A small slice of LIFE!

Wow ... I must say that I have had several food-inspired moments recently and cannot help but write them down. And I want to call it, "a small slice of life" as the singer, Greta Gertler expressed in her latest album - http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=18372424

I have a few Thai friends in DC (well, in America particularly) and one of my favorite friends is Sombat, a middle-aged Thai man who works as a Chef at a Thai restaurant in Falls Church, Virginia.

We met yesterday on his only day off, for a coffee and my first question for him was, "how is the kitchen?" He looked at me with a grim smile, "busy, boring, and tiring."

"Don't you like what you are doing? I am jealous at you, I want to be a chef," I exclaimed and almost scolded him for his answer. Why am I so quick on passing judgement on my friend? Who am I?

Sombat told me that his life is so uninteresting. The routine goes like this - he wakes up, goes to the restaurant, works from late morning till late night, comes home, sleeps, wakes up and starts the routine again, 6 days a week. Being in the kitchen, he cooks the same Pad Thai over and over and over. He makes me believe that his life is so crappy and I should't even start thinking of doing anything like what he is doing.

He asked me, "Don't you enjoy being a director?" His question really made my coffee more bitter than its actual taste. I told him that i was so stressed out with work and that I had reached the point in which I want to do nothing. (Basically, I was overworked and am waiting for a wonderful break).

Sombat told me that I don't want to work like him, on labor-intensive tasks, with no thinking required. I don't want to work 12 hours a day, 6 days a week, standing in the kitchen, cooking all the time. Even though I could cook and eat any Thai food that I crave, it would not be the core of a balanced life.

He concluded that we need a happy medium, that we need to be with family, enjoy a balance of work, live in a warmer place, and have enough independence to live life the way we want to. He kept telling me, "This is America, not Thailand, and this is not my home." I agreed with him but I am also trying to live in the present. Life is already tough enough, so if I add too much worries it won't help things.

We imagine that other people seem to have a better/richer and/or healthier life than we have, and in fact everyone faces their own struggles.

An hour passed and I had so much fun exchanging viewpoints, and arguing with Sombat, that we concluded two things: he doesn't want to be a director and I don't (think) that I want to be a chef. We will go back to what we are doing and try to find a happy medium, a well-balanced life, and we will reevaluate again whether this is something for real or just another slice.

A small slice of life in which we see each piece's deliciousness. The art of chewing is the key.

TAN