fork, spoon, chopsticks

i was queuing at the claypot rice stall at wisma foodcourt (the republic) this evening.... saw a middle-aged caucasian couple seated at the table nearby, having chinese claypot rice. the man clumsily picked at his rice with a pair of chopsticks. i watched as he struggled with his chopsticks, fidgeted between his fingers, criss-crossed them, sank them into the bowl of rice, failed, retried, failed, retried, failed.... obviously hungry and frustrated, but just couldn't seem to pick up more than a few grains of rice with each attempt. no matter how he tried, the gap between the crossed-chopsticks was just too big.

his lady partner seated facing him laughed in amusement. she hadn't even lifted the lid of her dish - guess she wanted to make sure she learned from his experience first before making a fool out of herself too. actually i didn't think that guy's a fool. it was just very interesting to see how hard he tried to use that pair of chopsticks, his persistence. i watched silently (while waiting to order) for close to 2 mins without shifting my attention. then, that man finally gave up, stubbornly flipped his chopsticks away and this time, tried scooping the meat from the mini wok using the soup spoon. soon, his fingers were digging around in the mini wok too :P poor guy.

i wanted to walk up to him and suggest that he has the option of picking up a pair of metal fork & spoon from the other stalls, but i was still in queue for my food. so i continued to watch, semi-entertained.. hehe. by the time i bought my food, some kind stall-owner from the other stall had already offered his forks & spoons to that frustratingly starving couple :)

speaking of utensils, i'm not good with chopsticks myself. i don't hold them the proper way too (i criss-cross them, which is incorrect). when rice is served in a small bowl, i like to eat it with chopsticks - you hold the small round bowl in one hand, tilt it close to your mouth, and use the chopsticks to lightly dig from the bowl. i do that when i eat rice congee too. when the rice is served on a plate or other flat surfaces (eg. hotplate, styrofoam box) i prefer to use just a single metal fork. most of my friends would choose a metal spoon to eat rice but i like the versatility of the fork more - you can poke, dig, scoop, mesh, pick, twist, turn... it literally works for any kind of food except soup (in which case, you can just sip from the bowl directly).

if you ask what i'm driving at with all this utensil talk? i'll say - absolutely nothing. it's just one of those many "so unimportant that nobody wants to listen to me" kind of thoughts, that i figured where better than post it here on my blog? :) if this post was a school essay, i'd probably score 2/100 for content.......

so back to the topic, what is your style - the fork, the spoon, the chopsticks, the ladle, the knife, or the hands??

- read up on the history of eating utensils
- how to use chopsticks
- more on chopsticks I
- more on chopsticks II