DANCES WITH CHICKENS

Sometimes you wonder what your fellow white (or black) barbarians are thinking. For instance, why are there Japanese lanterns for festivals that have at least a modicum or religious or spiritual content hanging behind the loudly partying big breasted slags? Lanterns that say "conducting (or 'managing') sacrificial rituals" (御祭禮 'ngaa jai lai').

And then you remember. They're there because they look colourful.
It's more or less a form of cultural appropriation.
Like cooking "Orange Chicken".

I myself have never cooked "Orange Chicken", which I have been told is the most popular Chinese dish in the United States -- a status it shares with General Tso's Chicken, another dish I have never prepared -- but I have certainly committed sheer tonnes of cultural appropriation. Steamed pork patty with dried fish (咸魚蒸肉餅 'haam yü jing yiuk beng'), or salt fish and chicken fried rice (鹹魚雞粒炒飯 'haam yü gai naap chaau faan'). As well as congee (粥 'juk'). And Wonton (雲吞 'wan tan'). It just strikes me that if you like eating it, you should know how to make it. Just in case you are stuck in Kansas, surrounded by miles and miles of trailer parks, wilderness, fierce howling bears, and folks who resemble Honey Boo Boo.


That is probably why my apartment mate, who is a Cantonese American person, knows how to do chopped liver (gehakte leber), brisket, several delicious Indonesian dishes, plus some French stuff; we're surrounded by miles and miles of non-Jews and non-Netherlanders.

And, during the tourist season, folks who look like Honey Boo Boo.


I think I actually did have 'Orange Chicken" once. It was during that period when the company was being sold to the Canadians, preparatory to which we had relocated the office from downtown San Francisco to a ghastly lean-to in the wilds of Fremont. Because that office park had few lunch options, we often had food delivered, organized and chosen by management.
One day we had "Chinese Food" from Panda Express.


I work in Marin now. There's a Panda Express roughly a mile away.
I have never been tempted by "Orange Chicken".

I live in San Francisco.
We've got food.




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