Coby, aka Elder Vail, was one of the missionaries we got to know pretty well in Vienna. He lives in Utah and came down for a visit for a few days. Here’s Coby slicing into some home made Kebap. Like all Americans in Vienna, Coby naturally loved and missed the pleasures of a tasty Kebap.
Since we were making Kebab, we decided to invite some neighbors over so they could enjoy it. Here we are with our homemade Kebab, home made yogurt sauce, home made pitas, and home made oven fries. Yum!
Elora is telling Kendalee how deeply she just loves Kebab meat. But Elora did tell us, “I love Kebab, but I love Vienna Kebab best”. BTW, you can spell Kebap either Kebab or Kebap.
Kebab makes everyone feel happy inside.
Later that night, while Karen was stuck with the consequences of dinner and putting the kids to bed, Coby and I snuck off and did some “man stuff”. Which involved shooting guns in the desert.
The next day, Coby wanted to go see a slot canyon. We gave him an option of going to a slot canyon or seeing some indian paintings on a wall. He chose poorly…. Because we got stuck in the sand about a mile down the road. The sand was just too deep for our poor car.
Coby even tried to karate chop the sand away, but BLAST! it didn’t work. Luckily, some other poor schmos were stuck in the sand too, and there was a man with a 4wheeler helping them out. We got out, then stuck again. By this point the good samaritan felt he had done enough, so he absconded back to his house with Karen and the kids.
I called a few neighbors back in Glendale, and got one of them to help get our car out. Here’s how the conversation went…
Wayne (the rescuer): “So, where are Karen and the kids?”
Me: “Someone we met out here took them back to Kanab”
Wayne: “Oh ya, what’s his name?”
Me: “Hmmm… I dunno, but they gave me an address where to pick them up.”
Wayne: **awkward silence while he stared at me like I was nuts**
For anyone who wants to know, if you get stuck in deep sand, just let the air waaaaaay out of your tires. Down to like 5-10psi. So there’s practically nothing in them. Then you can just drive right out. But we needed Wayne to first get our car “unhooked” from a sand berm.
We finally rescued Karen and the kids from the locked dungeon of the cellar in Kanab. We had to battle the nice old man and his wife and grand kids for a few minutes, but soon we were free and on our way back home.
When we got home, we decided to make another tasty Vienna treat: Momo! Here’s Karen making the dough. Sarita, back in Vienna, always made it so Karen wasn’t sure if she could do it right. She did a pretty good job though.
Meanwhile, Coby toasted the sesame seeds, which would then be blended up and put in the sauce.
I took over Om’s typical job of preparing the meat while using my bare hands (shudder).
Then rolled out the dough. I’d always get in trouble in Vienna for not making perfectly round circles. And Sarita would push me out of the way and do it herself, while Om would yell at me for using too much dough. Here I was not burdened with either of these perfectionists! But they were still missed 🙁
Karen had to fold all the Momo herself. There were about 80. The only way to eat Momo is with lots of people and eat it until you’re stuffed.
So we invited Wayne and his family over to eat and try out the Momo. It was a lot of fun. They either really liked it, or were just being polite. But I’m thinking since they also like to drink goats milk and eat rabbit they were being genuine.
Then, by Coby’s special request we made another Vienna treat: Pizzookie. It’s basically a huge cookie you cook in a pie pan (like a pizza) and then smother it in ice cream and tons of chocolate sauce and have everyone dig in together.
Oliver, who never eats Momo, had plenty of room for more ice cream, which he was eating directly off the table.
Then later that night, when we were too stuffed to move, we decided to have a battle in the front yard.
It was a long drawn out battle that started in the front yard…
But soon we ended up in the backyard.
And even after being disarmed the battle continued.
The next day we all went to church together and then Coby went home, before heading on to his study-abroad in the Middle East. Elora and Oliver are excited to see him again in 6 months or so!
