A Terrifying Experience In Which: Pooh and Piglet Encounter a Ghost

One evening, Pooh and Piglet were walking home through the forest. It was the night of the full moon and all kinds of strange creatures were wandering in the darkness. Midway home, a floating shadow appeared before them. Pooh was so scared he immediately hid behind Piglet, while Piglet made fists, ready to fight if needed.

Nobody moved until the shadow floated away from them. Then, quickly they ran towards home, Pooh lagging behind. Piglet stopped and waited for his friend. Reaching home together, they quickly bolted the door.

Pooh sat on the couch, relieved. “Don’t be afraid, dear Piglet. I will protect you, whatever happens!” said Pooh, proudly.

“I know, Pooh!” answered Piglet happily.

Just then they heard someone banging the door. Pooh instantly hid himself behind a cupboard while Piglet took a firewood for defense.

 Read the rest of the story here. Kindly support my story by clicking the link above. Thank you.

Note: 

• QuinTale is a 500-word writing event where a story is written based on a given prompt. If interested, visit the website for further details.

• If you're a writer, budding or otherwise, consider joining in our small community of writers at Write.Read.Support. FB group. Here's the link: https://www.facebook.com/groups/penmancy/

An Amazing Adventure In Which: Pooh and Piglet Go Hiking

One day Winnie-the-Pooh and his good friend Piglet were sitting together when Piglet said, “Why don’t we go hiking?”

“Where shall we go?” asked Pooh.

“How about Skyhigh Mountain? The whole world is visible from the top.”

“We shall go tomorrow then!” said Pooh. Though Pooh did not like hiking, he was happy to go anywhere with Piglet.

Next morning the two friends were on their way. Piglet walked with short but swift steps admiring the flowers on the road. Pooh lumbered along heavily, humming a song:

Read the rest here. 

Note: 

• I am doing this to get our newly-created website traffic. Please support this story by visiting the website, www.penmancy.com
• If you're a writer, budding or otherwise, consider joining in our small community of writers at Write.Read.Support. FB group. Here's the link: https://www.facebook.com/groups/penmancy/

5 Filipino Words That You Should Include in Your Vocabulary

Filipino is the official national language of the Philippines. It is also the term for the country’s citizen. Like me. I am a Filipino. My parents are Filipinos.

But did you know that dozens of Filipino words are now officially in the Oxford English Dictionary? Yes. The list is getting longer.

Here are five from the list:

1. Kuya –a term used as a sign of respect to an older male relative such as a brother, cousin, or family friend. It can also be used to address an older man even if they’re just an acquaintance or a stranger.

• If you have a biological brother, you can call him kuya apart from calling him bru or bhaee.

Example: My kuya John is three years older than me. He is an engineer.

2. Suki –a term used to refer to a customer who purchases products or services from the same provider.

Example: I own Kumar’s store and Mr. And Mrs. Negi are my suki. They only buy their groceries from my shop.

3. Baon –money, food, or other provisions taken to work, school, or on a long journey.

• If you’re working and you take food for lunch from home to eat at lunch break, then that food is called baon. The same applies to the money that parents give to their children when they go to school.

Example: “Don’t forget your baon, else you’ll starve at lunch,” Mrs. Rana reminded her daughter who is in fifth grade.

Baon to school for two kids
(photo credit: vegan friend, DK)

 

4. Yo-yo –is a toy consisting of an axle connected to two disks, and a string looped around the axle. (See photo).

• In many countries around the world, a yo-yo competition is being held every year. This competition normally consists of two parts, a set of compulsory tricks and a freestyle, where points are scored for each and the winner is the yo-yo player who scores the most points. Compulsory tricks, also known as a trick ladder, are a set of tricks that have been chosen before the contest, and the competitor must successfully complete each trick on their first or second attempt to score points.

Yo-yo toy that children and adult enjoy.

5. Halo-halo –("mixed together") is a popular dessert made of mixed fruits, boiled sweet beans, sago, agar jelly, evaporated milk, and shaved ice, typically topped with purple yam, and ice cream. It is served in a tall or wide-brimmed bowl. Yum!

So which of these words would you use first?

Backpack Out of Old Jeans

My husband has quite a number of old jeans that are not good enough 

to give away to people who can wear them but still good enough to be something else. 

