When I go to weddings parties I try to get in with the women who are cooking. It's fun to peel vegetables and make juice with them. I especially enjoy the juice making. It usually falls to the younger women to do it, and when it's a wedding in my neighborhood, this means it's my friends. Someone once advised me to not watch when people cook, because whether or not I see how it's made, I am going to have to eat. The juice methods are a bit disconcerting. The juice is made in giant buckets. The fruit or the leaf that is the base is dropped in the water, and then while talking and coughing, the women use their hands to squeeze out the juice. Then sugar and other flavorings are added, and the mixture is stirred with a big ladle. We take turns tasting from the ladle. When the juice is prepared, the plastic bags come out. The first phase of making the juice doesn't involve many women. We might all be there, but only a few people are actually working. The bagging, however, is an efficient assembly line. Two women per bucket ladle a certain amount of juice into each bag before passing the bags to the rest of us who are waiting to tie the bags, using a very particular type of wrap-and-knot. A third team takes the bags, wipes them off if need be, and piles them in an empty bucket. By the end of the process we are all sticky and giddy from sugar intake.