Bananas

The European Union has accused banana importers Fyffes and Dole Food Co. of running an illegal cartel to fix prices and control the supply of the fruit to Northern Europe, the companies said Thursday. Westlake Village-based Dole disputed the charges and Ireland's Fyffes said it was examining them. The European Commission can impose fines of up to 10% of a company's global sales if the accused are convicted.

Paved roads, free public schools and pastel-painted houses covering the lush hillsides testify to the relative prosperity that swept this Caribbean island during its stint as a banana republic. But with the Jan. 1 end to an era of preferential access to the European Union, the world's biggest banana market, farmers here are turning over their fields to more viable crops and waxing nostalgic about the days when anyone with a small plot of land and a good work ethic could make a decent living.

NOTHING says "tropical" more than the banana tree. Swaying above a pool, pond or patio, bobbing along an east-facing wall of a Colonial-style home, bananas can make semi-desert look like pseudo-jungle. Their hang-ten leaves surf waves of wind and call out for a tiki hut, their rewards not merely edible but ornamental too. Fruiting and non-fruiting varieties present a banana-rama of appearances: green-leafed, red-leafed, variegated, giant, dwarf.

Consider the banana. All iconic yellow peel and soft, sweet inside -- you can find it at the nearest Trader Joe's for as little as 19 cents apiece. But how much have you really thought about how it got there? Now the ubiquitous and perishable fruit finds itself the focus of appreciation in two new exhibitions opening this week from Los Angeles-based collective Fallen Fruit. The first, "United Fruit," opened Tuesday at Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions.

It's the cake that has fueled hundreds of thousands of birthdays, weddings and office parties across Los Angeles. You've probably had it: two layers of soft yellow sponge cake that sandwich a filling of fresh strawberries and fluffy whipped cream, frosted all over with yet more whipped cream, ringed with toasted almonds on the sides and decorated with red, blue or pink roses on top. It might have said, "Thank you for all your hard work," "Congratulations,...

Your Scene: Richard T. Watkins took the photo featured in the May 11 Your Scene of a reptile on a bunch of bananas in Hawaii. His surname was misspelled as Catkins.

Dole Foods is withdrawing a defamation lawsuit against a Swedish filmmaker after complaints in Sweden that it was trying to limit free speech, the company said Thursday. Dole had sued filmmaker Fredrik Gertten for showing the documentary "Bananas!" despite a court ruling that the case on which the film was based had been part of a massive extortion plot against the company. The documentary shows the alleged plight of Nicaraguan workers who say they were made sterile by a pesticide used at Dole banana plantations in the 1970s.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. says it will cut prices for a week at a time on thousands of items, from bananas to board games, through the holiday season. The nationwide cuts start this week with bananas selling for 39 cents a pound, rolls of lean ground beef for $1.25 a pound and select board games for $15.

THERE'S NO explaining superstition. Wherever luck turns mysteriously bad, you'll find an explanation -- and possibly, a fix. Take the banana. For some reason, saltwater anglers bash this fruit, which they fear brings bad luck. It's a superstition that's been around for decades -- perpetuated by recreational and commercial fishermen who also spit on their baits, never wash a lucky fishing shirt or hang garlic to ward off evil spirits.

Regarding "Curse of the Forbidden Fruit" [June 14], about the superstition against bananas on sportfishing boats, not so on the yachts the late skipper Gene Grimes piloted over many years here and off Baja. He seldom, if ever, went fishing without a bowl of bananas on the galley table. His record of catching and releasing more than 70 broadbill swordfish in these waters likely will never be matched. Bill Beebe Mar Vista