A gift of food….

Receiving food in Jamaica as a gift is an honour. The father of 2 of my students once sent his boys in with a bag of 5 ‘jellies’ – young coconuts whose jelly-like centre makes a wonderful cool refreshing drink. A grandma once stopped by the window to my room and gave me three beautifully ripe mangoes. And, the retired teacher down the road gave me 2 very large ‘pears’ picked from her own tree (that’s what Jamaicans call avocados).

But today – one of the teachers in Irene’s school sent over 3 fresh boiled crabs! What a feast. When Jamaicans eat crab, it’s usually outdoors – so any big rock will do the cracking of the shells. In our kitchen, we opted to use a hammer, but they were delicious.