Little India

The LA Blogitude miniseries “Enclaves” continues with its latest installment: Little India. Between my 7 mile run and a funeral-themed party at the local artist colony last Saturday, I headed out to Artesia with the crew to do a little trading of sweets, silks and spices. While a bit of a drive, it sure beat hopping a 20 hour flight.

First stop: Rajdhani vegetarian restaurant.

After braving a treacherous parking structure, we put our names in at the restaurant and gazed out across the piece of Middle Asia that had found its way to Pioneer Blvd.

Our table was ready and immediately after taking a seat we were told to “mind your legs!” as waitstaff moved our table four inches south. We had nice place settings, but they didn’t last. As soon as the table was moved we were told to “put your fork and napkin aside!”

We quickly obliged – and good thing, because the food was coming fast. Within minutes dishes were filled.

And it kept coming. Soon, we had more than we knew what to do with.

Waitstaff kept coming around to ask us if we wanted more. So we ate more.

Once they realized our tummies couldn’t hold much more, we received little bowls of water. The same woman who moved our table told us not to drink it because it was for washing out hands. Thanks mom!

And then we had dessert (left to right): dijonaise, mashed carrots and guacamole. No dummy, it’s actually lemon pudding, carrot pudding (gajar halwa) and green pudding (something halwa).

Next we were off to the clothing shops so Ben could find an outfit. But first we stopped into an appliance shop where everything had voltage numbers written in Sharpie on the box.

Back at dress shopping, I was mesmerized by the beauty of the fabrics and stayed out of the fray as Ben, Yirko and Kate charmed, finagled and haggled with various tailors. On shop 5, we found the one. A blue tunic with gold beads priced far below the others we’d seen and a much fit better fit too – but there’s always a catch and this time the sleeves were too small. There was a sewing machine on a stool in the back of the shop. Yirko suggested we ask if the sleeves could be extended with additional gold fabric.

“Hmmm,” the shopowner said looking thoughtful. “Fabric, threads, labor….that will cost more.”
“How much?” someone asked. We paused, afraid of the answer.
“15 dollars,” she said. It was a deal. Ben paid his deposit and we left happy.

What we really needed was a second dessert, so we went to Standard Sweet and Snack where we ate several forms of milk and sugar (burfi, peda, ladoo):

Before leaving, we sampled vegetarian pizza samosas and browsed a market where I saw cardamom in a bag, and Kate and Yirko went in on a $9 crate of mangos. Yirko also bought the tiniest can of Coke I’ve ever seen for his mom for Mother’s Day and I got a bar of cinnamon soap.

Next stop: Little Saigon.