil

2 onions

 1 carrot

1/2 celery

4-5 dried red peppers

2-3 tomatoes (fresh or canned)

1 ts. red pepper (paprika)

1 ts. ground black pepper

1 Tb. chopped parsley

 salt

1. Cut up meat in large pieces. Boil in salted water, stirring with a wooden spoon until the liquid is evaporated. Then add 3 Tb. oil.

2. Fry meat, stirring all the time.

3. In oil, lightly brown consecutively and transfer to casserole dish: finely chopped onion, diced carrot, diced celery, chopped red peppers (blanched and skin peeled off), and tomatoes (skinned and coarsely grated).

4. Season with red and black pepper, chopped parsley and salt to taste.

5. Cover with warm water, add 3 Tb.oil and cover with lid (or aluminum foil).

6. Bake in a moderate oven. Take the casserole out every 15 minutes and stir. Cook for 2  to 2.5 hours, then serve warm.

From Bulgaria

Chili peppers are a great food. They can put a little spice in your dish, substitute for black pepper, lift your spirits, reduce spoilage of food and much more. They are almost everywhere, and in a certain way they have taken over the world.

Tags:   Brazil · Bulgaria · Chilis · Peru · Tunisia3 Comments

We got to Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria, a week ago. We’ve started homeschooling and Bella and I wrote poems. The first one is mine (Cyrus’s), the second one is Bella’s.

From The Big Fieid Trip – London and Sofia, September 2009

Moss and grass grow between the cracks in the sidewalks

Crunch, I step on an empty green aluminum can

A bright reflection of the gold dome of a church blinds me for a moment

A gold M, a McDonald’s sign, stands on top of a ten-story building – a big gray block

Tangled gray TV and telephone lines along the cracked plaster of a wall

A parade of beeping cars with streamers stops at a red light, coming from a wedding

The ground vibrates as an electric trolley rumbles by

Ta-dum, ta-dum, ta-dum, a car tire driving over black cobblestones

Screech! A fan belt slips

A white plastic bag whips around in the wind in a trash-filled empty lot

Drip-drop, drip –drop, drip-drop, raindrops ripple puddles in a stone-lined pond then it begins to pour

In the rain, people funnel underground to emerge on the other side of the street

CAESARS CASINO a sign says, a man dressed as a Roman soldier, his spear points towards storm clouds

The rain water seeps into my clothes like a sponge, and I run for cover into a grove of chestnut trees 

 By Cyrus

From The Big Fieid Trip – London and Sofia, September 2009

The violin sounds like the mosquito buzzing in my ear at night

A gray haired man plays classical music on the subway stairs

On the steps of a church an old woman sells flowers in plastic cups

In a park a German shepherd runs “S”s in the grass, chasing a stick

A black statue of a dancer stands inside of a fountain full of chestnut leaves and

Above her 15 pigeons perch on a wire

Passing through a parking lot I smell car exhaust

Vroom! Vroom! A car drives fast and screeches around the corner

Rabbits in a cage on the sidewalk with children’s fingers poking inside

Plastic elephants in the window stare out at me

Black leather high-heeled boots, 300 Lev

Flakey pastry polygons in a bakery window

The smell of fresh bread floats into the air

By Bella

Tags:   Bulgaria · Poem · Poetry · Sofia3 Comments

     We have been in Spain and Portugal this summer. We have tasted a lot of good food and had a lot of company. We have enjoyed the summer a lot. We drove from place to place. The first three weeks we spent in Spain were in Alhama de Granada. In Alhama de Granada there was a big dog named Sassan. We went to hike up to the reservoir. Cruz made best friends with Luca and Clement, our next door neighbors. Lisa and James were Luca and Clement’s parents. We rented a house. Our house was #20. It had 52 stairs all the way up to Cy’s room. We went on many hikes and saw many baby birds that had been pushed out of their nests on the cliffs. They were swallows. When we went on hikes, we brought Sassan. He was sooo strong we had to take him off his leash or he would pull James down. We ate tapas almost every night. Papa and Uncle Spence made tapas like asparagus wrapped in ham, lemon chicken, and mussels sprinkled with bread crumbs. Uncle Spencer visited us for two weeks and brought a football for Cy.

From The Big Field Trip – Spain, May, 2009

      We spent one week in Sevilla (Seville), which is in Southern Spain. We went to a pigeon park and fed the pigeons little nuts and seeds. Each packet of pigeon food was 1.50 euro (1 euro is about 1.50 dollars). If you ever put your hand out above the pigeons with seeds in them, they will fly to your hand, land on your fingers, and peck at the seeds. You can catch them, but they are uncomfortable and flap their wings, so you have to let them go. Diego, my friend from Zaragoza (in another part of Spain) came to visit us for two days. He caught some pigeons too. Then we went to a museum where they had stone lion sculptures built by the Romans. Then we saw a baby bird and I wanted to catch it, but my mom said that the bird’s mom would sniff it and smell the human and think that it’s a human and fly away. My mom, Cy, and I saw flamenco dancers. They stomped their feet and it made a loud noise. There was a singer who sang like he was crying and a guitarist who tapped his feet while he played the guitar. We saw a bullfight, but it is too horrible to talk about.

From The Big Field Trip – Portugal, June 2009

     The first place we went to in Portugal was Coimbra. Coimbra is a small city with a nice river park. You could walk over the bridge and then you will get to the other side. If you walk down the path you will get to a science museum. At the science museum we made our own aliens. Mine was an octopus that had a beak, ate rotten meat, and had three human eyes. It was sticky and slimy. There was a puzzle that had parts of the human body. I made it all confusing, and I put it back together. It took like 40 minutes. We lived in an old building. Our apartment was at the top (up 45 steps). We were on the same hill as the university. The roads were cobblestone. I thought Coimbra was awesome. It had Fado singing. Men sang while the women watched. In the rest of Portugal women sing.

