I was on the road again to Stanthorpe to help Lakshmi and Yasoda with the langos stall over Saturday and Sunday (8th & 9th March). Stanthorpe being on the border of Queensland and New South Wales is a lot colder than Brisbane. Sitting in the back passenger seat of the langos van and seeing the span of the Great Dividing Range really made me feel miniscule in the whole scheme of Australia, let alone the world.
Stanthorpe has a really great vibe about it, it seems to be quite a rocky area as many residential homes have large rocks pointing out of their lawns, perhaps once a rock face being over-layered with turf. The people there are also very friendly, typical of a laid back Australian country town.
The Apple and Grape Festival takes place every two years and with 2016 being its 50th festival, apparently, they're really going to cook up a storm. The two days at the festival was spent making and selling langos. On the first day, initially people had no idea what langos were hence business was boring (i.e. no one came, my definition of bad business is not "not making money", but having "no one to greet"). So Lakshmi made me a "show" Chilli Non Carne (that's right, it's vegetarian chilli) to "show eat" around the festival. As in, I would only be taking delicate bites whilst displaying the langos on a delectably-promotional angle. It worked alright! I had lots of people stare at the langos - and then when I went back to the stall we had a line up of people already - success!
Leaving this morning on the Monday (10th March), before we departed for Brisbane, we went to visit an elderly couple whom L & Y had befriended the previous day. Marcia, 65 and Atlier, of whom the latter is 82, they have been together for 2 years - hats off to Atlier, he's doing well. Marcia is a softly spoken woman, talented artist and mother of two who had experienced domestic violence earlier in life. Atlier is a Hungarian War Veteren who is very multi-talented (IT specialist, construction manager and he even delivered a baby on route escaping from Hungary in the 1960s.)
Of their stories and interests, I wish we could have stayed longer, they are truly lovely people. Atlier so stoically-scarred yet caring of the world and his experiences. On the other hand Marcia, so interested in the world with her Australian up-bringing with her subdued vibrance seemingly ready to burst out every time she talks about art, water colour, fashion and people. They are such interesting people , it seems trivial to mention this now, but the moment we arrived; they gave us each a shot of homemade pear liqueur with an alcoholic content of 37% on our empty stomachs.
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