Read Fjellet, geværet, vannet (A mountain, a gun, a lake) by Lars Ramslie (in French, published by the Chamonix based Paulsen editions). A perturbing recollection of a broken childhood between the Norwegian outdoors and violent parenting, in the shadow of an out-of-control father. To the point I found it rather hard to finish the book, the author (and son) being often borderline apologetic for his father’s violent outbursts. That he survived such a trauma is astounding. That local social services could not keep his father away is a shame… I also read E.M. Forster’s A Passage to India classic, while travelling to Chennai, which already reviewed in a separate post.
Beyond indulging in South Indian dishes and a never ending range of appams and local fruits, I made rhubarb preserve from a home-grown rhubarb planting, sometime supplemented with the first figs from our fig-tree and sometime augmented by farmer market sticks. Picked too hot a day to make a ceviche, despite a quick dip in lemon as I returned from the market. (No aftereffect, it just did not taste nice.) And panned an experimental monkfish liver that proved nice and ejnoyable (and with a very mild taste compared with the veal liver I had to eat once a week as a child).
Watched nothing on the flights to and from India. Not even my neighbours’ screens! But watched the Japanese TV series The Hot Spot that is rather funny if not hilarious, and on the lengthy side (esp. all the lunch meetings in Mont Blanc (!) restaurant). Still, the mundane lives of all characters, including the alien—who suffers from all too human shortcomings!—, and the ever-present backdrop of Mount Fuji make the show worth watching for a while. (A second season feels superfluous, mind.)
