I was having coffee the other day with a media trainer the other day, who’s here with his family. It’s awkward to retell someone else’s story, especially when you know they’ll probably read it on your blog, but I’d never heard a story that so perfectly summarizes what it is like to live in Africa and care about — hell, even notice — food.
As he told it, they’d been working in Asia and in France, where, in addition to all the other plaisirs, the food is pretty good.
So Rwanda isn’t sitting so well with their 6-year-old. After a few months, he was still a little mopey. And of course. Moving to Africa is even harder, probably, when you’re six.
“Is it school?” his dad asked.
“No.”
“Is it friends?”
“No.”
“Well…what is it?”
“I just want to eat something delicious!”
After being in South Sudan (even if only for four months), all I can say is, me too!
Oh man! You’ve got it even worse, I’m sure.
It does require a bit of creativity and the lowering of one’s standards.
I feel a story coming on, sort of like the low growl of a hungry stomach. But, alas, there is no Backstory anymore. Don’t they do anything fun with fruit?
Ha! If only. But fruit, actually, yeah. The fruit is the saving grace. Passion fruits and pineapples and sometimes mangoes. My favorite are the “tree tomatoes” — does this mean anything to you? I’m insisted to that this is their name, but I never heard of them before I came here. Throw it all in a bowl and it’s delicious. (Of course, the next day, you think, “This fruit salad would be so delicious on top of a bowl of vanilla ice cream.”)