So, I disassembled three of his jeans pants and made two bags,

 a big hand/shoulder bag and a not too small back pack. 

Here, I am going to share the backpack.

Inspired from this Youtube tutorial, I made one my own -sewed and modified. 

No stick glue needed. 

I don't trust glue in keeping the back safe to carry around. 

Thinking about it brings me to a scene of falling stuff in the middle of the jungle, 

water bottle bent or worse, emptied or house keys missing. Lol! 

Instead of straight, I made the top edge tapered and the bottom area semi-cercilar. And I did some blunders, which I am going to enumerate, along with some tips so you don't fall for the same mistakes, at the bottom part of this article.

Here are some pictures.

The front part of the bag. The string is my old shoe lace. The blue lining and the pocket are from my husband's short pants

To make this bag, you need the following:

• 2 pieces of jeans cloth of your own measurement/size (this one is 11 by 12.5)
• a long 4 inches wide and 32 inches length cloth that would serve as the middle section of the bag
• 2 pieces of 1.5 inch bias cloth for side piping
• 1 piece 2.5 inches bias cloth for top edge piping
• 1 piece shoe lace
• colorful threads
• 1 button (I used the button from one of the jeans pants)
• 2 pieces of 3 x 25 fabric for handle
• 1 7x8 fabric for cap and a bias cloth
• one 5 inches piece of bias cloth for hanging (the one right in the middle of the two handles) 
• a rectangular piece of cloth for inside pocket
• sewing machine
• sewing needle
• scissors
• tape measure
• pen or marker
• ruler 
• needle pins (optional)

~The black lining of the handle is the string of the short pants which I just added on one side of each handle to make it wider~

Inside are tablet phone, kindle, and mobile phone. This bag can also hold a 1-liter water bottle.

The holes for the string. Each hole is hand-stitched with different colors of sewing threads.

In the video, only two holes are suggested for each side. I suggest that you do the same (remember the blunder I mentioned earlier).

~string holes at the side~

~I let the chair wore the bag for the time being.~

Tips in making this project:

•  Decide which part of the bag is the back side so you can sew the inside pocket there. The inside pocket should be folded twice at the opening so that no broken threads would be visible. The three sides should be folded once while sewing it to the middle of the 11x12.5 fabric.
• Since I used a ready-made pocket for the out part of the bag, I just sew it in the middle of the front part of the bag.
• With right side attach one 11x12.5 fabric to one edge of the 4x32 fabric using needle pins and sew. Remove each pin as you sew along. When you reach the curve side, make 3 to 4 small slits half an inch apart so as you continue sewing, the fabric also comes along.
• Do the same on the other side of 4x32 with the other 11x12.5 fabric.
• Sew in the bias cloths at the edges (see the blue edge lining of the bag). While doing so, remember to attach one end of each handle at the back side of the bag so you don't need to remove the stitches on that part later on, which what happened to me.
• Make the necessary string holes and stitch around it using blanket stitch or buttonhole stitch.
• Attach the other ends of the handles in between two string holes on  the back side of the bag. On top of it, sew in the cap with the right side upside down. Watch the video for clarity.
• Put the shoe lace and your bag is ready. 
• I added a button right above the outside pocket and added a hook for it that is sewn at the center edge of the cap. You can make a buttonhole there instead of a fabric hook.

If you decide to make this bag and have a question, do let me know and I'll answer your query as soon as possible.

The bigger bag that I mentioned will be posted soon -once I finished adding a zipper to it. :-)

With God, All is Possible!

Religious apologists would claim so!

Yesterday, I posted this -

"There had been an accident. One dead, three heavily injured, one lost a leg. 

These guys were rushed to the nearest hospital. 

While doctors were doing the best they can to save the victims' lives, 

their friends and family prayed for their safety."

If you were God, what would you do?
Would you listen to the families pleas and prayers and answer them 

or would you prevent the accident from happening altogether?

You see, if I were God, I wouldn't let any harm come to my children,
therefore, I'd prevent the accident from happening!
And I know you would do the same.

Now apply the scenario to a ship sinking, a fire, a plane crash,
a murder, a shooting, etc. The answer is all the same.

