On Fruit and Rabbits

I never liked tomatoes in Canada, but here I can't get enough of them. The tiny, cherry tomatoes that are plentiful this time of year are especially delicious. When they come as a side-dish with dinner I have to ration myself, or I will eat all of them, at the expense of the other diners and my own meal.

In Korea, tomatoes are a fruit not a vegetable. I know this is true all around the world, but I never saw tomato ice-cream until I came here, nor tomato pop. I never found them in fruit salad, bobbing along redly beside chunks of pineapple and kiwi in a sea of fizzy yogurt sauce, like I find here. I never thought of a tomato cheesecake, or tomato cookie. Now anything seems possible.

My rabbit MoShui is reading along while I write this, perched contentedly on my lap and weaving slightly from side to side with the rhythm of the keyboard. Since her name means 'ink', it seems fitting that she should be mesmerized by the development of words.

I can hear Shui Cai, my new rabbit, tearing around the spare room at top speed, 'watercolour' splattering against the walls. This is his favorite activity, after eating and making nests in the laundry hamper. No one's mistaken him yet for the literary type, though I hold out hope that through the steady influence of his diet of stolen papers, it is something that may yet develop.

When I was in Canada last summer, the pet sitter tried MoShui on a diet of tomatoes. She was not amused. Apparently country of origin is not a matter of importance in considering a rabbit's taste for the fruit. She never fully recovered - though you'd hardly know it when she's tearing into pizza(and beer). I wonder how her book reads. I bet the section on tomatoes is particularly acidic, fizzy yogurt sauce or otherwise.