My eating habits...
have been subject to a heated debate. Here is an excerpt of an email conversation B$ and I had a little while ago. Just to get things clear: I am not concerned about my weight in any sense. But sometimes I am worried about the impression people might get when I start, continue and don't stop eating.
Now, here's is one eloquent observation. Enjoy...
"(...) As for your eating habits, its not the actual amount you consume, but how self-reflective and vocal you are while eating, whether its at the beginning of the meal, when you occasionally get this wistful look and declare "I love it" so matter of factly, or when, in the middle of the meal, when you stop, almost in shock, and say (almost apologetically)"I should stop, but I can't," or at the end of the meal, when you look aggressively at me and declare "I eat more than you" as though you had a bigger ... ah, err ... appetite than me. Frankly, I don't think you actually eat more than me, but about the same, which, considering you are about 1/2 of my weight, is impressive nonetheless. I am a more quiet eater, appreciating the food in a more spiritual, meditative way, and hence it only seems to the louder eater (i.e. you) that I may be eating less. Believe me, we are equally big eaters, you and I. (...)".
posted by Özlem @ Wednesday, July 26, 2006
2 Comments:
Remarkably, my relationship with Ozlem has very much been centered on food, from our somewhat inauspicious start sipping traditional Korean oxbone soup after a long night of partying (which may have been somewhat too authentic for our little Oz) to our subsequent meals sharing, amongst other things, oysters, escargots, dumplings, chicken feet, bastilla, falafel, spring rolls, the entire menu at a place called Maia, etc. Her range of appreciation, from the lofty 5 star preparations of New York’s own Balthazars to the more proletarian and popular tastes of the more global “Taco Bell” indicate that she is not your typical food snob, but rather, a genuine lover of food – a gourmand of the highest order, if you will. Perhaps the description in her blog does not quite do justice to the spiritual connection that Ozlem experiences in her appreciation of new foods. Take, for example, her first oyster experience – Ozlem of course, first proceeded with caution, eyeing the raw shell and its contents with a mixture of curiosity and trepidation. A slow, building of interest ensues, as she gently squeezes the lemon over the oyster and inhaled the scent of the citrus mixed with the shell. And then raising the shell to her lips, quickly swallowed the oyster whole. As it sits in her mouth, she first, takes a slight, imperceptible taste, couple with a further boldness leading to a fuller experience: her eyes widen as the flavor bursts in her mouth. “Its good!” she says, and nods her approval – her judgment is final. The “Oyster” has been accepted. Were there 20 more oysters at the table, she likely would have had them all, savoring each one individually as its own experience.
I would suggest that Ozlem’s appreciation of food has been captured in the poetry of haiku master Masaoka Shiki’s most famous Haiku:
Eating a persimmon
From Horyuji Temple
Bell's resonance
Indeed.
I would just like to say that we should all be as passionate about food as Ozlem is...it is quite an endearing experience...clearly, it is one of the reasons we bonded :-)
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