Saturday is market day !

One of the most excellent things about my teeny little garret is that it happens to be on a street which has a super market every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. Going to the marché on a Saturday morning is one of the great quotidian pleasures of the week (and the prices are better than in the local Franprix !). Every one is intent on examining the arrays of colorful vegetables and fruits, the venders are eager to help you, ringing out, “Et avec ceci, madame…?” each time you ask for something. There are fishmongers, cutting open the coquilles St. Jacques right there behind their stand, splaying the turbot and saumon, deboning the caubillaud or morue for a customer. There is the extremely hospitable traiteur libanais – clearly one of my favorite stands – who hands out sample upon sample of his delicious kibbé, tabouleh, labneh or hummus to the passersby. There are ample, overflowing flower stands, with rainbowed bouquets or elegant arrangements. The cheese masters are slightly more reserved, their counters an exercise in the various shades of white, cream, beige and yellow, with the occasional blue-veined tint of a Roquefort or the ashy crust of a chèvre providing the bottom of the minimal color spectrum. They don’t call out to customers, but simply wait for you to examine and decide what kind of fromage you desire. Today, the woman in front of me at the cheese marchand carefully selected five or six different kinds of cheese and it was a marvel to watch the monsieur carefully cut each cheese, each cheese with its own proper cutting tool, and its own specific cut – whether a long, rectangular slice for the comté or cantal, or a round little pyramid of chèvre, or a wedge of brie or camembert.

Since I love lists, I thought I'd share what I brought home today :

Endive

Roquette = arugula

Courgettes = zucchini

Avocats = avocados

Pommes = apples

Tomates cérises = cherry tomatos

Kibbé

Tabouleh

Saucission sec = dried sausage

Fromage St. Nectaire = cheese

Cantal = more cheese

Jambon de pays = fatty delicious ham !

All of my reveries about vegetables reminded me of this line that I saw on an interesting piece of art at the ultra contemporary museum, Musee MACVAL. In this work, the artist interviewed a series of immigrants in Norway, who had come there from different places around the world, and asked them about their newfound life in the bottom rung of the Artic circles...This quote jumped out at me:
= No, I haven't lost anything that important -- just my last name and fresh vegetables.