Out to Market

Today we went to a local fruit and vegetable market. I love to buy my produce at these places. And you know why? Not because they're like, SO way better, or that like, the apples at Safeway taste like crap. Cause they don't, I mean, they're apples. I like to buy produce at these little stands because...of the way it feels. Like I've stepped back in time, back to when people sold the fruit at the market that they had spent all year cultivating. It's so nostalgic, you know? You step in under the little tent, grab a tiny shopping cart or bag, and start rummaging through the various vegetables, fruits, nuts, spices etc. Picking up a cucumber and feeling it's thick oily skin. Smelling the bottoms of pineapples or cantelope to tell if it's ripe. Finding the most colorful orange pepper in the display. For some reason I don't get this kind of satisfaction when I'm roaming the isles of the grocery store. Plus, this particular stand had so many different vegetables and fruit that I'd never heard of. I could have wandered for hours just looking at them all. Behind the fresh produce they had several isles of packaged goods. Some were normal, like Rice-A-Roni, but there were also tons of different kinds of foods from different countries. Some of the boxes didn't have a word of English on them. I loved it. Is there any other place you can think of that sells fresh, still-sitting-in-the-water feta cheese? Cactus? Three different kinds of Boc Choi? Four different kinds of oranges? Kumquats? I mean really, I haven't seen a kumquat in ages. We finally bought somemangoes, bananas, kumquats and fresh local honey. It was hard, I sort of had a flashback from the first time I went to Ikea. You know, like there's so many things you want to buy that you can't make yourself buy anything?! And you want to know the best part? They take credit and debit cards. Honestly.

See me in the back? I'm rummaging.

Orange Variety #3 - With stems attached.

Beautiful, isn't it? Are you hungry yet? I am...