When I was an undergraduate, our university operated on a semester basis, and required all lower-classmen to take a course during the Interim month of January. As the courses offered during that period were designed in part as a testing ground for future standard semester courses (‘experimental’), in part as cram-courses for catching up a missed class in compressed time or as courses that otherwise didn’t fit into the typical academic demands of a semester or involved travel, they tended to be highly desirable classes anyway, and I opted to continue my Interim studies during all four years of my undergrad education. It came in very handy in my senior year after I’d taken a whole semester of the previous year to travel in Europe (non-academically, but spending my school funds all the same) and really needed to finish school in 3-1/2 years rather than the full four to compensate.
But the real benefit of the system was that I got to take a delightful course somewhat off the beaten path of my degree each January. One year, it was ‘Chinese Conversation, Culture and Cuisine‘–a supremely entertaining class team-taught by two brilliant New York Jews and their Chinese grad student (the team in itself a refreshment in the midst of a perfectly fine ‘white-bread’ west coast Lutheran uni education). Two days a week, one or the other of our professors would lecture on Chinese history and culture, slipping in lots of anecdotal hijinks from their respective times studying in China; one day was a practicum devoted to classic Chinese cookery, and was needless to say the day of perpetual perfect attendance for and by all in that class, given how hungry undergraduates always are for good food; and one day was spent focusing on the development of Chinese written and spoken languages, with some rudimentary training in making Mandarin-like sounds and practicing the beautiful strokes of character calligraphy to accompany what the sounds should, at least, have meant, though I’ve no doubt that what we actually said translated as something much more in the comical-infant-to-international-crisis-causing range. One of the few things that’s stuck with me for all of the intervening years was learning that the proper greeting was not Howdy or Hey, Baby, but Have you eaten rice today? And of course, that is heart and soul of compassion and hospitality in any culture or language. Would that we all might operate more fully on the basis of that concern.
All of this wisdom aside, I guess it’s hardly rare for anyone as food-obsessed as I am to generally forget to eat once in a while. Here it is already 18.00 hours and I haven’t eaten more than a handful of pistachios. And those, not recently. Tasty though they were, I imagine I might not be just dreaming that I could enjoy a slightly more substantial repast before long. But sometimes I think a little semi-fasting is not a bad thing, because it may, for example, begin to ameliorate any damage done to my innards, and any, erm, expansive qualities reflecting that internal damage in my out-ards, over certain recent holidays by a slightly over-enthusiastic or exaggerated sense of my capacious personage’s actual dietary needs. Also because, being frank here (though I generally prefer the name Frances/is, should anyone ask), a short period of partial abstemiousness only serves to enhance the pleasures of the simplest foods.
And that’s what I’ll have today: the simplest. A little fridge-cleaning bite while paused from a somewhat overweening stack-up of household chores left too long undone, messes unattended. But I can’t say that I’ve any objections at all to a little truly simple food goodness, so I shall indulge in that momentarily. I’ll leave you with some verses to chew upon until my return on the morrow. Bon appetit! Or as we say in my family, Vær så god. That’s far more appetizing, I’m sure, than what I would have said in Chinese, no matter how good my intentions.
Art-Colored Glasses 
I also took that class and LOVED it….it enabled me to learn to make a mean Mongolian Beef…sublime. Hmmm…haven’t made it for a loooonnnggg time; perhaps I should dig out the wok. Also learned a few Chinese phrases that have helped me connect with Chinese folks from time to time, mostly at restaurants. (wo hao xie xie!) It also taught me to be very careful with the way you say the word “ma” in Chinese. Just a different inflection changes the meaning from mother to horse to some awful expletive. Yikes.
I hope you had a nice dinner, gourmet or otherwise…I also must go make dinner…just an easy sandwich tonight, no exotic foods this time. Bon appetit and adieu! Cheers, Gracie 🙂
PS My son’s middle name is Francis, btw!
Gracie, my love, you just have such outstanding taste! Did I already tell you that if I’d been a boy I was going to be Thomas? Such a good name!! And then to put Francis with it. So cool.
Dinner was nice and simple. I’d been brewing beef bone broth since yesterday, so I took a bowl of the freshly strained broth and stirred in egg, Greek yogurt and a little Parmesan, and it was very comforting. 🙂
I’d forgotten you took that class too! So fun. And yes, I remember the whole tonal danger thing about “ma”. Oh boy! I was also remembering Dr. Guldin telling us about when he’d told his teacher he had to hurry off “to the library to chop trees” and they couldn’t quite make sense of each other. Heck, I have that problem in English still!
Hope your year is starting off beautifully, my sweet!
Kathryn my dear!
Well….you could add names to yourself a la Latin American people of my ancestry do….loooonnnngggg names….ok, how’s about Kathryn Ingrid Tomasina Francis Wold Sparks??? I like the sound of that! 🙂
Mmmm…your foodie Tuesday simple meal sounded yummy. You are ever artistic even in simplicity, my dear! We just had chicken/veggie sandwiches and sweet potato fries over here. (baked)
Dr. Guldin was the best…very fascinating class…one of the best of my college years.
