Ginormous Little Things

The other day, I was eating.

It was in the central market foodcourt – I had in front of my a plate of Mee Hun from a little thai stand, and plate of Mango Rice from a Malaccan place. In terms of cutlery, the norm here is Fork and Spoon. Now, initially this just struck me as odd, being so used to the Fork and Knife entanglement of everyday western life. Nevertheless, it took no time to get over it, and I soon felt like a “pro” eating cutting meals with a spoon like it was nobody’s business. However, as I ate my Mango rice in the Central Market foodcourt, I had a huge paradigm shift (okay, maybe a little exaggerated? I can’t tell). As I used my spoon in my right hand to push the rice onto the fork in my left, somewhere in my head, I presupposed that fork and spoon technique was so limited in its possibilities that I just had to be doing the right thing. But alas! Something was wrong. Dead wrong. As I ate, I could feel a perplexed and curious stare from the other side of the table. Apsara, who has lived her whole life in Malaysia, was watching me eat the rice with an amused look. I asked what was so funny, and she explained that I was using my fork and spoon the complete opposite of everyone else. i.e. Its only common sense to hold your fork in your right hand (or left, if you are right handed) and use it to push rice onto your spoon in your other hand . For some reason this just seemed wrong, but I realized that it did make perfect sense – spoons are much more efficient for that kind of thing. Needless to say I quickly and shiftily glanced around to make sure no one was watching, and switched my fork and spoon. A disaster was averted, and a life changed forever.

(Totally not the food I'm referring to but the picture has a fork and a spoon in it! Unnecessary? Perhaps...)