Being a Chinese myself, I am sometimes bewildered by the enthusiasm shown on exotic foods. Dishes such as abalone, shark fin, etc are greedily devoured as if they are the best tasting dishes without understanding what goes into these preparations.
The exotic food mentioned here are over vaunted, in my opinion. Most types of abalone are bland tasting in their natural state; cooked ones derive the flavour from being simmered long in a superior stock- the taste coming from the stock rather than the shellfish itself. Same with shark fins, virtually tasteless without the broth or stock in which it is served. It is just cartilage from a shark; softened by lengthy soaking and simmering. Forget tales about sharks never getting cancerous growths, they do get tumours at times. Heavy metals also tend to accumulate in shark finnage, so be forewarned. Paying thru your nose for bits of flavoured cartilage is certainly not my idea of a great tasting dish. The widespread consumption of shark fins also brings about
ecological imbalance in underwater communities that leads to an irreversible decline. Live sharks often have their fins hacked off and thown back overboard to die. How would you like it if your arms and legs were chopped off for a special dish?
Taste aside, I suspect that most consumers of these exotic foods readily admit to themselves that it is not that great tasting or worthwhile but still consume it from a prestige standpoint; they want people to think they are well off and can afford such dishes. Prestige??? Foolish perhaps, but definitely not prestigious. Coughing up a prince's ransom just so you win others' approval is foolishness of the highest degree. It is so sad.
Perhaps you may be better off spending your cash on bird nests and sea cucumber as these have been shown to be nutritionally superior. Just don't go overboard or the prices of these items will skyrocket till they reach the outer reaches of the universe.
Tuesday, October 2, 2007
Sunday, September 9, 2007
Traditions & Commerce
Someone once remarked ;' When you are flush with cash, everyday is Christmas'. I would add that when you are in love, everyday is Valentine's Day.
It is not a new opinion that certain festivals are over commercialised. Festivals like Valentine's Day, Moon Cake festival, Fifth lunar month (bak chang) are some of them.
Florists and gift shops make a killing whenever Valentine's Day comes around on February 14. Romantic restaurants serving special twosome menus also rake it in on this day. What you pay for a single rose stalk will easily get a dozen in other periods. What you pay for a lovey-dovey dinner will easily feed a poor family for a month. I am not unromantic but believe that romance should be sustained all year long; not just spiking on this particular day.
When the 8th lunar month rolls around, moon cake makers get a windfall that can easily sustain them for the rest of the year. They start selling these confectionery at the start of the seventh lunar month; so sales actually span about two months. A baker whom I know personally admitted that profit margins are at least 200%. So a moon cake that sells at Rm10 cost only rm3.00 to make at most. Worse spin off effect is that salted egg prices jump during this period due to its overwhelming use by moon cake makers; as the yolk is a popular filling. Same with prices of lotus seeds. No problem if some stocks are unsold, just recycle the fillings for other confectionery.
Same with bak kua (barbecued meat) that is sold during this period. It is very hard to get bak kua that is actually sliced from a chunk of meat. Those sold now are just flat slices of minced meat with lots of oil, salt, sugar, coloring, nitrates and nitrites in them – a veritable concoction of chemicals. Lucky that they are expensive and we don't eat it year round; it is certainly not something the doctor prescribes.
Bak chang or rice dumplings are nice to eat, to me they are also a comfort food that bring back fond memories. I used to help my mom sort the glutinous rice and mung beans, wash the leaves and then, when the process is completed help her to devour the bakchang doubly quick. Somehow, the ones your mom made always seem to taste the best; the bought ones never able to measure up to dear old mom's labour of love. How I wish my mom still had the energy to make them. My fondness for them is never satiated by bought bakchang as the makers stinge on ingredients and never steam them long enough. Terribly expensive too at minimum Rm3.50 each for the simplest ones. Buying them is akin to buying an insult with a slap thrown in for good measure. I have the recipe in my head but never got around to making them myself. Just plain lazy, I guess.
At the risk of being branded a renegade of traditions; I remain steadfast in my conviction that festivals are over commercialised by entrepreneurs out to make a fast buck.
It is not a new opinion that certain festivals are over commercialised. Festivals like Valentine's Day, Moon Cake festival, Fifth lunar month (bak chang) are some of them.
