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Chopsticks > Forks · Stuff You Should Know

• 0:00
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• 0:59
  Speaker 1: Welcome just to you should know a production of five
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: Heart Radios. How stuff works? Hey, and welcome to the podcast.
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant, there's Jerry
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: over there, and this is stuff you should know all
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: about the song chopsticks. I wonder if you're going to
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: make a joke about that. Jerry beat me to it
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: when she was like, what are we recording today? And
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: I told her She's like the song dent Dent, Dent, dent, Dent. No,
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: it's dent dent, didn't sticks? Are there two chopsticks? Now
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: I'm just teasing. That's heart and soul. Oh okay, So
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: so what I said from big that was chopsticks right, totally? Yeah,
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: Robert Robert Loggia, Yeah, man, I should have continued rolling
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: and said, James Con, Wow, that is a very James
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: con like role though, isn't it. Totally? I think he
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: played that role and Blanket and uh well he was
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: a crime boss and bottle rockingly yeah, sort of good.
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: We watched Misery the other day. It still holds up.
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: Oh man, I remember seeing that for the first time
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: in Athens when I was in college. So great. Cathy
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: Bates can do no wrong. She did great. But if
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: you watch James Con he did really well too, like
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: his whole kind of trepidacious manner toward her was really
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: well done and not overdone at all, and like he
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: did a great job as well, and he had to
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: lay there in a bed for weeks and weeks and act.
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah it sounds like a dream. Yeah, And if he
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: if he balked at it, they would attach to Catherine
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: to him and make him pete in his own mouth
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: as punishment, like a little known fact about that movie.
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: Oh so chopsticks, right, we should point out here that, uh,
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: in researching this chopsticks and customs and etiquette, if we
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: covered all the countries and all that stuff that use chopsticks,
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: we'd be here all day. So there's kind of a
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: focus here on on Japan. They seem to be a
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: little uh the most um sensitive to transgressions with chopsticks
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: out of all of the Asian cultures. I think they
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: have the most rules against him at the very least. Yeah,
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: but when you read them, it's they could all be
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: summed up as just don't be a dumb American, yeah,
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: or don't have any fun whatsoever with your chopsticks is
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: another way to You're like, what's wrong with making them
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: antennas in a restaurant and going right I'm a walrus, now,
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: why can't I be a walrus? Right? Um? But we
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: are talking chopsticks, not the song. Sorry to disappoint you everybody,
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: but I saw that that that song is actually called
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: chopsticks because it was originally called the Celebrated chop Waltz Okay,
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: written by a sixteen year old school girl from England.
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: It seems about right, sure, so um, but we're talking
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: about the the utensils. And like when you think chopsticks,
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: obviously you think like Asia and you don't think that
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: there was ever anything but chopsticks in the history of Asia.
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: And while chopsticks are actually surprisingly old, I think they
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: go back about seven thousand years. Also saw five thousand years.
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: I'm going with seven. I think they're they're actually about
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: as ancient as that. They weren't like the go to
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: utensil for Asia until this millennium. Yeah, the the spoon
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: was kind of the go to the word chopstick. They
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: think maybe pigeon English Chinese pigeon English meaning chop chop
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: or quickly right. But you know, this is one of
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: these etymologies. It's sort of tough to pin down. It
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: looks like, but that's the English word for it, and
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: all of the chopstick using cultures they have their own word,
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: like in Japan it's hashi, it's kua easy in China. Nice.
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: I'm not sure if I said that right at all.
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: Um geo garrok in Korean, al right, not as not
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: as nice, and dett detta in Vietnamese. I'm sorry half
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: of the world's population. I love that you started strong
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: in Japan though, because you feel pretty confident in your
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: Japanese pronunciations. That's a good way to go. Yes, I
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: have a great tutor, that's right. So, uh, five to
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: seven thousand years ago. They were used initially for cooking,
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: and we'll get more into the ins and outs of
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: the history, but they were made from twigs probably, and
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: it was much much later, like you said that they
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: were table utensils, and it was all very much like, uh,
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: practicality based, yeah, because initially they figured out pretty early
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: on these, Um, the Chinese from five thousand and seven
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: thousand years ago, that's a really bad idea to stick
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: your hand into a pot of boiling water to get
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: something out it, say, like a bone or a piece
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: of meat or something like that. It's way better to
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: use a twig, and it's even better to use two twigs,
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: as if they were kind of a pair of detached tweezers.
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: That's apparently where they initially started to come into use
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: was during cooking and food preparation, not the actual eating process.
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: That's right. Um, there was a big population boom in
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: China at one point, some might say there continues to be.
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: Someone said, and resources became a little more scarce. They
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: started cutting their food up into little tiny pieces. Um,
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: for reasons of like helps it to cook faster. Um.
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: I wonder I didn't see anything about this, but I
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: wonder if that also just made it more share able
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: among a larger family. I could see that. That's a
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: great point too. And isn't it fascinating though, the idea
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: that a population boom led to widespread use of the chopstick? Yeah,
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: it's interesting. And then Confucius also was a vegetarian and
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: noted knife hater. He has a quote about knives. The
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: honorable and upright man keeps well away from both the
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: slaughter house and the kitchen, and he allows no knives
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: on his table. And I think that was a little
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: more because the knive was equated with eating meat right
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: less than like it's a garbage tool. You don't need
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: You don't need a knife to eat a plant. Basically. Yeah,
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: I might argue you might want to cut a piece
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: of bruccoli maybe, but you don't have to. I just
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: summed up Confucius. That's the level of arrogance that I'm
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: operating at now. Uh. And I think some of the
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: early and you know, it started in in China, and
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: then you know, pretty soon Korea, Vietnam, Japan, we're all
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: using them. But I think that Chinese chopsticks, uh, we're
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: joined at what they are? Now what do they call now?
