Fruit Symbiosis?

I hate household work. I dislike cooking.

But this Ramadan, preparing the fruit salad [ فروٹ چاٹ  : ‘fruit cha-at’ in Urdu speak ] for Iftar has fallen to me.

Quiet grumbling, mild protestations on being assigned this task on a daily basis for a month…not a day or two, not a week, but a whole MONTH…it was outrageous! I'd rather be sitting and doing most ANYthing else than washing fruit, carefully drawing up the imaginary lines of fruit-latitude-and-longitude, then choosing the right knives for each step of the cutting process!

Preparing فروٹ چاٹ is just NOT what I do! And yet I landed up with the job. I'm trying to be a slightly <emphasis> 'good' girl these vacations around, trying my best to act as mama's telling me, with some variation of my own of course! [I can't tell you how difficult it is for me to follow anybody's instructions :/], so I zipped up my mouth trying to shut all the words of protest just bursting to be heard.

So on the first day of Ramadan, I took up the challenge; got the fruit, washed, dried, got cutting. The pile I'd made was off-putting from the outset but once the knife was in my hand, I told myself: no turning back now!

First came the pineapple [thankfully that was already peeled and sliced!] under my torture, followed by 3pears, 2apples and 2bananas. Mama intentionally kept popping into the kitchen to see if I needed help; and did I ask for it? Of course not! I was just being adamant in not letting on the fact that I was dreading the inspection that would come later, the verdict mama would give if she'd passed the  فروٹ چاٹ   or not; that I was clueless if the way I'd sliced up the pineapple, chopped the pear + apple, quartered the bananas was right or not. And of course I just couldn't let my ineptitude show…no way!

But I kept going; chopping; slicing; squeezing lemon and pouring the juice to keep the fruit from blackening. The rhythm of my own motion eventually made me forget about the previously insistent hunger pangs. It took me 45minutes to get the bowl filled. After making layer upon layer of fruit, I got the spatula, shut my eyes, placed my left hand on the bowl's edge and started mixing.

All through the process I would just dump the cut fruit into the bowl without looking at it, so I saw the end result only after everything was done. I'd been expecting it to look nothing short of a mess and had full plans to drop the knife, wash my hands, and disappear from the kitchen till Iftar immediately after completing the preparation.

But I didn't. Because, because, because…the  فروٹ چا  looked amazing! It's just vanity, I'm sure, but I stood for a full minute just looking at what I'd made. The poking red faces of the unpeeled apple, mixed in with the tropical feel of pineapple dotted about with the pleasant scented pear was just *awestruck!*.

I felt strangely proud of my work. I picked up the bowl with caution and placed it ever so carefully on the mat to ensure the beauties didn't fall out. And was I glad when it passed the look-test! The fruits somehow felt my own, like I could identify with them in a certain way. I munched and savoured the crunch like I'd never before, all the while thinking, 'Look! It's me who made this!'

It's been 18days now that I've been making the فروٹ چاٹ  every day. I now look out for fruit promotions in supermarket catalogues and keep the fruit supply for the next day in check. I mix-and-match the fruit combinations according to which ones are in greater quantity; rotate the pineapples everyday to maintain their freshness, check the bananas for softness to make sure they haven't become too mushy and place them on a soft sheet so they don't blacken.

All this from someone who doesn't like cooking. Not to say I've changed my outlook on cooking, or that I'm going to start with other dishes now...not at all! 

But the fruit salad? It's mine now. We're in symbiosis - for the rest of the month, at least.