I finished up at the school a little after 1 p.m. last Thursday and headed straight to the “street market” (in a subdivision of Enugu known as “New Haven” Layout) and saw all of my regular market ladies. I bought five large roma tomatoes and four large red onions from Jennifer ($2.10). I had been wondering about the leafy green vegetable they supposedly use in soup, here, so I asked Jennifer what was the story there. She explained that it’s “spinach.” But it doesn’t look anything like the spinach we know. She said if I wanted some she could get me some for fifty Naira (about thirty cents, U.S.). I passed for the time being and went next door.
I picked up a pineapple, watermelon, two avocadoes, and a small bag of limes from Mrs. Okonkwa ($4.90). There’s a lady next to Mrs. Okonkwa who sells plantain. I decided I needed some. A medium size bunch of medium size plantains (five of them) cost $1.80. Then I made my way to the “green vegetable” stand.
One and a half kilos of carrots (about 3 pounds) and a cucumber from Rose set me back a whopping $3.60. She didn’t have any lettuce that looked nice. The green peppers she had out were pretty sad looking, too. And I didn’t need potatoes from her today.
Before leaving… I decided I did want to give the spinach a try. I went back to see Jennifer and she hollered out the name of someone in a neighboring stand behind her that she needed some spinach, or at least I assume that’s what she said. This other lady came with two huge bunches and said they were a hundred Naira each, roughly double what Jennifer said it’d be. Jennifer and this lady had a few words between them, Jennifer didn’t look too happy, and then the lady gave her one of the bunches and walked away. They bagged it up for me and I asked Jennifer how much I owed her, and she said fifty Naira.
Jennifer explained that I needed to boil some yam diced small, and to either put the cooked spinach on top of the yam, or put the yam on top of the spinach along with some fried onion, hot pepper and fresh palm oil. I haven’t had the courage to buy fresh palm oil nor cook with it. The hot peppers here will knock your socks off so I am passing on them as well this time around. As for the yam . . . I’ve tried it. It’s all right. But it’s a real pain to peel and I’m not up for picking another one of them up any time soon. I’m simply going to try just cooking the spinach just like I would back home, lightly sautéed in olive oil and garlic.
Closer to home, in GRA Layout, I didn’t see the girl named Promise (pictured above), from whom I frequently buy bananas and pineapple. I also didn’t see the apple guys again today. They must’ve gone through all of them and now there are no apples to be found in the city until the next shipment comes in. I think it’s been three or four days now where I haven’t seen any apple guys. That’s not good because Timothy needs his daily apple (or two or three, some days). I think we’re down to seven left, so we may be able to hold out another seven days, if we’re able to keep the ration to one a day.
Last, but not least, I also bought $6 worth of phone cards from a girl named Ogi (that much will last about half a week depending how long we’re online and how many minutes I use to call home). I also bought a loaf of bread ($.90) from . . . that corner shop across from the big church by our house. Did I mention that the bread here is rather sweet? It’s . . . hard to explain. It’s got the character of “Texas Toast” but sweet almost like a brioche but not quite as nice. It takes some getting used to. Although I do like it. Makes a great french toast.
$20 poorer, arrived home around 1:50 p.m.
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