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: What they're joined? And you gotta split them apart? Oh warabashi.
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: That's Japanese. That's the term for disposable chopsticks. Okay, but
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: I thought I thought the Chinese chopsticks were originally joined
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: like that. Yes, No, it was Japanese. Okay. There was
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: a single piece of bamboo that was like split kind
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: of like giant tweezers. Okay, yeah, I'm reading this now.
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: I had a sometimes I just now reading this, Well, No,
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: I get sometimes and it's the dumbest thing, but I
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: get confused between former and ladder. Oh yeah, it's not
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: that I get confused. I just have to go back
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: and sort of picture it in my brain. It just
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: takes an extra second, I think for everybody. That's right.
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: It's definitely not intuitive, so don't feel bad. I also
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: thought this thing about food poisoning was interesting. Um was
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: that in uh dynastic times in China, they would use
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: and I guess people that are a little more well
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: healed would use silver chopsticks um because they thought that
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: if it came into contact with something that was poisonous,
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: then the chopsticks would turn black and they would know
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: not to eat it. M I mean, it just makes sense.
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: When you're rich and wealthy, more people want to kill you,
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: So it's better to have something that shows if somebody's
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: trying to poison you, like your chopsticks turning a color
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: if you're being poisonous cyanide or something like that. The
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: problem is that doesn't actually work, and I don't know
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: why they didn't just think that through from the get go, like,
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: oh well, let's get ourselves some cyanide and stick a
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: silver chopstick in it and see what happens and see
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: that it doesn't work. But apparently does work in the
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: presence of garlic or rotten eggs because they put out
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: hydrogen sulfide so it will turn silver a different color.
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: So I don't know how garlic ever made itself into
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: a staple of Chinese cooking, but there we have it. Yeah.
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: And the other thing I thought was interesting and we
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: should mention too. This came from a variety of places,
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: uh Teagan Jones at Kissmoto, Lisa Brahmin from Smithsonian mag
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: q Edward Wang from Cambridge blog, Huff Poe Believe it
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: or Not, got in the Works, and some other places.
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: But um, I thought that Q. Edward Wang's history was
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: really interesting because um he mentions that wheat is kind
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: of the first reason before rice, which really surprised me.
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: It was very surprising. I think he knew all along
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: that that was a big reveal, you know. But that's
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: what gave chopsticks a shot in the arm. Um. So
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: first we have cutting um food into smaller pieces to
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: to have a cook faster, so you use less firewood,
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: right because there's a population boom. And then as wheat
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: becomes kind of fashionable and widespread, um, you're starting to
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: use chopsticks because you're making things like noodles and dumplings.
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: And prior to this, millet was the the go to
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: green and millet's really small, It's much smaller than rice,
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: and you certainly aren't going to turn it into like
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: a noodle or a dumpling. You make a gruel out
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: of it. And so for thousands of years, the go
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: to utensil that people used to eat with in China
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: was a spoon because they were eating gruel or porridge
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: or whatever. Everybody hated life. But when we came along
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: and they started turning into noodles and dumplings, they said, oh, yeah,
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: I remember those things that we use those twigs to
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: to cook with. What have we made a smaller version
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: of those to eat with two And that's where the
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: chopstick got its first like real boost in in usage
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: around Asia. Yeah. I mean, try to eat a big
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: spoonful of noodles and just watch as they flop off
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: and sling delicious sauce all over all over the place.
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: There is literally nothing more frustrating than trying to eat
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: noodles with the spoon in the entire world. Yeah, and
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: I mean, sure, you could chop them up into tiny
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: little pieces so they rest in your spoon with some broth. Sure,
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: but who who wants to do that? Like the person
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: that cuts up there busketty at the table into tiny
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: bits is a six year old yeah, or just thoroughly
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: un American one of the two, maybe both, depending on
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: how sophisticated the six year old days. Uh. The other
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: thing I thought was interesting too, uh from Mr Wang's
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: article was he talked about stew, which is gang in Chinese. Uh.
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: They ate a lot of stew back then, and chopsticks
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: would be very useful for picking up things like the
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: more solid objects in the stew, like the vegetables. Right,
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: So you've got wheat coming into into vogue, you've got
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: smaller pieces vegetables stew being eaten, chopsticks or like, come on,
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: we're gonna do what we gotta do this. We just
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: need one more thing to get us over the hump
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: and people are gonna know us everywhere around the world.
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: And that one thing was a particular kind of Vietnamese
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: rice that ripens early apparently, and it's a shorter grain
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: or a medium grain, which means that it's easier to
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: um it clumps more easily. Also has a lot of
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: like starches to it. It's just kind of clumpy, sticky rice.
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: And here in the West, we're not really used to
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: that kind of rice. So we're like, how are you
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: going to use chopsticks to eat this stuff? Like, try
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: eating some uncle bends with chopsticks. You can't do it.
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: It's like trying to eat noodles with the spoon. Yeah,
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: or you would just do that move. And this is
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: what I didn't understand when I was growing up, because
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: I was a little naive when I saw chopsticks, I
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: would just think about scooping up the rice on top
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: of them very awkwardly. And it wasn't Since I was
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: a little bit older and had good clumpy Chinese rice
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: and Japanese rice, I was like, oh, it's very easy
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: to eat with chopsticks. Yeah. And you're just like, oh, okay,
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: I've got it because it's sticks together. It's like a
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: nice little morsel of food and it sticks together just
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: about the right size, and and it's it's it's totally different.
