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Fruit - the final frontier"We start talking about something unthreatening like the eating of fruit, only to find ourselves staring into the abyss" From Margeret Matthews: Just thought you might like to refer your listeners to Arthur Mee's Children's Encyclopedia - where you can discover how to cut an apple inside without peeling it' It's in Volume 3 on page 1 thousand six hundred and twenty two. The article comments 'much fun is to be had from this feat, for we may give a friend an apple thus divided and ask him to peel it for us - it is very amusing to watch the expression on his face when, after peeling the apple, he finds that the inside is cut up into pieces.'
Chris Trawin of Southgate London wrote further on the anthropology of fruit-peeling having been struck by reflections a couple of weeks ago on methodology as employed in Thailand ie banana's are eaten by beginning at the 'style' or withered male part of the fruit while using the receptacle or stalk as a handle.
As an English Language teacher working within the Chinese community, my attention was first drawn to this phenomenon in the late 1990s. A pilot study of the various peeling methods adopted by Chinese learners, conducted between 1998 and 1999, indicated a clear division between those from different geographical locations, irrespective of age, sex or social background. Students from Hong Kong and the neighbouring province of Guangdong were shown to favour the technique described by your listener while those from elsewhere in China tended to prefer our own more familiar western method. A comparative study involving Japanese students revealed a rather more complicated distribution pattern although in hindsight I would concede that the same group used was probably too small to merit any serious consideration and most of them weren't that keen on bananas anyway. Go on, you know you want to add your comments on the peeling and eating of fruits. Don't be shy. Only a few million people will find out.  | |
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