One of my favourite 'tong sui' is barley boiled with 'fu chok' (dried bean curd strips) and 'pak gor' which is called 'ginkgo' in English. In case you've no idea what ginkgo looks like..you're going to find out soon because this post is going to be all about this fossil fruit (ginkgo has been around since the Jurassic Times..no kidding.Google it up)
GinkgoMy mum usually assigns my bro and I to shell the ginkgoes. This task is rather tedious because you have to crack the hard shell,after the shell,you have to get rid of a thin brown layer which covers the bean. We have to be very careful during the whole process because we don't want to end up with mashed up beans (my bro gets carried away with the small hammer we use to crack the shell) or scarred beans (the brown layer is rather hard to peel n I sometimes end up scraping away a whole chunk from the bean.Oops..)
While I was carefully scraping a bean with a sharp knife barely an inch from my fingers;I had an inspiration to be philosophical with ginkgo. (pardon the randomness...) Let me share:-
Look at this handful of ginkgo I picked out from the bag:-
My mum hand-picked all the ginkgoes so there are no obviously rotten ones among those. When we make friends,we are somewhat doing that. We try to stick with those whom we perceive as good,able to get along with...etc etc. Our immediate choices are based on how they appear to be;that is,what is on the outside.When we want to make friends,we take care to appear friendly,charming,polite,fun....basically;whatever is appealing to others. We put on our best sides forward. So that is the reason why we get along so well and easily with new friends.
This has happened to me a lot of times before. I would suddenly get close to somebody,and we'd be very close;doing things together,telling each other a lot of things. But gradually,we will drift apart;in some cases,in a matter of weeks. Now,I'm not talking about BGR or those bitchy type of friendships where the sole reason is to make use of each other to get popular;when in fact,the 'besties' hate each other. No,when I say 'drift apart',it means,we simply run out of things to talk about and become not so close anymore. We revert to 'hi,bye' friends.
Of course,this doesn't happen to all friendships,if not,how else did we find the jewels who stick with us through thick and thin and remain close to you for years to come. Those are the ones which we must hold on to. The initial period of being friends is what I regard as a de-shelling process,where we slowly get to see the 'inside' of the person.
However,sometimes;we discover something which we don't expect.
Now,there is a difference between:-1. the person does not have anything in common with you,and
2. the person is plain 'rotten'.
The point I'm trying to make here is;some people are just NOT what they appeared to be at first. Whether deliberately or not,they can conceal their rotten side very well. And the worst of them are those who do it deliberately and do not think it is wrong. All of us have,at one times,pretended to be something we are not. But there are very few who have that kind of manipulative nature. So,be wary of these type. Or if you are one yourself,look around you and see how many real friends you have.
The good friends which we have,we might go through some rough patches.
Like ginkgo has to be boiled to release it's true flavour. But the end result is sweetness that we can enjoy. Appreciate it!!!
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Remember:
People don't change,they just be what they really are
Philosophical musings finished.
Thanks for staying with me til the end.
:)
2 squeaked:
Ginko with barli...yes...this is also one of my favaorite...
i used to have my grandma hammer those gingko shells nicely so that she can just peel it off :)
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