I am in touch with someone who currently works out in the middle of Africa (also the middle of nowhere) where I used to work. The little town is not on the nation's power or water grid, so such things as "refrigeration" are impossible without a generator. (I mean, let alone things like supermarkets.) That is to say, there's not so much options when it comes to food. There's bread. Margerine. Beans. Potatoes. Carrots. Amazing pineapples, mangoes, papayas. But otherwise, options are limited unless you want to kill, clean, and cook it. And certainly beyond the basics of bread, meats and produce, there is nothing to speak of. My first week there I desperately craved cheese and apples. I think going a year without cheese would not have been possible for me.
Fortunately, a town 5 hours drive south does manage to have "stores" (really just like street kiosks) with ice boxes on generator power. These stores then also somehow manage to get and sell 1 kilo blocks of New Zealand White Cheddar. Anchor brand. It is actually really great cheese. And it freezes well. All for just about $40. I wonder if the price has changed. Anyone passing through that town was always charged with bringing a block (or more) of cheese back.
And what a difference the block of cheese made! It seriously could make everyone's week when it arrived. We'd have pizza parties in honor of the cheese-- no matter that it was not mozzerella.
In the midst of all these huge life changes-- marriages, babies, grad school, cross continental moves--it is good for me to remember to appreciate the small things. And how much more crucial even it was for me to appreciate the small things out in the middle of nowhere.
Here's to you, New Zealand Anchor Cheddar. Thanks for making it, unmolded, to the place where Stanly met Livingstone.
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