And that, my friends, is the difference
between your God and me 

or anyone who chooses
to prevent bad things from happening.

Less than three minutes later, my niece shared a link to an article titled, "why so much suffering" in the comment section. It was a link to Jehovah's Witnesses website. This is the link if you're interested. 

We exchanged arguments, questions, and answers (although much of my rebuttal were ignored).

She shared the link for me to read since, according to her, I have a lot of unanswered questions. Well, I do. But just because these questions don't have answers...yet, I'd leave them to god. No way! And that is because the universe is filled with mysteries and we don't have enough knowledge to unravel them. Even then, it is perfectly fine to live in doubts and accept that many things are unanswered. That even makes our life more exciting. 

She encouraged me to go through that article, which I did. I read lines after lines with verses quoted from the Bible. There are many flaws in that article if one really tries to understand it, but I didn't enumerate them all to her. Instead, I took two claims and added my own interpretation. But before I go further to discuss that, I'd like to mention three (there are more) claims presented in the article:

1.  Jehovah, God, never causes bad things to happen, for it is unthinkable for the true God to act wickedly, for the Almighty to do wrong!

2.  The ruler of the world is Satan the Devil. (That is why there is so much suffering in the world.)

3. With God, all is possible. 

So, let's dig this deeper. 

~If there is a benevolent God, the number one must be true. (Yes, it would be fantastic if everyone on earth is happy and face no problems, including global warming. Yay!)

~But wait, famine, riots, war, hunger, diseases, conflicts, murder, shootings, atrocities with each other, etc. are all over the world! Ah, Satan the Devil is behind all these. (Well, it's actually great to have someone else to blame for all the mess in the world created and governed by the Almighty that doesn't do wrong! Perfection!)

~Oh, geez! All is possible with God! If so, then it means that Satan the Devil can be destroyed, immediately! Once Satan the Devil is defeated, all suffering in the world will disappear, will dissipate into thin air. With God, all is possible so those people who are victims of being in the wrong place at the wrong time can never be in the wrong place at the wrong time anymore. 

"Do it, God! Do it!" plead these starving innocent children.

"I will, my children! I will. Be assured that I know when all of Satan’s challenges will have been fully answered.So be patient 'cause I am patient. For now, I am giving you time to come to know me and choose me as your Ruler. While you do that, I'll let you starve!" answered God (Jehovah).

"Don't bother about that promise, children," I butted in. "God is some egomaniacal, capricious piece of sh...., err, human imagination that has extremely low self-esteem. Why else would he want his children to please him and creates a tantrum if he isn't pleased and let you starve instead of smashing that head of Satan's so you'll never starve and suffer again? So, go home! Tell your parents to wear contraception and demand from over-eating, obese, mansion-owning dregs of humanity to spare you some food for your bellies! Don't depend on God. He's got a huge ego to please!"

Persimmons or Amarphal or Ramphal: Hachiya and Fuyu Variety

Five days ago, my husband had some business to attend to in Dehradun. Going to bigger cities is something that we don't do often. In fact, we would be glad if transactions can be done online or through someone. We just loathe the pollution -the traffic, the crowd, the garbage, the horrible plight of non-human animals and the apathetic and cruel treatment of human beings to these poor earthlings!

So, to make the trip worthwhile, my husband and I would buy the fruits, groceries, vegetables, nuts and seeds that aren't available in the place we live.

This time, he took two varieties of persimmons -Hachiya and Fuyu, and other fruits like Thailand guava (huge and bland but tasty and crunchy), chicos, custard apple, canary melons, red grapes, Midknight oranges, etc.

The above picture is a variety of Hachiya. From medium size to large size, the fruit is a delight. Hachiya variety looks round but pointed and they are astringent or sappy, which means, they cannot be eaten when hard and firm. They have to ripen from top to bottom. They must be very soft, only then, sappiness goes, and they're enjoyable to eat.

A few of the vendors selling this variety shared their stories involving Hachiya. This variety is NOT popular among customers! At first, we were puzzled. Such beautiful and tasty fruit and people don't like it? There must be a reason.

There is only one explanation. And I'll go through that below. In the meantime, here's Fuyu variety.

