Rollin'

Rohit and Lucy were in town a few weeks ago, and we had lunch with them. We went to this fast food sushi place (yes, it sounds like a bad idea, and yes, it was a bad idea). Rohit got this volcano roll, which was raw fish wrapped in rice and nori, but covered in cooked fish chunks, salmon roe and melted cheese.



Yum.

Chi maqbool ast?

Today while leaving FSI, I had a short conversation with one of the Dari teachers:

Her: You have an important weekend coming up!
Me: Yes, I do.
Her: (Something in Dari that I didn't understand).
Me: (Looking befuddled).
Her: (Looking concerned, repeats something in Dari that I didn't understand, except I got the phrase "you will be pretty.")
Me: (Still kind of befuddled).
Her: (Switching to English, now looking very grave) You will fix your eyebrows so that you look pretty?
Me: (Noticing her perfectly plucked brows for the first time) Um, I guess so.

(Post title translation: What is beautiful?)

Verb Conjugation

Today's lesson: conjugation.

Man entehaar karda-am
Tu entehaar karda-ee
Oh entehaar karda-ast
Maa entehaar karda-aim
Shumah entehaar karda-aid
Oonah entehaar karda-and

Translation:

I have committed suicide.
You have committed suicide.
He/she has committed suicide.
We have committed suicide.
You (plural) have committed suicide.
They have committed suicide.

I have attacked.
You have attacked.
He/she has attacked ...

And so forth.

Vocabulary

This week, I learned the following words in Dari

- extremist
- to kill
- suicide attack
- to threaten

I still don't know how to say "tomato."

How soon we forget!

It was a great weekend in Minneapolis/St. Paul. Such a great time to see my old friends, brunch with my sister and just get away from the wedding for at least 48 hours. Well, at least for Masha. But on the last most she forget to mention one shining moment from our weekend of pleasure and sight-seeing.

We went to the Mall of America on Sunday to do the ferris wheel and, while there, decided to do the log flume. Well, I decided to do it, and then had to talk Masha into riding with me. Easy sell, but probably helped by the fact that Masha might not have known exactly what she was getting herself into.

So, at 11:00 a.m., we loaded ourselves into the log boat, and proceeded to have a nice ride around the inside of the mall, checking out historically accurate recreations of old mining towns, Paul Bunyan and his ox, Blue, and a cute little settler home. Anyway, as we got higher and higher, Masha got more and more scared. I guess the anticipation was getting to her, but by the time we hit the top of the flume, her nails were dug into my back, her nose was pressed against my spine and I have to assume that her eyes didn't see a thing on the ride down. Oh, and the scream into my ear probably would have shattered her eyeglasses if she had been wearing them.

So, needless to say, she's up for our bungee-jumping adventure in New Zealand next year. And here is a little picture of our "pre-flume" bliss. Can we do it again????