From The Big Field Trip – Portugal, June 2009

     After Coimbra we lived in Cabo Espichel for two weeks. Cabo Espichel is on coast of Portugal near Lisbon. We finished our school work. In Cabo Espichel there was a dog that got its leg cut off by a tractor blade. His name was Jijo. We had a mini-pool, but the water too was cool to swim in. There were a lot of fruit trees. There were cherries, oranges, lemons, figs, plums, apples, and peaches (one of the peach trees broke from the blowing wind). I caught bees with my bare hands. The bees were pollinating the flowers. There were butterflies too, and a hummingbird moth. We went to the beach in Sesimbra and met a 10 year-old girl who spoke Spanish and was from Peru, but lived in Lisbon. I buried a girl’s ball in the sand. We played tag in the water, and it was really quite fun.

From The Big Field Trip – Portugal, June 2009

     We took a day trip to Sintra, which is a town near Lisbon. There was a big castle on a rocky hill. As we were walking to the castle, there was a cat that was hunting, and it caught a rat. I thought the cat was bringing the rat to its babies. It ran up to the rocks, and I ran after it. It started cat-growling after me. I slipped off a rock and fell to the soft, leafy ground. When I got up, I looked around, and I guess she already got to her babies, because she wasn’t there. It was cool to see a domesticated cat living a bobcat or a bear. In Sintra we went to a palace that seemed like a fairy-tale castle. The King and Queen of Portugal lived there a hundred years ago. It was cool. Outside there were grassy ruins, and I saw the same cat in there. There was a forest. All the trees were from all over the world. Inside the palace every room was fancy. There was furniture with rabbit fur, and it was fluffy. I wanted to live in the Queen’s room. The Queen even had a velvet bidet.

From The Big Field Trip – Portugal, July 2009

     After we left Cabo Espichel, we went to Sao Joao de Tarouca, which is a small village. In Sao Joao we had a huge chlorine pool. There was a dog, a cat, and at least a dozen lizards that climbed in our house and around our walls. The lizards couldn’t swim (I tried it in the bird bath). We had a castle house with six bedrooms and five bathrooms. It was built of large blocks of granite. We had such a big place because Grandma, Aunt Cathy, Aunt Connie, Erica, Julian, and Zacciah came to visit us. There was a little house outside. I thought it was a chicken house, but it was for storing corn. I let Zacciah use my goggles in the pool, but he didn’t give them back (eventually he did). It was fun to be on vacation and have great guests.

From The Big Field Trip – Portugal, July 2009

     After that we went with all of our company to live in Ponte de Cavez for almost three weeks. Ponte de Cavez was not even a village – it only had like three houses. There was a river with lots of fish and fishermen on the other side of the house. Once I went to fish with Grandma, and we got a fish (a man gave it to us). It died. We had a swimming pool that we could drink out of (if nobody peed in it). The water came from a spring. There were three dogs – a big dog and two puppies. The big dog was tied up so three quarters and a half of the time we couldn’t play with it. The puppies were really cute. Whenever I cuddled with them for a long time and left, they would follow me, and when I ran, they ran. They were really fast for puppies.

From The Big Field Trip – Portugal, July 2009

     I went on a little trip to Spain with Grandma, Aunt Cathy, Aunt Connie, and Mom. We went to Santiago de Compostela to see a big party. There were a lot of fireworks that almost blew up half the church. They made boob cheese there. It was because a man made a sculpture of an angel, and it had way too big boobs. He was ordered to make the boobs smaller. The people in town did not like that, so they started making “queso tetilla”, which means “boob cheese”.

From The Big Field Trip – Portugal, August 2009

     When everyone left, we went to Talasnal. Talasnal is a town where all of the homes are made of schist, which is a flat stone. It had about a dozen cats. There was a teeny-tiny German shepherd that jumped on me, and when I ran it tried to bite my heels. If you take about a half an hour or 45 minute walk down hill (because Talasnal is up on a high hill), you get to a beautiful river beach. In the river beach there are a lot of young and old people swimming or bathing. There was a diving board six feet above the water. If you jump into the water, you won’t touch the ground because it is really deep down. It is about a 45 minute to an hour walk back up the big hill to Talasnal.

From The Big Field Trip – Portugal, August 2009

     Next we went to Lisboa (what the Portuguese call Lisbon). Lisboa is the biggest city in Portugal. Lisboa is cool because there are a lot of parks, and there is a butterfly garden where you can actually see butterflies laying eggs on leaves. I saw caterpillars forming chrysalises and butterflies hatching from chrysalises. I also saw many pairs of monarch butterflies mating. One of those pairs was flying and mating. I went to a puppet museum. There were puppets from Sri Lanka in masks that were Naga Rakshas, which means “snake demons”. One night I went on a date with Papa and Cy. We went on a movie date. We saw The African Queen in the Film Museum. I thought it was really cool. When I went on a Fado date with Mom, we stayed up til about midnight watching fado. It is a very actionative music (that should be a word that means that do every single emotion). In Lisbon we made two really good friends, Clyde and Nico. Nico’s birthday was on September 2nd (I think). I made a poster that said, “To Nico: Happy Birthday – Bella”. I gave her a plastic horse too. We spent four days in London and then went to Bulgaria. I’ll write soon about London and Bulgaria.

From The Big Field Trip – Portugal, August 2009

Tags:   Portugal · SpainNo Comments.