Fuyu variety is the non-astringent variety. They are quite small, round but flat. These are the characteristics of the non-astringent persimmons -round and flat.

Until three days ago, we've been eating this variety the wrong way, or shall I say, eating it one way -the soft and ripe way!

My husband's experience in buying this variety this time gave some light as to  
when to eat Fuyu best, and that is, when they are hard and firm.
This goes back to the vendors' stories. People like this variety because they can be eaten immediately making it popular.
Customers only buy Fuyu!
And that is because, these fruits are displayed and sold hard and firm, never soft and ripe, and that is the first experience most customers have.
So, the moment they buy Hachiya and eat the same way they eat Fuyu,
the experience would be horrible
because Hachiya variety is astringent.
Nobody really likes a sappy tongue, right?

Also, not many have the curiosity to ask why and find out how to properly eat Hachiya persimmons! So, the next time they see the fruit, they'll pass by it remembering their
disgusting first experience.

The thing is, not many know how to eat it.
Even the sellers themselves!

So, now you know!
The next time you come across these fruits, buy them in loads, for they really taste good!

Just a few tips. We keep them in the fridge, wash them thoroughly, 

and eat them with their skin on. 

The skin of Fuyu is a little bit coarse and tends to separate from the pulp onceit is soft and ripe. When hard and firm, it is crunchy and sweet (an iinformation we

just paid attention to even though we've read the same info two years ago).

~two platters of fruit goodies: Midknight oranges, chico, local orange, guava, Fuyu and Hachiya persimmons~

• Hindi people call persimmons Amarphal or immortal fruit OR Ramphal or fruit for the Gods.
• In the Philippines, Filipinos call the fruit Mabolo. For 27 years in the Philippines, I'd never seen the fruit. I just heard it. Though I wondered how does Mabolo fruit look like. My imagination pictures a round and black fruit. 

The Buddha

Stephen Grellet, Quaker Missionary

Though there are variants of this quote, I prefer the use of "fellow creature" because it embodies all creatures on earth, which makes sense since the author was a member of the Religious Society of Friends (also known as Quakers) that practices vegetarianism and veganism as a reflection of the Peace Testimony, extending non-violence towards animals. 

We don't need to be a Quaker or a Christian or a Muslim or a Jain or a Hindu or a Buddhist to be good and kind to our fellow human beings and to all the non-human animals we share this planet with. After all, we are all Earthlings, citizens of the planet Earth!

Be vegan.

Non-human animals value their lives as much as we value hours.

Let peace reigns in our hearts and it begins on our plates. 

I Am a Vegan Anarchist

I am a vegan anarchist because meat consumption is just one of the symptoms 

of a larger evil that pervades our society, which is capitalism.

The disease of capitalism erodes compassion and makes humans see, not only other creatures, 

but also other humans, as commodities which only have value for the profit that they may fetch 

in the market, regardless of all other considerations. 

A capitalist mind-set, not only prioritizes profit, but also terminates 

everything else that it sees as not marketable. 

Since values are arbitrarily set by the market, 

in a capitalist system, a large proportion of the planet’s beings, both living and non-living, 

are arbitrarily discarded, as the market sees no value in their existence. 

And the ones that are seen as valuable are most often seen as valuable only for their final value of profit, thereby leading to horrific holocaust-like conditions for all their existence 

until their ruthless extermination in the name of generating profit.

I am a vegan anarchist because when an animal or human being or a tree is tagged 

to have this value or that much value, it becomes a one-sided world - a world that is run 

by people whose personal interest is always put at the top, 

regardless of who suffers or dies. 

A road worker works hard so the rest of the world could have a pleasant journey 

or so goods could reach their final destination without getting rotten but is paid meagerly. 

Why? 

Does his life and work least important among other kinds of work? 

Definitely not! 

The same goes to the life of a pig or any other animal. 

Does a pig’s 6-month life worth 10000 rupees? 

No! 

But the capitalist mind would say so! 

Only a vegan anarchist recognizes that all earthlings have inherent value of their own, 

that the pig’s life is invaluable - a value that can be determined by nobody. 

It can neither be sold nor bought. It cannot be traded for anything else. 

And as long as people put a monetary tag to anything, 

whether it’s  natural resource or human and non-human living being, 

exploitation, in any form, 

will never cease to exist.

