Daily Prompt : Ooze

August 22, 2017

In response to one-word prompt : OOZE

One summer our Dad took us to Bangladesh. Our first stop was Lahore, Pakistan, from there we changed planes to go to Dhaka, Bangladesh.

We took a train from Dhaka to go to our Grandparents, home in the village. It took us close to 8 hours to reach Feni a small town, close to our Grandparents village. The village was twelve miles from the town. My Dad hired two taxis to take us there. This was the first time, we met our cousins, aunts and uncles.

One evening I saw two of my uncle’s servants  climbing a date tree, which belonged to my uncle. They tied their ankles with a rope. I was curious I asked them, ‘why did you tie your ankles?’

They laughed because I had no clue. In reply they said, ‘it helps us to climb the tree.’

This part I kind of understood, but why are they  taking the pitchers, one of them explained they needed them to tie onto the tree, so when they make a cut, the juice from the tree would collect in the pitcher.

Apparently they have to do this late in the afternoon so the juice which slowly oozes out all night will fill the pitcher.

The raw juice is not very tasty, but the juice is boiled in big pots, as it boils the fluids turn thicker like molasses.

They do not leave it at the molasses stage, but keep boiling it until it is the right thickness to turn into jaggery(it’s a concentrated product of date, cane sugar).

Jaggery is used to make delicious sweets.

…………………………………… 🙂