I have been remiss in discussing Wakana쳌fs harvest. She has been working in the yard again, cutting back the lush vegetation that threatens us on every side. Our front yard ends in a steep drop down to the neighbor쳌fs property. That slope is covered with thick vegetation, brush and vines. She has been working down over the slope cutting the vines and freeing the trees that grow in there. She has found a lemon tree and another papaya tree. She also found a rather interesting vine growing up a tree, one that she left in place because of the vegetables it carried. She found pumpkins growing overhead, big ones. So far she has harvested two of them and another fell today. I see pumpkin on our dinner table in the future.

Another harvest she has been looking forward to is our bananas. There is a patch of trees in one corner of our yard with several trees in it. They are actually overgrown. But there have been bananas ripening on them for some time now and Gordon helped us cut a tree to get the fruit the other day. Now, you have to understand that Wakana has been practically pacing back and forth in front of these trees waiting for the fruit to be ready. Once we dropped the tree and cut the bananas from the stem she held this huge pile of fruit proudly and asked me, 쳌gWhat should we do with them?쳌h Sigh. You쳌fd think that planning would be part of the anticipation.

We쳌fve since been eating bananas at every turn. Bananas here are like zucchini back home. When the zucchini ripen everyone has too much. Zucchini bread appears on the table every day, they appear in bags at neighbors houses and fill baskets by the road.

Here it쳌fs bananas. She tried to give some away but everyone has bananas. Gordon didn쳌ft want them. Steve took some but he lives on a boat and has no trees. She has added them to bread pudding and yesterday cooked some in coconut milk and added it to our curry for supper. It was very tasty.

Another fruit that is coming along is the mangoes in the back yard. Apparently they produce twice a year. There is a small crop in the early winter and a larger one in the summer. So we will have mangoes soon.