介绍:
Xiaohua：The dinner table is more than a place to sit down and enjoy food. It’s also a social place. Business deals are inked there. Strangers become lovers there. But what if you abandon the social function of a meal by eating alone? Recently, a New Yorker article talks about the rising number of people in China who eat alone or cook alone, and are enjoying it. First, do you think that it is becoming sort of a more commonly seen thing?
Heyang：Yeah, I think it’s something that’s becoming a bit more popular and I think it is breaking through some of the existing social stigma of one person dining outside. It used to be frowned upon, maybe more or less, but not that much anymore.
John: Yeah, I mean I disagree with the term “popular,” because popular implies that everyone thinks it’s a good thing. And so I think when we talk about something is popular, I don’t think eating alone is popular. I don’t think that most people in China think that eating alone is a good thing. I think we see happening more often, mostly because of various commitments to your time mostly. And lots of people don’t have the time after work or on the weekend or wherever you are going to from A to B, to actually make a plan to sit down with someone. No, I need to eat something now, so I can go do what I need to do.
Heyang：Well, actually, I think I see a different kind of interpretation of what’s going on or whether you call this a trend or not. I think it’s actually sort of popular and I think the negative perception of it has changed in China, maybe not in a wide scale. But certainly in certain groups, it’s sort of like a cool thing to do. It shows that you are confident enough and it shows that often you actually have the taste to go to a pretty nice restaurant, and you are enjoying the food yourself. You could be nicely dressed or just decently dressed, and just you are enjoying that food. It’s a relationship between you and the food.
John: Sounds so depressing.
Heyang：No, hell no! It’s a healing process.
Xiaohua：It’s empowering, food is empowering.
Heyang：Well, I think it’s just, it’s a greatest experience. You can actually focus on the food and that healing process for some people. OK, John, you married a guy, you don’t understand this.
Xiaohua：OK, have you guys ever eaten alone in a good up-scale restaurant? You know, something more than a fast food chain.
Heyang：I have, I have.
John：No, no.
Xiaohua：I have, too.
John: Why?
Heyang：And it was sort of like, I mean you are an independent young women who has the money and the taste.
Xiaohua：John’s not. I thought you’re conversing to him.
John：She’s addressing the audience.
Xiaohua：Yeah, sorry.
John：But I think we have some men in the audience though.
Heyang：Yeah, well, OK, so you are just having that intimate relationship with the food and it doesn’t really matter what other people think or…
John：But the food is an inanimate object. It’s something to be consumed. You cannot have a conversation with food. You cannot order five dishes, and then share your food with someone else. Oh, this is really good. I’d like his because of this. I don’t like this because of this. I mean I understand, like I eat alone all the time. As you guys probably know for lunch. I almost always go alone.
Heyang：Yes…excuse me.
Xiaohua：Not an up-scale restaurant though.
John：Not up-scale restaurants, you know, Xiabu Xiabu is kind of…
Xiaohua: It’s not up-scale. Anyway.
John: Anyway, so I think that, you know when I was a single and in the university, you know, after graduated and I was working by myself and working in a job, I’d eat by myself all the time. Yes, I did enjoy it, but I think that in most of those cases, it was just something to do quickly and get it over with. And really now, I mean I view it very much in having a relationship with someone whether it’s a friend, whether it’s your spouse, your kids, or whatever. It’s sharing the food, sharing a healing, as you said, a nourishing thing, that’s really important.
Heyang: That’s one type of way to dine, but there’s a completely different type. Previously, when you were, you know, single, you would just make it a fast food kind of experience. That’s not really an experience of FOOD. Here we are talking about. You take the time, you relax and you really enjoy the food. And why is it a conversation, it’s sort of a conversation in your mind, that you can really feel the food on your palate, and think about that and you enjoy that. And that’s perfectly fine. I think it makes me feel really good.
Xiaohua: Yeah.
Heyang: And you are sort of dating the city. I don’t really see why there’s the negative feelings about like going out to a nice restaurant on your own.
John: I don’t feel negative about it. I just don’t see the point. All you said that I get it, I understand why you are saying that. None of it applies to me.
Heyang: Because you have a family, and when you don’t have other…
John: No, it doesn’t. Because I would never, even without a family, I would never go to a nice restaurant by myself.
Heyang: OK, well, here I’d like to quote a little bit from this really popular Japanese TV drama called “孤独的美食家”, The Lonely Gourmand. So, it basically tells you that when you are having the food alone, it’s free from the constraint of time and society views. And one fills le appetite with happiness and in that brief moment as you are enjoying the food, one’s heart and mind is set free. And that intimate moment is what I cherish so much.
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