International Evening

We always enjoy sharing an evening with our Indian friends. The food is always wonderful and lots of fun with their 3 young daughters to entertain us. Tonight was interesting. We met a friend of theirs, "V", last week and he invited us to come tour his plant where they extract sandalwood oil and export it to India.

So here we are: in Tanzania, with friends, the wife from India, and the husband from Pakistan, who was educated in Japan and England. The plant we toured, run by "V" (also from India) was very interesting. They import the finest sandalwood from Australia and Sudan, Uganda. Eucalyptus wood is brought in from South Africa to run the furnaces to process the oil. The purified oil sells for about $160/kilogram, which calculates to $4000 per 25 kilo container. (Compare that to oil prices!!!). "V" has a German shepherd. And, we were entertained by an American movie, The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.....which we all know is a "spaghetti" western, made in Italy.

We agreed to get together again soon, and I was asked to prepare a meal I had made for the family several months ago: fried chicken, mashed potatoes, cream gravy, and biscuits. "Southern"......now would you consider that "international"? You bet your "buttered biscuit" it is!!!!!