Sri Lanka

It was 12 in the night. I was half asleep-half awake and trudged to my closet. After changing in my travel clothes I went to hail a taxi to take us to the international airport, to meet my cousins. We heard the trolley before we saw it. My cousin came hurtling at me and I jumped out just in time, and he hit a pole. We trudged to immigration and were on the flight.

Sri Lanka was hot and moist (perfect place for fungus to grow :)). After getting out and renting our fifteen seater van, we started towards Kandy. On the way, we visited the elephant orphanage. I was stunned at the idea of it, and was gaping in awe, but my mom rushed to the elephant feeding centre. Just for you to know, never step into the enclosure of a hungry elephant, he'll go completely nuts. After feeding him watermelons, bananas and oranges, we went to the bathing centre. We scrubbed the back of the elephants and I got hit on the head with the trunk. We came in at our hotel, dropped our bags and rushed out. We first saw the Buddha temple. It was huge you could have fitted in two cricket stadiums. In the temple, they say that there was a tooth of lord Buddha, and it's officially proven by Raghav Agrawal from the it is proven department.

The next day, we left for Bentota. On the way we stopped at the botanical garden which was huge. We were going to see the orchids as there were many types of them. There were about 50 types of orchids there. We moved around for a few hours and finally were  going to the camper. My dad challenged me to a race to the exit which 100 metres ahead. We took off. I was in the lead when I didn't notice a trees root and fell. Badly hurt  I limped to the camper with the help of my mom. We stopped for lunch at a weird place called woodlands. We continued and reached our hotel, The Bougain Villa. After dropping our bags we headed for the beach. After the beach we went to the dinner place, Golden Grill. After the food, since it was my mom's birthday we called for a pineapple surprise which was basically a pineapple cut in half with ice-cream on it. When they served it they put some alcohol on it and lit it on fire. It was cool. We headed home, and crashed.

The next day we woke up early to go to the beach, catching two auto's. We had loads of fun on the beach and went back, and seeing the breakfast table, my stomach did flips. We started our journey to the Galle fort and on the way stopped at the turtle conservation. Over there we saw many endangered species like the Olive Riddley. These people buy the  turtle eggs from fishermen and keep them for until they are two days old. They kept handicapped turtles too. We continued our way to Galle. It was basically a whole city. There was a cricket stadium where Mahilla Jawardaneye had made his highest score ever. It was a fort from the Dutch period  and inside it was a new city. We walked for a few hours and then settled down to eat lunch. We then walked around the place and had some homemade ice-cream and shopped for a while. We bought post cards and wrote on them. It's always my mom's crazy idea about sending postcards home. We went to the post office which was dingy and pushed our postcards in the box. We started for the hotel but on the way my mom insisted on stopping to watch the sunset. We stopped and took a route to the beach. We watched the sea for twenty minutes and trudged back to our camper. But then we saw something that I would never have done in my life. There were tall coconut trees. One tree was tied to the other by a string. Then on that string a man was walking, from one tree to another. I didn't know that was possible. But I knew I had lost 20 Sri Lankan rupees. I had bet that the strings were not for walking. After grabbing our seats we drove for the temple. The Buddha was huge. That's all I can say. You could see it from a mile away. Then we went for dinner. We were going to a very famous restaurant called Bentota Lake. We ordered and waited. And waited. And waited. And waited. And waited. And waited. And finally got angry. We went to the kitchen to find that no one was cooking. We were so angry that we sat in our camper all grumpy as we were very hungry. But our spirits were lifted when we stopped at Golden Grill. We ate like a pack of wolves. Finally we reached home and crashed.

The next day was again started the day with the beach. After having fun for three hours, it was time to leave for Colombo. We left and on the way we played Antakshri on the journey. We came in only to be greeted by the noise. After 3 days of peace, we had to be welcomed like a Mumbaikar. But the holiday was not over. We first started our search for a restaurant. We searched. First place . No. second place . No. third place . No. like this we went around and around. My dad joked " in search of food you find the whole city." We saw the ground, the trains, on the beach and much more. Finally we found a good 5 star hotel coffee shop that served us some vegetarian food in its pastry shop. We ate like there was no tomorrow. Finally, after a the long drive we went to our hotel to freshen up.

Sitting back in our camper we split. The moms would go do some shopping and the dad would come with us. We first went to the museum. Outside the museum there we two men with really big remote control cars. They were racing them and they were going so fast that all you could see was a cloud of dust. We went into the museum and I actually had fun. We were going out when my dad insisted to talk to some Chinese woman in mandarin and so I did. We then caught an auto to the lake and grabbed our boats. We were finishing our round when the propellers of our boat got stuck and didn't budge. We got our boat and went to the docks to call for help. After pushing we finally got it harnessed to the man's motor boat. We all had some ice cream and coke and caught some more autos and went to Galle face park. Over there we saw many kites. We bought one and flew it. The winds were good and it was the first time I had flown one. We then sat then, watching the sea. We had to then leave for dinner. We found a very nice Indian place and were welcomed straight away by the smell of dosa's. We wolfed the dinner like a pack of hungry wolves. When we reached the hotel we immediately crashed. 

