We were already in exams week and I had a paper the next day. Even though my friends and I were prepared, we couldn’t stop learning because it was one of those papers that could just humble you. We were tired and famished. They were at my hostel so just like any other good host I was supposed to give them food right?
Cooking was never my thing at the university or let me say especially at the university. I was there to get knowledge and perfect grades and every other thing was a distraction and that went for cooking especially in exams week. I suggested food delivery but it was too late so two guys volunteered to go look for food for us. They came back with noodles, very cold noodles. I am probably the biggest fan of noodles but those noodles weren’t “noodlesing”. At that point hunger was killing us and nobody even thought about heating the food.
Another weird thing was that they came with extra packs for everyone. I didn’t understand what was going on and was actually about to hail them as “the big guys with the cash”. They explained the seller was shouting buy one get one free because it was too late and it seemed like she had so much food left and didnt want to return home with it. According to my girl maths, I was going to keep the second one for tomorrow and just convince my friend who wasn’t a fan of noodles to give me his second one.
If that plan worked, I would have two dinners for the subsequent days after all it was exams week and I didn’t have any business in the kitchen.The first thing I noticed was the pack was full of vegetables and you could literally count the strands of noodles. “Oh no problem, I love vegetables”. First taste, second taste and I realized there was so much pepper and salt. Now I was alert and then my fork pierced something hard. “Okay, so this woman adds meat cubes too? That’s so cool”. I brought my fork out only to see a grasshopper! Yes, a grasshopper!.
I’ll never forget this. Someway somehow even though my friends were hungry, they started with their khebab first but I couldn’t wait another minute. The moment they saw what I had brought out of the food, they didnt even bother to check theirs. Right there, one guy collected all the pack and sent them to the bin.
From that day, cooking became “my thing” especially during exams week. At least I knew the amount of spices I was pouring in my food and I knew every other thing that went into the food and of course grasshopper wasn’t part.
Till today, even if you pay me to eat some roadside noodles/food, it’s definitely going to be a big NO. I’d rather prepare it myself.
“Buy one get one free” noodles, what else were we expecting?..