Banana

The banana isi a tropical fruit. People used it as a food even before history began to be written. The armies of Alexander the Great found bananas growing in India in 327 B.C. No doubt they grew there long before that time. Because of an old story that the sages of India rested in the shade of the paklnt and ate its fruit, the banana is often called the "fuit of the wise men".
Plan scientists believe that roots of banana is plants were carried to the east coast of Africa by a people who moved there in ancient times. From there the banana plant was carried across the African continent to the Guinea Coast by early Arab Traders.
When Portuguese explorers discovered the Guinea Coast of Africa in 1482, they found bananas growing there. These explorers took roots of the plant, and its African name, banana, to the Portuguese colonies in the Canary Islands. The nest step in the journey of the banana plant wa across the Atlantic Ocean to the New World. In 1516, only a few year after Columbus; famous voyages of discovery, a Spanish missionary brought this useful plant to the Caribbean island of Hispaniola. Other missionaries followed his example and planted bananas on the the other islands of the Caribbean and on the tropical mainland. Thus, the banana plant had to go more than halfway around the worls to reach Central America, where so many of the world’s bananas are grown today.
It was not untiul the latter part of the 19th century that banans were brought into the United States in quantities for sale in stores. Before that time, very few Americans other than those who had traveled in tropical countries had ever seen or tasted a banana. Even after banana schooners began entering New Orleans, Boston, and other ports, only people who lived in or near the port cities were able to eat bananas. The banana is perishable. Unlike some other fruits, it cannot be stored. Within a period of ten to twenty days, bananas must be harvested, shippes several thousand kilometers, ripened, and sent to the stores where they are sold. Today’s modern transportation-fast, refrigerated ships, train, and truck makes it possible for families in Chicago, in the United States, or Calgary, in Canada, to eat bananas every day of the year.