Books are such a powerful source of making one drift into a world away from their own! Excerpts from the book “A long way gone….memoirs of a lost soldier” reminded me of the first time I set footage into this country that I now call “Home away from Home” .....USA. Being an adulterated Hindu eating meat, my first experiences in seeking something that would serve as a proper meal was in the cafeteria in my University….which not only edified me with the terminologies related to food and dealing with the servers but also mutated my taste buds to suit the needs and adapt to the “In Rome Eat the Roman” way of dining!
After a survey and confident of having made the right choice for lunch, I decided to go for the “Cheese” burger which I assumed to be nothing but a chunky piece of cheese with a few veggies sandwiched between bread/bun (latter being the Indian way of addressing to bread in a burger) that I would savor with ketchup….alas…that excitement barely lasted for minutes until the first bite when I realized that the devious “cheese” in the burger was nothing but a misnomer and that it actually equated to meat that was consumed like cheese in America while on the contrast was a taboo for the “Hindus” in India…..BEEF!!! That was my first te-a-te with beef ….. an experience beyond words as while chewing, I too felt like a cow ruminating….chewing on heavy and hard fodder….to develop a taste for relishing it!!! My next step in exploring the food world was a term that only I would have understood if I had been the chef …..I always insisted for a “Chicken burger”….now the chicken made sense but what did I mean by burger which is a term used with cheese burger?? Did I mean that I wanted a concoction of chicken and beef on my sandwich or was I confused in knowing what I wanted for lunch? No wonder I received bewildered looks from the servers when I used my own terms….as I would force them to think that they either heard me wrong or I spoke a language that was foreign or I asked for something that they would have to invent for me!!! The minute I would read their faces I would immediately change my choice to a soup or a salad that held the same meaning in all the dictionaries alike. Least did I know that it was supposed to be a “Chicken Sandwich” or a “Cheese Burger” and not a cocktail!!!
Fortunately….soon enough….guidance from people I knew (and didn’t) elevated me to a platform where both the parties – me and the person opposite to me could comprehend each other…. not in sign language but via grammatically correct English....afterall that’s all it takes for Survival of the Fittest!!!