this one is for jason
@bobfoto daniels.
i forgot how we got to talking about mangoes and pineapples the other day. jason mentioned he bought some "sweet-as" pineapple but he forgot to take a photo of the roadside vendors. that brought to mind those long ago trips to the country and stopping at side roads to buy fresh fruits.
this picture is old, taken about 1981 or 82 by one of the former mr. summerfields. the winding 'highway' overlooked the volcano taal, a small volcano within a much larger volcano's crater/lake. the place was and still is called tagaytay, once the honeymoon capital south of manila, and is noted for the beautiful view of that little volcano. the climate there was once temperate, i.e., coolish than in the city or the farms in the lower lands. and when the little volcano acted up, behind these stalls would be the best vantage point to watch it.
the prices here weren't by any means cheap, but you could haggle. if you had a car, all these vendors would have a standard price, which they didn't adhere to as of course they needed to make a sale and if the cheap city folks were buying they might as well make the sale rather than the next stall.
the old lady in white bandana was sorting her pile of jackfruit. there's another old lady being blocked by that little tart (hahaha! ooops, that's me) sorting out yams. in the stalls are papayas (real papayas, not the teeny-weeny you get to see here in north america), bananas, pineapples and soursop. there were a few measly looking mangoes on the stall on the right in a bilao, a tray made from some local plant). the young man was selling peanut brittle, a kind of delicacy that the place was famous for (see photo here:
http://www.taal.gov.ph/panutsa-sweet-and-simple-taal-deli/)
i looked like i had four legs, didn't i? heck, i must've been 28 or 29 in this photo as i still had a lot of hair and skinny legs.
i think now there are starbucks in between these crudely made stalls. i think that when i visit next year, i should take an updated photo of this place and maybe capture one of the vendors texting while making a sale.
now, please excuse me while i go make banana flambé.
