A motto I always keep in mind is a man’s basic need is no more
than three meals a day and a bed. Needless
to say bowls are dear to me just as dishes dear to westerners. I almost eat
everything with bowls. Even at leisure. I once wrote in a miniblog:“I watch TV
with 2 bowls on hand for melon seeds & husks, a Greek silver bowl & a
Turkish copper one. Though both country’s in feud with each other, both bowls
stay together with me like twins in front of the screen.”

Bowls dear to me, many of my posts are bowl related, for instance, “Porridge
too hot, I drank it with soy milk. I slowly picked up the bowl with two hands
when suddenly: ‘Morning, Mr. Liu!’ I had to put it down to respond,(it tumbled on the plate. Thankfully
the bowl is made of steel.) Greetings can be a disturbance.” Another time in Liu
Changxing Restaurant, a man asked for a bowl of porridge. The answered was “only
two bowls left, both or nothing.” I then came up to say I could have the other
one when the man had disappeared.

To me there is business in bowls. An example, “ Back home from lunch, wife
told me: ‘Tangbao didn’t rise, still 6 Yuan a portion, but tofu-jelly is up 1 Yuan
and so is wonton, No idea of the others from the menu.’ I commented: ‘At a
tangbao restaurant, eaters may leave with a bowl of tofu-jelly, or a bowl of
wonton, you don’t expect them to leave with just a few meat dumplings, do you?’” (Wonton is complimentary to Tangbao.) Like a barbershop, restaurant can be a source
of information, here from a bowl of noodle at a Zhenjiang Noodle shop: “While
eating, I heard a loud voice:‘Noodle！’No need to say more. ‘I’ll ask (inquire) for
you,’ she told a shop helper, ‘They do need hand, but (since) the shop’s there.
It pays more, over2000(Yuan),’she said aloud while eating.” Sometimes comparisons
are easy to make: A bowl of vegetable & egg noodle cost 8 Yuan in both
nearby noodle shops, I prefer one of them. …

A bowl itself can be food for thought. “Three empty bowls
are on the table. Daughter: ‘Mom is out to buy something for the lunch.’ ‘Do
you ever see birds back in nest with food shared with babies? That’s what human differs from animals.’”
The most recent bowl analogy is a miniblog this week: “Breakfast
at canteen. Admiring colored bowl in Z’s hand, I: ‘Nice
bowl for begging!’ Soon spinach brought out, eaters pounced on it. Z: ‘Why not
get some?’ I: ‘Begging to me is a once for all business.’” Many things are irreversible. …

Though bowls are dear to me, I always put it down and forget it after
meal, not because of a pair of slippery hands: I’m blamed for the bowls and dishes
not washed clean enough in my hands.“… wife’d say:‘You just put them in the
sink.’ I am freed from washing dishes after meal all these years. Still I’m not silly enough to be simply away after dinner. Instead I would
say: ‘Let me wash?’”