Florists and gift shops make a killing whenever Valentine's Day comes around on February 14. Romantic restaurants serving special twosome menus also rake it in on this day. What you pay for a single rose stalk will easily get a dozen in other periods. What you pay for a lovey-dovey dinner will easily feed a poor family for a month. I am not unromantic but believe that romance should be sustained all year long; not just spiking on this particular day.
When the 8th lunar month rolls around, moon cake makers get a windfall that can easily sustain them for the rest of the year. They start selling these confectionery at the start of the seventh lunar month; so sales actually span about two months. A baker whom I know personally admitted that profit margins are at least 200%. So a moon cake that sells at Rm10 cost only rm3.00 to make at most. Worse spin off effect is that salted egg prices jump during this period due to its overwhelming use by moon cake makers; as the yolk is a popular filling. Same with prices of lotus seeds. No problem if some stocks are unsold, just recycle the fillings for other confectionery.
Same with bak kua (barbecued meat) that is sold during this period. It is very hard to get bak kua that is actually sliced from a chunk of meat. Those sold now are just flat slices of minced meat with lots of oil, salt, sugar, coloring, nitrates and nitrites in them – a veritable concoction of chemicals. Lucky that they are expensive and we don't eat it year round; it is certainly not something the doctor prescribes.
Bak chang or rice dumplings are nice to eat, to me they are also a comfort food that bring back fond memories. I used to help my mom sort the glutinous rice and mung beans, wash the leaves and then, when the process is completed help her to devour the bakchang doubly quick. Somehow, the ones your mom made always seem to taste the best; the bought ones never able to measure up to dear old mom's labour of love. How I wish my mom still had the energy to make them. My fondness for them is never satiated by bought bakchang as the makers stinge on ingredients and never steam them long enough. Terribly expensive too at minimum Rm3.50 each for the simplest ones. Buying them is akin to buying an insult with a slap thrown in for good measure. I have the recipe in my head but never got around to making them myself. Just plain lazy, I guess.
At the risk of being branded a renegade of traditions; I remain steadfast in my conviction that festivals are over commercialised by entrepreneurs out to make a fast buck.
Sunday, September 2, 2007
Are you a junkie?
You may be a junkie without even knowing it. Or a painkiller dependent slob.
How? By eating local delicacies of course. Local fare such as nasi lemak, bak kut teh, nasi kandar. Heaven only knows what other foodstuffs are guilty too.
A friend in JB who used to sell nasi lemak in KL told me that he regularly pops a handful of panadol (paracetamol) into the rice/water mix when boiling it. I jibed that he was trying to pull my leg but he swored that he kid me not. I countered that panadol tablets taste bitter, wouldn't the bitter taste be evident when the rice is done? It seems not; some kinda chemical change occurred during the boiling process, rendering the bitter taste non existent. Why then would someone put paracetamol into nasi lemak? The answer was it makes you feel better, paracetamol being a painkiller. Regular consumption of the doctored rice will lead to a feel good sensation, leaving you with a hankering for the particular nasi lemak joint. You won't feel good unless you have had a good dose of the rice with lauk (side dishes). Over the long term you certainly won't feel good with the liver having to process the drug. Liver failure is a real prospect here!
Horror stories abound in JB's nasi lemak joints. There was a popular shop in Taman Perling that opens only in the evenings, may still be around as I haven't passed it for over 3 years . This being a mamak joint, it is patronised mainly by Chinese diners. One popular story making the rounds then was that the food is charmed; the sambal being the prime suspect - a patron having come across the remnants of a used tampon in the sambal mix! Eeeyuck! Another variation was that someone saw toyol (little spirits) running among the dining patrons. I suspect that these stories were cooked up by envious competitors whose businesses weren't up to scratch. Enough said that I didn't feel up to trying the fare at this joint, but a friend who did told me that the food was no big deal.
Another shop was located along the seafront in Permas Jaya; lots of people can be seen waiting for it open up by 6pm. This I did try, coming away disgusted as the food was so ordinary and bland as not to merit the waiting. Saw people clamouring for the ayam goreng (fried chicken), tried it – it was like trying to swallow bits of dried jute bags. Perhaps the fengshui must be awfully good here; there's certainly lots of wind and water in the vicinity.