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: So when you eat Chinese rice or Japanese rice, or
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: even viating Themese rights the stickier rice, then you understand, Okay,
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: you can use this as a as you can use
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: chopsticks for this. And the Chinese figure this out as
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: well when rice became much more of a staple of
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: the Asian diet, and all of a sudden, now you
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: didn't need a spoon anymore because everybody's like to heck
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: with millet. Who wants gruel? Nobody? So they threw their
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: spoons out the window. Um, and then they started just
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: eating chopsticks for everything that you could use it for everything.
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: Now that's all you needed for your meal. Yeah, and
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: that all in one solution, I think was um. That
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: happened in China and Japan and Vietnam for sure, and
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: Korea I think was the one stand out because I
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: believe in Korea the spoon and the chopstick still go
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: hand in hand. Yeah. And this I believe it was
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: Q Edward Lang who maybe wrote this, but he basically
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: said it. It seems to be a conscious decision, almost
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: as if they were being contrary or something like that.
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: Maybe they just want to do their own thing. Well,
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: they eat a lot of very very hot stews and soups.
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: Have you ever had boot aga? I don't think so.
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: I'm not even sure I'm saying it correctly. Have you
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: ever been to eat it like h mart or like
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: an Asian food cord or something like that. If you
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: go to a Korean place, they usually have I think
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: it's called boot. It's like hot dog soup basically, my lord,
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: and it's like this kind of I'm not even sure.
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: I guess it's a It's like a chilly paste broth
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: with lots of great processed meat in it, and like
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: ramen and like hallapenos. It's just so good. But that
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: thing comes to you boiling, and you're supposed to like
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: eat the chunky parts out with it with a chopstick.
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: But I guess it always comes with a spoon tube,
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: so I think you're supposed to actually eat the broth
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: with the spoon rather than sip. I'll tell you one
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: thing I do love is the design of the um
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: and I'm calling it the Chinese spoon. I don't know
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: if it originated in China, but you know the soup
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: spoon I'm talking about, Yeah, like the one you use
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: for miso soup. Man, They're just the best. Yeah, they do.
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: They because you can get a really big spoonful on there.
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: You know, it's ergonomic. It just it's the way to
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: it's the way to do it, unless you're just going
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: to pick up the bowl and drink it, which is
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: great too. Up with the miso soup spoon. All right,
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: let's take a break because I'm so hungry after he said,
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: hot dogs stew when the stomach is growling. Uh, And
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: we'll come back and we'll talk more about Chopsticksosh and shock.
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: So I don't remember what episode it was, Chuck, but
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: do you remember when our our stomachs growled insane with
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: one another? That was very recently? It was. Yeah, you
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: can still reminisce about recent stuff. I say, I'm nostalgic
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: for that thing that happened last week pretty much so
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: apparently and this, uh, I'm not sure how accurate this is,
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: but the four main kinds of chopsticks apparently, um, in China,
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: the chopsticks are a little bit longer and a little
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: more blunt on the ends. Yeah, And they think that
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: might be a nod too, Confucius basically saying like, don't
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: have knives at your table. Don't even have vaguely sharpened
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: chopsticks even like nothing stabby nothing, Don't you don't want
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: to be stabbed at your table? I think in Japan,
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: they're a little sharper and a little shorter, but you're
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: still not supposed to be stabbing stuff. No, don't stab
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: that piece of tuna. No, it's you can just tell
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: if you've ever done that while you're doing it, that
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: you're violating some unnatural law or something. It feels wrong,
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: doesn't it. Yeah? Uh, let me see here in Korea,
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: apparently they are shorter as well, and they are also blunt,
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: but they can be metallic. Yeah, that's one thing that
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: we'll see because we're gonna talk about. As with everything
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: in existence, there's some horrid environmental impact with chopsticks as well. Um,
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: But the Japanese are like, give us cheap, disposable wooden
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: or bamboo chopsticks and basically nothing else. They're just crazy
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: for it, where some of the other Asian cultures are like, no,
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: we can use reusable ones, but the Japanese are like, no,
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: we want nothing but disposable, cheap chopsticks. That wabashi. I
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: assume that you and you me have your own chopsticks
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: at home. Oh yeah, and do you bring those two restaurants?
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: Oh no, no, no, never do. We should really should,
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: But I usually think when I'm there, I'm like, man,
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: I should have brought my chopsticks. Well, you know, I
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: mean like if you go to any Asian store, they
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: have like cute little it looks almost like a pencil case,
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: but it's you know, chopsticks inside, and it's meant for
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: you to carry them around with you. But no one
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: does that. You just don't. Even though hopefully in ten
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: years when we're all like, Okay, this is out of
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: control and this is really bad, everyone will be doing that.
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: You just don't do it. And yeah, we have some
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: that like I could just put in my jeans pocket
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: and walk around with if I wanted to, but I
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: don't do it. Yeah, I take my straw now and
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: I use it because I now keep it in my purse,
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: your merse merse, which goes everywhere with me. So I
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: need I need to throw some chopsticks in there. Sure,
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: And it's a good feeling when you say no straw.
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: I've got my own, and I would love to be
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: able to say no, no, you keep those wooden chopsticks. Yeah,
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: take that straw and shove it where the sun don't shine. Wow,
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: I'm not that aggressive. It's so funny depending on where
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: you are in the country though, Like if they bring
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: you a straw and you say no, no, straw please,
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: they look at you like you're just a straight up
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: democratic socialist hippie, you know, like you're trying to undermine
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: the government or something like that. It's kind of hilarious. Yeah, sure,
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: But other places now are There's a couple of places
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: in my neighborhood who have um postings on the wall
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: when you walk in talking about the impact of straws,
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: and that straws are upon request only, right, and if
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: you've got a problem with that, you can take a
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: straw and shove it where the sun does shine, right,
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: or you you take that problem to the voting booth.
