| Like most people, I've seen the odd running of a red light or stop sign, which are "crimes" of a sort, but today I saw the real thing up close and personal. I discovered, via Beth, some fantastic seafood gumbo that comes pre-packaged and ready to heat up at Publix. It's a Publix brand item, but it has whole shrimp, crabmeat (including the odd shell), okra, tomatoes, and a wonderful dark roux like real seafood gumbo is supposed to have. The package says it has "Cajun" spices, but it's really Creole gumbo. The best Louisiana food, in my opinion, is Creole, not Cajun, but the Creole-Cajun distinction is hard for non-Louisianaians to comprehend in the world of TV chefs who have never set foot in Louisiana. The gumbo doesn't come with rice, though, and gumbo without rice is like Eggs Benedict without Hollandaise sauce. A few doors down from Publix is the China Wok. I went in there today to buy a small carton of their white rice to put in my gumbo. A boy of maybe fifteen or sixteen went in just before me, and he might have even held the door for me. I had seen him coming out of a Firehouse Restaurant a few doors down with rolled coins in his hand, and I became suspicious of him immediately. He got to the counter ahead of me, and he said something to the Chinese man behind the counter that I didn't catch. I placed my order, and I heard the kid say to the Chinese man that he had rolls of dimes. I think he said each roll was worth $20, and he had five or six rolls. The man gave him the bills, and the kid took off sort of running. I looked out into the parking lot, and he was dancing around. I paid for my order (96 cents, but they gave me a nickle in change from my dollar bill, which I put in the tip jar), and left the store. I was walking to my car when I saw the Chinese man come out in an obviously aggitated state. The kid had ripped him off. He had wrapped up pennies and claimed they were dimes. The Chinese man was pissed off. I asked him if the boy had given him pennies instead of dimes, and he said yes. I told the man to call the cops, but, alas, he didn't understand me. What that kid did was a crime, albeit a low-level one. I doubt he wanted that money to buy tickets for the Christmas Dance at his school. If he's doing that at fifteen or sixteen, what is he going to be doing in ten years? The people who own that Chinese restaurant are obviously immigrants who are working their butts off to succeed in the American Dream. They recently opened a second restaurant in our neighborhood that I haven't been to yet, and there are usually two, three, or four toddlers and young kids in there when I go in. They weren't there today, though. When I've talked to the kids in the past, their English was faultless. What I'm seeing in this restaurant is emblematic of the immigrant experience in the United States. The parents are limping along in English, getting robbed in one of the oldest stings there is, and their kids are playing on laptops while their parents dish out wonderful ethnic food behind the counter. I assume the parents are documented and legal aliens, but I don't care one bit if they're not. They're helping this country be itself, and I'm for that. I just wish they hadn't been victims of crime this afternoon. Irony? How often do you see that kind of thing happen? ED |
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