Our “how I learned to stop worrying and love the pomelo”.
That’s right, it “gratuitous unrelated clip” time. And don’t we all love that time.
But if I’ve learned one thing about Yangon, nay, about Myanmar, it’s that it’s a magical place of wonder and mystery. A place beyond time, where hope lives and happiness reigns; dreams are discovered and fortunes lost; oneness is achieved and nirvana found; inner peace discovered and malaria caught; orchids blooms and then many more orchids bloom (really, the orchids here are out of control); intestines are fried and shrimp is pasted; unicorns dance and rainbows sing…
Anyway. The point of the story is, two months ago I could probably have maybe identified a pomelo, maybe (for those of you playing along at home, think a not-quite-soccer-ball-sized grapefruit. But green, and kind of misshapen), now, not only can I identify them, I freakin’ love them. Seriously, they are truly great. It’s like a mild ruby grapefruit that magically arrives peeled and deseeded and segmented and on a plate in your fridge.*
Other things I now love include:
- Cheap longnecks (although it’s possible I already loved those).
- Shan noodle soup (also possible I already loved that).
- Not dying every time I get in a taxi (I definitely already loved that, but I just wasn’t sure how much I loved it until the opposite was a daily possibility).
- Days when people aren’t chanting.
- Being able to read 30% of the characters on any given shop or road sign.
- A strictly cash-based economy (this is not true. Having to remember cash all the time is literally the worst thing that could ever happen. I can’t imagine how our very, very, very distant ancestors managed it).
- Occasionally seeing stars though the smog and light bloom.
*It’s possible that last bit is only true if you have a cook and she has too much free time on her hands.