I just got back from a lovely lunch of my beloved pho xao (pho with fried noodles, which is actually a plate of smoky fried noodles stir-fried with lots of greens, onions, garlic and a little beef. It comes with a cup of savory beef broth on the side.) On the way home, desiring a bit of the sweet, I purchased a greasy banana fritter to munch as I strolled. Like fish and chips in the UK, the fritters come wrapped in paper to keep the grease off your hands. Usually, it's squares of newspaper, but this time it was neatly-trimmed notebook paper, one side of which had someone's carefully-written algebra homework on it.
Truly nothing is wasted here.
P.
3 comments:
I think that we tend to think of the way we do things as some sort of Platonic ideal and everything else is in a continuum of debasement. Then we go to Asia and that whole theory is blown out of the water.
No wonder we use 30% of the world's resources.
Steve - I've always considered myself to be very open to and accepting of other cultures. However, traveling in a country and living in one for an extended period of time is a vastly different experience. Until now, I didn't realize how US-centric I'd been. The 'continuum of debasement' is a real eye-opener.
When I lived in Korea, I got involved in trying to get the Korean farmers to improve their water. The wells were usually near the fields - which were fertilized with human shit from what we called honey buckets - and the darker water was considered better. Anyway, we thought the wells transmitted TB and hepatitus and we thought the Korean were unbelievably stupid for using them.
We all smoked - which, even then, we all knew was unhealthy - but smoking seemed OK while drinking the water was stupid.
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