and on the fourth day

I discovered peanut butter. And it was good.

Now that I'm safely out of the country, I can talk freely about this. The Finns have something against peanut butter. Five weeks in Finland without peanut butter, it was an exquisite form of torture. I searched the shelves of every grocery store I entered and always found the same sketchy brand, usually just one lone and dusty jar, sitting ignored on the bottom shelf of the jam section. After a while, I looked just for sport, just to see if I could find that one grocery store that understood the importance of the almighty peanut spread.

Coming from a country that dines almost exclusively on breads, you think they'd be open to a bit of variety but every time I lamented the loss of my beloved PB I received looks similar to what I you'd expect had I suggested something really gross like, oh, I don't know, adding rye to everything (oh, but wait...;). When I booked my ticket to India, one of the first things I thought about was the dealer outside the shala; the guy who sells tofu, banana bread and peanut butter out of his blue duffle bag each morning.

It's taken me a few days to catch him but yesterday I wandered outside after practice and the heavens sang - the blue duffle bag was there in its rightful place sitting on the wall. Within minutes I was the proud owner of my own jar of peanut butter and I rushed home where, with a tear in my eye, I enjoyed it with a piece of flatbread I'd brought with me from Finland. And, yes, if you must know, it was rye. After five weeks, some things grow on you.