I noticed that within our Vietnamese families, food is the 6th love language. We cook both on the good day to celebrate and on the bad day to comfort. My aunt would cook then me and my cousin will eat, as a way of exchanging love. Whenever there is a cookout, the adults always prepare foods and invite us — the young to eat: “do you want some food?” as a kind way of “I care about you”.
Therefore, we learn to treat our beloved with foods. One of my professors used to say that food is one of the universal things that connect people together. With foods on the table, we start our conversation easily. Even without a word, the act of sharing foods is enough.
What if the foods are not really good, it does not matter. What matters more is having something together. The experience is what brings us closer “I taste what you taste”. Hence, family meal is extremely important, it is one of the rare time that family members can sit together, regardless of the busy life out there.
Food also represents for culture. With Vietnamese way, we use chopsticks to pick our foods, and even pass them around for others. We do not have our own portion, we share. In other cultures, Indian family like to enjoy their foods using hands while Italian show etiquette by eating with knife and folk. Yet, what is beautiful is that no matter where you come from, what language you speak, what you do, we are here, on the table, to enjoy something, with each other. Shouldn’t it be enough for us to appreciate out of life?
As much as how we cannot live without food, we might die without love. If there is one day, all of us will cook for ourselves and eat by ourselves, it will be the most lonely day of our lives. We are fundamentally social animals, even there is no need for hunting, there is always a need of sharing and of being together.