Bak kut teh or 'meat bone tea' is of course pork ribs in herbal soup. Some joints selling this dish do a roaring business while others regularly swat flies. Most of the time the herbal mix is a proprietary secret; the exact composition known only to the proprietor. He'd sew up the herbal mix in a cloth bag; boil the soup in the shop, then take the used bag home to dispose of it – thus preventing any would-be spy from learning the blend. Stories I heard include one where ganja is one of the ingredients in the magic bag of tricks. Some joints do not allow takeaways; to preclude you from doing a lab test. Drinking a soup where a narcotic has been simmered probably makes one feel good; you may not function well on days when you don't consume it. I don't know, bkt has never been a favorite with me; especially the JB version that is over infused with pepper and tastes rather bland similar to the Singapore version. Seems the Klang version is the authentic one as it originated here.
On opiates, nasi kandar cooks presumably used to add kas-kas when cooking curries. I heard it is seed from the poppy plant; how they imported it is another matter. People who regularly consume such curries would invariably fail urine drug tests even though they are not knowing drug users. Imagine a situation when a job seeker takes a urine test and is immediately labelled a drug user; I really sympathise with such poor buggers. This ingredient is probably not used anymore. I must admit to a hankering for fiery curries; maybe should get a urine test soon. But of course , I was brought up on a steady diet of curry and rice, must be my jaded taste buds, hmmmm.
There is no need to resort to underhand tricks if the food you serve is delicious and offers value for money. This will be my motto if I ever set up a food joint one fine day !
How? By eating local delicacies of course. Local fare such as nasi lemak, bak kut teh, nasi kandar. Heaven only knows what other foodstuffs are guilty too.
A friend in JB who used to sell nasi lemak in KL told me that he regularly pops a handful of panadol (paracetamol) into the rice/water mix when boiling it. I jibed that he was trying to pull my leg but he swored that he kid me not. I countered that panadol tablets taste bitter, wouldn't the bitter taste be evident when the rice is done? It seems not; some kinda chemical change occurred during the boiling process, rendering the bitter taste non existent. Why then would someone put paracetamol into nasi lemak? The answer was it makes you feel better, paracetamol being a painkiller. Regular consumption of the doctored rice will lead to a feel good sensation, leaving you with a hankering for the particular nasi lemak joint. You won't feel good unless you have had a good dose of the rice with lauk (side dishes). Over the long term you certainly won't feel good with the liver having to process the drug. Liver failure is a real prospect here!
Horror stories abound in JB's nasi lemak joints. There was a popular shop in Taman Perling that opens only in the evenings, may still be around as I haven't passed it for over 3 years . This being a mamak joint, it is patronised mainly by Chinese diners. One popular story making the rounds then was that the food is charmed; the sambal being the prime suspect - a patron having come across the remnants of a used tampon in the sambal mix! Eeeyuck! Another variation was that someone saw toyol (little spirits) running among the dining patrons. I suspect that these stories were cooked up by envious competitors whose businesses weren't up to scratch. Enough said that I didn't feel up to trying the fare at this joint, but a friend who did told me that the food was no big deal.
Another shop was located along the seafront in Permas Jaya; lots of people can be seen waiting for it open up by 6pm. This I did try, coming away disgusted as the food was so ordinary and bland as not to merit the waiting. Saw people clamouring for the ayam goreng (fried chicken), tried it – it was like trying to swallow bits of dried jute bags. Perhaps the fengshui must be awfully good here; there's certainly lots of wind and water in the vicinity.
Bak kut teh or 'meat bone tea' is of course pork ribs in herbal soup. Some joints selling this dish do a roaring business while others regularly swat flies. Most of the time the herbal mix is a proprietary secret; the exact composition known only to the proprietor. He'd sew up the herbal mix in a cloth bag; boil the soup in the shop, then take the used bag home to dispose of it – thus preventing any would-be spy from learning the blend. Stories I heard include one where ganja is one of the ingredients in the magic bag of tricks. Some joints do not allow takeaways; to preclude you from doing a lab test. Drinking a soup where a narcotic has been simmered probably makes one feel good; you may not function well on days when you don't consume it. I don't know, bkt has never been a favorite with me; especially the JB version that is over infused with pepper and tastes rather bland similar to the Singapore version. Seems the Klang version is the authentic one as it originated here.
