Where all the time ends
Once upon a sleepy afternoon in Cu Chi "- 5 kg of cherries - 5 kg of oranges - 3 bags of chips..." Wearily, I jotted down the endless list of items to be packed for my trip to Saigon at the beginning of July. What was supposed to be a 1-hour trip to Walmart to buy all the items requested by my family turned out to last for 3 hours, with hopping on and off the 405 to get to the countless grocery stores and farmers' markets around the city. Sitting under the shade of a sweetgum tree, with a cup of bubble tea, I waited for the bus to get to the next farmers' market. It was a dazzlingly sunny day, with no sight of clouds in the deep blue sky overlooking the glistening skyscrapers. As I arrived at the market, the fragrant scent of the apple piles at the entrance calmed me down after hours of navigating the crazed crowds of shoppers at Walmart diving for summer discounts. Still, I was more than glad to arrive home, hands aching from carrying too many packs of strawberries. ...