I’m posting the picture just so I don’t feel like I’m cheating on my goal, but the real interest is in the video below. I typically don’t place high value on video clips, but in this case, I think the activity is cool enough to be worth it. It’s only 41 seconds long (be warned, the volume might be high and it starts off with someone very close to the mic speaking).
On our drive out to the bungalows we stopped at a roadside coconut stand. Apparently, this is a common refreshment & snack in India. It was my first experience with coconut water and the fresh (green) coconut. Coconut water has since become a thing that’s quite readily available at most grocery stores as an all natural sugar-electrolyte drink. If you’ve never had it, just know that it’s very different from the coconut milk you might get in a can.
Likewise, the coconut meat is very different than what you might get as shredded coconut or as a whole coconut at the grocery store where the meat is pretty dry and crumbly. In the green coconut, the meat is sweeter and more gelatinous. Not really slimy, but soft, like Jello made with a reduced amount of water.
Roadside in India, you pull up and this guy chops the end off a coconut with his wicked looking machete and hands it to you to drink. Once you’re done drinking the coconut water, you hand the coconut back (see the one he takes back part way through the video) and he chops it in half, chips off a bit of the husk for you to use as a scoop and gives it back to you to eat.
Two differences between us an an Indian stopping by the roadside for coconuts: 1 – the price jumps by a factor of five to a whopping $1.25 equivalent. 2 – the Indian customers don’t get the straw.
I appear to have taken this video and the picture above with the Pentax W60… it’s only 15fps and a resolution of 1280×720, but I had a coconut to deal with and couldn’t manage the 60D. Picture specs: 5mm focal length (28mm equivalent), 1/100 sec shutter, f/3.5, ISO 50.
