Mom used to complain I inherited my pa’s flaws, while turned a blind eye to her virtues. But after one meal I served her, she changed her opinion in part. She said I had the same cooking hand as hers, to say the least. I am an honest guy, and I attribute this success to the recipe for that dish which was the only one in that meal. Concerning this recipe, there is a story I am now sharing with you.**************************************A Recipe and Its Story
Couples of years ago, I were an undergraduate. My roomies and I were asked to have a meal in our assistant’s house. I couldn’t recall whys. However, Considering the routine, there stands a good chance that he gave us a sermon hoping we guys paid more effort on studies. Anyway, thanks for his kindness and delicious dishes. To cut a long story short. We helped him get those raw materials ready and he put on his apron then began his show. Frankly speaking, we didn’t want to be his audiences of our own accord, but we couldn’t leave. He kept getting after us and making sure that we were around paying undivided attention. we faked understanding what he said by constant nodding, but our eyes fixed on the pot where this dish was underway to avoid his sight. After a long time (whenever I felt ill at ease, time was snail-paced), he covered the lid and showed us the way to his drawing room. Then he continued his sermon which made us nodding on (a few years later, one of my buddies wanted to introduce me to a girl. But that girl refused to further our relationship. She said my head was a little bit long. Looking into the mirror, I realized she didn’t exaggerate the case------a little bit longer than it used to be. What happened? I racked my brain and spent several sleepless nights to work it out. It was that simple up-and-down movement made my head re-grow . ). As time went by, things seemed to get worse. We could detect the aroma pervading the air, which stimulated the excretion of our saliva. You may manage to hide the process of swallowing slaver, but it must take some special training to stop the coos naturally coming from the stomach. As luck would have it, we were not ready for this unexpected event. So besides our nods, our stomachs’ coos began to accompany our assistant’s speech with this down and that up. This concert didn’t come to an end until our assistant’s coos joined us. We couldn’t help laughing. ***********************it should be the second longest wait I had encountered. The first one is in my mom’s stomach waiting for the safe landing on this new world. Anyhow, a big pot of dish was placed right on the dinning table. Yup, there was only one dish, but with a large amount. Obviously, our assistant was afraid that he was not understood ( I think he would never be understood until we come to his age), therefore, he carried over his monologue and we teamed up with him by nodding. After a few mouths of this dish, I came to find that our assistant did a good job. Glancing around, I saw my roomies must have felt the same way, for the other four were so concentrated that they even forgot to nod. I was the only one who stayed sober. One thought crossed my mind that I have got to do something to wake them up. The minute I wanted to elbow the guy next to me, I found our assistant smiling at us silently. It seemed as if he was quite pleased we enjoyed his dish. I put my heart into my stomach and went on my meal. ***********************Seeing the big pot’s bottom, we felt full. One of us showed his satisfaction by stretching his arms. All of a sudden, a strange voice---“phut”---- burst out.What happened?We searched around to make sure what was going on and noted that guy who was stretching arms looked very embarrassed. “Are you O.K.?” “I am fine.” Yep, he was fine. But his waistband was dead. This broken band was being held in his hand. “How did you do it?!” we asked in surprise.“You know, it was an old one and nearly broken before we got in. I had been considering to discard it.” He explained.“really?” We took his words with a grain of salt. Yes, the band was not new, however, it should not be that old, either.“What are you guys thinking?” We didn’t tell him what we thought of him at that moment. But our assistant, an honest and straightforward man, tried to comfort him. “Take it easy! I am quite stuffed. You guys better eat up the rest. So I will be able to wash this pot.”A hand’s turn. We did it with flying colors----there were barely a few drops of soup left on the inside wall.*************As soon as we came into our dorm, a debate started. We were all good debaters and liked to talk over anything happened around us. This time, our topic was “ what caused that waistband broken?”. This argument carried on till late night when the neighbors knocked at our door and threatened to beat us black and white if we didn’t stop making noises. Anyway, we draw a rough conclusion. That was, this incident resulted from two ingredients. One part attributed to the band itself, for it was not durable; the other fault part was the owner of the band, for he ate too much. But which part contributed larger? We didn’t have the definite conclusion because the party refused to cooperate with us. *********************************To this day, the characters in this story scattered about the world. Our assistant moved to the State to make scientific researches. We five guys lost track of him ever since. Recently, a little bird told me our assistant gets on well with his new boss. I have a feeling in my bones his Chinese dish more or less made some contributions. Last September, our dorm had a reunion. We talked about jobs, girls, classmates, our alma master, and of course, that waistband-broken incident. This time, the party confided in us that he did eat a little more than he should have. But he still refused to assume the responsibility. He agued it was not he but our assistant who was supposed to answer for that incident, for our assistant cooked a terrific good dish that night. We disagreed with him. How did we have the heart to accuse our assistant who was so nice to us. Then who should be the fault part? Another skull session kicked off. Finally, we thought of the magic recipe for that delicious dish. To do justice to the recipe, we gave it three chances to argue, but it gave up. So the jury consisting of five judges declared the recipe killed that waistband. That night, we carried out the death penalty to this recipe-----we cooked the dish in the same recipe our assistant used years ago and had a big meal. Certainly, this time, no accident happened, for we all wore durable waistband after that waist-broken event.
