Farmers Market Friday: Rio de Janeiro

Rachel (of Rachel's Rantings in Rio) and I go way back... well, kind of.  See, before I even had this blog, back when I was a blog stalker and not a participator, I found Rachel's blog.  Writing in my private blog from the time, I shared these thoughts of her:  I am following a blog called "Rachel's Rantings in Rio", which as you might have guessed is a woman (American, married to a Brazilian) in Rio, ranting. Well, not always ranting, but sharing thoughts mostly. It is like an online, ever developing ethnography. She is witty, crass, sweet, brutally honest, and overall happy. I love it.  Enjoy Rachel's view of the feira, and if you are looking for an American's view of all things Rio (witty, crass, and sweet included), stop by her blog and say hello to her.  

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The vegetable guy and I had a wonderful relationship at first. I suppose it is normal for some relationships to not make the long haul, nonetheless it can make things awkward.

You see, I used to buy already selected baggies of veggies from my guy. I always went to him and he was always a great help. He would even separate out the best bags of my favorite vegetables and I would buy them. We’d chat. I even introduced him to my children.

But sadly, we couldn’t keep that level of feira love. He started asking too much from me, quite literally and in the form of money. His prices kept going up, the size of the veggies in the bag kept going down and the crap he put aside for me was just that, crap.

So I broke up with him. I broke up with my vegetable guy. Life is too short to spend it eating overpriced tiny green pepper!

Of course I am not afraid of a little confrontation so I talked to him about it. After all, relationships are all about communication. I told him that his stuff was getting too expensive and the quality was going way down. He blamed the rain, the feira, and the other vegetable men.

I’m sorry but this girl has standards when it comes to her relationships: Own up or ship out.

Initially it was quite awkward. He would call me over and I would say thanks, not today. Then he started noticing that I was carrying someone else’s vegetables. It wasn’t a good feeling for either of us. I felt like a vegetable whore and he felt rejected.

But not all feira relationships are meant to be forever. Now we are on good terms, still waving hello to each other each week. He has found other feira loves and I have 2 different vegetable men. I suppose I am a bit of a vegetable whore after all, and fruit... Don’t even ask about my loyalty when it comes to looking for mushrooms.

Of course there are some feira relationships that can go the distance. I’ve been seeing my fish guy for 7 years now. It’s getting quite serious.  

Find Rachel on the web:

BLOG // TWITTER // FACEBOOK

And then tell us, how are your farmers market relationships going these days?

(Words by Rachel, Photos by Tiffany.  I think we make a great team.)