About four months ago I was living
with a family in the Amazon Rainforest.
I was eating what they ate, worked like they do and was getting eaten by
mosquitoes the way they might, if they didn’t have a sixth sense about when
they were going to be bitten. I miss it and think of it often but since then I have had quite a few other adventures. I have visited Crater Lake, driven across the country, and
have lived in Atlanta for a month and a half. However, I was sitting down to dinner with my partners tonight and as I was eating a wonderful salad with lettuce, cucumbers, tomatoes, croutons, sunflower seeds, and kalamata olives, I
suddenly felt as if I was being pulled into a time warp tunnel back to the Amazon
Rainforest four months ago…
We had walked through the forest
for two hours, jumped off of a 30 foot waterfall, walked for another hour
and a half when one of the brothers from the family led us off the trail to
this strange little grove where a tree had been cut down, and from the looks of
it, quite a while ago. With the
warm rain falling on us, we watched as the brother took his machete and began
to hack away at the next uncut foot of the fallen tree. As I looked at the tree, I could tell that the tree had been
felled for just this purpose, and whatever was living in it wasn’t harvested
often. The tree was tawny in color
and in various stages of decomposition, as if only a foot of it was used at a
time. The grove was filed with an
unusual, yet familiar scent. As I
was trying to recall what it reminded me of, Jose asked me
“What does this place smell like?” I closed my eyes and concentrated fully on the smell, then said,
 |
| The grubs. Slimy, yet, not satisfying. |
“Kalamata olives.” He nodded in agreement. As I turned again to the brother hacking
away at the fallen tree, I saw that he was pulling grubs from the trunk and
suddenly I realized why it had been cut down. This tree harbored a specific type of insect larvae and by cutting
the tree down they could have a predictable source of this nutritious
food. Having had a previous, and
not so positive experience, with grubs only a few days before, I declined
tasting this culinary delight.
Jose, having enjoyed his first grub, took one, popped it into his mouth,
and chewed viciously (the outside of grubs are very chewy). As we walked away with a leaf bundle of
grubs to take home, Jose says,
“Those tasted like kalamata olives a
little, like the tree I guess.”
“The tree was probably starting to
ferment, and the grubs eat the tree.”
I replied. Nodding his head
he said,
“I liked the other ones
better. They were creamier.”
Now, four months later, I am still
reminded of that grove, the way the scent of the fermenting tree filled the air
around us, and Jose’s frank evaluation of the grubs every time I eat kalamata
olives. In time this memory
association may fade, but part of me doesn’t really want it to. However, I’m tired of thinking of grubs
every time I bite into something delicious with a piece of kalamata olive in
it.
