Friday night market

“Today is market day. Are you coming?” one of my matron friends reminded me yesterday. Oh! I completely forgot! Every Friday evening several staff members carpool in one of the Home’s buses to go to the market in the neighboring village where fresh fruits and veggies are sold cheaper than normal. I was low on produce, so I quickly ran into my house and grabbed a couple of large bags and some money and hopped on the bus with the other staffs.

“What is a good price for tomatoes?” I asked a staff member sitting next to me. “How about green beans? And peas?” I was determined to be more independent than I’d been on my first market trip which meant I needed to know how to buy and bargain on my own. Everything here is sold by the kilo, which is a measurement I am still unfamiliar with. Recognizing this, my staff friend insightfully told me: “For you, all you need is a quarter kg. For this, say ‘ek pauo’.” Ek pauo, I repeated and tried to think of a helpful hint to remember it by. It was to become the most useful phrase in the next hour.

Thankfully, I didn’t need very much subzi (veggies), so I took some time exploring the market and experimenting with bargaining. By the end, I felt very accomplished having purchased satisfactory amounts of tomatoes, green beans, green peppers, cilantro, mangos, and a small watermelon all by myself for reasonable prices. Produce is very seasonal here, and had they been fresh and available, I might have also bought carrots, eggplant, peas, bananas and cantaloupe, but it seems the season for those items is kuttum (finished).

After I arrived home and washed all the new food in diluted potassium permaganate (a chemical which Kathy appropriately nicknamed “pinky”), I took my sandals off to wash up and settle in to watch a movie on my laptop. It had been a full day. Upon seeing the discoloration of my feet, the first question in my mind was is that a tan or dirt? Both, I concluded and smiled at the visible signs of a day well-spent.