What is a picture worth? About 50,000 dong- nearly US$5. Or at least this one did and involved me buying four peeled pinapples. They were elaboratley carved in spirals and were fresh and delicious. All in the name of Wekend Herb Blogging over at Kalyn’s Kitchen.
Thes women are shrewd. This money and overnight train journey to the north west in Sa Pa, near the Chinese border, I bought another of these elaboratly carved fruit for 5,000 Dong and they’d probably ben shipped up from Hanoi.
Women accost me on the street thrusting their yokes onto my shoulder for the obvious tourist shot.They attempt to force bananas on me. I managed to resist the bite in Hanoi. Back home I tend to avoid these yellow smiley fruit as they make me gag.
Eventually I succumb to one post chicken pho banana in a hill tribe village, It was black and yellow and as in the south sea islands sweet and not long off the bunch. In contrast,the bananas we are pushed back home have been picked unripe, shoved into cold storage and subjected to a variety of artifical ripening methods.
No wonder they make me gag.
And this is what I’m learning about Vietnam. It is the connection between the people and their food.It’s there around them open to the air, not sealed in some vaccum pack.
But to explain more during a dog blogging weekend would be tasteless.
4 Comments