Day 15: Lal Qila

Sunday Sunday Sunday! My original plan for Sunday was to attend Toybox, the Mardi after party that is help in Luna Park from about noon till 8. However, because they were sold out and the tickets were scalping for about 200 I figured I'd venture elsewhere. Soo, I decided that it was a perfect day to seek out some delish Pakistani food. That's right ladies and gentleman I only held out on pakistani food for two weeks before I gave in. haha. Unfortunately, Sydney is definitely not swimming in Pakistani cuisine so I basically had two to choose from, and one of those was within walking distance, so I easily found the winner. It took me about an hour to walk all the way there, and it was nice because I was able to explore part of Sydney I hadn't seen before. The restaurant was in Surry Hills and on the walk I saw a lot of Lebanese places and little ma' and pop shops. I arrived at Lal Qila (which was on Cleveland and YOUNG ST!!) to find a really homey cute restaurant. When I got there it was just me and one family that was finishing up their lunch, so it was nice and quiet and the waiter was quick to help me out. I was looking specifically for nihari, but though it was on their website it wasn't on their menu. So I enquired with the waiter and he got all excited that I knew something that was off menu (I guess I don't look like someone who would know a lot about pakistani food, how surprising!) haha. I ended up ordering nihari, 2 naan, and samosas. The food was delicious. The samosas were especially good and the ambiance was nice. I talked for a while with the waiter who was interested to know how I knew about Pakistani food and was curious as to where I was from. He was a really nice guy and the short talk was really refreshing. At the end of the meal he kept asking if I wanted dessert and I kept saying I would pass and went with chai tea instead. When he came out with me tea he also brought out Gulab Jamun and said it was on the house for me. Like I said, he was really really nice. By the end of the meal I was STUFFED and was happy for the hour walk back to the apartment. On the way back I stopped at an International Student Festival which had live music and when I finally got back to my apartment I only had about 45 minutes before I had to head out again to meet my roomates at their church. They had invited me to the 5:30 service in the morning and I told them I'd give it a go. The church, Trinity Lutheran, was in Chinatown and the entire service was given in Bahasa Indonesian. They luckily had headphones that translated the entire service. The sermon was really great. It was all about helping to increase and propagate each others faith as a community. How helping each other to expand and solidify our faith will help each of us grow and become stronger as people and as a community. Yalin, my roomie, has been attending the church for about 10 years so she has a really strong group there and she introduced me to everyone. They were all extremely nice and all said they hoped to see me next week. I was impressed by how welcoming everyone was and I do think I'll be going back. Afterward, the church hosts dinner for everyone but because I was so full from lunch I took a rain-check and went home. On the way back I grabbed some boba mostly because it looked too good to pass up and stopped a few times before I got back to watch some street performers and a salsa dance class. In the evening I watched some TV, did my nails, and got ready for work the next day. Woo, here comes Monday...