Wednesday, April 12, 2006

Kiss Me, I'm Kosher for Passover

Scene: The Godiva store at 50th and Lexington Avenue.

"Excuse me, are your chocolates kosher for Passover?" I ask the young black man behind the counter.

"They're kosher, but they're not kosher for Passover."

I look at him.

He looks at me.

"I don't know what that means," he admits.

"I don't know what that means either," I say.

He begins again, "All of our chocolates are kosher, but they do something special for Passover and they're just not ... that."

"Right." I say.

"We have been selling a lot of coconut macaroons," he says.

"I see," I say. "But are people buying chocolates for Passover?"

"Yes, they're buying chocolates."

I look at him. It is clear that neither of us has any idea what we're saying, we're just reading off lines someone else gave us to say. "Okay!" I say.

As I am browsing for chocolates, a rumpled, middle-aged business man comes in and approaches the same counter assistant. "What are those things with stuff in the middle?" asks the man.

"Um," says my new friend, "truffles?"

"Yes, truffles!" says the man, sounding like Dudley Moore in Arthur. "I need to buy some truffles for my wife for Easter. And I have a fucking brother in-law. I need to buy something for him too." Oh God, this man is drunk in Godiva at 2pm.

"You have a fucking brother in-law too," repeats the assistant. I guess he wanted to make sure he got that right. So he leads the bombed business man over by the truffles and I gingerly step out of the way.

"Ha ha! These are trufles? Great. I'll take a box." They return to the counter to ring up the purchase. "Oh. And my brother in-law, that piece of shit, he's living with us. Can you believe that?" I didn't get to see what item was selected for the piece of shit in-law because I had to turn away to keep from laughing. Judging from what was in close proximity to the cash register, I'd say the lousy mouch got a green foil wrapped Easter Bunny. "You're a good man," the blotto exec told the salesman.

We waited for him to leave and when I got up to the counter we all burst out laughing.

Thanks to Bizzy for sending me this link about the CSI plot in DC (That's "Creative Seder Initiative," boo yeah!) She wrote in her email, "We had a seder at the Temple when I was in HS with the Navajo exchange students. They loved it, especially looking for the hidden Matzah. " Oh, those wacky Unitarians and their acceptance for all the world's religions!

2 comments:

J said...

Yay, they even had an Ethiopian Jew in there. That was a nice article.

Speaking of whole foods, I just sampled a drink there made from algae and now I don't feel right.

Janet said...

Drunk in Godiva. Wow. And while you're discussing Passover too. There's something incredibly ironic about this, though I can't lay my finger on it.