Serviettes
Napkins. You know 'em and love 'em. Or at least pretend to use them in restaurants. Not so in the land of the Reindeer. (Or for that matter, most of the cities I've been to.)
It's the weirdest thing. Napkins are out in full galore during coffee, meals, snacks, etc. They're carefully folded to sit perched either under your coffee cup, or utensils. The decorative napkins are often tissue thin, and delicate to the touch. Pretty. But yet few regularly use them, or even acknowledge their presence. I'm accustomed to the regularity of unfolding and laying the napkin across my lap. (ok, so this is attributed to my poor eye hand coordination, and my inherent loathing of dry cleaning costs.) Call me crazy, but napkins help keep the amount of food off the side of your glass. And the gravy off your chin. Know what I"m getting at here?
Finnish people have more woods than they know what to do with them, so the cost of paper can't be that prohibitive. (it's not, i checked. napkins are not causing families to sell the family farm.) So what gives? Puzzling. Impeccable manners abound at the table. You'll be hard pressed to find more people who can handle their cutlery as well. Folding food onto a fork has never come closer to an art form. (Speaking of which, you'll notice the fork is held facing down, and then food is loaded on. Try it, it's different. Fork tonsils curving towards the plate, use your knife to push food onto the concave ??? side. Same across farmers, students, business coworkers. I wonder if the Famous Fork lady had anything to do with this;)
Ya. So no napkins while eating. People stare at me in wonder and amazement, but no.
posted by irene @ 7/31/2002 04:20:00 AM
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