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: This fall right exactly. So are you prepared? Because I
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: have a feeling you do a better job than me
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: at this because you you so often have great, convoluted
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: ways of describing visual things. I'm going to do a
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: great job describing it to you because you can watch
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: my hands. But I think for everybody listening it's going
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: to be very problematic. All right, how do you use chopsticks?
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: All right? Gonna get you back for this one, chuck.
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: So I did it intuitively by the way, which is
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: what I suggest. Yeah, a thing watch some people. I
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: think reading it and having it explained makes it way harder.
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: I think it's just one of those things you have
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: to watch somebody do in practice. I mean, it's just
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: all practice. But essentially, there's a couple of things to remember.
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: Is that both chopsticks are laying. Do you want Do
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: you want to go step by step through it? No?
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: I think I want the Josh method. Okay, well it's
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: the same it's the same method description. Okay. So in
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: the valley between your thumb and your forefinger, Okay, the
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: webbing right there, that's where the chopsticks rest, the thumb taint,
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: the thumb taint, the chode your hand showed, Oh my god,
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: handed it really is. Um wow. So the two chopsticks
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: lay right there, Okay, Okay, one of them, the bottom
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: one is basically meant to be immobile and stationary. It
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: just basically stays there. And it's the top one that
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: you're you're you're moving, you're kind of holding with your forefinger,
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: your index finger and your middle finger. That's that's what
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: you're using to move this, this top one. And so
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: it's really the bottom one that stays basically stationary, and
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: the top one is the one that's moving and you're
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: just using it to kind of pick up and tweeze
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: food or rice or um whatever with it. If you
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: get really good, you can like pick your friend up
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: with that right or catch a fly if you're sense
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: a level with chopsticks, for sure. But that's essentially it,
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: and the the you don't want to hold it too tightly.
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: If you're if you're gripping it too tightly, your your
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: muscles are too tense, you're not kind of be able
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: to um to to to kind of make that tweezer
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: motion very easily, or you're certainly not going to have
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: much control. It's kind of paradoxical that the looser you
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: have your hand to a certain degree, the more control
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: you have over the chopsticks and the tension that you're
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: wrecting towards the end of the chopstick. So keep your
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: keep your hand loose but in control, and just make
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: sure you remember that the bottom one that's kind of
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: resting all the way along your thumb the freezone. It's
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: basically stationary, and the top one is the one you're
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: directing with your index finger. And middle finger. Yeah, I
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: recommend halfway through your meal switch those two out because
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: that bottom one is just along for the ride and
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: it needs to do a little work, you know what
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: I mean. So just switch them out and make that
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: one the topper and uh give it, you know, make
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: it do a little sweat, sweating. I think that's a
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: pretty good chump, do a little sweat. I think we
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: deserve a Peabody Award for describing how to use chopsticks
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: no visuals. You did talk about the environmental impact a
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: little bit, but it is a real problem. I mean,
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: you see these tiny little things and you think, what's
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: the big woop? Like a tree can probably make a
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: gazillion chopsticks, so they need like maybe tin trees in
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: China to make all the chopsticks they need. Do you
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: do you remember that just one thing? Do you remember
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: that cartoon It might have been a Simpsons or something
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: like that, where they chopped down a tree and they
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: show them processing one single tree into just an individual toothpick.
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: That's pretty sure had to be the Simpsons, you know,
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: But imagine if that's they're like, no, we we make
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: one chopstick out of just a single tree. I didn't
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: think about toothpicks. Man, How many toothpicks can you get
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: out of a tree? I don't even know their their
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: problem there on the horizon, right, But when you think
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: about the fact that China alone produces eighty billion disposable
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: chopsticks every year, then you get a little bit more
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: of a sense of exactly how many of these trees?
