Volu 3, Afterword
As a person who got through elentary and middle school with the school-provided lunch, the words 『school cafeteria』 and 『school store』 simultaneously evoked both feelings of yearning and awe in .
I imagined all sorts of useless things about what I would do after entering high school, such as scrambling to get bread at the school store, or asking for a larger serving at the school cafeteria while being scolded by the old lady in charge.
However, once I actually entered high school, what I saw before was truly anticlimactic.
A al-ticket based system that left no room for argunt about the selection or quantity of food.
All the popular items on the nu would be sold out because of the students who ca early to school for club practice.
There was no separate school store, and the place that sold bread was treated as part of the school cafeteria, so all the students satisfied their need for bread by solemnly standing in well-ordered lines at the downtown McDona**s.
And more than anything, what left crestfallen was the fact that everything was quite expensive.
It was certainly less expensive than wandering into so restaurant in the town to eat, but paying 480 Yen for shoyu ran or 400 Yen for curry every day was simply too high a threshold for a highschool student who did not have a part-ti job.
As for bread, the yakisoba sandwich that often appears in stories set in high schools was actually priced over 200 Yen. What’s more, they were so small that you would need at least three of them to fill your stomach.
No matter how you looked at it, it was not a price that would prompt students from all over the school to compete fiercely for their share.
Of course, there was no way that my mother would allow to spend nearly 500 Yen everyday to eat things like curry and ran, so I was fortunate enough to receive a bento from her almost everyday for three years that was far more filling and had more variety than any single item from the school cafeteria.
It has been a while. This is Wagahara, whose biggest regret is not being able to eat the katsu curry that was the most popular item on the school nu.
In the end, the first ti Wagahara was able to decide what to eat on his own was after entering college.
As for being able to properly cook on my own, it was only after the late age of twenty five.
I think that deciding what to eat on your own is an essential step to becoming an independent adult.
In order to make decisions on what, when, where, and how to eat sothing, it is necessary to have a suitable level of economic freedom, ability to take action, ability to discern the quality of food, and the ability to act without the oversight of guardians.
On the other hand, it is probably only after one gains all these requisite abilities and becos an adult who does not rely on anyone for their food, that they start to realize how lucky they were to experience a ti when they could completely depend on soone else for their bountiful als, the so-called 『mother’s cooking』.
By the way, I am sure that most adults have so fond mories of their『mother’s cooking』, but the phrase『father’s cooking』 doesn’t pop up very often.
However, these days, it has beco quite normal for fathers to participate in taking care of children as well.
Maybe once the children from this generation grow up, they will feel nostalgic while saying things like 『My father made this particular dish for when I was a child』.
By the way, my experience of an unforgettable 『father’s cooking』 is the roasted pacific saury that my father would quietly leave next to my keyboard as I sat in front of my PC while drinking coffee.
Around two-thirty in the afternoon. Coffee and pacific saury would be waiting on the PC desk.
My father was always a little crazy when it ca to fish, but I still have no idea why he would choose that sort of ti to roast pacific saury.
This book is about the children who are still not able to choose the contents of their own als, but who are growing without realizing it into people who will be able to make those choices soday.
Unlike a certain Demon King and his friends, they are still incapable of securing their own als unless they are under soone’s protection, but it would be nice if we could see them grow just a little closer to adulthood in the next volu as well.
Well then, let us et again in the next volu!!
– Wagahara Satoshi.
『Wagahara’s friend watching in shock as he sticks his head into a box』
Friend: What on earth are you doing?
Wagahara: Pacific saury in a box.
Friend: You’ve been strange since a while back, what happened?
Wagahara: Perhaps I have lost confidence in myself.
Friend: Should I pack so in a box and ship it to you?
I have beco addicted to ran lately. I want to eat so tasty shoyu ran made with chicken stock….
Reviews
All reviews (0)