Odissa New Year (14th April)
on Jen's Indian Adventure (India), 01/May/2010 12:17, 34 days ago
Why is it that the week you’re due to go on holidays you always seem very tired at work and the last 5 office days take forever to complete? Well, when I say ‘you’ I actually mean ‘me’.The week before my island adventure was, thankfully, broken up by the Oriya New Year (Wednesday 14thApril).Vishuva Sankranti is the traditional Oriya New Year and generally falls on this day each year. It coincides with the traditional New Year inAssam, Bengal, Kerala,Manipur,Nepaland Tamil Nadu - in short the solar Hindu New Year.  All of CYSD staff got together in the afternoon and had a drink traditional to the day, but historically drunk to re-hydrate on the first summer day each year. (Question: Have they not noticed the sun high in the sky for the last 3 months?) The drink was a mixture of liquidised fruits, loaded with banana, cashew nuts, coconut, paneer, milk, curd, sugar (lots) and black pepper (lots of lots). As my colleagues happily asked for seconds I wasn’t sure if it was too sweet from sugar for my taste as it hit my tongue or too hot from black pepper as it hit the back of my throat. As it took me so long to decide I had to go back to work before I had an opportunity to finish my drink.(As I write about food, my friendly, neighbourhood gecko has arrived on the outside of my bedroom window for his evening meal–nice chap, never complains about the menu !)