He had quite the whitest teeth and a wonderful grin - I'd buy from him any day. His cart was laden with the most colourful array of fruit. I called to him from my second floor balcony and placed my order for bananas, pineapple and paw paw - watching while he carefully weighed things in a scale, with the clink of weights as he made adjustments. Crab apples are in season at the moment - they are strange looking fruit, quite different to anything else. Similarly there are veggie wallahs who bring produce round on their carts and you hear their cry as they look up for customers. The fruit wallah was so pleased with my order that he offered me a coconut - they lop off the top with a serious looking knife to reveal a little hole, into which they put a straw and you can then drink the coconut milk. Afterwards, they fashion a spoon and you can eat the paste from inside the fruit !
But a few nights ago, returning home in the evening after dark, I found an 'ironing wallah', busy ironing a pile of shirts on his cart. How could the electric iron work out on a cart in the street, you might ask? He didn't have to worry about the length of the electrical cord or where the socket was, because there wasn't one..... The base of the huge, heavy, iron was filled with red hot coals which glowed in the dark - and with gushes of steam and heavy thumps, he was ironing a shirt collar with the authority of one who knew what was what ! I couldn't help wondering how you would put the iron on cool for synthetic fabric - remove an ember I suppose ?
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