The next day I was awoken with my uncle looming over me already with his swimming gear on. I quickly put on my swimming gear and was in the pool within minutes. After having a hearty breakfast we were going to say bye-bye to Sri Lanka. We drove to the airport and with nothing to declare we sat in the plane.

I was greeted back in Mumbai with the usual noise and pollution. When we reached home I sat down and ta-da. I wrote the thing that you have just read.

Elipsis

We went to one of the coolest restaurants in Mumbai and I want to share my experience with you. Let me start by saying that I have no words saying how the presentation of the food was. It was an experience like in a master chef tasting room.

We first called for starters which on the menu  looked like a good idea. They change the menu everyday and each kind dish had a different name and different contents. They had typed it very close to each other and with the dim lights I could not make out a word and left the ordering to my mom. I thought the menu should be spaced out. 

We called for flatbread which was a crisp bread with mushroom truffle and arugula leaves. We also called for spinach & arugula salad and as the name suggests it is filled with spinach, arugula leaves and some big blobs of goat cheese with candied nuts. We called for cauliflower soup and they served it in a UFO looking plate. The presentation  was astounding.

For the main course we called gnocchi in broccoli, Parmesan and ceremele sauce. Gnocchi was something we had heard only on Master chef. It was nice to taste it.  We also had popcorn grits. Now, can you imagine having popcorn for dinner! I called for it but didn't like it so much.

Last , we called for the dessert Rocky Roads. It had chocolate balls, peanut  ice cream, caramel sauce and a bed of marshmallows. The marshmallows were at the bottom followed by the ice cream and caramel sauce. Then came the chocolate balls which were dipped in nitrogen gas which made it impossible to brake but when you put it in your mouth, it melts.

My experience at Elipsis was great, if you go then leave a comment  on how you liked it.

Chocolate Chip Muffin

I made cupcakes and they tasted awesome. At first, I forgot to add sugar to the batter and the first batch came sugar less. I made forty cupcakes and i want to share this recipe with you.

 Prep Time: 15 minutes

Cook Time: 20 minutes

Total Time: 35 minutes

Ingredients:

• 2 cups all-purpose flour (260 grams)
• ¾ cup cocoa powder
• ¾ cup granulated sugar
• 1 Tbsp baking powder
• ½ tsp salt
• 1¼ cups whole milk
• 2 large eggs, beaten
• 2 Tbsp butter, melted
• 1/3 cup vegetable oil
• 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
• 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips, plus 1/3 cup additional chocolate chips for sprinkling

Preparation:

1. Preheat oven to 350° F.


2. Combine the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, sugar and salt in a large bowl.


3. Combine the milk and the melted butter. Then add the oil, and finally whisk in the beaten eggs and stir in the vanilla extract.


4. Thoroughly grease and flour a muffin pan (or better yet, you can use paper muffin liners).


5. Add the liquid ingredients to the dry ones and mix no more than ten seconds. The batter should be visibly lumpy. That's OK! It's extremely important not to overmix the batter, or the resulting muffins can be hard or misshapen.
   
   TIP: The dry and wet ingredients, respectively, can be mixed in advance, but as soon as the wet and dry ingredients have been combined with each other, the liquid will activate the baking powder and the batter needs to be baked right away.


6. With a rubber spatula, gently fold 1 cup of chocolate chips into the batter. Don't overwork the batter.


7. Carefully spoon the batter into the prepared muffin pan (you can use a small ladle or even an ice-cream scoop).


8. Finally, sprinkle the remaining chocolate chips onto the tops of the muffins, and transfer to the oven immediately.


9. Bake 18-20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of a muffin comes out clean.


10. Remove pan from the oven and let the muffins cool for five minutes in the pan. Then remove the muffins from the pan and let them cool another five minutes on a wire rack.

After eating your handmade cupcakes, add a comment about how it tasted.

Horse Riding

I went horse riding to the Embassy International Riding School on Sunday the 6th for 'Own A Horse Day'. It was drizzling and our car was parked in the muddy parking lot. Just when the black Honda was out of sight, my sister and I walked to the stables. 

