Mango Season

Rocks crash against the zinc roof, one after the other, followed by children’s shouts, and then an older voice, “Pero, deja eso!”  (But, leave that be!).   No matter how much we all yell at the kids, they won’t listen for long.   The rocks keep coming – an attempt to knock mangos out of the big tree in my yard.   It’s easier when a muchacho just climbs the tree and shakes the branches, or knocks at them with a stick – one, two, three shakes and small mangos rain down like candy from a piñata.  They all come running, looking for the ripe yellow ones, but settling for hard green mangos too.  Lacking such a muchacho, kids never seem to tire of throwing rocks, small sticks, other mangos they found rotting on the ground – all a weak attempt to walk away with arms full of fruit.  They leave my yard a mess of fallen leaves, branches, rocks, trash, mango carcasses…  I’ve learned to tolerate it and sweep up once a week. 

My price for this invasion is mangos.  I do none of the work – they deliver mangos to my kitchen table, ripe, green, doesn’t matter.  We eat the ripe ones like candy, ripping them open with our teeth and spitting out the peels, biting satisfying chunks of mango flesh from around the large seed.  The green ones we cut into slices and eat with salt and vinegar, passing the bowl around until everyone’s fingers are sour and delicious.  I’ve made mango bread, mango salsa, mango spritzers… the tree is still full of mangos, so I predict I’ve got about another month or two for more inventions. 

I lay in my purple hammock, strung between the mango tree and the sweet orange tree, and wince every time a random fruit falls, crashing through the leaves and against the roof.  I haven’t been hit in the head with a mango yet, but it’s likely only a matter of time.  And I’ve become shameless about asking for help.  My neighbor climbs the mango tree and next I want him to climb the impossibly tall coco tree too:  Hey, I’m pretty enough for you to risk your life so I can eat some coconut, aren’t I?   Yes.  He struggles up the branchless palm tree, clutching with arms and legs like a monkey, and throws down coconuts, which I will then ask him to break open with a machete.  It’s really a process to get to the meat of a coconut, but thankfully everyone’s a la orden.  (At your service!)  I’ll really miss that about this country.  That and the fruit.  My fridge it stocked.