I conclude that fine western dining has more style over substance. As the facilitator put it, it’s “more about the presentation, so don’t be surprised if the plate’s very big and the portion’s very small”.

Anyway, the fine western dining that we went through at SHA Villa in the afternoon was rather useful, although I suspect that by the time the O’s are over, most of us would have forgotten the many rules and manners that were taught to us.

I mean, not many of us put much stock into sitting with our back perpendicular to the ground, slowly bringing that carefully sliced piece of fillet into the mouth and then munching it slowly.

Hello! Time is money/for mugging!

Okay, I digress. Of course, the main highlight of the course was the practical component where we had lots of fun, and good food to boot.

Me: “Eh, she not looking right?”
JS: “No.”
*Stabs vegetable savagely and stuffs it into mouth*

I did that plainly because I thought it was rather retarded to slice a leaf up.

Of course, being in an all boys’ school means that food isn’t always the main focus.

JS: “Their skirts so short very vulgar leh”
Me: “Woah, you’re complaining meh?”
PX: “Yah lor, you this kind complain one meh?”
JS: “Wah lao, I’m not that kind of person okay”

*He puts on an act of angelic innocence*

Of course, he’s hardly innocent because we caught him oogling at the waitress that served us our desserts. We were laughing away when she suddenly came with the plates. He froze and his eyes were suddenly tracking her. I don’t know how to describe it, but his eyes were obviously moving around in their sockets like a weapons laser that had acquired a target.

After she left.

Me: “Why you beo until like that?”
JS: “Huh where got?!?” *Denial!*
Me: “Hello, you were staring at her can.”
JS: “She’s not bad whaaaatt.”
Me: “She’s the one with the stiletto heels right? What’s her name?”
JS: “Celine”

To his disappointment, she moved over to the other side of the restaurant. So for the rest of the meal he was looking and wishing aloud for her to come over. To give her credit, most of us agreed that her eyes were rather enchanting.

“Nice eyes,” JS said.
“What, you’re going to tell her that her father stole the stars from the skies and put it in her eyes ah?”
“No no, she’ll probably slap me lor”
*Shrugs*

After that he was reporting her movements through bearings and the clock positions.
The next waitress who came was a team leader, and I sort of noticed her name tag when she was asking us if we wanted coffee or tea.

It read: “Hoai Thu”. One and a half years spent with Vietnamese scholars meant that I could instantly recognize a Vietnamese name. So after she left, I leaned back to talk to Le Vu.

“Oi Le Vu, that waitress there with the team leader tag is Vietnamese ah?”
“Huh? Which one? How you know?”
“There that one with the two tags. You go see the name tag. It’s H-O-A-I –T-H-U”

Speak of the devil, she came.

He was staring at the name tag with his eyes so close she clearly felt uncomfortable. But after that, Phuc, him and her became rather good friends because she was then stationed there permanently and they were speaking animatedly in rapid-fire Viet to each other.

Which was rather interesting…

We held a mini-concert in the restaurant later by rubbing the wine glasses with wet fingers and making the glasses “sing”. They pretended not to notice, but after a while, it became a little unbearable because the drone was extremely loud.

A waitress took away JS’ glasses, and then ours, which led to us protesting because we weren’t doing anything.

Me: “Wah lao, you confiscate for what, I still want to drink one leh”
PX: “Yeah, we weren’t playing”
Sarah: “You all play play play. You know the kitchen also can hear. Very noisy.”
Me: “But I still want my water”
Sarah: “I’ll get you another cup”
Me: “Why don’t you just give me the glass?”
Sarah: “Very noisy lah.”
Me: “You should be proud that we’re able to make the glass resonate at the right pitch and frequency you know.”

*I was bullshiting, but she didn’t call my bluff”

Sarah: “Later break how?”
Me: “It won’t break one lah. Modern glass…”
Sarah: “It’s crystal you know. Why don’t I give you another glass you go outside and practice?”
Me: “No need, at home a lot.”
Sarah: “Got people break before you know.”

*She makes some lengthy speech about someone dropping the glass or whatever, which completely misses the point*

*I can’t remember what I said later, but the conversation swerved towards singing.”

Me: “You know, it’s nearly impossible for a person to sing until the glass breaks? He must sing at so pure a note and at the right frequency…”
Sarah: “You go home try lor, then tell me”
Me: “No need, I can try here.”
Sarah: “Wah, I better run away.”

Which was a relief because if I had tried, I would have broken the glass, wrecked ear drums and most importantly, destroyed the sanity of others.

Yup, so after that, she went around collecting glasses from most of us. Our teacher wasn’t discouraging us, so we got bolder.

“This is resonance. The less water, the louder, etc etc etc etc…”

I tried it again with Andre’s glass. She suddenly apparated in front of me, arms akimbo.

“Oops”

I smiled and disappeared.

I think we more or less demolished the whole idea of fine western dining, but we had lots of fun.

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