On opiates, nasi kandar cooks presumably used to add kas-kas when cooking curries. I heard it is seed from the poppy plant; how they imported it is another matter. People who regularly consume such curries would invariably fail urine drug tests even though they are not knowing drug users. Imagine a situation when a job seeker takes a urine test and is immediately labelled a drug user; I really sympathise with such poor buggers. This ingredient is probably not used anymore. I must admit to a hankering for fiery curries; maybe should get a urine test soon. But of course , I was brought up on a steady diet of curry and rice, must be my jaded taste buds, hmmmm.
There is no need to resort to underhand tricks if the food you serve is delicious and offers value for money. This will be my motto if I ever set up a food joint one fine day !
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
A hankering for the real thing ....
Something less serious, on my favorite subject – FOOD, Glorious food.
Good ol' chicken rice, you can't get it easily anymore. By this I mean chicken rice cooked the traditional way. A nice chicken stock is made from the legs, necks, etc and then used to boil the rice with fat you liposuctioned from the chooks; enhanced with ginger, salt, and other ingredients.. Rice cooked this way is nice enough to eat on its own, to borrow a phrase.
The chicken will be steamed not boiled as nowadays; no roast chicky for the true gourmand. Wonder who steams chickens the old fashioned way anymore. Steamed chooks actually taste sweeter as they retain the juices which are otherwise lost when boiled.
I recall when I was a wee kid my mum used to cook chicken rice for the whole gang on alternate Sundays. She reared her own chooks in a hutch I built for her at the back of the house; damn proud of it I was. She'd boil water and select the fattest unfortunate chook, pulled the feathers from the gullet area, then enlist the services of her most blood thirsty son namely yours truly here - the rest of her brood were too squeamish; and I'd blithely slit the poor bugger's throat while she held on to the squirming bird's legs and neck. Norman Bates's rival was on the prowl again! Now I do the squirming as I shudder at the thought of how I could do it then. It was by the grace of Providence I didn't graduate to become a serial killer.
Nostalgic, those were the days. Chicken rice you get now just don't taste as good anymore. The rice is boiled with bottled stock or cubes with margarine, coming out a sickly pale yellow and tasting as bad. Chickens are boiled and then immersed in cool water; ostensibly to improve texture. Old mamas will tell you to avoid such boiled chooks if you are in the midst of a coughing spell; don't really know why.
You ever thought how many plates of chicken rice can be served from just 1 carcass? I did, but never figured it out. Suffice to say, it is many. Vendors employ many tactics to squeeze out as many servings as they can. The breast meat is often cut into 2 layers as it is thick. One layer will have the original skin, then the second layer will be adorned by skin transplanted from another unsaleable part of the chook such as the back. Another trick is to smash the flat of the cleaver on the portion, squashing and loosening out the meat to make it look more substantial. This trick is the favorite of vendors in Johor Bahru as I have observed. I know as I grew up in ol' JB.
A must have condiment with this meal is ground chilli mix - made from chillies, garlic, lime juice, sugar and salt. Dip the chicken slices in this mix, heavenly taste. The mix you get from vendors are made with artificial vinegar or acetic acid, the taste is way off the mark. Sometimes, you just can't cut any corners.
Sometimes, the simplest things are the best.
Good ol' chicken rice, you can't get it easily anymore. By this I mean chicken rice cooked the traditional way. A nice chicken stock is made from the legs, necks, etc and then used to boil the rice with fat you liposuctioned from the chooks; enhanced with ginger, salt, and other ingredients.. Rice cooked this way is nice enough to eat on its own, to borrow a phrase.
The chicken will be steamed not boiled as nowadays; no roast chicky for the true gourmand. Wonder who steams chickens the old fashioned way anymore. Steamed chooks actually taste sweeter as they retain the juices which are otherwise lost when boiled.
