The Ethiopians are mango vampires.
In this country, fruit is not cleanly sliced with a knife. Instead, the vampire gnaws a hole into the mango’s side, quickly severing its skin. As teeth sink into flesh, practiced fingertips massage the fruit to release mouthfuls of succulent liquid.
Think juice box, minus the box.
That’s why everyone on my bus rejoiced when the vehicle chugged to a stop on a leafy dirt road, just one hour into the journey from Arba Minch to Addis Ababa.
The doors swung open and dozens of fruit sellers bombarded the bus, carrying bundles of bananas, plastic platters of limes and baskets of mangos. It was a flurry of chatter and birr, with bills exchanged for bags of precious produce.
When the bus started up again, the mango vampires sank their teeth in.
Within a couple hours the floor was slippery, sticky and smelled of rotting sweetness. With mango carcasses on the ground and the sugar high long gone, all that remained was 10 more hours of a dusty, bone-jarring ride.
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