Q Shock you (School Lunch)

[Qsamasensei]

Have you ever gotten sick from eating the school lunch.


http://www.japantoday.com/category/national/view/salad-in-school-lunch-identified-as-cause-of-mass-food-poisoning

[moolooman]

I promised myself at the outset of this ALT gig that I would never leave any of my school lunch. Haven`t yet, and haven`t been sick. I lived in China for a year and a half and suspect my gut developed a bit of extra toughness as a result.

[Paul]

What is surprising to me is that it doesnt happen more often.

[Qsamasensei]

What is surprising to me is that it doesnt happen more often.

I could imagine the cases of food poisoning would be increased in areas where the school lunch isn't prepared at the school, but at lunch centers and then delivered to the schools hours before lunch time. Plenty of time for the food to cool down to a dangerous temperature.

[SirDickusBacillus]

Q Shock You sounds like an awful kancho.


I am also suprirsed this doesnt happen more often. I think they do fairly well with lunch here. I wouldnt like to see America switch to an all school serviced lunch for every student. I think there would be pure chaos.

[Otaku]

I think there would be pure chaos.

That's because people like different things. You can expect everybody to eat the same thing, I mean, outside of Japan, that is...

[FujiFromMyWindowFujiFromMyWindow]

I generally like the JHS lunch and hate the Elem. lunch...I've had so many experiences regarding lunch and have various opinions about the socialization or lack of it that goes on with the ALT. Lunch is it's own novel.

The calorie accuracy depends on if the meal is cooked at school or provided by a lunch center. My first year at JHS the chef cooked like she weighed. Heavy. I was told that JHS was supposed to be about 800 calories for the "growing boys and girls" but some days the staff portitions were about 1000 surely. The bowls of curry and rice, udon etc. were "Yamamori". (translates to something like mountain sized.)

Of course by 1pm I was bloody famished and found it hard to say no. There was something uncomfortable about throwing food out. Then I learned that the leftovers were given to put on fields as fertilizer, but it was too late for my fat ass.

On the other hand there were days when an item in the lunch was low like salad or vegetables. For some reason, instead of dishing it out equally to the men and women, I noticed the women getting less. It didn't matter if it was male or female dishing it out. Somehow, that too was not right I thought.

[FujiFromMyWindowFujiFromMyWindow]

I will never forget when I found myself working with a former Elem. homeroom teacher whose class I had taught at another school.

She ignored me and refused to participate at the original school. In fact, at the original school the student's had generously prepared my lunch with a little extra leftovoers because it was my birthday. They presented it to me directly in front of her. I said thank you to the kids, was about to sit down, she didn't acknowledge me, nor bat an eye, and immediately attempted to take my tray and give it away. I was speechless. The kids stopped her. If I had not been in Japan so long I would have been humiliated. But I thought, ahhh someday her atittude will bite her in the butt.

Yah right! The next school I was at she was there. Staff lunch was prepared from 12:25 eaten from 12:35. Normally the kids ate from 12:40/12:45

I hauled mine upstairs to eat with her chaotic/ear deafening class. While, I sat and waited and watched the steam evaporate off my lunch. Finally at 12:45, the kids had the room prepared and started dishing the food out. Nobody was paying any attention to me so I said: Sumimasen, Osakani, Shittsureshimasu.

Did I ever get told off by my students. They were ruder than the teacher.

A week later the principal brought it up all pissed off. "Dame DESU!! on and on in Japanese." .

Crap I just wrote out the whole story and lost it. I'm still new to this forum. When I have more time I will explain my reasons for eating ahead of the kids.

1. Western people eat hot food and hate it when it has cooled off. We don't eat cold rice and meat.

2. Students were 30 minutes late before they started eating and teacher didn't care.

3. I taught at the school twice a month. I ate with each class only once or twice a year and therefore think they should have shown some appreciation.

4. If they can't show appreciation they could show some respect. I'm an adult. I'm a teacher I don't do things without thought and reason. I'm not Japanese but it doesn't mean I'm brain dead. I know their customs and expectations. Do they know mine? No. They're braindead.

