Dining Horror!

I was watching a cute song from Little Mermaid the other day- in which Ariel, the mermaid is struggling to learn dining etiquette to be a princess. She innocently picks up a fork and brushes her hair in the dining table! This took me down the memory lane and I remembered experiences that I had, just like Ariel.

When I think fork and knives, there is one painful incident that is ingrained in my mind. I still cringe with embarrassment when I think of it... And being embarrassed is one of the most painful things a human can go through…Yes, even more painful than a broken heart!

This incident happened around seven years ago. My relatives had come to our place in Mumbai, and we were all invited to dinner at Cricket Club of India. I was cricket-crazy at that point in my life and was very excited at the prospect of eating at the CCI and was already imagining the expression on my friends faces when I would tell them. Little did I know that this experience would be a disaster which would haunt me for years to come!

We reached CCI around 7 PM, where we met some more families. All were new to me. Once there, the “youth” took one table, and the “not so youth” took the other.

Our table decided to order Chinese food, and I was pretty excited by that (well I was just 17, and Chinese food was enough to excite me!!). I gave my ok to Spring Rolls and Vegetable Hakka Noodles. I was pretty uncomfortable surrounded by new people, the only known person being my cousin- who was not sitting next to me (apparently out of decency to other guests… he knew his etiquette pretty well!). Etiquette dictates that conversing with everyone is very important (of course I didn’t know that). My extent of small talk was answering questions shot at me from both sides.
The lady on my right asked “So, what do you intend to do next?” I had just finished my 12^th standard exam. I always think it is dangerous to meet people at this stage of life. They all start giving ideas.

“I will mostly do my engineering” I replied politely.

“Oh from where”

“From Mumbai itself” I said. I could guess where this would go.

“Oh ok. Not trying for IIT?”

“Nope.” I answered monosyllabically hoping she would stop the interrogation. She didn’t.

“You should have. I have a cousin who did his engineering from IIT and then did his MS from MIT on full scholarship….” I tuned off at this time and just nodded politely. She soon finished with me and moved to others in the table. I relapsed to a happy silence. Things can get quite uncomfortable at a dinner table for a quiet person (though I like to think of myself as just an excessively and abnormally good listener!!). My silence was suddenly noticed and everyone pounced on me and told me to talk! I cursed them mentally but outwardly smiled and said I was listening. I then went back to anticipating the food.
The food came and I happily took one spring roll. I picked it up with my hand… and then happened to glance around. To my horror, all picked up their fork and knife and started cutting and eating the spring roll expertly. I glanced at the other table- the older gang was much more casual and chilled out- they were eating with their hands. But our table had pompous people who were eating with cutlery. I calmed myself and bravely picked up the knife and fork. I started cutting the roll- the knife went through quite easily. So far so good. I pulled the piece with the fork- but the bottom half was still not severed and wouldn’t come off. I put in more force- the knife was making grating noises against the plate. I broke into a cold sweat. I used all my force and managed to pull it off and happily put ten minutes of effort into my mouth. I was already dreading the next bite- but it had to be done. I started the whole exercise again, a bit more confident this time. I started cutting again- but this part of it seemed a bit hard. From previous experience, I knew force helped. I applied it- but to my acute embarrassment the piece came off suddenly and fell outside the plate. I very quickly put it back on plate and sheepishly glanced around to check. My cousin was looking at me as if I was crazy.

There was one more piece of the roll left on my plate. Ideally, I knew I should cut it again. But I had no energy left for that. I quickly poked my fork into the entire thing and stuffed it into my mouth. The lady next to me chose that moment to ask me if I wanted one more roll.

I could obviously not reply due to my full mouth. She looked at me as if she wanted to tell me to join a finishing school instead of engineering. I wished I could evaporate.
Next came the noodles­- I was slightly confident about this one, as there was no cutting to be done. I mean, how hard can picking up noodles be? I found out- It was indeed simple to pick up noodles with a fork. But extremely tough to keep it there! It was so slippery- and kept falling back on the plate. I was mortified. I discreetly used my hands once or twice, before wisely deciding not to eat anymore. The CCI experience in a nutshell, was a fiasco.
That was seven years ago. Cutlery no longer scares me- though I still find it illogical at times. I mean, why would I use a knife to cut hara bhara kabab, when I have a hand and a good set of teeth? It takes the whole fun out of eating! But, I have accepted it as a necessary evil – and am on the way to becoming a princess soon!