Food for thought

Good food. One of the necessities in life for me. Although I don't belong to the category of "Live to Eat", I am definitely a connoisseur of good food and a critic of not so good food. What I eat does matter to me. When I land up in a some distant relative's place ( as in.. a brother of the cousin of my aunt's husband's sister's husband ) I tend to get very circumspect about food. "Oh..please God..let the curry taste the same as the one cooked by Mom back home" is usually my first reaction when food is served on my plate. Back home at the dinner table, the situation is different. Eating is more a mechnical process devoid of any thought since I know that I will like the food.

Girls and food. This is an interesting combination. The amount of food consumed by a girl ( of age 13-30) has often left me bewildered.( Let me not generalize say most of the girls most of the times..). One of my friends who was supposed to be "very hungry" gets full after eating a mere two rotis. And it's not just her.. I have seen most of my cousins do this. To put it straight in the Hyderabad lingo , "Ladki Khana aisa kha ti hain jaise uspe "aisaan" kar rahi ho" ( girls eat food as if they are bestowing a great favor on the food particle by consuming it).

Hey .. I am eating you. You know ...such a big favor. Don't you have any courtesy . Why don't you blush like the boy next door!!! This is what a girl seems to say. Watch a girl playing around with two rotis in her plate for hours together and you will more than agree with my thoughts.

Hostel life makes one adapt to the "just about eatable" kind of food. One gets to see different kind of "eaters" in the hostel. Cribs about the quality of food is a daily phenomenon. There a few however who gobble just about any kind of food. While the rest just wait for the meal to get over, the glutton seems to look at the "morsel of food" and say " What the heck will you do? No matter what..no matter how you taste... I will eat you.". Gulp..goes the food down his intestine. Ahem.. spare a " thought for the food".

8:30 am . 1:00 pm. 8:30 pm. What are these? In the same hostel, I came across a few souls who just did not care about the quality of food. The timings mentioned are the times in day a where you will find these souls in the mess.( Unless held up by a critical assignment or project). The quality of food just doesn't seem to make any difference to them. For them "you eat to survive" and " you survive when you eat food irrespective of its taste. They have this "monk" kind of attitude. There was one occasion when the breakfast was horrible and there was a monk sitting next to me.

"How does the food taste?" I asked, expecting him to join me in the crib.

His face did not betray the slightest of emotions.

"It is normal, just like it is everyday. It tastes like food", he replied.

I was stumped!!!