We went to 'more!', a small supermarket to buy the ingredients for the cake we wanted to bake. We got all our ingredients but we couldn't find the cinnamon. We asked the lady in the counter, and she was like yes yes (still sitting there). Once again I asked her "Where is the cinnamon?" and her answer was, again, "yes yes" (!?) - she, like many working class indians, didn't speak english! so Riina and I tried, without succes, to explain, in hindi, what cinnamon was... After a little while a female costumer walks in, and I ask her how to say cinnamon in hindi, she then ask the girl who worked there "Elaichi kahaa hein?". Now i just happen to know, don't ask me why, that Elaichi means cardamom, so I tried to explain to the lady that cinnamon is the one commonly used in desserts, is a kind of dried bark, not the same at cardamom, and finally she looks as if she understand, the lady ask for dalchini. I think, NOOOO (!) dal means lentalsoup!!!... But luckily the lady was right! cinnamon in hindi is Dalchini - yet another word added to my hindi vocabulary. Practical lessons everyday - the world is my college!
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