2023 365 Questions: Chopsticks

[smittenbyu]

2023 365 Questions

6 – Chopsticks Day: Can you eat with chopsticks? If yes, how often do you use them?

The first time I heard of chopsticks was in a Chinese restaurant in Paris back in 1989. I still vividly remember that trip. It was my first away from parents trip. A school trip. My parent sent me on the trip to make friends outside a school setting. We had just moved to Rome and I was finding it so difficult. I had such a wonderful time though. While almost all the kids on the trip were living away from home, they were not necessarily living outside their culture (some were Italian born with American, British, other EU country parents), at least not that far removed and had been in school for several years already. Being in a Chinese restaurant though got us all on equal footing. We were all together in a space completely new to us. It was a shared moment together. We had a really fun time. The staff were amazingly patient and showed us how to use chopsticks and also showed how we could practice at home using chopsticks and rubber bands. They let us take a few home. Since, one couldn't really walk into any store and get some.

 

Of course, the chopsticks were forgotten about for the following years. When we moved to Singapore, we learned how to. Because, duh! In Hawai'i as well - everyone Asian or not learns to use them - at least that's what I saw with the locals. So, yes, have been using them for the last few decades. Definitely after moving to the US/NoVA, I am not using them as frequently as I used to - going from several times a week down to possibly every few months. I do insist on getting chopsticks whenever I go to an East Asian place. And have them at home. Kid has her practice chopsticks at home, since she was 5 years old, and brings them out whenever I make any thing East Asian. If you want to keep up with your motor skills and coordination, it's a great practice, while you eat yummy delicious food! ;) She is slowly getting better.

 

My Malaysian friends would tell me that I had the right way to hold them. Their parents would praise me and chastise them for not doing it right! ha! So, the efforts of those staff at that restaurant back in 1989 are to be thanked for as they taught well. Tip: hold one like a pen with all your fingers, except the index finger and only the one on top (?) is the one that moves with the help of the index finger.

Comments

[spiffikins]

I remember when I was quite young - would have been probably 7 or 8 - and my uncle came to visit - he was in the Canadian military and was posted on the base 30 minutes for us for a while - so he would sometimes visit when he had leave. He was my mom's baby brother, many years younger, so she hadn't really grown up with him and she loved having him come over - and he loved it because she managed to treat him as an adult, vs some of his other siblings who still saw him as a child.

But one of those visits, we went out for dinner at "Chan's Kitchen" - the one chinese restaurant in our town. And my uncle very patiently taught me how to use chopsticks. I was so impressed that he KNEW how to do this - he was VERY worldly and regaled us with stories of sleeping under the Eiffel tower and other amazing adventures from his time posted in Germany.

Neither of my parents knew how to use chopsticks - or would ever have thought to attempt it - but I was just old enough to learn and to retain the information. Interestingly - my coworker D who was actually born in Japan (her dad was in the military and they were posted there) - never learned how to use them at all!