7:10

We have been wilting for lack of good dairy.  Good cheese, yogurt, ice cream - we miss it terribly.  As for milk, the heat and the blackouts make it difficult to keep milk for much more than a day and we don't love the taste of it anyway.  Even the ultra-pasteurized doesn't seem to last despite its weird chemical taste. 

We had long heard tales of fresh milk, straight from the cow, that could be purchased daily.  But we had also heard tale that it could only be purchased in the morning.  Different places had different times but it seemed they all ended by 8am.

We're not morning people. 

But we recently resolved to overcome our laziness in hopes of having some cereal for breakfast. 

So I ascertained that the nearest milk vendor (at the nearby market in town) sold milk from 7-10am but usually sold out early.  After dropping the kids off at school (at 8am) we stopped by the market and spoke to the milkman who, sure enough, was out of milk by the time we got there but said he would be there early the next day.

With not a small amount of determination, I got up early the next day and was at the market at 6:40.  No milkman.  Someone took pity on me and asked what I was in search of.  Milk.  Palatable milk.  "Oh.  He comes at 7:10, the bus comes in at 7:10." 

I had misunderstood.  He wasn't there 7am TO 10am.  He was there exactly at 7:10.  An easy mistake to make in a country where NOTHING is on time (my Spanish partner frequently comes 45-75min late to our meetings without a thought).  But no.  The milkman is punctual.  And sought after.  I got my bag of milk (yep, he poured it into a 1 liter plastic sandwich bag).  I had the gall to ask for another one and he flat-out refused.  Turned out I had only ordered one bag. 

He was sold out by 7:18.