While Hemal was off galavanting around India, I took over DCist HR duties. This basically meant receiving a bunch of emails, replying to ask for writing samples, and gently letting people down when their proposed posts turned out to be thousand word screeds decrying political correctness (and not even political correctness in DC). Above all, I just had to keep track of everybody.

I managed to mostly not screw things up. Hemal, being a much sweeter and thoughtful person than is really necessary, brought me back some Indian candy as a thank-you. Specifically, stuff from Cadbury India.

The basic formulations were familiar — fruit-flavored hard candies; chewy toffees; chocolate bars — but the flavors were subtly weird. The pineapple was stronger, somehow. The toffee was more lactic. It was different, but good.

With one exception: the chocolate. Really, it's hard to convey how bad it was. One bite and you could taste the dismissive imperial prejudices of the original chocolatier. Clearly, Cadbury did not spend a lot of time fretting about quality control in its India division. I never knew that a candy bar could be so bad that it's actually racist.

But the rest was tasty. Thanks, Hemal!