In conclusion, if students want me to eat with them, they should mind their manners. They are kids sure. But the teachers are sometimes worse than pigs. I once sat with a Librarian who shoveled her gullet so full of food that nobody could understand her Japanese. She would even choke. Does the prime minister of Japan speak with his mouth full of food at International conferences?

If they can't improve their manners then I should be permitted to sit with the teacher in the classroom or downstairs with the staff. This should be optional anyway. It is my paid break time and I deserve it, especially when I teach 6 classes. I should not have to drag my tray upstairs. I should not have every kid inspecting my lunch from home either. Manners.

That said, it is a pleasure to eat with kids who attend good schools and have good teachers. They are cute, and fun, and sometimes interesting....because they LISTEN and show respect.

I know I am new and coming across as a SOB so Rant Over

[SirDickusBacillus]

I just think of that little girl, who will remained unnamed in my post, who use to say "How rude!". There have been growths on that girl since that time.

I think its a big deal too though. To eat alone is one thing, you can start whenever. Eating with the group means just that to me. They are fairly strict about the Itadakimasu. As for you snob teacher, MEXT her. She sounds jelly that you got some food and she has to eat her normal amounts and then throw them up after class.

[Richard_BenoitEnglipedia Drone]

I'm glad I am at JHS and rarely eat with the kids. I have a pretty hard time with the whole everyone starts eating at the same time business. I fail to see the offence.

If kids are busy working and they are too busy to start eating then that is something else. That's just no fair if another is "unable" to start eating. But if they are running around, picking their noses or just chatting up their crush (riiiiight) then screw you guys I'm digging in.

The whole group mentality for me is sometimes just to hard to bear.

[moolooman]

Fortunately I have convinced my lead teacher that the students don`t really want anything to do with me during their lunch eating. They just want to talk with their mates, so I eat in the teachers room.

When I did eat in the classroom with the rest of them, I had not an ounce of trouble/concern/anything about waiting for the collective itadakimasu before I started eating.

My problems begin when I wonder why they say `thank you` to their food, then throw most of it away. Akiko (my better half) always taught me that there is a special thing about rice, and you don`t throw it away. That is how they roll in her house perhaps. Come to think of it, it was frowned upon big time to throw away food back in my family home aswell.

[jessen100]

so, Q shock = 給食　right? where does the you fit in?

[Richard_BenoitEnglipedia Drone]

Well .. you see... "you" are being shocked by...the....shock....what it means is fool me once.....uhhh shame .....what it means is you can't fool me again is what it means.....

[FujiFromMyWindowFujiFromMyWindow]

I updated my rant above.

[SirDickusBacillus]

I updated my rant above.

Dont do that please. お願い

[Paul]

I know I am new and coming across as a SOB so Rant Over

Feel free to rant, really! That is one thing that you probably need to do. There are so many times that I would have loved to have a forum like this years ago to rant, and bitch, and complain, about the petty shit that happens everyday that I thought my head would explode.

I could if you are interested give you an honest response on the "why" they do the things that they do, but you really need to vent your feelings first.

Go for it, bitch, moan, complain, have your period if you are female, if not, have one anyway.

When you are ready, calmed down, chilled out, after a splint or two, figuratively speaking, let us know, then I amongst the borg host of other's here can try to explain the reasoning behind the borg's insistence on conformity.

[moolooman]

It must have been a real bitch before the Internet then Paul

[Otaku]

It must have been a real bitch before the Internet then Paul

LOL! <--Paul, that's for rubbing metaphorical BBQ sauce in my eyes.

[moolooman]

I best hold off though. My first learning of computers revolved around:

10 PRINT "HELLO"
20 GOTO 10
30 END
RUN

[Paul]

It must have been a real bitch before the Internet then Paul

I know you guys are giving me a hard time but really the world was a hell of a lot bigger back then. Fortunately my brother and I recognized the potential for communication between ourselves back during the initial dial-up era of the internet.

Prior to that I used to have to literally go to a pay phone and use telephone cards to talk with the family back in the states or use snail mail. Calling from our house phone was just way too expensive as at the time there was only one option KDD and they kept prices so high with no competition that calling from home was out of the question.

