The Sweet Juice Ran Down My Lips and Left a Sticky Trail of Extacy Across My Chin

So in three weeks, Sarah and I will be on board a plane (from the Big City to Chicago at the time of this writing)...

In honor of Sean hosting me and showing me the way...I'll let him do some posting while I'm gone to keep you all entertained. He's a tremendous writer, and you've already probably read some excerpts from his letters.

Due to the catchy post title...here's part of an email Sean sent me on his 'spring break' from teaching school.

***

That evening for dinner, I unwittingly had a theme. While I went to the night market hoping it would be glam and full of good items for tourists... it was not. While the guidebook suggested it was a great place to eat... it was not. I'd read about some places to eat, but was not sure if the food would be good, so I figured some fresh fruit would be a good appetizer.

I headed for my favorite yellow pineapple (god's smile) but was distracted by yellow watermelon. Have you tried it? The seeds are smaller and it's bright yellow. Delicious. The vendor slided it for me and put it in a bag. I put the cold wedges in my mouth and sucked the juice before squeezing it's watery sacs with my jaws. I went back for pineapple but was distracted by a different vendor selling yellow mango & sticky rice (so often we get green mango here). I debated for several minutes and finally asked for mango sans sticky rice. She had no problem weighing and cutting me a mango. It may be the best mango I have ever eaten--subtle flavor (none of that gasoline acid I remember as kid while father sucked on the stone in the trailer), such sweet juice, and flesh so soft it just fell apart (nearly) by pushing your tongue against the roof of your mouth.

It was so amazing, I had to stop walking in the market and just concentrate on eating the mango. Well when I finished the mango, I was still in the market (instead of half way to the restaurant). So I went back for the pineapple.

And while eating that sweet yellow smile of god, I found a pancake artist. She drew pancakes in animal shapes--with detailed lines inside the pancake. She used a squeeze bottle with a funnel spout (like a hot dog stand uses for mustard). She drew the outline of things--face, chin, whiskers and let the outline darken on the griddle. Then she filled in the gaps with batter. But the lines were darker and more golden. So when she finished, you could see her design. She did butterfly, Hello Kitty, turtle, penguin, bee, bird, and an amazing free-hand elephant. She laughed when I took pictures. We'll see if they turn out.

By the time I ate watermelon, lingered over mango, and took pictures of pancakes while enjoying pineapple, it was 8 pm. I figured it was too late to be choosing a restaurant, and I felt great from my appetizers, and i wanted to still swim, so I went back to my hotel--ignoring the yellow jack fruit which would have continued my theme and instead enjoyed a mixed choco-vanilla soft serve ice cream (the only guilt of the whole evening).

I finished my cone, changed into my swim suit and spent a refreshing 30 minutes in the pool and walked to my room at 8.55.

***

W's editorial note: Sean threatened to leave the hotel because their pool only stayed open until 7. The staff quickly made a phone call and arranged for it to stay open, 'just for him'.