Capitalist systems breed exploitation over cooperation, 

perpetuate control over empathy, 

and drive cruelty, death and destruction over love, life, and protection. 

Hence, I am a vegan anarchist because anarchism is the necessary solution 

for transforming the world into veganism. 

Potato-Tomato Dish: Simple & Quick No Oil Recipe

If I were to get rid of one thing that I do every day that is cooking. Fortunately, I only cook once almost all the time except in some rare cases when we have great stuff like mushrooms (it's a rarity around here) or when my husband and I feel like eating extra. When it happens it's always light. 

Like this recipe.

And this recipe is for two people. 

~my share~

What are needed?

• 2-3 medium size potatoes (washed thoroughly, never peeled and thinly sliced)
• 5-6 ripe tomatoes, preferably round variety because they're juicy (chopped)
• salt to taste (I used a pinch since we're used to it already)
• red chili powder, according to your preference (I used half a tsp.)
• lemon juice, optional (I use it when it's too spicy for us)
• 1-2 tbsp. poppy seeds, optional (I generally add them because we have them and they induce sleep
• half to 1 a glass of water

What to do?

• In a deep pan, add chopped tomatoes and cook for 2-3 minutes
• Add salt and potatoes. Mix and cover on a low flame.
• After a few minutes, add red chili powder and poppy seeds. Mix again.
• Add little water at a time.
• Cook until the tomatoes get smashed and the potatoes get cooked.
• Check the taste.
• Let it cool a little bit and serve.
• Add lemon juice just before it is served. (Heat destroys vitamin C in lemon juice, but for the purpose of enhancing taste, lemon juice ca be added when the dish is still hot.)

~this time, this dish was eaten alone~

Serve alone or with roti!

~This one is with black and white sesame seeds. What a great way to eat sesame seeds!~

• When I make it for lunch, we usually have this with roti and our roti is not the usual roti. It's made of whole wheat flour which is grounded in a bigger grain, meaning, it's not refined at all and it's full of bran (fiber) then with it are mixed grounded flax, melon seeds, and watermelon seeds (readily prepared with vitamin B12 so we won't be ingesting B12 in one go), sesame seeds and zero salt.   
• Most of the times we eat this dish with one small roti each. Sometimes, half each of one big roti.
• Our cooked food, especially with rice or roti or chapati, vegetables always weigh more than the roti. For example, for 1 roti we will have it with a big bowl of vegetable dish.

This recipe can certainly be modified. 

Do let me know in the comment section below. 

Use the section of what do you think of this recipe, too!

Enjoy!

Tehri Hydro Development Corporation Ltd. (THDC Koteshwar Hydro Power Project)

The Koteshwar dam is on the Bhagirathi River located downstream of the Tehri Dam in Tehri Garhwal, Uttarakhand. KHEP dam is an important part of the Tehri Hydropower Complex that serves to regulate the Tehri Dam's tailrace for irrigation purposes and water load balancing. 

KHEP dam as seen from Pokhari - Koteshwar road. The photo was taken in November 2016.

 There are two roads to reach Koteshwar from Rishikesh. First is through Narendra Nagar -Chamba - Gaja -Pokhari -Koteshwar road. From Chamba, one can go to New Tehri directly. Second is through Devprayag - New Tehri road. Koteshwar from Devprayag is around 40-45 kilometers and deviates at Chaka village. Along the way, you have to ask the road to Chaka because there is another road that goes to New Tehri bypassing Koteshwar road. It's easy to reach Koteshwar once you reach Chaka. Everyone knows Koteshwar dam.

Up-close

The upper houses of KHEP colony. The right line of houses is CISF line where CISF constables and next ranking personnel along with a few of THDC staffs are housed. Below this line is a two building, eight flats for higher officers of THDC. Most employees here come from B.Puram. They don't stay here in the colony.

KHEP township taken a little out of the temple. Just below the BSNL mobile tower is KHEP's dispensary where, as of this time, two doctors (one CMO and one ACMO) are managing the dispensary along with three nurses, pharmacist, lab technician, assistant lab technician, and other hospital staff.

