A few things from India

Bhut Jolokia
One of the first times I hung out with Nubbins, he brought a small chili pepper over to my house that I'd never heard of, a Fatali. "Do you like hot food?" he asked. DO I? "Let's chop this up and put it on your leftover pizza." Sure, I thought, I can handle hot food just as well as the next guy. "Be careful," he said as we were getting ready to eat the pizza with tiny bits of Fatali chili on it, "there are probably several hundred thousand Scoville units on that slice right now."

Anyone who knows me knows that this is like telling me that I HAVE to eat the slice of pizza. I had no idea what a Scoville unit was, or how hot that slice was going to be. After a couple of glassfuls of milk I was willing to admit that I wasn't prepared, but that Fatali was my new favorite chili.

Nubbins and a few of the other guys have been growing super hot chilis for a few years now, so when a new hottest chili in the world was announced, he bought some seedlings and has been growing them this year. They're a north eastern Indian chili called Bhut Jolokia or Naga Jolokia, which means Ghost chili. What's not clear is whether they're called that because they were previously hard to find, or because when you eat them you die. The previously hottest chili in the world was the Red Savina Habenero, which clocked in at about 580,000 Scoville units. What does that mean about the hotness of a Red Savina? Just think about this...the hottest jalapeño you've ever eaten would have had a Scoville rating of about 8000 Scovilles. That means that a single Red Savina, which is about a third the volume as a jalapeño, is about 60 times as hot. A bell pepper is 0, a jalapeno is 8000, a Red Savina is 580,000, and a Bhut Jolokia is 1,040,000. Holy crap.

What am I going to do with a pepper that ridiculously hot? I'm going to chop it up and eat it on a pizza, of course. That's what I know how to do. I'm planning on sharing it with my Sikh friend Obiwan, because he has previously seemed to be completely impervious to the scourge of capsaicin. We'll see how he handles the ghost chili.

Dawali
Also from India, although not confined to the North Eastern area, is a holiday called Diwali. It's celebrated all over India by Hindus, Jains, and Sikhs alike. A bunch of the people I work with came back from this weekend waddling around like they'd just eaten Christmas and Thanksgiving dinners combined, and I guess it's because of this festival. Each of the major Indian religions seems to have their own reasons for celebrating Diwali, but it seems to be universally regarded as a celebration of the Goodness in people triumphing over the Evil in people. I can agree with that! Happy Diwali! It seems to be the Indian version of Christmas. Everyone, both secular and devout, celebrates the holiday, and people send out massive mailings of Diwali cards. They eat tons of food, play with firecrackers, and greet everyone with warmth and cheer. I wonder if they also have rampant consumerism, nauseating music, and silly sweaters.

Fasting
To round out this post about the subcontinent, I've been thinking about doing a fast before Thanksgiving this year. "Zart," you ask, "why does fasting have to be from the India? What about Catholics?" What about them, smartass? They abstain from meat one day a week during one season of the year. They've got nothing on the Buddhists or Hindus ascetics. I'm just kidding, the Indians certainly have no corner on asceticism, but they're pretty good at it. I wouldn't really be doing it for spiritual enlightenment, although I assume the discipline required to abstain from food for a few days will show me something about myself. I'm more interested in doing on to clear my body of some of the junk and gunk and toxins that I commonly poison it with. I figure that now that rugby season is over would be a good time.

I looked fasting up on Wikipedia because I always go there to learn surface knowledge about new topics. I've never done a fast before, so I don't really know too much about how to prepare, how to do it, what to expect, etc. I know that at its core, it's just the practice of not eating anything, but my friend Mabooti did one before and it was much more involved. Unfortunately, almost all of the information I found on Wikipedia about fasting dealt with religion, something that I'm fascinated with but averse to. I found a spot where Wikipedia is lacking! If you can find info on there I'm missing, feel free to leave it in the comments.