We have a regular customer who buys a bolis (pronounced bowl-ees) just about every day. A bolis is an awesome homemade popsicle. You use real fruit and blend it with either water or milk (depending on what kind of fruit it is) and a little sugar, then you put it in a small plastic bag, tie a knot in it, and freeze it. You eat it straight from the bag, tearing a little hole with your teeth to suck the juice out.
Since Arturo (Conan’s step dad) often brings coconuts from the coast, Paulina makes some delicious coconut bolis- it’s the water from the coconut, plus the coconut “meat”, plus milk and sugar. The finished product looks like this:
Arturo was in the store alone the other day, and he sold a bolis to our regular customer. A couple minutes later, Paulina goes back to the store, right as the customer comes back with the bolis in hand. “I don’t think this is a bolis,” he says, handing it back. “Oh, sorry,” Paulina says, putting it back in the freezer. She grabs a different one and hands it over to the customer, who quickly goes on his way.
“Arturo, what did you do?” she asks. “What? That wasn’t a bolis? What was it then?” he asks, a little indignant. “Really? You can’t see the difference between this bag and this bag?” She holds up the two bags. Here’s what the other bag looks like:
“I just grabbed it out of the freezer,” he says. “But what is it?”
“It’s Lucia’s milk. That Julia has been pumping and saving up just in case. She keeps it down here because there’s more room than in the kitchen freezer.” The bag even says Lucia, and has a date on it, unlike the bags for bolis. It has “mother’s milk” printed on the bag as well, albeit in English. You would think our regular customer would have noticed that it was different from the bolis he buys every day. But apparently he didn’t notice until after he had opened the bag and started to eat his breastmilk “bolis.”
And nonetheless he came back for more the next day!
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