Steaming fish balls

I’d only been in Thailand a short time. It wasn’t yet enough time to have mastered the art of the chopsticks. The sounds of woks crashing, food sizzling and foreign words bounced off the dingy walls of the cafe. Calenders were hung on most walls, faded and dusty. While some were in Thai, others were in English and Thai and I could see that the pages had not been turned for some time. Plastic dishes of various pastel colours were scattered over the grimy fold-up tables. The smell of salty soup hung over the heads of the Thais, who were talking animatedly while eating their soup. In the centre of each table was a collection of old glass jars. Each was filled with essential Thai condiments. Forget the tomato sauce, they had chilli, sugar, soy sauce and a stinking blend of chillies and fish sauce. I was lost. A bowl of steaming noodle soup was placed in front of me. With just a little trepidation, I picked up my chopsticks and stirred them through the soup. Nothing strange floated to the surface. With a smile, I realised that there was no offal in the soup today. The soup was filled with a lot of stock, noodles, slithers of vegetables and balls of fish meat. And all I was equipped with was chopsticks?! I was just getting in to it when a lady from a nearby village spotted me. Her child was sitting on her hip. There is a strong chance that I was the first foreigner this lady had ever seen. (She probably assumes all foreigners are sweaty, red-faced people.) She pointed me out to her child and her pointed finger stayed in mid-air until I finished eating. Knowing that this lady was watching me, I tried my absolute hardest to eat gracefully. My chopsticks gripped each ball of fish meat nervously. Dropping one would mean that the soup would splash up everywhere, giving me away as the unsophisticated kid that I was. With more than a little pride in myself, I finished my lunch. I had left almost no mess around me. The village lady was satisfied and turned away, heading back to her day’s work.