cracking the case

A recent conversation between me and my roommate.

The setting: Our house in a small African country. We’ve only been here a few weeks, and so our kitchen is rather modestly equipped at the moment. We have a coconut from a nearby village (sold with just it’s brown ‘furry’ cover… não aquele casca enteira como vende coco verde) and have just managed to use a Leatherman knife to bore a hole in it and drain the juice.

“Hey, let’s crack this open and eat the coconut meat.
“Yeah! Do we have a big knife?”
“No, just a few (somewhat flimsy) steak knives.”
“A hammer or something?”
“No, no tools around.”
“hmm….” (This is accompanied by both of us staring at the coconut for a moment.)

"I know. Why don’t we just chuck it really hard at the ground and see if it cracks open."
Another pause, as is always the case when subtle genius surfaces.)

“That might work…”
“Should we do it outside?”
“If it works, there will be too much dirt on it. Let’s just do it in the hallway.”
“Ok. Good thing we moved those boxes out of the hallway this morning.”

The entire place has painted/polished cement floors (Little do these folks know this is all the rage for modern flooring back in the US.) We stand at one end of the hallway, surveying our workspace. I hide in the kitchen, just peeking out the doorway into the hall. My roommate cranks back his arm and hurls the thing at the floor, immediately ducking for cover in another doorway.

SMACK-CRACK!!
“Holy shit, that worked really well.”
“Sweet. Rinse it off – there’s still time to put it in the vegetable curry.”
Yumm