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When I was in North of England, I was surprise to see that local Pakistani (and some Afghanis [Pashtuns], Bangladeshes, Sri Lankans and Hindus and Shieks, a little bit of all of those people) gets 'bitter melons' in their grocery stores. Wao. I looked up the sky and exclaimed. Under this gray sky and rains, you get it here. Some of them surely talked about how they miss their tropical weather back home, even you have to take salt tablets - and how they miss all those 'fragrant vegetables and great spices'.

To me it meant they are not just being insular - and segregating against white British. They got ties and connections 'to' back home in all sorts of ways and levels, and I rather believe, British society and culture really don't have capacity to even to listen about those things - even once from them.

I am not much convinced that aspect of Britishness or Englishness have changed much. It's a small change which probably has to take place - and it's probably very possible and do-able. True. Someone has to start trying, and we haven't done much about this. When younger generations and kids go wrong or do wrong, adult, older generations must take blame for it.

Bitter melon is pretty common thing in some warmer or hotter part of the world and there are varieties and ways of cooking. For ease we mostly do

- Bitter Melon and Egg (which we learned from that Chinese restaurant in Albany CA)
- Okinawan Champloo way
[We will put recipe or do youtube?]

And bitter melon has been consistent part of our diet for past 6 years or so. When we find good ones, we just buy it and get it cooked in that day or next day. Fresher is better.

But the other night we found one becoming yellowish, we were meaning to get to it early but weather has been cool, so we thought it'd last on the shelf. When we cut it open, then inside was this red (camera failed to get that red accurately) and those red seeds had very sticky yellow coatings.

We checked on the internet and figured that this is a sign of it's becoming ripe!

We never knew that before. One account said green ones are used by Pakistani people and ripened ones are preferred by Chinese people. But probably there is more info about this.

Following recipe for Sri Lankan curry powder from Charmaine Solomon's The Complete Asian Cookbook, this is a mixture of coriander, cummin, fenugreek, cardamom seeds, cinnamon, curry leaves and chilli powder.
Charmaine says: "In Sri Lankan (Ceylonese) cooking, one of the main characteristics is that the spices are dark roasted. This gives them an aroma completely different from Indian curries".