"MY COOKING EXPERIENCES" in "WRITER@WORK: Stories From A Lone, Urban Girl"

How do I feel about cooking? Seriously, don’t ask. When it comes to being a woman and living in Indonesia, I hate that question. It’s not that I really hate cooking. I’m just not that good at it yet. I’m still learning.

When I was a kid, Mom and I used to try recipes. It wasn’t exactly like opening a cookbook and choosing a menu. On the weekends, she and I would sometimes go to restaurants, hawker street foods, or other small dine-ins in the city. We’d choose variety of foods, locals and else.

After tasting each, Mom would ask me to guess the ingredients by relying solely on my tastebuds. Did it contain salt? Sugar or vinegar? Chili or pepper?

Then we’d go shopping for goods and try to copy the previous menu. We’d try that in the kitchen. Sometimes we could make the exact same thing, other times it was just close.

Sometimes we failed. Like the time we tried to fry doughnuts, but the flour ended up too attached in one big bulk on the pan. It looked more like a cakwe (our local version of churros) instead.

So, what had changed?

I began resenting kitchen duties when some people started enforcing their opinions and stupid, sexist, double standard regarding cooking in the kitchen:

“Oh, it’s a woman’s job.”

“You’re not a good wife if you can’t even cook. Your husband might cheat on you. Your kids will starve.”

“You should be ashamed. Your brother cooks better than you do.”

I HATE THAT. I wonder who came up with such a stupid, sexist idea that only women must be able to cook? They applaud men who do, as if it’s something special. If it’s women, it’s because they should. Yay.

For a while, I’d been a rebel. I’d wanted to prove them my point, that I am still a woman despite my lack of cooking ability.

My whole perspective changed when I met my best friend. Coming from a Portuguese family and being Australian, he proudly said he loved trying recipes and baking cookies too in the kitchen. He’d helped his mom since he was six.

And he started baking his very first cake at the age of ten. Wow.

When I used to help him to prepare meals, I realised the enjoyment I’d missed. At that time, Mom was still busy looking after poor ailing Dad, so we no longer had time to do our usual routine.

I kind of regret listening to shallow minds, although perhaps they still need to be properly educated. Living on my own now, I started learning how to cook again in the kitchen. Once I poisoned myself, because the salmon pasta was no longer good. Yuck.

I like that cooking helps a lot to save money. You also get to experiment in the kitchen (according to Mom the catering business owner and my best friend who loves baking cookies.)
However, don’t you dare bring up the gender card with me. Anyone can cook if they want to. It’s a skill, not a gender-based role. Besides, it’s 2018, for God’s sake. Stop acting like it’s still 1918.

R.

(Jakarta, May 10, 2018. From Jakarta’s Couchsurfing Writers’ Club Weekly Writing Challenge. Topic: “What do you think about cooking?”)