Our teacher was there with three other children and we mounted our horses, all from the left. We were guided by the helpers to the arena and were left. Our instructor, Miss Anna was there telling us what to do. My horses name was Appache, a white stallion, whereas  my sister had a pony, Floatsy. My sister's horse was laziest and she kept running the wrong side the whole time. We did sitting and sitting and rising trot, which was the bumpiest ride. We did the changing direction game and finally the game called crocodile. We had to go between two sticks and could not step out of the line. We went into the cafe for a break, all drenched. 

We ate some popcorn and some juice and back to the stable. We got our horses and we groomed them and cleaned their hooves. Now came the stinky part where we had to clean the stables, free of poop. Disgusting. We then took out for a walk and mounted them to go for a ride in the woods opposite the Embassy. It was a forty-five minute ride and it was loads of fun. We came back tired, sat in our car and my mom put her foot on the gas and sped off. 

FIFA World Cup

The abbreviation FIFA stands for Federation International Football Association. FIFA is the soccer world cup which is held every four years and is hosted by different countries.

 The FIFA started 1930 and Uruguay was the host and the hosts won! The FIFA in 2014 is being hosted by Brazil. Every year the matches are played with a different ball. The ball they used in the FIFA 2014 is called the Brazuca.

 32 teams take part hey are in the world cup. They are divided into 8 groups of 4. Group A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H. the teams in one group play against each other. From each group two teams are out and the other two are in the sixteen.This is called the2^nd round, the knockouts. In the 1^st round the match can end as a draw but in the 2^nd they shall give you extra time, penalties and even more penalties if needed! Like this teams get knocked out and finally two teams play the finals.

In Brazil this year they used different cities which are:

 SALVADOR

 NATAL

FORTALEZA

BELO HORIZONTE

BRASILIA

CUIABA

RIO DE JANEIRO

 SAO PAULO

 CURITIBA

PORTO ALEGRE

Each stadium has to hold about 50’000 people as the FIFA craze has reached the end point. People are having sleepless nights because of night matches like at 3:30 a.m. on the other side of the world. Yet the FIFA is loved and awaited for.

Elections (new version)

Elections are when the people of the country choose their leaders as India is a democratic republic. Different people with same ideologies come together to form a party. People  representing parties stand in the elections and then get elected to Lok Sabha and the leader of the winning party becomes  the Prime Minister. The elections take place every five years in India .

People from different parties or individuals stand from  a constituency so you go and vote for that person, but in the end the leader of the winning party become's the  prime minister. The prime minister then chooses some ministers to join him in his cabinet of ministers. The prime minister gets to govern over the country for five years.

The Election Commission of India conduct the elections all over the country and check for fair and just means to be used by the candidates. Electronics voting machines are used on which the party's name is written with the logo and a blue button next to it. You have press the button to elect that leader. From September 27, 2013 they installed a button called None of the Above (NOTA) button which means you don't want to elect anybody  but you want to go vote . So you press that button but you don't elect anybody. Once you have voted the person on duty will use a special ink and make a mark on one of your fingers and this means that you've voted and you can't vote anywhere else. If you try, you'll get sent to prison. The teachers of government run school and colleges are made to do election duty and make sure there will be fair elections. In year 2009, the elections involved an electorate of 714 million.

There are many different parties such as Congress, Bharatia Janta party (BJP), Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), ShivSena, Samajwadi Party​,Bahujan Samaj Party. Some are the national parties which have a country wide presence and others are regional parties which work more in a particular state. The National parties then take help of regional parties to contest the election. For example, BJP is the national party but Shiv Sena is the regional party helping them with elections in Maharashtra. If there is a candidate standing from shiv Sena in a particular 3constituency, there will be nobody from BJP there. Shiv Sena and BJP are allies.

Different parties have different logos like for congress there’s the hand, BJP the lotus, the AAP the broom and many more. The elections are fun but can sometimes be dangerous. Elections can be dangerous when the people from parties come and hit, burn houses and do other not nice stuff to people who didn’t vote for that party and the men who do this get money in return. Candidates bribe people by giving them money, food , clothes etc. to go and vote for that party.

Elections are a fundamental duty of the Indian Citizen. Every citizen above the age of 18 has to fulfill his duty towards the country by going and  voting.

Computer

COMPUTER

Raghav Agrawal-6B

A computer is machine we use in everyday life,

It cuts across your work like a knife,

You can mail, you can chat wherever,

If you have laptop by your side.

Praise Charles Babbage and Ada love lace,

The inventors of this machine,

It used to be a calculator,

But now it's used for everything!

Although the keyboard ain't straight

Don't stay up the entrie night in haste

Trying to straighten the order of the letter

I am telling you, its a waste.

The CPU is attached to the computer,

To give it life,

There’s a disconnect,

PHOOOOOOOO


THE SCREEN GOES BLANK!!