As an Intercultural Aide (ICA) in the dorm at MSU, I am tasked on a daily basis with the job of engaging with residents and creating opportunity for people to have meaningful discussions which, in this age of technology, is becoming a rare commodity. Therefore, when my teacher tasked us to go and interrupt McDonaldization, the only thing that came to my mind was to interrupt the unwritten laws that McDonaldization has introduced into our culture. For instance, the laws inside an elevator: stand as far as possible from the closest person near you, silence is the golden rule, and the only exception is announcing the floor one is going to. These common-sense behaviors became the laws that I tried to break throughout this exercise.
I focused on the elevator because, as Tim Wu explained in his article The Tyranny of Convenience, it is convenient “…that is, more efficient and easier ways of doing personal tasks…”, in this case easier way to get to higher floors without taking the stairs. So, I started my journey of disturbing the McDonaldization in my dorm, Bailey Hall. This was a bad idea because most people know me in the building as an ICA, so they were easily opened to talking to me and engaging in any discussion. Consequently, I relocated my quest to the library building’s elevator.
Most of my first attempts were failures even though I thought that by trying to complement people’s bag’s color or shoes or scarfs, they would be more prone to have a conversation, but it was not the case. I did three travels between the first floor and the fourth floor, and I did not get any single conversation beyond mere “thanks” to my complements. Also, I got some weird looks that I could not explain. I am sure, some people might have thought that I was a mental ill person who is just standing there in the elevator with no destination. One person actually asked me if I was okay, when I was asking her how she is doing and how her day is going, maybe in an attempt to remind that no one talk to strangers in an elevator.
Seeing that the elevator was not working, I decided to stay on the first floor and to go talk to the servers in the Sparty’s. Due to the fact that most of the items I usually in the fridge behind the bar, I used that opportunity ask her “What does she think that I should get because I am going to be starting for a long period of time?”, she quickly responded coffee, but I kept on asking other question. Actually, she seemed not being bothered by my talk, but the people in the line behind were the ones making noise, and one of her supervisors showed up and asked me to be quick and make space for others. I left with the realization that, maybe people really want to have meaningful conversations, but the systems and the fast speed of the society in which we live do not give time and space to people to do so.
Refrigerator Photograph of a Family in Michigan
The saying usually goes: “Tell me who your friends are, and I will tell you who you are”. Is it really true? Can the different things we associate with in life say more about ourselves? These are questions that I tried to think about when I took the picture of my friend family’s fridge a couple days ago. It is a certitude that no one goes groceries shopping or shopping in general with the thought that the things they are about to buy will reveal more about them. However, by simple choice, we only buy what we like, what we consume, and what we identify with.
This inexact science is what I used, but this time applied to food and the grocery products that my friend’s family bought, to characterize them. As seen in the picture, almost everything is processed food, only the lettuce in the down left compartment is the only fresh food they have. Judging from that observation, I could conclude that that family does not cook as often as it seems. This observation can mean two things. Firstly, according to the words of Chelsea Fagan in her book the Financial Diet: A total beginner’s guide to getting good with money: “… much of our generation regards to home cooking as simultaneously scary and far too much of a hassle”, we can say that maybe this family might be wealthy because they can afford all these process foods, but they just do not like cooking or do not have the time. Secondly, on the other hand, if we follow on the lines of Tracie McMillan in her book the American way of eating, where she states that: “…good, fresh food tends to cost more, especially in cities, making it difficult, if not impossible, for folks of limited means to afford it”, I can agree because my friend’s family lives in a city, and that can explain why they do not have a lot of fresh food. Definitely, trying to judge my friend’s family financial background based on the content of their fridge is more difficult than expected. Also, because as Melanie Warner talked about process food in length in her book Pandora’s lunchbox, we can see that these foods that fill this fridge are made to be very cheap in such a way that the rich and the poor can both afford it. Consequently, I would rather see this family as a middle working class.
