上班族必備軟實力

*Richard has a lot of experience eating.

One cannot eat Chinese food with a knife and fork, nor can a person eat Chinese soup with a spoon. It just simply won’t taste right (and people will laugh at you). You eat Chinese food with chopsticks, and you cannot eat Chinese soup; you must drink it.

You can use your hands, and you can drink from the bowl. The first time I got one of those rice triangles, I peeled it. I thought it was covered in black paper, but it is seaweed that you are supposed to eat. I should have asked someone how to eat this kind of food. Instead I just ended up looking foolish.

Chopsticks are not that hard to use. All you need to do is look at what other people are doing and copy them. (Except the children, they just stab stuff with them.) The sticks nestle on the soft place between the thumb and pointer finger. Then all you need to do is find a way to make them open and close by manipulating your other fingers. It just takes practice.

Once you know how to use chopsticks, you may think that you know enough to eat anything, but there are some finer points that you may or may not know about.

When you get a big bowl of beef noodles, you will be given a pair of chopsticks and a oversized spoon that looks like a small, short-handled ladle. Since long, wet, and slippery noodles are almost impossible to pick up with chopsticks, you are supposed to lift up a few with the chopsticks lay them into the spoon, and eat them. This can take quite a while, so you may also lift some noodles with the chopstick and then slurp them into your mouth. It is also acceptable to drink the soup directly from the bowl by lifting and tilting it with your two hands.

Peking Duck is wrapped. Noodles are slick.

Peking Duck. You will have a round crepe, that looks like a tortilla, some celery sticks, onion sprigs, a brown sauce, and the cooked and sliced duck. Place the duck, onion, and celery on the crepe and put some of the brown sauce on it. Some people use the celery to scoop up sauce and paint it on the duck. Fold the crepe and eat with your hands. It’s kind of like a soft taco.

So, people of Taiwan, don’t laugh too hard at the foreigner who is struggling with their Chinese meal, and don’t start yelling across the restaurant about how somebody needs to find a fork somewhere. Just be patient and helpful and we’ll all get through it. Thank you for reading.

【作者介紹】

Richard 是一位台灣女婿，在台灣生活15年，喜愛台灣文化，以風趣幽默的文筆，細膩獨特的觀點，介紹在台灣生活的趣事，一起跟著Richard探訪外國人的台灣世界吧！