#2625 "It's a flower, for God's sake!" (8/30)

It's time for a Costa Rica micro-memory!

Every day for breakfast in Costa Rica, we had fresh fruit. We always had watermelon and pineapple. There were other fruits, too, but watermelon and pineapple were served every day, both at the Kioro and at the Westin.  The pineapple was exceptionally good, sweet and ripe and delicious every time. 

The fact that we had pineapple every day was one of my micro-memories, and as I was reading through my list, this other pineapple-related memory came up, so I'll share it.

Our guide on the sloth tour in Guanacaste was Juan Carlos. He was a joyful, gregarious fellow who is passionate about his work at this sloth sanctuary and the re-forestation work that is being done there. Juan Carlos knows a lot about the flora and the fauna in the area and was eager to pass on his knowledge to us. He is also a bit theatrical, which made the tour even that much more fun.

As we were walking along the path, he pointed out a pineapple plant. Have you ever seen a pineapple plant? Here's a pic I took of a pineapple plant in Hawaii.

Juan Carlos stopped by the pineapple plant to tell us about it. He told us that the pineapple plant is a bromeliad.  Bromeliads do not produce fruit. They produce flowers.  The pineapple fruit is formed by dozens of flowers fusing together to form the pineapple, so therefore, the pineapple really a flower. He then kind of yelled, "It's a flower, for God's sake!"

Here's an interesting little article I found on the internet about the pineapple.

Whether it is a fruit or a flower, pineapple is dang tasty.