hmong
minnesota_chris I was in trouble and I knew it. Hours, minutes, seconds counting down. Ran across the street, avoiding cars, reached the first stall that had what I needed. A whole bushel basket of cucumbers. The stall had Hmong farm women and girls, handling money and scuttling about. Minnesota's fresh vegetable industry relies on the unpaid labor of Hmong women and girls, I think.

"How much for the whole basket?" The women and girls just gaped at me. I heard from behind me, the voice of an old man. I heard the old man say "Thirty dollars."

I eyed the small farmer, a man no doubt birthed and raised in the wild terraces of Laos, where the Lao are the owners but not masters. Lao soldiers will be shot if they don't mount automatic machine guns on their jeeps, shot by the Hmong, who control the land to this day.

I said ok, and took my trash bag full of cucumbers back to the car, my future settled.
120825
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ever dumbening . 120826
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x the spirit catches you, and you fall down 120830
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minnesota_chris they made really great fucking pickles too, I miss those. 130205
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