 50 foot avocado tree across the street – foto by smith There’s a 50 foot tree in a courtyard across the street I’d been staring at for a year wondering what it was. Couple months ago Gonzalo, the owner, started grilling chickens on the sidewalk every Saturday and I’d go over and get one. He saw me looking up at his tree and said it was an aguacate — avocado. I said wow, I love avocado and looked up, unable to see any until he showed me. The fruit and the leaves are the same color and it’s dense. Came back and tried for weeks from every vantage point to see an avocado to no avail. Then awaiting one Saturday chicken, he picked an avocado and gave it to me. I came back and slowly ate it, watching the tree it grew on across the street and thinking “I am eating your seed.” Now each time I look I can see dozens of them, especially in the unpickable upper third. Gonzalo picks them by getting on top of the first floor roof and using a 12 foot pole with an empty liter pop bottle taped to the end with a rectangle cut in one side. He reaches the pole up, slips the bottle hole around an avocado and jerks, catching the fruit inside the plastic bottle. Can get two or three each reach. One Saturday he needed a lime for my grilled chicken and went to the 20 foot tree beneath the avocado and shook a lime down for me. Within this city block there are orange trees, grapefruit trees, banana trees, mango trees, pomegranate trees as well – and who knows what else because Oaxaca city is naught but one inner courtyard after another all hidden from the street, with trees and flowers and cactus and roofdog growls tumbling over the walls – rich and poor side by side. This is a great place.  unpicked avocados at top of tree – foto by smith  banana tree down the street – foto by smith |