Happy New Year to you and your sweetheart….and don’t forget to watch the way you inflect Ma!! 🙂
Cheers, Gracie 🙂
I had my rice today, thank you, and I love especially Children Gardening. Always a yummy pleasure to visit you on Tuesday -:)
I had to use some of those great fruit and vegetable names! So many cool and silly sounding things out there. 🙂 Thanks for coming by for a nosh!
For a moment, just a fraction of a second, I thought the verses described what you were about to have for dinner.. I had a good chuckle imagining you with a corndog and two raisins:) It is good to feel hungry once in a while (a good friend said this once) and on occasion, a fraction of an occasion, I allow myself to feel hungry. But never… never have I forgotten to eat. I am in awe…
Considering the sort of calendar you keep, I think it’s a miracle you’d remember *any* meals, unless perhaps one of the many you seem to be fixing for everybody else!
The “menu” isn’t *too* far off a past reality, from when my older sister was a little put out that she was assigned dinner duty in Mom and Dad’s absence on a day when she was already pretty busy, so she threatened to feed the rest of us a “balanced meal” of Weenies and Raisins. I think we probably all opted to pitch in a bit on that note, though knowing the four of us, I wouldn’t be shocked if it turned out that both hotdogs and raisins made it to the final plating! We were nothing if not goofy kids. 🙂
Ah! Now this is a young foodie. Even at a mere 4 years of age, he returned to place the sprig of dill, exhibiting an understanding of what many of us learned much later in life. It’s all about the presentation. Kinda like the way you presented these 3 pieces of verse. 🙂
🙂
Those are my first showing here of some of the multitudinous book pages I’ve laid out for maybe-someday-possibly publication. I design them all as two-page layouts, so these are all halves of sets. But you can get the idea, I think, from them.
Chinese Conversation, Culture and Cuisine is a very interesting class, if we had that in University I would easily enroll on it. I like how colorful Chinese culture is, everything have a special story from food, to simple things at home.
Every culture has such fascinating twists and turns and so much richness, if we just dig in! I agree, China is absolutely one of the richest treasure troves, and has been for thousands of years!
Oh I wish I’d had that kind of class when I was at university!
Lovely images and words, so clever to present them like that!
I just wish I’d paid better *attention* in most of my uni classes!
The presentation is from the large collection I have of my images and texts set up as book pages for maybe-sometime. 🙂
I love the children gardening one, how can i get just that onto the GARDENING FB page !, it is a lovely image and message! very immediate! c
Can’t say I’m surprised that you would be attracted to *that* one! 🙂 If you’d really like to share it, I can think of a couple possible ways: click on the image and then drag and drop the full-sized version to your desktop, if you can–or just post a link to this post on your FB page. I’d love to have it in that place if you approve!
Love all the poems, especially the title of the second (hehehe). The first thing my eldest “cooked” for me was a bowl of Cheerios 🙂 More children should learn to cook and garden early in their little lives before the technology world grabs them and takes them away from nature.
Cheerios: one of my favorite recipes too. 🙂 Yes, you and Celi share my sense of urgency that kids ought to be given the wealth of the kitchen and garden as early and quickly as we hand them other toys and pursuits!
You wrote: “Have you eaten rice today? And of course, that is heart and soul of compassion and hospitality in any culture or language. Would that we all might operate more fully on the basis of that concern.”
I so love that Kathryn. So love it Kathryn that it makes me cry. (Hopefully I’ll be one of the latter ones to comment on this so that I don’t fully reveal what a mush-hearted woman I am.) I could go all serious here, but will resist. Just – thank you for another lovely post.
You’re far too kind, but then that’s the way mush-hearted people are, no? I will admit to being somewhat S’mores-like myself: a crusty exterior, maybe, but inside I’m kind of sticky-sweet and squishy. (Not to mention always needing to have a bit of chocolate in me.) 😉 Seriously, Antoinette, I am very glad you found something here that spoke to you. 🙂
Thank you, KI, for another delicious repast alla imagination, except for the corn dog and two raisins, not much of a combination. Tee! Hee!
Yes, It’s three raisins or the deal’s off for me!! Hee-hee-wheeeee! 😉
I am going to keep this one very simple: I am not biting ANYTHING in Bite This! ♥
I think I might *want* to eat improperly-prepared fugu if forced to try lutefisk again, myself!
I think you might have me on that one – lutefisk is the DEVIL!
All the same, I venerate lutefisk as the potential catalyst for world peace: if someone just loaded up a bunch of missiles with lutefisk it seems to me we’d have the all-time perfect weapon of deterrence for pretty much any outrageous evildoing anyone might have in mind, as long as you give ’em just a hint of what they’re really up against. 😀
This post is a lovely melange of words and images. Hopefully they will get published in book from one day. 😉
Never say never! 😉