kidattypewriter

Sunday, March 14, 2010

A short story, containing nothing much about something in particular, ending somewhere in particular, and going nowhere much

One fine morning that happened to be this fine morning, the Baron and myself found ourselves in the Preston shopping centre. We weren't in the shopping centre for any particular reason, we just found ourselves pulled to it, like a minor planetary body pulled towards a gigantic quasar black hole at the centre of the galaxy. Anyway, since we were in the shopping centre, we decided to do a little shopping, just for the fun of it.

We didn't of course do shopping for anything ordinary, like detergent, pasta, bread, or vegetables. The strategy that we followed was, instead, to move towards the strangest, most exotic and curious looking fruit in the entire shopping centre, and buy that instead. We found in one box a little spiky thing, a bit smaller than a tennis ball and coloured brownish red. The sign said that it was a 'Rambutan', but I would never have been able to place that name to that little red-brown spiky thing, or vice versa, if asked. We duly put one - just one, mind - of these things into our shopping cart and trundled off to the checkout counter.

The chap at the checkout was even more perplexed than I was by the spiky-tennis-ball-thing in the bottom of our cart. And his checkout chap machine was even more so. If I couldn't place a shape to the name 'Rambutan', he could barely place a name to the shape, either, or for that matter a name to the name (he called it 'Rembuntan'.) He called for assistance. His computer called for assistance. The people that he called to for assistance called other people for assistance. I toddled over to the fruit aisle where we'd got it from, found the price, and came back to find that someone had already got the price. The sole Rambutan was duly loaded into our bag, and we emerged blinking into the daylight, triumphant in the knowledge that we had won our Rambutan. Whatever, in fact, it was.

Now all that remains is to eat it. I'm a little worried about this bit actually. Maybe we should have a Rambutan party, and cut up the little-red-spiky-tennis-ball thing into little bits, and share them out to everyone at the party. Or maybe we could turn it into a stew. A little red, spiky, tennis-ball flavoured stew. I'm open to suggestions.

This has been one in a series of blog posts about fruit!

5 comments:

BwcaBrownie said...

gosh I keep learning every day from blogs. Lovely photo of the rambutans on a tree at the link, and destructions for best access to the fun part.
In 1981 I discovered kiwifruit, and very soon after discovered anaphylactic reaction to it, so am now wary of new food experiences.
May you enjoy the fruits of your labors.

broken biro said...

Not a lot of people know this - Queen Victoria tasted the rambutan on her travels and loved it, but she never had one again because they don't keep very long and wouldn't travel to UK.
For more boring facts about fruit go to: www.bananayawn.com

TimT said...

Well the things you learn when you do blog posts about fruit. Thanks, fruit aware bloggers!

Caz said...

I adventurously bought a dragon fruit last year (at least I think that's what it was, can't quite remember) - red fleshy fruit, with tiny black seeds. Very pretty to look at. I felt I should expand my experience and exposure to the fruit family.

I tried to enjoy my new fruit, but it was tasteless, and while the little black seeds were crunchy, adding a surprising and not unenjoyably texture, overall, it was, umm, fruitless to have strayed from the tried and true.

Perhaps I will dare myself again in another few years.

ras said...

Rambutans and Lychees are deliciously Spikey
Their Fruit is Sweet and Juicy
The juice runs to your caboosey (?)

My Favourite are Longans, they are from the same family but are smaller, brown and less sweet.

Email: timhtrain - at - yahoo.com.au

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