Group trip to Benque

Yesterday was the last group trip. We went to Benque to visit families and learn how to cook bollas (not sure of the spelling) and tamales the traditional way. We started about 8:30 and it was done about noon. The process starts with ground corn and water which makes a lumpy mixture. For tamales the lumps are strained out, but not for the bollas. Each mixture is cooked in a big bowl with a bit of grease, basically like scrabbled eggs. Seasoned chicken is cut into pieces, cooked in grease, water and chopped vegetable added. The next step is to put these mixtures on palm leaves that have been steamed over an open flame, cut into about 10 inch squares, and washed. The corn mixture is ball then patted down on the leaf and a scoop of the chicken is put it. There is a special way to fold the double layer of leaves because they are then steamed for about 45 minutes before they are done. Along with the bollas and tamales we had hot sauce and rice milk. I like it all except the rice milk was very sweet and didn’t hit my stomach right.

The family had two children but the neighbor kids come over to play all the time and a group of Americans can draw a crowd. The kids were all pretty shy until we started taking their pictures and one of the American girls brought out a coloring book. She told one boy to pick a picture he liked and she ripped it out and gave it to him. He looked at her in shock, so I am gathering that ripping a page is definitely a no-no here. I was looking at some of the flowers in the yard when a couple of girls about 7 years old decided it was safe to talk to me. I found out about who lived in each house, their homemade “tent” house, their ability to jump rope, the dogs name, ect. As long as the conversation was 2 to 1 they were very chatty. When one of the other Americans came close they would be shy and giggle again. Just as we were getting ready to leave they decided to put on a “king of the mountain” type show with the clothes line and a pile of sand and rocks. It was all in fun and no one got hurt.

I found out that a girl from college lives just up the street from this house. I may have to visit her one of these weekends and stop by to visit this family again.