Have you seen the price of dhania? I refuse to pay thirty rand. Every bunch I have seen in the stores has been withered and shrunk.
"What happened, y'all flew this dhania first class from Mexico?" I interrogated the hapless lad in the stringy apron at Food Lovers stacking the jam tomatoes as if in the finals of the Chelsea Garden Show.
As desperate as the Durban Indian may be for a vital ingredient in curry, biryani or in my case, the newfound fad of Bombay bhel puri, I refuse to be extorted.
"While you were gone India, we had a terrible heatwave, kanna," Tommy pleaded in defence of the farmers' pricing system. "All the herbs got dried."
A few years ago when the war in Ukraine started, the dhania price also went through the roof. The war was completely unrelated but it made for good conversation at the Bangladesh Market. Now that the world is being shaken by the US and Israeli missile strikes on Iran and the retaliation from Iran across the Gulf, we are likely to feel the bite of higher oil and food prices right across the globe. But our farmers clearly had a head start with the dhania price.
"There is something they not understanding about us," Vimla insisted. "If we haven't got, we will do without."
That is a philosophy of life many of us grew up with. I made the mistake of trying to debate Vimla by being a little too clever with my economist's logic.
"Do you think the farmers might have been a bit smarter and taken a loss on the dhania for a little so as not to antagonise the housewives and cooks like myself," I put to Vimla.
My pompous higher grade English and amateur lawyering had her snarling.
"You think the farmers are worried about us?"
Evidently not, and they are getting their comeuppance. Most every bunch I have seen in the shops has just sat there on death row until being thrown out, one suspects.
To be honest, I did not fare much better either. If I were to add up the cost of the petrol driving from shop to shop, it would have been much cheaper paying the higher price in the first place, but I had my pride.
I have to admit that I was quite desperate. All the advance preparations had been made for the bhel puri that I was going to carry to the ceremony and concert on Saturday. The tamarind and dates had been soaked, boiled and carefully sieved. Copious quantities of jaggery had been added until the taste was as close as possible to the one that Subash had served me from his cart on the back lanes of the Bombay High Court. I cubed and boiled the potatoes and roasted the peanuts. The huge bag of puffed rice stood proud under the rack of orderly jars that had materialised during my lazy 44 days of roaming the Indian subcontinent.
"When you gonna clean that counter and put everything away?" the Madame screeched.
She had no concern for my trauma about the dhania price. I was going to chop the tomatoes, onions and cucumbers just before the ceremony and do the mix with the chaat masala, fine sev and chickpeas just before serving the guests. The neat calculations in my head and concern about the dhania price did not bring out any sympathy in the house.
"Tidy up and pack everything away!"
During my prolonged absence frolicking on Penang Island beaches, climbing the hill to Batu Caves and watching night after night bharatnatyam performances in Mylapore, the house had been turned into a military base right down to colour-coded Tupperwares.
"Do we have a big bowl?" I asked and then bit my tongue.
"If you look nicely you will find it."
In arguments, I always come up second best, so I quietly tucked my tail between my legs and bent to look in the cupboard. Lo and behold, every possible dish that I needed was right there. No point in my pleading memory loss or dementia. The Madame used to run a factory and like the Manjras or is it Raj Mohamed slogan, "From a matchstick to a toothpick," she has everything covered in the finest detail.
People know me to be a lover rather than a fighter, so I decided on a peace offering. One of the few items on my India shopping list was one of those little contraptions for squeezing limes. I mixed the Madame a fresh lime soda with a little hint of both salt and sugar. She was pleased.
"Why you don't try that Vegetable Uncle in Springfield?"
The suggestion was most helpful. Off we trotted early Saturday morning to the bottom of Lotus Road for hot vada and tin fish samoosas from the delightful folks raising funds for Foxglove temple. Sitting next to them was the veg guy with freshly harvested dhania.
"They're cutting from four o'clock in the morning," Uncle Harry told me.
I did not mind in the least coughing up R20 a bunch for the crowning touch on my absolutely fabulous bhel puri.
Kiru Naidoo is one of the organisers of the Durban International Book Fair and may be reached on 082 940 8163.