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: And it says here there was I'm trying to find
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: out what year this is. It was It was fairly recently, um,
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: but they've had like parliamentary meetings and stuff about this
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: in China and they estimated that it takes about twenty
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: million twenty year old trees to cover their annual rate
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: of production. Yeah. A guy named by Jen I'm pretty
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: sure I said his last name correct. Um. He's like
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: a representative from the Glen Forestry industry group and he
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: really like rocked everybody at a parliamentary meeting where he
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: basically said, hey, do you remember that old figure that
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: everybody has been touting for years that we actually use
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: fifty seven billion chopsticks a year, produced fifties seven billion
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: chopsticks a year. He said, that's way off. It's actually
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: eighty billion and like you just said, we need twenty
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: million twenty year old trees to meet that a year,
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: and people said, wow, that's kind of a problem. And
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: so around the around the world, like China. So of
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: that eight billion, I think China, half of them stays
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: in China. Of the other half I wondered about that
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: goes to Japan. And Japan was actually the one um
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: that started all this. They came up with disposable chopsticks
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: warribashi um all the way back in seventy eight, and
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: I've just been crazy worm ever since. Like you can
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: go there, like a pretty high end restaurant in Japan
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: and they're going to have wooden chopsticks. Chopsticks yeah that
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: you you would pull apart. They'll all There are also
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: plenty of restaurants in Japan that have re usable ones,
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: and they're much more elegant or whatever. But it's not
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: like you wouldn't just walk in and be like, what
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: is this disposable chopsticks? Are you kidding? Because they're just
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: such a part of Japanese culture. So they use seventy
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: seven percent of the other half Korea uses twenty one
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: and then two percent comes to the United States. I
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: have to catch that. That That was two thousand and eleven figures,
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: which is the latest I could find. Yeah, I'm kind
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: of surprised that. Um, I would think China and Japan,
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: it would just seem like they would like everyone would
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: have their own and it would be a very like
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: prideful thing to take care of your chopsticks and to
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: have something cool looking. It just kind of surprises me
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: that they're so down with the disposable. It surprises a
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: lot of people. Especially Japan is like really well known
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: for being meticulous with recyclinging and reducing waste and stuff
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: like that. Um yeah, it's just this one thing. They
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: really love their disposable chopsticks. Um, and they just throw
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: them away. They're not being recycled or composted or anything
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: like that. They're just being thrown in the trash. So
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: some what I read is that some restaurants will offer um,
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: you know, t uh for free if you bring your
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: own chopsticks or maybe like a but um yeah, basically,
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: but there's not like a lot of there's not a
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: huge amount of movement in Japan where China and this
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: is I think I read this in like a like
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: a New York Times Green blog or something like that. Um,
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: China has made some some moves like like taxing disposable
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: adding an extra tax to disposable chopsticks. I think, um,
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: more regulation basically overall, I think, which is really saying something,
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: you know. I mean, Um, there's there's like apparently a
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: whole sub industry to the disposable chopsticks industry that is
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: small enough that it escapes a lot of oversight, and
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: they can be really problematic, like there can be a
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: lot of chemicals in these chopsticks. Um, they're just like
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: an all around basic nightmare and it's just such low
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: hanging through all and everybody has to do is just
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: have their own chop sticks. But just people just won't
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: do it. And I'm guilty too, like I said, I mean,
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: we we have reusable ones at home, but we don't
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: take them out of the house ever. Yeah. Plus the
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: paper used to encase the said chopsticks. That's a lot
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: of paper too, Yeah it is. And what do you
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: do with that stuff? You just rip it open and
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: burn it at the table. So yeah, yeah, yeah it's true.
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: Should we take another break? Yeah, all right, we'll take
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: another break and talk a little bit about etiquette. Right
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: after this, because we're all doing it wrong to a
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: certain degree. Shosh and shock. Okay, miss Manners, lay it on.
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: That's Dr Mrs Manners, PhD esquire. So this is mainly
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: Japan that we're concentrating on with the etiquette, and like
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: you said, I think they take it a little more
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: seriously than some other Asian countries because it turns out
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: that chopsticks can and have had an important part in
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: burial rights, yeah, and funeral rights, Buddhist funeral rights. Like
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: a lot of the the taboos I guess you'd call
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: them over chopsticks in Japan and in other Asian countries too,
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: are kind of based on like, well, that's that's kind
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: of something we do with funeral rights. And so that
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: reminds us of that Japan is not crazy about being
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: reminded of death or mortality or pain. All that stuff
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: is very um unlucky, Like the number four is unlucky
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: because the word for four, I think she also sounds
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: very much like the word for death. Right. I think
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: I remember that that. So they don't have four elevator floors,
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: is that right? Don't if they do or not, but
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: let's just go with that. They don't because it sounds
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: pretty great. So etiquette level one is how is how
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: this is presented. There's a couple of levels here as
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: far as like, you really shouldn't do these things, but
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: if you really want to ramp it up, you shouldn't
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: do these things as well. I felt these were kind
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: of willy nilly, didn't you. Well, I mean, this is
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: one person's opinion, right, But um, the things that you
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: really shouldn't do are the following. Um, do not if
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: you like get up to go to the bathroom, don't
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: stick your chopsticks sitting upright in your bowl of rice. No,
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: And that has to do with the household Buddhist altar,
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: because it is a bowl of rice is offered as
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: to a dead person's spirit. And this apparently is from
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: a Baudhist Baudhist Buddhist funeral rites as well, because there's
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: a photograph of a bowl of rice and to stick
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: chopsticks in the middle of that would be for boating. Um,
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: I think it's they'll have like a photograph of the
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: deceased and they give them a bowl of uncooked rice,
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: so they and they stick the chopsticks up in there.
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: Oh okay, I read that it's reminiscent of that that okay,
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: So that's so it's got that death thing going on,
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: the death angle. Yeah. And then the other thing I
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: saw about that too is that they also is reminiscent
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: of a like a bowl of sand within since sticking
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: out of it that you would also put on a
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: Buddhist shrine to the deceased. So they're like way too
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: reminiscent of death for that to be Okay, Okay, that
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: makes sense. Now there's another one that's very similar. Don't
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: leave your chopsticks crossed, like resting on your bowl or
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: on your plate. Just don't cross your chopsticks. It's it's
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: impolite basically for the exact same reason is sticking them
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: out of the bowl. Right. And I think that one
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: is when you see, like on food Instagram food posts
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: a lot from Whitey saying, you know, like across the
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: chopsticks because it looks cool or whatever. Look at how
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: cool this looks? Not cool? Apparently we talked about spearing. Uh.
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: The advice here is to treat them as if they
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: are actually connected, even though they're not. It's a good
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: way to remember it, like pretend connecting. That's right, Yeah,
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: and remember this is like that. I think that goes
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: back to like Confucius Um, where it's like, don't don't
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: have a knife at your table, don't use your chopsticks
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: a spear food. That's right. Apparently it's bad luck or
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: not bad luck, well maybe bad luck to use uh
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: two different chopsticks. Yeah, um, you should have the same
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: mommy and daddy. This person said that it's just unsightly
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: and that it's also reminiscent funeral rites. That one I couldn't.
