Tuesday, October 8, 2013

The Last Pomelo



Up late, up early.   Faint yellow morning, barely here.  Yellow cast the color of dust.  Continental grounding to the salty blue ocean’s antipode.  A dustybrine tension, this road or that, where the trickster stands watching, laughing.  And this morning, and for many mornings this week yellow was moist and I sank my hands in for nourishment.

My older daughter and I confront morning first.  She needs to be dropped off just after 6:00 AM.  Against our will, we both “arise and go now, and go to” the bathroom, down the stairs, off into the car.  I didn’t have my act together to bring my iPod and we listened to the Kenny Dorham “Trompeta Toccata” from the same year the Beatles first landed at JFK.   It’s lovely.  It’s just been in there for over two weeks now.    

An hour later I took the little one over.  It’s rather a different scene.  Early on you can get in and out easy enough.  No one is there.  By 7:30 AM it’s like getting into the Holland Tunnel.  Since no one ever pauses for anyone unless a person makes it impossible for the other to move save to collide, you simply must be an asshole to cover any ground whatsoever.  I reluctantly wrote about driving my Honda Odyssey around this neighborhood in the “Invidia” chapter of Seven Deadly Starbucks (7DS).  Time driving a car is time wasted.

Having completed my cursive K-turn in the face of bidirectional, overtly intentional, oncoming traffic I plodded along toward the main road.  This time I had the iPod in and Willie Colon’s “Se Baila Mejor” came on, randomly.   It’s from the great trombonist, orchestra leader’s 1969 release “Guisando” (“Doing a Job”) which has Willie and Hector, mid safe heist, on the cover.  As an album I prefer the release from the previous year, “The Hustler” which is flawless to my ears.  But “Guisando” is worthy and this is my favorite tune from the album.  http://www.amazon.com/Guisando-Doing-Willie-Colon-Hector/dp/B000JJRWPI



It’s fast.  And like a fish, leapt up and out of a stagnant hatchery into well-aerated water, it suited my mood leaving the school service lane, veering right on to the main road.  Gangster cover, pistol in your face, bragging that they’re the best of all the dance bands, the attitude is straight-up, Bronx hip-hop, eighteen years before “Criminal Minded.”  The energy level is like pristine Bad Brains speedcore about thirteen years before that same titled cassette was released.  Right before the break where it spreads out like a wave building, before churning inconceivably into double-time, Hector Levoe taunts the imaginary audience like some Elegba Poncero, daring you.  I can only imagine what a dance floor looked like when they did this number.  “Colombian Coffee!”

Safely home, I need my morning shake.  This is my ‘no starch’ breakfast routine.  Cut up bananas and peaches and some frozen raspberries and blend it into a breakfast.  Now a friend tells me that this too is unhealthy.  Sugar, even from fruit, is going to give me arthritis and God knows what else.  As a concession I’ve taken to throwing a cucumber or a pepper in to dilute the fruit.  Sounds off, but it adds body to all the perky sweet tastes. 

Today’s a bit sad though as I will be cutting up the last pomelo.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pomelo  Two weeks ago, my daughter’ friend, who hails from Fujian, gave us a large box with about ten pomelos inside.  Do you know the fruit?  They’re big.  Somewhere between the size of a watermelon and a grapefruit and taste a bit like the latter without the acidity.   We used to buy the fruit already pealed, wrapped in plastic from the supermarkets in Hong Kong.  But I don’t think I’d ever properly taken one apart before.



The first one I served improperly sheathed.   I was reminded of the first time I encountered an avocado thirty years ago and tried to peel it like an apple.  To my taste, this pomelo was dry and gritty.  I see.  A box of pomelo duds?  Was this a case of a full case of 而不[1]?

For the second pomelo, I took my time and did the requisite work of removing the membrane.   More labor for sure but once its done, it is divine.  And orb after sunny orb, working through our crate, I got the hang of it: cut through the top, slice down the sides, lop off the bottom and peel back the remaining rind and then, from the small hole in the top, rip it open, slowly.  At this point, the real work begins: pulling out the tightly wrapped segments of fruit tendrils from within, dropping them all in a bowl. 

I can recall visiting Colombia in 1990.  It wasn't the best time to backpack through Pablo Escobar’s Medellin on a low budget, but it was certainly memorable.  The first thing I saw, crossing in from Ecuador was a funeral procession, which seemed an unfortunate omen.  But the country was grand and I was particularly mesmerized by Cartagena, the jewel on the Caribbean.  There were, at the time, stalls by the water, which were ringed with glass jars containing and incredible selection of absurd fruit, none of which, save the bananas, I’d ever seen before.  You could pick out whatever struck your fancy and they’d throw it in a blender and present you with new tastes for as long as you provided pesos.  Testimony to the strange, unique bounty of the “new” world.

Interaction between the “old” world and “new” (Elegba was certainly a spectator at that checkout counter) changed forever the diet of both places.  Usually I think of all the new tastes that became old world staples.  Belgian chocolate, Chinese eggplant, Irish potatoes!  My dear grandmother always had such a hard time considering that potatoes weren’t somehow indigenous to Eire.  But the Pomelo, appears to be native to Eurasia.  It comes originally from South and South East Asia.  And where as I don’t know if the durian has much of a future in North America, I’d say the pomelo is a good bet.  It’s a lot of work, but the yield is high.  Go Asian citrus!  "indigenous innovation" is more than just yesterday's slogan.  The pomelo is a disruptive fruit.  

I just cut up my last one and threw the rinds in the waste basket.  Buying another one will not do.  I need another crate. 



[1] huá'érbùshí:  flower but no fruit (idiom); handsome exterior but hollow inside / flashy

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