Things today have made it so much easier to stay in contact that it truly has made living here so much easier to deal with. I readily admit that if the internet had not come along as it has I highly doubt that I would still be living here. Back in the late 90's my wife and daughter actually begged me to go back to the states for a vacation to get the hell outta dodge here, it was making me crazy.

LOL! <--Paul, that's for rubbing metaphorical BBQ sauce in my eyes.

Just make sure that there is kimuchee in the BBQ sauce! Stings right good!

[moolooman]

I remember downloading porn on dial up. It was a bitch.

Hang on . . . I don`t remember that at all.

[sonofobed]

I best hold off though. My first learning of computers revolved around:

10 PRINT "HELLO WORLD"
20 GOTO 10
30 END
RUN

Fixed.

[FujiFromMyWindowFujiFromMyWindow]

Sure Paul, after almost a decade here I still welcome your thoughts on school lunch. Bring it on!

It is a good thing you are here, you seem to add balance.

Your thoughts on "what if the internet had not come" are interesting....Did you actually take that vacation back to the US?

You wrote that your wife and kid pretty much begged you to take them on a holiday to the US. Does that mean they were getting tired of life in Japan? ...should we assume that they are not Japanese then?

[Paul]

Sure Paul, after almost a decade here I still welcome your thoughts on school lunch. Bring it on!

It is a good thing you are here, you seem to add balance.

Your thoughts on "what if the internet had not come" are interesting....Did you actually take that vacation back to the US?

You wrote that your wife and kid pretty much begged you to take them on a holiday to the US. Does that mean they were getting tired of life in Japan? ...should we assume that they are not Japanese then?

I was getting to be the pain in the ass. (She might argue that I still am......) I had been here for over 10 years and needed to get back to the USA and my own family for a break. The circumstances surrounding the time were difficult at best for me with work and family and I thought I was going to burst a few blood vessels in my head. I went home alone for two weeks, had a blast, came back here and took my wife and kids to Disneyland for a week, yeah an entire week, went into hock for the whole thing, spent something like $25,000.00 or $30,000.00 for the states trip and Disney, but I would do it again in a heartbeat!

There's no place like home!

My wife is Japanese. Thank you as well for the nice comment, I am actually blushing.

Ahhh...school lunch, aka at times as spew-shoku? I get back to you after I eat mine today.

[Paul]

Today was rice, stir fried vegetables with tofu, tofu-burger's, milk and milk pudding for dessert. On a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being perfect, I give it a 7.5, not too bad seeing as how I have yet to "eat" a 10. (Freudian slip there......)

The past couple of years the lunches have been rather good, the "center" where they are prepared changed nutritionists and this one evidently also has a cook's license as well, which makes a world of difference.

[Buddy-Tom]

The school lunches I have seen in JHS have generally been very poor in many ways. The ingredients are of low quality. The overwhelming portion of the meal is starch. Much of that is highly processed, like bread and noodles. A lot of sugar in the sauces and desserts. Too much emphasis on tofu. Not enough protein and fat for growing minds and bodies. On the rare days fish or chicken is served, there is a mad scramble amongst the male staff members to get the extra portions.

[gsuiris]

Where I am there are not enough green vegetables or fruits. A lot of starch, a lot of meat (seriously, we often have a meat, plus vegetables with meat, and meat in the soup).

Doesn't matter though because I don't usually eat all of it anyway. Either no time, or I don't like all of it.

My favorite is when we have curry. God I love that stuff.

[Paul]

Has anyone ever wondered why there arent more cases of food poisoning from school lunch?

It is because they as a rule of thumb do NOT serve fresh vegetables, even the cucumber gets boiled. Particularly in locations that have lunch center's rather than having the lunch prepared right in the school.

They are not prepared, nor I would venture a guess here, trained in how to properly handle, keep, and serve, fresh garden veggies with school lunches.

[Otaku]

Curry was mentioned. Why is it a lot of times a hard boiled egg is served with curry in Japan? What's the connection?

[jessen100]

theyre good together?
idk

i have chicken curry and nan tomorrow.