Harvest and Harry Potter

My mentor Dr. Ram was back at work on Monday, coinciding with the timing of the first harvest of the vegetable soybeans that have been growing for my taste survey, so fortunately there has been more hands-on work to do at work this week.

On Monday, we had the first harvest of three of the five lines of vegetable soybean. Usha and Huyen taught me how to recognize which pods are ready for harvest; when they are bright green, the seeds fill 80-90% of the pod and are visibly defined, and are hard when squeezed.

As the taste-test survey will not be for about two weeks, we then boiled, blanched and froze the pods. All the pods will be given the same treatment so preparation isn’t a factor in the taste.

On Tuesday, we dissected some flower buds under the microscope. I was able to see the things Dr. Ram gave me some talks about during my first week here concerning plant biology. For example, the standard, wing, and keel petals, the anthers, stamen, and pollen, and so on.

On Wednesday, we visited two vegetable markets. One was a weekly city market, where farmers could sell directly. The second was a daily village market located on the street, where sellers deal with the farmers through a middleman. I was able to see some new vegetables, and get a better sense of the marketing problems that might be faced by farmers.

The weekly market. There is something pleasing about seeing all the veggies in bulk...

Onions

Snake gourds

The best mangoes I have ever tasted

Tomatoes

Carrots and root vegetables

The daily village market

On Thursday, Dr. Ram arranged for us to have a tour of the ICRISAT gene bank. In large freezers, they have short- and long-term storage for the genetic material for thousands of varieties of their mandate crops: sorghum, millet, chickpea, pigeonpea, and ground nut. I also learned there is a backup gene bank in Svalbard (I immediately thought of the Golden Compass) in case of a global catastrophe.

The drying room

On Friday we had a second harvesting of vegetable soybeans, this time getting a big yield from a fourth line. The fifth hasn’t had such a good yield, and might need to be omitted from the survey. And – there’s a mite infestation on the AGS 406 line…

But the pods still look good.

Boiling/blanching again

On Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday I also went to the IACD from 11-12 to teach the Spoken English classes. On Tuesday I brought in my laptop to show a slideshow of pictures from the U.S. I put together, featuring pictures of all my family, Buddy, Kobe, friends, classes, different vacations in the states, and Molly and Jose’s wedding. On Wednesday and Thursday it rained all day, which affected attendance – only a few people were in the classes, but they actually felt more productive. I still feel like I am floundering as an English teacher, but I figure as long as I have them talking in English in some way it will be at least a little helpful. They also taught me a few Telegu words and phrases – but I am hopeless at the pronunciation.

I ran into these three on the way to the IACD one day.

This week was also Harry Potter week. Helene and I, sometimes joined by others, watched each of the Harry Potter movies, one per night, in preparation for Deathly Hallows Part 2. On Friday after work, we headed to the theater! (Helene had to go a few hours earlier to buy tickets; due to some issue between companies Indian theaters weren’t selling tickets in advance.) After a dinner of naan and dal in a restaurant next door, we got to the theater…

The last supper.

The Indian theater was an interesting experience. Unfortunately, no one was dressed up – I was probably the most spirited in my Hogwarts t-shirt. Despite the PG-13 rating and some gory scenes, people had babies with them (we could tell because, understandably, they were crying). There was an intermission, and I suppose wolf-whistling is the way to cheer/clap for movies. However, the movie was amazing, and it was an emotionally trying evening! I can’t wait to see it again in the states. J

Luckily Helene was there to capture the emotional moment...