Mango Thoughts

April brought mango season. Immense umbrellas of foilage groan heavily with ripe, yellow and green fruit swinging on vines in the breeze. I am always reminded of free swinging testicles bursting with juice. I can't help but chuckle as children emerge with long poles and take swings at these pinatas. One almost feels bad for the tree- his reproductive parts being prime targets for stick weilding boys and girls.
But once you get a taste of fresh mango juice all the feelings of concern for the tree vaporize.The secret that westerners don't know is that the sweetest mangos- the local ones, small and yellow aren't to be eater. They are to be sipped. You squeeze and suck all the syrup leaving behind the skin, pulp and pith. But noone explained this to me. I had to figure out my method of consumption by trial and error.
The local mango should come with a manual. As a westerner, when I see a ripe fruit, my saliva starts flowing at the thought of that first juicy bite. Apples, pears, peaches, plums. Even tomatoes. In the summers I used to sneak tomatoes from the neighbor's- I'd sit in the garden under the shade of the vines and bite right into the tomato's flesh like an apple- Juice and seeds running down my cheeks and overalls. Pure tomatoey heaven. But mangos... I was totally unprepared.
My first experience was full of promise- a whole bucket for the two of us to split. We washed off the dirt and stickyness and piled them into a mango pyramid. A particular one caught my eye- it was especially plump and had a nice even color. With squinched eyes and gaping mouth, I dove in, sending juice squirting to the four corners of the earth. Then, slowly my eyes opened, I fell from heaven and landed teeth first in a jungle of strong, stringy mango fibers. Every crevice of my teeth was packed full of mango floss, turning my mouth into a malady of tooth rearranging fur. Never bite into the local mangos! Since that first bite I have slowly perfected my no-teeth juice extraction technique.