Guatemala, Part Seven: Tom and Asa Finish Shopping

(continued from Parts Five and Six)

We headed east in search of bread. The idea had been to go to either (a) Organica or (b) Sabe Rico, but I had a third idea: (c) the Italian bakery that Tesi and I had discovered a week earlier, when we were having trouble finding Organica and Sabe Rico. (Tesi and I had had trouble trouble finding them because, although I marked them on a map before we left the house, the map that I marked them on was not the map we took with us in the Jeep.) We were closer to (c) than to (a) or (b), and (c) had really great bread. I thought I knew what block it was on, but I was wrong. We could have asked someone, but I didn't know the name of the bakery. We bought bread at (b).

It had become clear by this point that we were not going to be home by 5:30. When we spoke with Tesi on the phone it also became clear that it really did matter when we got home, because Nancy was waiting to serve this meal to us. So Tesi grabbed the keys to the Jeep and headed downtown to rescue us from the consequences of our folly. In hindsight I would say that, in addition to underestimating how much time it would take to walk to La Bodegona and overlooking the fact that it takes longer to go to two stores than to one, we had also failed to allow some leeway for how long it might take a couple of people like us to choose some fruit.

In spite of some guilty feelings about how much trouble we had caused, I was perfectly prepared to rattle away about the fun we had had, until Tesi stopped us in our tracks when she heard what we had bought:

"Now don't flip out, guys, but you know Mum and I can't eat grapefruit."

Well, I used to know that about Tesi. Grapefruit (and no other citrus!) interferes with some prescription medication that she takes. And Gerry takes the same one, it seems. I could have said "Hang on, we're not absolutely sure they're grapefruit -- let's look up 'toronja' when we get back to the house", but I didn't think of it. Another thing I didn't think of until later is that if we had only been watching the time -- if we had only known while still in La Bodegona that we were going to be getting a ride home -- the melon decision would have been a no-brainer.

I should also mention that the next day, when Tesi finally happened to look at the bananas we had bought, she kindly pointed out that they were not banana bananas but plantains -- those starchy ones for cooking. Well, as soon as she said it I could see it. I mean, I've seen plantains before: they tend to be not just larger but angular -- very much like the ones we bought. No excuses. Though, you know, it's not like there are only two kinds of bananas in the world: I mean, given that there are grapefruit here that don't look like the grapefruit at home, why shouldn't there also be bananas here that don't look like the bananas at home? But no excuses. Though I am still wondering why anybody would put cooking bananas in the stand-alone fruit section of the store!!! Okay, maybe I did flip out a little.

Somebody also pointed out that when La Bodegona didn't have a lot to offer in the way of fruit we could have gone to the mercado. Oh, yeah, I forgot about that. I had heard of that place, but I never knew where it was. Too bad. Yeah, too bad we didn't go get our fruit at the place where everybody says don't ever eat any of the fruit or vegetables from that place no matter what!

Sorry about that outburst.

The grapefruit were actually quite good. Amadi loved them. I liked them. Asa tried them, but the verdict was no, he really doesn't care for grapefruit.