Back when bananas were exotic

My husband asked me if there are any more of his body parts that I am going to talk about in my blog. That is too funny. I will give him a break and talk a little about me.

Like all young kids, my brothers and I freaked out over candy.
The candy that was available at that time was not that good and the packages were not as sophisticated as the ones that you found in the US or Europe.
The only packages I could remember is "Florida" gum and I think it was made in Tunisia.( I am not sure.)

My mom traveled often for a her job to Egypt, USA, and Turkey.
She would bring us a lot of different candies. We couldn't wait for her to go abroad just so we could have all that candy. It had to be divided equally. If there were one pack left of let's say M & M 's, we had to count them one by one so none of us got an extra one.
One of my brothers would eat everything in one day. The candy lasted a few days for the other brother. I, on the other hand, didn't care too much about sugar, waited till both brothers ran out of candy and sold some of mine to them. I made my own divided box with different containers to put the candy in. I was so proud of myself.

Something else that we and many Tunisians found exotic at that time was bananas. Tunisia rarely imported bananas ,so when it did, one banana was about $1 compared to 10 cent for a loaf of bread at that time. I can't tell you enough how excited we got over those bananas even though we had so many other delicious fruits. ( dates, figs,oranges etc.)
Once, after finishing our favorite meal of steak and mashed potatoes, my father brought in this big box full of bananas!! I don't think I've never seen that many bananas in my life as I did that day. I still remember the faces of my brothers when looking at that magic box. We were in a row looking at the box and drooling even though we were so full. It indeed was too good to be true. My father had one condition. He said, "you can eat as many bananas as you want but that applies just for the next hour." We were so full we could barely finish one banana. I was so disappointed and I hated him that day. I never understood his point till this day.
A few years later, we went to the USA to visit my mom's friend and bananas were one of the things that we ate almost every hour, my brothers especially. It drove me crazy because we would be stuck in the car for hours at a time traveling from state to state and my brothers didn't have a problem farting and burping the whole ride. It is very hard to deal with brothers at that age.
We are over bananas now..

My brothers and I were also obsessed with potatoes. Any shape or form especially fries and mashed. My mom made sure that on our birthdays we got for dinner steak and mashed potatoes. I spent one summer when I was a kid at my grandfathers who lived in a traditional house in the south of Tunisia. Old traditional Tunisian houses have a courtyard in the middle with rooms all around it. We all slept outside in the courtyard. I got so bored and tired of the food there. At least at my parents house, we had variety once in a while.
So, my cousin and I were craving fries one night so badly we waited till everybody fell asleep. We went to the kitchen secretly at 3 a.m and started cooking fries.When the fries turned brown and it was time to take them off the boiling oil, my grandfather woke up.
We went back to the beds and covered ourselves pretending that we were sleeping while the fries were cooking themselves. He yelled at us and the threw the fries and oil right past us onto the courtyard floor.

"Les pommes de terre rendent de grandes services,surtout frites,mais elles ne sont pas tout."
Deguy