Chapter 11: Ancient story about the perspective on food

I’ve always been fascinated about the experiences that older people have earned through life. Just as a computer records, they just spit out facts when you least expect it. Every old man has experienced at least one thing to talk further, think if you were to add up all old people experiences in one place. We would not even need any history teacher. As my relationship with food is very special, I realized, when I heard my grandmother’s stories about her childhood, that I really ought to appreciate that there is food to come by today, compared with her time…

My grandmother was six years old. She sat in the kitchen and examined her mother, who stood and greeted guests in their kitchens. It was a typical Asian summer day with the sickening air and many humid degrees. Because her little sister was born neighbors came to visit with different gifts to show their friendship in a polite way for her mother. It was during World War II. It was in an Asian country where war would not hit as hard but still did well to know. A small country that had so much power in addition to the rest of the world.

To show reverence by giving a chicken as a gift was not unusual. So my grandmother’s mother got a hen as a gift by a man who lived nearby, but because she thought this was too much, she wanted to bid again. She immediately asked if he wanted something to eat, suggested omelet, which he gratefully accepted. My grandmother’s father was out on an errand but would come back in at any second. While grandmother’s mother fried omelette in the pan suddenly the air alarm went off. Soon after, the first bomb fell.

My grandmother knew immediately what she would do. She gathered her two small brothers, and gathered food and water in a bag. She hastily threw a big quilted jacket over her little newborn sister’s body. The bombs fell, the house broke and people were screaming. Grandma grabbed the cover jacket, not knowing if her sister were included in the pile and ran as fast as she could into the other side f the street with his brothers shortly behind. The neighbor’s bunker was small, but many were held in it. The neighbor himself was not there. They were many who crowded into the dark bunker. People from the street, their children and their grandparents. My grandmother saw her mother come just before the door was shut. Outside, they heard a man and woman yelling and banging on the bunker door. But it was too late, there was no place. Desperation and fear were heard in their voices, but there was nothing to do.

A bomb fell just outside. My grandmother believed that the couple did not survive. Part of the roof fell in, shrapnel fell into the bunker. They were in a dead-end where no one would make it if they didn’t come out from the bunker. Everyone understood it, but when they tried to open the door, they discovered that there was something in the way on the other side of it, two dead bodies and some concrete residue. Suddenly it became a battle of life and death. To push open a door to save their lives just to face a war. The shrapnel glowed orange and yellow. At any moment it could explode. Gentle movements. Slightest misstep and everyone was wiped out. Dead.

A glimpse of daylight reached in and a moment later the door was the tiniest open. Just to fit a small child.

– Run! Save yourselves. Hide! Screamed Grandma’s mother to the children that would fit into the slot. If we survive this, we will find each other. Go to first relatives or acquaintances and stay there!
Grandma grabbed her two brothers in one hand and the bundle with her sister in the other hand and pressed out. She ran. She ran as the smoke became denser and denser. While the bombs fell near or far from her. It was chaos. People everywhere who ran in all directions.But my grandmother had one goal in mind, the river.

The gray-brown river flowed on as usual, totally unaffected by what happened on the mainland. The boats were moored along the rickety bridge. Grandma knew what she would do. She jumped into one of the boats and hid in it. She discovered that her brothers were not with her. Panic, fear and sadness ran through her body. Then she calmed herself by thinking that if they survived, they would be reunited. Her little sister was crying. She tried to comfort her, but it was not easy. In a dirty, cold boat while their city was bombed down right in front of her. She thought of her mother and her father. Wished they could do it and that all would soon be reunited. Until then, she held out. And waited. Soon it would be over, soon, soon …

Days after the incident, it was difficult to get food. In this regime, it was also forbidden to do private businesses by selling food. But since there was nothing else to do people had to buy it illegally, since all the shops were shut down. A boy in the neighborhood was sent to a farm in the village to buy eggs, pork and rice. Because if the police saw him, they would probably not give a thought to that he did anything illegal. But unfortunately, on the way home, the boy passed two police officers. No one had told him how illegal it was, so without knowing anything he swung the brown bag back and forth in his hand on the way home.
– What’s in the bag? the police officer asked.
– Food, the boy said proudly. I’m out on an errand for my parents.
– Where did you get this? Asked the police to him. And what’s your parents’ names?
– From the gentleman on the farm over there, he replied. But you need to hurry because it’s almost nothing left!
Then he gave the name of his parents and walked home. What he didn’t know was that the man on the farm was murdered and that his parents were about to be imprisoned for the crimes they committed.

The meaning of needing food has never falling me in mind, but after hearing this story it made me realize how much someone can go to get food. This period of my grandmother’s life has led her to always be thrifty with the food, and always be assured that everybody else at the table has gotten food on their plates before she served herself. I can’t help but feel ashamed at how ungrateful I am by what I have. I’ve never understood how it feels to not have access to food, instead I choose to ignore it and throw away what I have.