THE SHUK

I. Never Pay Asking Price
So I’m making guacamole, because I can,
which really means because I bought an avocado
in the shuk for two and a half shekels. But I can’t break
this bargain fruit open until
assured it won’t go brown.
I need a lemon.
So I head out to the shuk, a woman
on a mission. The first fruit stand I see,
nada. This particular shmoe
doesn’t sell lemons. Moving on,
jackpot. I take
my time pretending I know
how to pick a good lemon. Finally place one in the
translucent plastic bag that comes also
in yellow, pink or blue, and wave my arm
under the guy’s nose. He weighs it, grunts,
fifteen shekels.
I feel myself asphyxiating on the citrus air around me
and the flies are closing in and I think I may need to sit down-
until I grab control of myself- I’m nobody’s sucker!- and seize
the opportunity to practice
my Hebrew with a key phrase my friend taught me
for just such situations.
In my most indignant tone I spit, Ma, ani frayarit?
and storm away, lemonless.

Turns out, my friend tells me later,
there’s been a lemon shortage the whole year.

II. Drink Lots of Water
I’m walking through the shuk when I’m hit
with this craving for diet coke. (I have a diet-coke-
drinking problem.) The first store I see is
a liquor store, so I pop in for a six-shekel
fix. (Liquor stores here
follow the mentality that alcoholic
content or not, drinks are drinks.)
Forgetting of course, that this was the store
I had been to last week to buy wine
for a Shabbat meal. The clerk was slimy, like
the dead fish juice spilled all over the shuk floor.
Motek, he said, kamah yafah at. Yesh lach chaver?
Sorry, I don’t speak Hebrew.
It’s true, my Hebrew isn’t perfect, but I understood him
perfectly. Now, I see the same slick head of gel, his eyes
fall on me and he cries, Hallo, hallo, motek!
About-face.

That’s one way to kill an addiction.

III. Money is Worthless Here
On the way home from work, I find myself gripped
by a desire to be healthy, so I stop by a random
fruit/vegetable stand and pick out two sweet
potatoes, two apples, two cucumbers and an onion.
I’m only one person, but I need to eat too.
Take my goods to the register,
seven shekels. Beautiful.
Take a fifty out of my Anne Klein wallet,
hand it over.
Ma zeh? the clerk asks.
Money. What does he think it is?
Small money you don’t have?
No. If I had it, I’d give it to him.
Ach, get out, go, go, no big money here!

I’ve never actually been thrown out of a store
for trying to pay.