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: I couldn't figure that one out. There's there's another funeral
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: one to a lot of funeral rights involved chopsticks, passing
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: food from chopstick to chopstick. Like if you're like, hey,
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: you gotta try a bite of this, that's just hold
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: it up. It's it's but it's kind of it's a
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: little bit showy if you can do it, but um,
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: but when you know it's somebody grabs it with their chopstick.
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: That's how they pass bones from cremations during funeral rites too,
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: And they're like, no, that reminds us of that as well. Yeah,
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: and there are some of these that are just like
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: I can't believe people do this. Do not wash your
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: chopsticks off in your beverage. Yeah, that's gross. Someone do that.
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: I don't know. Apparently somebody has the Other thing about
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: this is so the fact that they have restrictions on
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: this social restrictions means that people have done it before.
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: But they also go so far as like most of
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: these things all have like individual words. That's how like
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: I grow the Japanese are about this, this kind of etiquette.
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: They have words for that, Like washing your chopsticks off
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: in your drink is not just called washing your chopsticks
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: off in your there's a name for it. Uh, let
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: me see here. Do not treat them as toys. And
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: we talked earlier about um, putting them in your mouth
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: like their fangs or walrus tusks or antennas or drumsticks
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: just not a good look. Right. Here's another one that
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: is um. This is a sort of one that I
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: think happens a lot. Is you might see women American
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: women maybe do their hair and put chopsticks in them.
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: Those when you see that in Japan, those are not chopsticks. Right.
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: It might look like chopsticks, but they're actually called kanzashi. Yeah,
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: it would be kind of like sticking a fork in
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: your hair. Right, if you're walking around Japan looking like that,
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: they'd be like, why do you why do you have
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: that fork in your hair? Looks a little off, But yeah,
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: that like they look just like those things, but there's
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: a separate thing. What did you call them? Yeah? Nice?
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: It's a beautiful word, right, I know. Um. Another one
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: is you'll very frequently see people do this and and
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: I've done it too, and it's apparently excess acceptable under
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: certain circumstances. But when you break your waabashi, your disposable
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: cheap chopsticks apart at the end, um, if they're splinters
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: or there's like a piece of wood sticking out, you
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: can rub them together kind of soften the the wood
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: or get the splinters off. But you're not supposed to
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: do that. It's just like a matter of course, because
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: you're basically insulting the restaurant. You're saying, like, these are
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: so cheap, these chopsticks that you're providing your gas that
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: like I've got to rub them together, and you definitely
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: don't want to like make eye contact with the owner
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: while you're rubbing it together, Like this is what I
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: think of your establishment? Um, and people do that all
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: the time. I do. It's almost like habitual. It's habitual
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: for me. And I started doing it when I first
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: started using chopsticks because I saw the person I was
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: with did it and I was like, I guess that's
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: what you do. You get those little splinters off. And
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: now it's a total habit and uh my whole thing there.
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: I don't think that one's a really big one, like,
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: especially in America, it happened so much. I don't think
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: anyone a restaurant owners like super insulted by seeing this. Sure, yeah,
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: especially in America, but they are super cheap and they
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: do splinter right. Well in that case, yes, like that
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: that that proprietor has brought it on himself for herself
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: for providing everybody with such cheap chopsticks that they're splintery.
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: I will always remember this now, I'll tell you that. Yeah,
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: And this is so I agree with you. I think
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: that this is probably not that big of an insul
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: especially in America. It's probably falls in line with like
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: how you're not supposed to, um, like put your with sabi,
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: put in the soy sauce or something like that. Well,
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: if you want to just do it. You know, if
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: you want to be remarkably polite, then you wouldn't do
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: any of these things. Some are way worse than others,
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: and I think that one probably falls into the lesser category,
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: even though it's under this advancing. This is why I
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: was saying this seems Willie Nils Yeah, and that we
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: also covered some of this in our sushi episode. Um,
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: because if I'm not mistaken, don't you eat sushi with
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: your fingers? Or am I wrong? You? Don't you eat
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: with your fingers? Or do you not? No? I don't.
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: I love showing off how great I am at chopsticks.
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: I use them every turn, every coming, can't. Yeah, I
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: eat millet gruel with chopsticks. That's how good I am. Yeah.
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: Or you I've seen you just flip up a shrimp
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: and catch it in the other one. What a show off.
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: It's pretty great because you have chopsticks. You have four,
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: you have two in each hand, yes, basically, and you
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: do a little side show there. It's really impressive. Edward
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: scissor hands, Josh chopstick finger But no, you're supposed to
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: eat sushi. It's specifically nagiri right with your hand that's
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: how it was originally done, if I remember correctly from
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: our sushi episode. Yeah, but yeah, we use chopsticks these days.
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: Here's another no no is do not use chopstick as
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: a rake, Like, don't lift up a bowl of rice
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: and just sort of rake rice into your mouth. So
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: that's Japan. I saw in China that's perfectly accepted, really normal. Okay, yeah, yeah,
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: it gets dicey with it's not the same and everywhere
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: you know. Yeah, here's the thing. I don't know if
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: we said this before. So in Thailand they don't use
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: chopsticks almost as a rule. Um, in Vietnam, Korea, Japan, China,
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: they're they're totally ubiquitous. Almost the only thing you're gonna
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: find that you eat with um. And so that means
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: that like even a bowl of soup like miso soup,
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: you're supposed to use your chopsticks for that. Like the
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: little chunks of of um of um tofu. It took
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: me a second. Um, you use your your chopsticks to
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: eat those out of the bowl and then you slurp
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: the rest or sip the rest depending um. But with rice,
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: you would hold the bowl up kind of close to
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: your face, but not like up in your face, just
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: under under your chin and out a little bit and
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: then you, you know, eat the rice with your chopsticks
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: from there, lifting the rice up to your mouth, not
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: shoveling it into your mouth from the bowl, right, And
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: I saw with soups and things. Also is if you
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: really want to ramp up the etiquette, you should try
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: and drip into the bowl. Oh right, when you like,
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: when you are picking up the tofu, you want to
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: kind of shot shake the tofu off so it doesn't
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: drip on you are on the table. If you really
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: want to excel etiquette, you would just not eat anything.
