The way I see it, we ought to be careful with what we eat and drink. In other words, we must be careful about what goes into our stomachs.
An incident that occurred earlier this week, is prompting this discourse.
I was at a Food place (that will remain unnamed (for the purposes of this class), a few days ago and someone placed an order for chicken and fries-seasoned chicken and fries to be specific.
The two ladies, we will refer to them as Food Handlers (for the purpose of this class), were busily engaged in filling several orders at the same time.
All of us present, waited patiently. Suddenly, I heard an exclamation from one of the female customers: ‘Hey, she putting her hand in the fries!’
I positioned myself where I could see better. (I guess it is not good for customers to be able to see how and when food is being prepared huh?)
To my shock, the two ladies were preoccupied in removing some of the fries with their hands and throwing them into a garbage bin. I am assuming that they were burnt or something but the natural question is: Why not use a fork or other appropriate piece of equipment?
Hands can sometimes be deadly.
Suppose, they had recently used the toilet and suppose some of the filth had remained in their fingernails?
Suppose they had not even washed their hands, after using the toilet?
Seriously, I travel fairly often and I am appalled at the number of men, I see utilize public bathrooms and head straight out of the door, without washing their hands!
Besides, as a Public Health Inspector, I learnt with some degree of interest, that some of the toilet paper are coded something like plywood.
One ply; two ply etc.
Well I newa!
The one ply are the very thin ones that your fingers can break through very easily and the others get thicker etc.
So, only God knows, the history of those hands that were fingering the people’s fries that afternoon.
The lady has a lot more spunk than I have and she confronted one of the Food handlers and told her never to do it again.
Of course she did not take it kindly and started to deny but realized her futility, when she realized that where they were, was very visible from the outside.
So it therefore begs the question: Do we continue to eat with the philosophy that ‘out of sight-out of mind’ and what eyes don’t see-heart won’t grieve?’
Just this week also, I heard a story on radio, about a guy who sat down to eat some juicy looking plums, one evening.
As he bit into the first one, he saw a worm and spat it out. As he bit the second one, another worm.
The guy turned off the lights and ate all of the remaining plums. He did not want to see the worms. He wanted to enjoy his plums.
Well I newa!
It brings me to a teachable moment:
Food handlers, I beseech you-yea implore you, to be professional and clean in handling food that you preparing and serving for public consumption. Some of you may even be murderers, as people have died of food poisoning and such like.
I was at a church function on Sunday last and when a little boy was offered something to eat, his immediate response was: “I have to wash my hands first.”
Now where did he get that? Obviously he has been well trained by his parents.
So too, we as adults, need to be more decent in our dealings generally but more especially with food meant for public consumption.
That’s the way I see it. How do you see it?
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