Life without escape?

(Baonghean) - Dirty food is not the seller poisoning the eater, but we poisoning ourselves. If there are lives without a way out, bewildered meals in the era of dirty food, don't ask far away.

1.One afternoon more than 15 years ago, in a hotel with windows overlooking Ha Long Bay, I was stunned to see a Chinese girl eating an apple.

The Chinese girl works as a tour guide, and every week she leads groups of tourists to Vietnam. The apples she eats are so fragrant, she bought them from a supermarket in China, and she only needs to rinse them once under the hotel tap to be able to eat them, skin included.

It is completely different from the Chinese apples that are being sold by Vietnamese people in Vietnam. It is still the same apple, but even the aroma is full of chemicals, the skin is covered with a transparent layer of candle to keep it hard, it is marinated to the point of completely losing the freshness of life. And, the fruit placed on the altar for a whole month has no trace of damage on the skin!

But why did the Chinese girl have to carry a fruit thousands of kilometers to Vietnam to eat? Why did she know that these fruits, grown in China, are safe, but should never be bought in Vietnam? And what nationality are the traders who poison thousands of tons of fruit on the way from the farm to the hands of Vietnamese consumers?

I still think that the traders who make profit from dirty food are the hidden butchers of the century! Until…

Illustration: Nam Phong

2.Ten years ago in Taipei, I often wandered around the vast Carrefour supermarket full of agricultural products and food on weekends without buying anything. Or I stood absent-mindedly pondering in a tiny Seven-Eleven grocery store during my lunch break. Because I missed home so much!

Every vegetable and fruit here has its origin clearly marked right down to the farm. Imported meat and food are carefully quarantined, ensuring the quality is consistent with the packaging. Each office lunch box has a label clearly stating the ingredients, origin and calories for the meal, helping customers to weigh - measure - count accurately and feel secure with any food.

And I remember the dusty meals on the streets of Hanoi. Dirty, rotten, and spoiled food that consumers turn their backs on, but restaurants are willing to buy at cheap prices!

Are street food restaurants safe? Photo: Internet

And the bunches of vegetables and beans bought at the market, we nervously picked and washed them, worrying about pesticide residues. For many years, my family even completely eliminated some foods such as long beans and green beans from our meals to avoid becoming victims of greedy farmers.

But in Taipei, if dirty food is discovered, people don't curse the farmers, they condemn the market managers! And if food shows signs of poor quality, restaurants and suppliers turn their backs, even warning people about this phenomenon in advance!

And many office lunch restaurants and family dinner restaurants have done more than I have ever experienced: They encourage customers to bring their own chopsticks and spoons from home! This not only helps customers feel secure about the cleanliness of the utensils, but also helps limit the abuse of disposable wooden chopsticks and plastic spoons, contributing to protecting the environment and the freshness of the air!

The actions of those “private traders” made me realize that the fight against dirty food is not between buyers and sellers! It must be the responsibility of state managers. Until…

3.Five years ago, my brother had to close his sandwich shop on a small street corner in Hanoi. Just because he was too kind, committed to clean food. He made each sandwich as if it were a sandwich for his own family, not making dirty, fake sandwiches like those street vendors.

That small bakery uses fresh ingredients that are as expensive as those in star hotels. The raw vegetables are washed with boiled water and left to cool. Even the milk used to soak the pate ingredients must be the best sterilized milk in Vietnam, 100% real cow's milk. They do not use the fresh milk that is being advertised but is actually reconstituted milk from Chinese milk powder.

And if sold at the market price of other stores, then in one morning, selling out the entire bread cabinet, my sister would only make a profit of 36 thousand dong! While the shops next door would make five or seven times more profit! No one can see the kindness of a street bread seller. And it is only worth 36 thousand dong! Who would believe in the conscience of a bread seller, that he does not sell dirty food?

Whether food is clean or not depends on the conscience of the seller? (Illustration)

And we will always nod our heads in approval of fragrant, reasonably priced, and colorful foods. On one hand, we demand clean food, but on the other hand, we calmly kill those who sell clean food!

We demand clean vegetables, but we only buy beautiful vegetables! We demand clean meat, but we refuse to pay for those “clean commitments”, we need to eat cheaply!

There have been campaigns in the world calling on people to use ugly food. It is vegetables with worms, small, crooked fruits and vegetables. It could be stunted pigs, unappetizing chickens, fish with unattractive colors. But when people go to the market to buy ugly food, it is a way to ensure clean food, and to limit sellers from joining hands with manufacturers to follow the trend of big-beautiful-cheap-dirty!

It turns out that the kindness of the buyer is more important than anything! Once the buyer is ready to kill the kindness of the seller! And the power of the decision of 80 million buyers is stronger than all the regulations, all the calls for joining hands for clean food.

4.But we continue to demand big - beautiful - cheap - dirty food and on the other hand, condemn dirty food. Every two days, my friend transports a whole truck of cooled vegetables and fruits from Da Lat straight to Hanoi. He complains that his vegetables have been unsold and have been losing money for the past two years. Because everyone who buys them complains that his vegetables are ugly, often wilted, and bruised.

Oh my god, bringing high-quality vegetables and fruits straight from Da Lat to Hanoi, how can they be as shiny and fresh as the vegetables sprayed with preservatives, chemicals to keep vegetables growing, chemicals to keep flower petals shiny and beautiful and not falling off sprayed on vegetables... like other stores are using?

My neighbor has a banana garden, and is often sad because he cuts a bunch of bananas and puts them on the market, but they never sell them all. Everyone complains that the bananas are still green, take too long to ripen, or fall apart. How can bananas ripen on the tree turn yellow all at once, unless someone dips the whole bunch in a vat of ripening chemicals?

I cannot answer the above questions. Dirty food is not the seller poisoning the eater, but we are poisoning ourselves. If there are lives without a way out, confused meals in the era of dirty food, do not ask far away. Those who only know good/cheap/delicious for themselves without thinking about this society, they poison their own meals and those of those who do not know why they become victims of the dirty food storm.

Rumor has it that merchants are building apartment buildings with homegrown vegetables, and boarding schools that house people and pigs together. They will make good money by playing on fear. But they are a kindness in a society that is getting poorer. Ruralization of the cities is never a good management strategy for a decent country.

Trang Ha