Jelly Good Time (2004-07-25)
Summertime is jelly time. Everywhere I go, I see this sweet snack in stores. Yesterday I went to the local veggie shop and there they were, a variety of single-serving fruit jelly cups sitting alongside rock melons.
Jelly is a popular gift of choice in Japan especially in the
summer. This brought back memory of an anecdote in 1999 soon
after we arrived here. It happened in a supermarket where we had
just bought
a boxful of gift-packed jelly to bring
to a Japanese friend. After we paid, we went to a table provided
for customers to bag their shopping and began to fiddle with the box
and our
bags. Somehow KL dropped the box on the table while he was
putting it in a bag. The top fell open and its content
spilled out all over the table and onto the floor. No fewer than
three employees appeared from nowhere and darned near skidded across
the floor to come to our rescue in an instant. As they were
picking up the jelly, the manager came with a brand new gift-boxed
jelly in exchange with ours which was in tatters. I was
totally embarrassed not because of the commotion we caused, but because
of the kindness we received. We couldn't even say thank you to
those people properly due to our very bad Japanese then.
When I look at Japanese jelly, I can't help but remember the good
encounter we had with those lovely staff at that supermarket.
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