Eating in the canteen

I have been learning to eat with chopsticks. The ones they give you here at the college canteen are in a long thin paper bag with "sterilized" printed on it, but the bag is open one end, and the chopsticks are wooden and usually still wet, so you can't help wondering!

We were so worried about trying to be polite here, but that hardly seems an issue any more. Ok, so you don't put your fingers in your mouth. If you find a bone or something icky in your mouth (and the "meat" is mostly bone with a little something wrapped around it) you can very delicately take it from you slightly parted lips with your chop-sticks - not too hard (with practice) if it is something big like a chicken head, but it can be tricky with fish-bones. So in a case like that you just open your mouth slightly (not too much now) and go "phlew!" and spit it onto the table. Or the floor, though that is a little insensitive because it makes it slippery for others. Only things like tissues and chopstick wrappers generally go on the floor.



So, about noises! It's ok! Especially with noodles. Just slurp away. Pick a few up with your chopsticks and start slurping. And as for managing with chopsticks... its really, really easy. You either hold your bowl up near your mouth - right under your chin or lips is ok - or you put your mouth down near your bowl or dish. In our canteen they use those big metal trays (like in "MASH") with little compartments, and they give you a little metal bowl as well. You can use it any way you wish. I like to have my rice in my bowl. Most people get some soupy stuff in their bowl and drink it straight out of there. So I have seen people sitting there with their chin or lips down at table level trying to slurp straight from the tray because its too hard to pick the tray up.

Then there are the big things. They always have these steamed buns - they just look like a lump of uncooked dough, but they are actually quite light. Sometimes they are shaped like a big lump, other times they are all sort of twisty. These things you can pick up with your fingers and bite, and dip it into your gravy on your tray or whatever. Or you can spear it with your chopsticks and pick it up and bite bits off, or delicately hold it between your chopsticks and bite bits off. Then there are things like greasy fried pizza base, and they give you big triangles of it. That's nice, although its greasy - a bit different from everything else! Some people manage that with chopsticks, others use fingers.

Oh, and about the chicken head. I wasn't kidding. Peter was staring at the bits of chicken on his plate one day, and suddenly realised one of them was a head. Not much meat on that, but a tasty little eyeball or two if you want it and maybe the comb part isn't too bad - he didn't try it! He’s such a little favourite, the next day he was served up with a foot. And sometimes he even gets a couple of heads – but I’ve never had one.