 The entrance to KHEP from Bhagirathipuram. There's a checkpoint ahead. Just state your business, whether visiting or just passing, and you're good to go.

P.S. Keep visiting my blog for more pictures.

Tehri Dam, Tehri Garhwal, Uttarakhand

Tehri Dam taken somewhere in August from one of the viewpoints along Tehri Dam - Bagirathipuram road.

The road that goes in the middle of two green parallel lines is a national highway New Tehri and Bagirathipuram to the neighboring towns like Rishikesh via Chamba, Koteshwar through the left road, and Srinagar Garhwal through the upper road.

We once traveled this road from Rishikesh via Narendra Nagar - Chamba road to Gauchar in Chamoli District.

As you can see the water is aqua-marine during the months of August through June, but the level of water falls down in winter.

Tehri Dam Hydro Power Plant is located below Bagirathipuram (B. Puram) where the main office of THDC is located and where its employees and staffs including CISF (Central Industrial Security Force) personnel and their families are housed. There is a reasonable market at Bagirathipuram. Fruits and Vegetable stores, grocery shops, pharmacy, sweets shops, clothing, and textiles, etc.

 Government offices include India Post, State Bank of India and Punjab National Bank.

It is known that when the dam was built an entire town including the villages in its lower vicinity was submerged and residents were relocated and the new town, New Tehri was born. New Tehri is around 15 kilometers from Bagirathipuram.

The backside of Tehri Dam. The excess water flows down and gets dam in Koteshwar which is around 25 kilometers from here.

This is the view of the dam if you are coming from Koteshwar, particularly if you use the left road from the zero point bridge which leads to the township of Bagirathipuram (the view on the top left). The right road from zero point bypasses B. Puram if you are heading towards Srinagar Garhwal but will still have a good view of the dam.

Like many dam areas, the surrounding hills are damaged and the water is lifeless.

One serious thing that can be done here is a massive reforestation in and around the areas where fruit-bearing trees are planted along with other non-fruit bearing trees for diversity.

The place is cold, but not that cold, in winter and quite hot and humid in summer. Since the roads are not yet fully completed, some landslides occur during rainy days which sometimes cause roadblocks.

There is a road from Bagirathipuram to Koteshwar. Many of the employees and staffs in Koteshwar come from B. Puram and commute every day to work on THDC buses. There are private jeeps as well for public transport but not frequent. 

For more information about the dam, visit THDC website.

Koteshwar Dam soon...keep visiting for updates and new posts!

Persimmon: The Fruit That Nobody Wants?

 These were the persimmons my husband went and purchased from a village near Pauri town.

In 2015, when we were still in Khirsu (about 20 km. from Pauri town), we were able to purchase persimmons from a local fruit shop, Himalaya Fruits at Agency Chowk. Of all the fruit shops in town, only this guy had persimmons. So upon buying, talks came up as to how we knew the fruit to asking where did he (the shopkeeper) get the fruit. Locally, he replied. From nearby Pauri. He did mention the name of the place but we forgot it.

Anyways, at that first time we were only able to take 7 kilos because the rest of them were not good...rotting (sadly, not many knew the fruit and somehow people don't have the 'let me try this' kind of mentality and apparently, they seem to have an aversion towards eating fruits). For Rs.50 per kilo, we took home 7 kilos, most of them were already ripe and ready to eat. 

Before we left, we took the shopkeeper's phone number and my husband did some arrangements with him. It was agreed that when the next batch comes, he would send us 20 kilos of properly selected persimmons. And so, after 25 days, I think, Suresh, our regular taxi guy, got us two boxes of persimmons from Pauri. Payment was made a week later when we went for marketing using Suresh taxi service.

One year later, in a new place called Koteshwar which is around 100 kilometers to Pauri via Chakka - Devprayag - Pauri road, the same problem occurred. Nobody around here even knew the fruit. So as usual, I carried its photograph to show to shopkeepers hoping one or two of them will be able to arrange for us.

In the meantime, knowing it's already persimmons' time, my husband rang the Pauri fruit shop to check if persimmons were available. Confirming, he said. And they've been in his shop for a week already. 

We were very excited!

And so, an order for 30 kilos was talked and he has to call us a day before it arrives in his shop so we can arrange for its transport. Transport means, we will be hiring a taxi to go and get persimmons. 

