The papaya

Job appeared at my door in the afternoon last Thursday exactly as he had promised that morning at school. In his hand was a large plastic bag, a ubiquitous item in Beninese culture.

“I brought you that papaya.” He handed me the plastic bag. I was expecting several papayas, having lived most of my previous life in Missouri, a place not really known for its large quantity of papayas. Grabbing the item inside by the stem, it was revealed that Job had not brought me several, but one papaya. One papaya the size of a medium pumpkin.

In front of my middle school are fields of beans and manioc, a couple mango trees and some papaya trees. After piecing together several conversations at the school, one of which involved him protesting the sacrifice of his beans for a soccer field, I learned that Job is responsible for many of these plants. 

He and I have joked about me working in the fields with him and me making dinner with the produce he would give me after the harvest. One conversation focused specifically on mangoes and papayas. This was about a week before he showed up at my house with a fruit bigger than my head.

I took the papaya; my arms strained under its weight. He left me with instructions to wait a few days before cutting it open. Then to refrigerate what I couldn’t eat right away.

He said this last part with a completely straight face.

It’s hot here. And there are few solaces. I have spent hours trying to map the location of all the fridges in my village. And added the names of those people to the list of those whom I need to make a particularly good effort to talk to on the street.

“Job,” I said, “I don’t have a refrigerator." 

"Oh, I do,” he responded. “Just bring it over after you open it, and I’ll keep it for you.”

“Thanks a lot,” I said, mentally adding another point to the map in my head as he left.