Tzu Chi Ramen Noodles

Today is the last day for the year 2011. How crazy!!! Just like any other day, today was super busy and filled with surprised! We have been eating a lot of ramen lately, because there has been a shortage in the food budget at the creche. Many times, even if we do have the means to buy food, there is a problem with transport and we cannot go out and buy food. Many different obstacles come up at all times.

So today was no different. Everything was stable until when we got to tonight. We all sat down to eat ramens and then we saw there were many black flakes. At first glance, we all thought it was pepper flakes, since they do that sometimes, but then at a closer glance....they were actually little mites!!!! Eh. Not pleasant. I have no idea how they got there, they must have already been in the individual packets of ramen noodles when they were cooking them. It is really not the cooking staff's fault either since we have no electricity and it is very hard to see them even when we have light. So cooking in the dark with a small oil lamp definitely makes it hard to notice them when cooking. So needless to say, we stopped eating the noodles and I ran to the kitchen to tell them to stop serving it to the children. The older children had already eaten all of their servings, but the babies have not yet. THANK GOODNESS! With the babies' record of being sick in the past few months, this was definitely not the time to get stomach viruses again. Everyone was freaking out that I threw away all the ramen for the babies, because we had no other food left. I quickly thought that I can make some of the Tzu Chi Ramen Noodles for the babies. We were running out of gas for the stove as well, so I quickly ran to get more noodles. I made 5 packets of the Tzu Chi Wild Vegetables Noodle packs, where the noodles are actually green in color. I cooked all the noodles for as long as the gas would allow me then I started to use a manual egg beater to help blend the noodles. My arm was dying from turning the egg beater for over half an hour. The noodles were getting to be pretty mushed and then we put it through a hand strainer. This all took about two hours, where finally two aunties and I made enough food for 16 babies! Oh boy, a blender would have definitely helped in this situation, but we did it the old school way, got some muscles working! Great work out!

The babies were all screaming out of hunger. We fed each one of them and after the meal, each one of them were all smiles. It was the first time in months that all the babies ate all the food and no one had thrown up! On top of that, most babies sat quietly while being fed. The best thing was probably that all babies, while I was feeding them, touched my Buddhist bead bracelet that Master Cheng Yen gave to me when I was back in Taiwan. It was as if to say thank you to her for providing them with food. I was very touched by this gesture. Looking in their eyes, it was as if they understood. I talked to them about Master Cheng Yen and they all smiles. Good Karma was doing its work tonight! No doubt! I am very grateful for this opportunity! Great big shout out to the Tzu Chi PDX family and my mom for sending me the Tzu Chi ramen noodles. They came in handy tonight!

This was the end result for the smaller babies!

The rest that did not go through the strainer went to feed the older babies! Nothing was wasted! Awesome!

All the babies went to bed with a full stomach and a nutritious meal tonight! I am so grateful for all the support! Thank you Buddha for looking after all these children at the orphanage! I couldn't ask for a better way to end 2011!

HAPPY NEW YEARS EVE EVERYONE!