This time though, we asked for the name of the place where persimmons were available.

Two Saturdays ago, a call came from Himalaya Fruits. Persimmons were there!

Right then, B arranged for a transport to go to Pauri.

And so, at 8:30 the following day, he went to get 30, or maybe 40 kilos of persimmons. I didn't go because nobody was there to take care of Perci and Meegnu. Six hours drive plus a few more for packing and others, so more or less we would be gone for 8-10 hours minimum. So B went alone.

But there was a detour. Around 5-7 kilometer before hitting the proper town of Pauri, the board 'Satekhal', the place that the Himalaya Fruits guy mentioned appeared on the road. So, they stopped and asked around. Luckily, one man was familiar with the fruit and knew someone who had the tree, but he wasn't sure if fruits were still there. He called the guy, nonetheless. It turned out, his was empty. But, this guy knew someone else who also had the trees. He rang him and, fortunately, his trees were still full of persimmon fruits.

He then sent his son to accompany B and the driver. He even warned B to wait and let them do the harvesting because the village had no motorable road. But, no! B and the driver trekked for a kilometer uphill, saw the trees, climbed to pluck them, and took some pictures. 

They helped in packing, too!

One of the guys who owned a tree of persimmons shared his story about how no one wants persimmons. He said that a month back, he and another guy took about 100 kilos to a Mela in Dehradun. In the morning, they were selling persimmons, freshly harvested but unripe, for Rs. 20 per kilo. Many people inquired about it. When it was told that the fruit isn't ready to eat yet, that it has to be kept for a week or more to ripen since it has to be fully soft, people rejected the idea out rightly. 

They waited. And so, towards the end of the Mela, about afternoon, they dropped the price to Rs.10/kilo. And guess what. NOBODY bought it still. I mean, it is a fact that somehow many people have an aversion towards fruits up to an extent of avoiding them because they cause diabetes when, if they really take a thought of it, fruits are hardly (to nil) part of their diet. But for a fruit that was sold for as cheap as Rs.10 per kilo, isn't it worth a try to buy one kilo to see how it is? 

Have people lost curiosity? 

I didn't think so because when it comes to processed foods -junks like pizza, 

burger, chips, etc. these same people would not even have a second thought of stuffing those into their mouths.

So, I guess, this unpopular culture of fruit-eating has to change. And I can see that it has already begun. Most people are not just aware.

Anyway, they ended up taking 50 kilos of persimmons back home.

Persimmon trees yield less at first and then as it grows older the yield increases. The tree above is around 50 years and this variety of persimmons, small, tomato-like, not every fruit has seeds. In fact, seeds in fruits are rare. According to the man who tends this tree, from whom B took persimmons, the roots creep underground and a few meters away from the main tree a sapling grows to become another tree. And so on. 

So the picture below must be like that.

Back to my story.

B ended up taking 44 kilos from this farm and Kishan, the taxi driver, took 6 kilos for his family. Kishann, however, regretted he only took 6 kilos later on and suggested to come back a week or two to get more.

Because B told the Himalaya Fruits guy that he would come, before heading home they went to his shop at Pauri town. The guy was selling it for Rs.80 (the same fruit but not from the same guy whom B bought for Rs.15/kilo). B got it reduced to Rs.40/kilo and as a formality, he took 6 kilos more to make our persimmons from Pauri 50 kilos in total. He also took some other stuffs from the fruit guy like Californian grapes which was sold for Rs.600. B took a kilo and paid Rs.400/kilo for it. Some pears were also bought.

~our typical breakfast along with homemade fruit juice (canary melon or watermelon or banana) and oat-nut mix (oats, dates, pistachios, almonds, cashews, munnakka, green raisins, hemp seeds, sesame seeds, chia seeds~

This is how the small variety of persimmons look like in half -seedless, juicy, and sweet. It has sweetness different from the Himachal variety (capsicum-like, with seeds).

Persimmons are absolutely divine fruits. It's no wonder it's called Ramphal. It is, indeed, fruit for the gods!

Never miss persimmons every year. I know we won't as much as possible.

Buy it hard, keep it at home. Wait. Check. Eat. 

You'll never regret you bought it.