Karla.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Karla found herself at the end of the month in Santiago, working at a Cafés con piernas for little wages, tips, free tortas and a pair of high heels. Back at the hostel (were she was able to convince the manager for a weekly discount) the extra sandwiches went over big with the tourists as she sold them cheaply as Chilean `artisanal tortas` ' All made with local ingredients. Local in that as Karla knew, they came from the local supermercado around the corner.

This was quite the change from what she called her `kebab wallah ` job in Mumbai at an expansive hostel, more an open courtyard hotel with a large tandoor and bbq pit with a big tawa on top. She quickly used her cooking skills and storytelling to earn free room and board as she entertained nightly. Everyone was a foodie in that they all knew what a kebab was from home. So Karla adjusted by what she could find on hand and used her skill to transport all these foodies to local India!

From pasanda and nargisi, boti and kakori she delighted the ever changing clientele with these exotics and for the long travelled, tired home craver, she would offer up variations on chicken tikka, donair, satay and “shish” kebabs to bring them back down to earth. Every name could change based on what she would find near by at the market stalls and lane ways.

 

 I tried writing across but a little a harder to do as the hand does not sit on the board properly. I was angling for a better anchor on a tree so this one will go on one tree down the trunk as unlike the others across two trees. 

Interesting how once I finished and looked at the final product after the fixative was sprayed on, it was really, really dark. Hard to read unless up close. I wondered then were, what floor from what house I got this piece from.