I recall when I was a wee kid my mum used to cook chicken rice for the whole gang on alternate Sundays. She reared her own chooks in a hutch I built for her at the back of the house; damn proud of it I was. She'd boil water and select the fattest unfortunate chook, pulled the feathers from the gullet area, then enlist the services of her most blood thirsty son namely yours truly here - the rest of her brood were too squeamish; and I'd blithely slit the poor bugger's throat while she held on to the squirming bird's legs and neck. Norman Bates's rival was on the prowl again! Now I do the squirming as I shudder at the thought of how I could do it then. It was by the grace of Providence I didn't graduate to become a serial killer.
Nostalgic, those were the days. Chicken rice you get now just don't taste as good anymore. The rice is boiled with bottled stock or cubes with margarine, coming out a sickly pale yellow and tasting as bad. Chickens are boiled and then immersed in cool water; ostensibly to improve texture. Old mamas will tell you to avoid such boiled chooks if you are in the midst of a coughing spell; don't really know why.
You ever thought how many plates of chicken rice can be served from just 1 carcass? I did, but never figured it out. Suffice to say, it is many. Vendors employ many tactics to squeeze out as many servings as they can. The breast meat is often cut into 2 layers as it is thick. One layer will have the original skin, then the second layer will be adorned by skin transplanted from another unsaleable part of the chook such as the back. Another trick is to smash the flat of the cleaver on the portion, squashing and loosening out the meat to make it look more substantial. This trick is the favorite of vendors in Johor Bahru as I have observed. I know as I grew up in ol' JB.
A must have condiment with this meal is ground chilli mix - made from chillies, garlic, lime juice, sugar and salt. Dip the chicken slices in this mix, heavenly taste. The mix you get from vendors are made with artificial vinegar or acetic acid, the taste is way off the mark. Sometimes, you just can't cut any corners.
Sometimes, the simplest things are the best.
Thursday, August 16, 2007
House brands
House brands of common food and household items are a boon for the budget conscious.
This is mainly in the realm of hypermarkets such as Tesco, Giant and Carrefour. With their huge bargaining power and marketing channels, they are able to extract good deals from producers. The lower price is then passed on to the consumer.
House brands with lower prices generally do not equate lower quality, though the imported items do tend to be superior. There are probably people who fight shy of house brands; do not want to be caught dead in possession of such items for fear of being labelled cheapskates. Such are pitiful souls who don't know how to stretch their ringgit.
My personal exposure to house brands is mostly limited to that of Tesco's. No, I am not paid by them to plug their house brand. A large proportion of the range is actually imported from the UK, and end up selling for substantially less than the equivalent locally made item. How is this possible? Buying power, economies of scale and efficient logistics; remember Tesco has a worldwide presence. Producers would much rather make less per unit and much more overall thru supplying a huge volume of goods; the bigger cake-small slice rationale.
Which brings to mind; how are our local producers able to survive? Given the choice between imported and local with the former having better quality and a lower price to boot, most people would plumb for the imported - halal status not withstanding. Are local producers just plain inefficient or they just greedy in trying to get a bigger margin? Trying to take local consumers for a ride? Or just not aggressive enough. The mediocre quality of their goods hardly puts them in a position to penetrate oversea markets? What about hushed up 'arrangements' between competitors to fix the market?
Think on.............
This is mainly in the realm of hypermarkets such as Tesco, Giant and Carrefour. With their huge bargaining power and marketing channels, they are able to extract good deals from producers. The lower price is then passed on to the consumer.
House brands with lower prices generally do not equate lower quality, though the imported items do tend to be superior. There are probably people who fight shy of house brands; do not want to be caught dead in possession of such items for fear of being labelled cheapskates. Such are pitiful souls who don't know how to stretch their ringgit.
My personal exposure to house brands is mostly limited to that of Tesco's. No, I am not paid by them to plug their house brand. A large proportion of the range is actually imported from the UK, and end up selling for substantially less than the equivalent locally made item. How is this possible? Buying power, economies of scale and efficient logistics; remember Tesco has a worldwide presence. Producers would much rather make less per unit and much more overall thru supplying a huge volume of goods; the bigger cake-small slice rationale.