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: You just sit there quietly with your chopsticks side by side,
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: still in their wrapper, just smiling politely at everyone. It
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: didn't break any rules. And I'm really hungry, that's right.
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: There's a couple of more here. Don't point with your chopsticks.
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: It's tough not to do. Do you point? I don't
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: point at people you know or anything like that. Can
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: you pass me that thing right there? And you just
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: sort of give a little nod, like, hey, that that
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: pot sticker over there? Yeah, because they're fun to hold
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: and point with and like do stuff with I just
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: I don't know, Maybe I'm still it's still novel enough
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: to me that I have to remind myself not to
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: to point, or Umi has to remind me not to
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: point with the chopsticks. Or when you're talking and you're
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: expressing things with your hands and you're using your chopsticks,
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: or if you want to just do a little Maestro routine, right,
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: you know that's looked down upon. Or if you if
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: you're using your hands for something else, you don't stick
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: your chopsticks in your mouth and just hold them in
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: there while you're like moving plates around or something like that.
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: You set them down. And here's the other thing too.
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: If you go to a very nice restaurant in Japan
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: um or in the States and it just happens to
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: be a Japanese restaurant, how about that really prolonged this thought? Um,
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: they're gonna give you a chopstick rest. Oh, shut your
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: chopsticks on so they're kind of lifted off of the
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: table the end that you put in your mouth. If
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: you don't have that, you can take that paper wrapper
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: and roll it up and make your own chopstick rest.
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: That's right, because you're setting your chopsticks down on a table.
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: M there could be you know, have germs, right, and
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: speaking of germs, also, chuck. You never ever use the
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: chopsticks that you're eating with to serve yourself from a
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: communal plate or bowl, that's for sure. They should give
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: you like a spoon or something like that to spoon
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: it onto your plane, and then you use your chopsticks
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: because that's just germy and diseasy, and apparently, um, there's
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: a a like a supplement to that where if they
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: don't give you a serving spoon, people flip their chopsticks
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: over and use the thicker and shovel the food onto
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: the plate, which is not necessarily anymore hygienic because that's
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: where your hands have been rather than your mouth. But
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: that's the more socially acceptable thing to do then just
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: using the business end of your chopsticks. Ye, I don't
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: know why that's so funny to me. Um. But the
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: ends though, I mean, if you're using them right, you're
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: choked up a little bit, so they're not really being
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: touched by your hands, you know, true, Like you don't
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: stick the ends in your palm, that's right, that's true.
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: You choke up on it like like a baseball bat. Yeah.
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: They say in Korea apparently that the the further down
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: though you hold the chopsticks, the longer it's going to
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: be before you get married. Well yeah, I mean we
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: could talk about some of these kind of fun fun facts. Uh,
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: let me see here. One is, if you are given
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: an uneven pair, you will miss a boat or a plane.
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: M hm. And this is came from Malaysia. I'm not
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: sure if that's ubiquitous all over Asia. I think it's Chinese. Okay,
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: I think what else here? This is kind of fun. Um,
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: if you use chopsticks, it involves over fifty muscles in
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: the fingers and thirty joints and the um well overall
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: in the fingers, arms, shoulders, and wrists. Yeah, pretty cool
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: it is. I mean, how many use for a fork?
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: Like to maybe give me a break? Um? I saw
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: a couple of things. Um. One is that there was
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: a study that found that eating popcorn with chopsticks makes
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: eating popcorn much more enjoyable than eating it without chopsticks
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: with your fingers instead. And they even controlled for the
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: amount of extra time it takes to eat popcorn with chopsticks.
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: It's not just that you're eating slower, so you're rellishing
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: it more. Because they had a control group using their
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: fingers eat at a very slow pace too, And apparently
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: they think it's just the fact that you're doing something
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: differently makes you appreciate the thing that you're doing or
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: that you're eating that much more. Like, um, if you
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: pour water out of like a separate, you know, water bottle,
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: like at a restaurant, how they have like the little
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: chilled water bottles they'll bring over, that water would taste
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: better than water that, um, you just poured out of
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: the tap, even if it was the exact same water,
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: because it's being conveyed differently. Yeah, And that's also how
• 44:16
  Speaker 1: you would get popcorn to last through the opening previews
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: of a movie. It's right because you're not just shoveling
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: it into your mouth like I do. It's so bizarre, man,
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: I do the same thing. I've tried to do the
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: like a couple of kernels at a time, and you know,
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: I do that for the first few and then before
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: you know it, I've just got handfuls that I'm I'm
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: pushing into my mouth right right, That's how you have
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: to do. You have to use the palm in your
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: hand to really shove the entire fistful in there. You
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: can't just use your little finger tips. It doesn't work.
