Housekeeping in Haitian Creole X: Not as bright as the Ji Seriz

Ji Seriz: Brilliantly coloured and ever so slightly tart

Eske ou pare (are you ready), Mme Josette might have asked me when I showed her the small Styrofoam tray of cherries I’d bought from the local supermarket.

She was full of advice on what to do with the cherries. The consensus was that we make juice.

Eske ou ka sa a pou mwen souple (can you do this for me, please?) I asked her.

Wi, she nodded.

I opened the refrigerator as Mme Josette took her pinny off and prepared to depart, into her weekend. There was no sign of the cherry juice she had promised.

Ki kote ji seriz? I asked.

You should use the juicer, she replied.

So I did. With Mme Josette watching and supervising the addition of water at the end of the process.

“Dous tankou siwo ak sucre (sweet as syrup with sugar),” she told me.

But I left it au naturelle – with a bright undertow of tartness, faintly sweet. Lip-smackingly good and a brilliant orange-pink. It looked as if I’d used food colouring or splashed some grenadine into the glass.

Mme Josette has promised to bring me a whole “mammit” load of cherries for just 50 gourdes (about a dollar). That will mean jugs galore of Ji Seriz.

“Our battered suitcases were piled on the sidewalk again; we had longer ways to go. But no matter, the road is life”
– Jack Kerouac