Which brings to mind; how are our local producers able to survive? Given the choice between imported and local with the former having better quality and a lower price to boot, most people would plumb for the imported - halal status not withstanding. Are local producers just plain inefficient or they just greedy in trying to get a bigger margin? Trying to take local consumers for a ride? Or just not aggressive enough. The mediocre quality of their goods hardly puts them in a position to penetrate oversea markets? What about hushed up 'arrangements' between competitors to fix the market?
Think on.............
Sunday, August 12, 2007
Light & Deadly
Quick! ditch those aluminium pots and pans you have lying around the house. Sell them for scrap, aluminium fetches a good price nowadays.
Has this guy gone bonkers or something? Sorry to disappoint you, still same old rambler. I didn't go into the scrap recycling business either.
Seriously, aluminium has long been suspected as a contributory factor to the onset of Alzheimer's disease; though not conclusively proven. Best to minimise the risks and keep one's fingers crossed, mine are crossed till they turn blue.
My dear mom is now 84 years young; losing her memory – suspected Alzheimer's.
Praise the Lord that her health is very good indeed. Short term or recent memory is very bad but has photographic recall for yesteryears' happenings. To test her during the last CNY balik kampung, I asked her about her life before I was born. She could recall every detail well; I even managed to extract from her some recipes for comfort food that I sorely missed. During the CNY binge of eating and sitting around, my mind got around thinking what brought about her condition. It is not a simple case of her hard disk getting full. I then recalled that she used a lot of aluminium cookware; stainless steel or tempered glass ones were not generally available then. Lord have mercy, I ate a lot of food (albeit delicious) from those pots and pans too. Am I destined to get Alzheimer's too? This is rather worrisome to say the least. I hope I don't get to the stage where I have to jot down my life's details in a little pocket book or make that a PDA in this digital age. Good thing I haven't been quaffing down fizzy drinks in aluminium cans for a long time. Hmmm, must inspect restaurants' kitchens before I eat there, gotta beat a hasty retreat if I see any aluminium cookware lying around.
Not only kiasu but getting kiasi too.
(kiasu= afraid to lose ; kiasi = afraid to die)
Has this guy gone bonkers or something? Sorry to disappoint you, still same old rambler. I didn't go into the scrap recycling business either.
Seriously, aluminium has long been suspected as a contributory factor to the onset of Alzheimer's disease; though not conclusively proven. Best to minimise the risks and keep one's fingers crossed, mine are crossed till they turn blue.
My dear mom is now 84 years young; losing her memory – suspected Alzheimer's.
Praise the Lord that her health is very good indeed. Short term or recent memory is very bad but has photographic recall for yesteryears' happenings. To test her during the last CNY balik kampung, I asked her about her life before I was born. She could recall every detail well; I even managed to extract from her some recipes for comfort food that I sorely missed. During the CNY binge of eating and sitting around, my mind got around thinking what brought about her condition. It is not a simple case of her hard disk getting full. I then recalled that she used a lot of aluminium cookware; stainless steel or tempered glass ones were not generally available then. Lord have mercy, I ate a lot of food (albeit delicious) from those pots and pans too. Am I destined to get Alzheimer's too? This is rather worrisome to say the least. I hope I don't get to the stage where I have to jot down my life's details in a little pocket book or make that a PDA in this digital age. Good thing I haven't been quaffing down fizzy drinks in aluminium cans for a long time. Hmmm, must inspect restaurants' kitchens before I eat there, gotta beat a hasty retreat if I see any aluminium cookware lying around.
Not only kiasu but getting kiasi too.
(kiasu= afraid to lose ; kiasi = afraid to die)
Thursday, July 19, 2007
Honesty & Tall Tales
Honesty is such a lonely word.
Everyone is so untrue.
Honesty is hardly ever heard.
And mostly what I need from you.
So goes Billy Joel's Honesty
Is honesty the best policy? Or rather is honesty the better policy?
Lying can take more than one form; be it simple white lies or blatant outright deception.
One can also be addicted to lying – one is then termed a compulsive liar. Jim Carey's Liar Liar movie is a good showcase of this affliction; his character can't go thru a day without uttering some untruth, his attorney job not withstanding.