• 44:47
  Speaker 1: You'll choke on them. And I don't know if it's uh, um,
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: sort of a subliminal desire for me not to be
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: distracted during the movie. But the ideal, in the ideal world,
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: I would just sit there in munch a couple of
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: pieces at a time for two hours, like, just chew
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: them a million times. No, no no, no, just eat a
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: couple of kernels at a time and just really elongate
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: the whole experience. Take put those chopsticks in your merse
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: and take those to the theater. People would be like,
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: look at that guy, Hey, though you have to be
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: careful though, yes, they yes, they would. You have to
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: be careful though who you brandish those chopsticks around, because
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: so you put this together. Kudos for that. Um. One
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: of the facts you came up with is that there's
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: something called consecutively lay a phobia. Consecutive a phobia, I
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: think I said, which is literally a fear of chopsticks. Yeah,
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: there's a fear for everything. But but yes, but I
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: was reading a blog post on it on some maybe
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: psychnet I think, and they were saying, like, there's basically
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: two categories of phobias, ones that are semi rational. They
• 45:58
  Speaker 1: use the example of a fear of sharks. Well, if
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: you did run into a shark, there's a chance you
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: could be killed by that sharks. So it's not just
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: totally bonkers to be afraid of sharks, but the a
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: phobia of sharks is in irrational fear, Like maybe if
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: you live in Kansas, you've got no reason to have
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: a fear of sharks. This this one, they said, this
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: basically qualifies in in the bonkers category. Like there's virtually
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: nothing that chopsticks can do to hurt you, So to
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: be irrationally afraid of chopsticks, where you feel like heart
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: pounding anxiety is is a genuine died in the wool phobia.
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: But some people do apparently experience this, although it's super rare. Yeah,
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: that's interesting, But you'll like avoid entire types of restaurants
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: because you can't be around chopsticks, and you'll get anxious
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: just thinking about being around chopsticks. That's so sad because
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: Asian food makes up a large portion of my diet. Well, luckily,
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: for you. You don't have consecutively a phobia. No. I
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: mean when I think about sushi, I think about fuh,
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: I think about ramen. M I think about good old
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: fashioned Seesuan Chinese food. Oh yeah, think about Korean mhm.
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: And that's just the tip of the iceberg. I could
• 47:15
  Speaker 1: eat that. I could eat that all the time. Dude,
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: you've got to get some booty j I'll take you
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: to go get some. All right, you're gonna You're gonna
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: love is so good. I can't wait. You got anything else?
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: I got nothing else? Forty five minutes on chopsticks, baby bad.
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: If you want to know more about chopsticks, go get
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: yourself some that you can reuse and eat conscientiously with them.
• 47:37
  Speaker 1: And don't forget all of the manners. But just go
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: eat some Asian food, because no matter where it's farm
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: or what it is, it's probably pretty good. Agreed. Since
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: I said that, it's time for listener mayo, I'm gonna
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: call this too. For two. Hey, guys, I wrote a
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: few years ago about Alan Alda. I thought i'd share
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: a Sammy Davis Jr. Story. Uh, And this is from
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: Andrew Limburgh and Ittsburg And he got his alan Aldawin
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: read and when I told him this was coming on,
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: he wrote back to for two baby nice. Yeah, there's
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: people out there who are like, oh for ten, I know,
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: so I assume it's not like we're keeping track of
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: people like that. Oh no, I haven't spa Oh you do, men,
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: that's me, uh, he says. So in the eighties, Sammy
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: would had been cleaned out by his ex wife and
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: was selling barbecue sauce. He was in Pittsburgh to promote it,
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: and my friend Larry, who had a local TV show
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: at the time, got a chance to interview him. When
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: they arrived at the hotel, they were told they would
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: get twenty minutes with Sammy, but when they talked to
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: Sammy's manager, he said only ten minutes. So instead of
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: having time to set up a two shot interview and
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: for people that don't know the linko that means both
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: people are in the same camera frame. Uh, they kept
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: the camera on Sammy and Larry would then go back
• 48:52
  Speaker 1: and at his footage later, so he would, I guess,
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: re ask the questions with a ghost Sammy just edit
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: it together. At the end of the interview. They needed one,
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: just one two shot of the two of them together
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: so they could edit it realistically, and Sammy's manager said nope,
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: and Larry looked at Sammy almost begging because they needed
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: the two shot. Sammy took a long drag of a
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: cigarette and said, get your two shot, babe. The manager
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: then said, oh, well, I guess I'm the a hole,
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: to which Sammy said, as a matter of fact, Babe,
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: you are an a hole. So this is how the
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: story goes, apparently. Uh. And Then Andrew says he's been
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: listening since oh eight and went to that live show
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: in Pittsburgh. Please come back, and he says he is
• 49:39
  Speaker 1: a podcast now called the Pittsburgh Oddcast, and he said
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: we average about hundred listen to an episode, which is
• 49:48
  Speaker 1: pretty darn good. Andrew, Yeah, it is nice working for
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: a self styled show that's not bad at all, especially
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: a local one to Pittsburgh Oddcast. Yeah, so, Pittsburgh Ian's
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: if you're from the Burg, check out the Pittsburgh Podcast,
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: and Andrew, or even if you're interested in it, sure, Pittsburgh.
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: You might live in Philadelphia and just be a burghead exactly. Uh. Well,
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: that was a pretty great one. Thank you very much too.
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: For two that's pretty impressive, Andrew Um. And if you
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: want to get Chuck to do any Sammy Davis Jr. Impressions,
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: right in with your own Sammy Davis Jr. Story and
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: see how it goes. Uh. And you can put that
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: in an email, wrap it up, spank it on the bottom,
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: and send it off to Stuff podcast at iHeart radio
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: dot com. Stuff you Should Know is a production of
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: iHeart Radios How Stuff Works. For more podcasts for my
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: wherever you listen to your favorite shows.