Other things in the fridge are the sugary products. We can see on the left there is a chocolate syrup, a hot fudge for ice cream, a bottle of caramel, some energy drinks in the top middle part, and the sugary juice in the middle there too. These products show that the family has a very sugary diet and taste preference. This reminds me of how food companies would add sugar to any product just because they know the consumers easily fall for the taste of sugar. Also, we can see a lot of dairy products like milk, eggs, and a lot of cheese in the compartment under the lettuce compartment. Even if I was not able to take a picture of the freezer, seeing the steak sauce on the top right side shows that the family consumes a lot of meat too. In terms of drinks, we can see a couple of cans of beers in the middle compartment. Lastly, seeing Lunchables and frozen hamburgers and pizza reminded of Michael Moss’s article The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food where he explains how all these foods came into being, and how these companies made sure that their products are targeting the working families or children. Indeed, my friend’s parents work all day long and they have a sixteen years old daughter, a nine years old son, and my friend who is in college with me. Therefore, the two other children and even the parents would usually go to school or to work with either a Lunchables box or a microwaved hamburger which makes a lot of sense because the parents do not have time.
After all these observations that somehow makes sense with a lot of science behind the food we consume, I guarantee that this photo of the fridge at one moment in time does not say the whole story about this family. There are so many things that if I did not talk a little bit with the family, the picture would not have told me like the number of children in the house and the work that the parents do. However, one thing the photograph says for sure is that this family consumes a lot of process food because their fridge is filled with all these big brands packaged products. Does it mean that this is the only option they have? or is it just a matter of preference? This is something this photograph will never tell me because it is one moment in the time of a family somewhere in Michigan.
Food Diary: Whole against Processed
First Day
Oatmeal
Milk
Honey
Water
Black bean and Rice Enchilada
Guacamole
Lettuce
Red Onion
Ice cream
Chocolate Chip cookies
Second Day
Scrambled Eggs
Hot chocolate
Brown Bread
Water
Panda Express Fried Rice
Panda Express Orange Chicken
Everfresh Kiwi Strawberry Juice
Fruit Punch
Pop tart
I thought that documenting the food that I consume was going to be easy. However, when one has to think in terms of not consuming “highly processed food”, which is defined by Melanie Warner in her book Pandora’s lunchbox as “something that could not be made, with the same ingredients, in a home kitchen”, the choice one is left with is very narrow. I tend to eat whole grain and home-style made food almost every day, but I still crave sugar and salt most of the time as snacks at night.
My daily food habit consists of breakfast and dinner mainly, I only eat lunch occasionally when I have the time. So, I thought that I could go by without eating anything processed, but it was not the case. The first day started very well with oatmeal, milk and honey. Milk as a dairy product is surely known as a processed food, but reading Melanie Warner made me more aware of its components like the vitamin D and vitamin A that are not necessary from the cows, and that are surely manufactured somewhere in China. Though I thought of the oatmeal and I had the same line of thought as John Erdman from the University of Illinois who stated: “The hypothesis that whole foods are always going to be better is a good one”. Therefore, I counterbalanced the processed side of the milk with the benefits that I was going to gain from the oatmeal. Then for dinner, I had black bean, rice guacamole and red onions which was fine. Nonetheless, ice cream and chocolate chip cookies came to the side of my plate. That was when I realized that as a human, Michael Moss, who wrote the article the Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food, and Melanie Warner are right about the fact that we crave tastes such as sweet and salt and that is what industrial processed food companies always bet on to make their food addictive.
The second day was harder because I had to limit my intake of processed food. It started off well but ended off with me eating a pop tart. If there is anything that this food diary made me aware of, it would me my craving for sweet at night. If I had to pay for the ice cream, chocolate chip cookies and pop tart every time that I wanted to eat them, it would have taken a huge amount of money in my budget as Chelsea Fagan puts it in her book the financial Diet: “… but it more immediately costs us in our checking account”, talking about the fact that our generation does not cook any more. I believe that I sustain my cravings for some tastes because I do not cook. If I were cooking, I would like have always been looking forward to eating the food that I made for myself and not something from outside.