I cannot help but feel lying is stressful – both to the liar as well as his audience. Let's start with his audience; those people to whom a person tell lies to- may be apt to call them the victims. Very frequently the victims know full well that the liar is spouting lies but are too kind or courteous to tell him off. I know because I have oft been a victim of lies big and small. Stressful as I have to hold myself in check to keep from confronting a friend who is such a compulsive liar. Four out of every ten statements issuing forth from his mouth are untruths. Mind you, he is not trying to swindle me into a get rich quick scheme or somesuch; not that I have anything to be conned out of. Just lies about everyday things. Except he keeps repeating the same lies on different occasions but with dissimilar basis. We'd known each other for over 10 years and while I am not exactly Einstein, I am not a doofus either so he should know I can't be easily deceived. I just didn't have the heart to confront him with his lies. Ever the thinker; I wondered why he keeps doing it. Is there a psychological need for him to keep lying? Does he actually derive a perverse pleasure in diddling his victims?
When one exhibits a penchant for lying; one should be well equipped with a really good memory besides the first prerequisite of verbal creativity. This is because of the problem of lying to many victims; never sticking to the same tall story line. You can forget what lie you told to which person as well as the exact context of the fib. On the other hand, your victims can recall clearly what you lied about earlier and contrast it with what you have just repeated. Worse, they may get together in your absence and compare notes and conclude that you are just a big fraud. Liar Liar becomes your moniker. Yes, it is all too easy to become a liar of Clintonian dimensions.
Some may say such lying is harmless but the problem is such consummate liars may graduate to worse levels such as swindling or cheating as well as marital infidelity. Whatever it is, the harm has been done. I am especially wary of people whom I know are prone to habitual lying that I take everything they say with a double pinch of salt.
Perhaps it is still better to keep one's mouth shut than open it unnecessarily. If you cannot tell the truth, then shut yer trap. Don't lie.Why bother.
Nothing is opened more by mistake than the mouth. A closed mouth gathers no foot too.
Everyone is so untrue.
Honesty is hardly ever heard.
And mostly what I need from you.
So goes Billy Joel's Honesty
Is honesty the best policy? Or rather is honesty the better policy?
Lying can take more than one form; be it simple white lies or blatant outright deception.
One can also be addicted to lying – one is then termed a compulsive liar. Jim Carey's Liar Liar movie is a good showcase of this affliction; his character can't go thru a day without uttering some untruth, his attorney job not withstanding.
I cannot help but feel lying is stressful – both to the liar as well as his audience. Let's start with his audience; those people to whom a person tell lies to- may be apt to call them the victims. Very frequently the victims know full well that the liar is spouting lies but are too kind or courteous to tell him off. I know because I have oft been a victim of lies big and small. Stressful as I have to hold myself in check to keep from confronting a friend who is such a compulsive liar. Four out of every ten statements issuing forth from his mouth are untruths. Mind you, he is not trying to swindle me into a get rich quick scheme or somesuch; not that I have anything to be conned out of. Just lies about everyday things. Except he keeps repeating the same lies on different occasions but with dissimilar basis. We'd known each other for over 10 years and while I am not exactly Einstein, I am not a doofus either so he should know I can't be easily deceived. I just didn't have the heart to confront him with his lies. Ever the thinker; I wondered why he keeps doing it. Is there a psychological need for him to keep lying? Does he actually derive a perverse pleasure in diddling his victims?
When one exhibits a penchant for lying; one should be well equipped with a really good memory besides the first prerequisite of verbal creativity. This is because of the problem of lying to many victims; never sticking to the same tall story line. You can forget what lie you told to which person as well as the exact context of the fib. On the other hand, your victims can recall clearly what you lied about earlier and contrast it with what you have just repeated. Worse, they may get together in your absence and compare notes and conclude that you are just a big fraud. Liar Liar becomes your moniker. Yes, it is all too easy to become a liar of Clintonian dimensions.
Some may say such lying is harmless but the problem is such consummate liars may graduate to worse levels such as swindling or cheating as well as marital infidelity. Whatever it is, the harm has been done. I am especially wary of people whom I know are prone to habitual lying that I take everything they say with a double pinch of salt.
Perhaps it is still better to keep one's mouth shut than open it unnecessarily. If you cannot tell the truth, then shut yer trap. Don't lie.Why bother.
Nothing is opened more by mistake than the mouth. A closed mouth gathers no foot too.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
