Markets abound on the island of St. Lucia in the eastern Caribbean. From the bustling food stalls haunted mainly by locals, to the aisles of trinkets and tapestries designed for tourists adventurous enough to leave the safety of their all-inclusives, and even to the traveling vendors - the friendly hawkers who might visit your beach with handfuls of carved sea turtles and scarves and tiny shells, you don't have to try hard to find a bargain.

In the capital city of Castries, this woman not only sold us a coconut, but she skillfully showed us how to drink the milk, smiling as the sweet liquid touched our foreign lips for the first time. Then she took back the fruit and chopped it with precision, showing us how to remove the meat from the shell so we could nibble.

Do the St. Lucian locals walk around sipping coconut milk from straws? Probably not. But we felt content at the market to wander the streets and absorb the multitude of sensory provisions -- those designed for locals and tourists alike.