A number of people have sent me links to fortune cookie-related art (short story, drawings, even a short film!). The cultural fascination with fortune cookies, particularly with fortune cookie scribes, is<\/p>\n
So I will start rolling them out over time. Here is a story from Carl Lang (who Facebook messaged me) about a guy whose job was to secretly listen to dinner table conversations so he could write customized fortunes.<\/p>\n
Here is an abbreviated excerpt. (Full text after the jump)<\/p>\n
I worked at a high class Chinese restaurant that my uncle owned. My job wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t waiting tables, cooking food, or cleaning dishes, but something far more mischievous. My job was to secretly listen to peoples\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 conversations through microphones hidden under the table and write specified fortune cookies for the end of their meals. The waiter served each one on its own plate to the receiver. The idea was that the patrons would then have an enjoyable personal experience at the restaurant and keep coming back. It worked well, the couples who received personalized messages seemed to come back regularly, even though the cardiovascular nightmare of the fried rice we served was no more appealing than at any other unsanitary Asian establishment. We did nothing special with the food, but patrons kept coming back, it was because of the fortune cookies.
\nThe key in writing the fortunes was to make them eerily personalized yet still neutral enough to have been received randomly. People were always excited to open their fortune cookies regardless of how their dinners were. They would read their message and be filled with joy. Some of them would even open it up, read the message and then not even eat the cookie. Though to their credit, if the people that did eat them knew how many years it had been since we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d last made a new batch of cookie batter, they would not have eaten them either. Did you know that there are no fortune cookies in China? They were invented in the states, so was General Tso\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s chicken.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/p>\n
Maybe You Can Live On the Moon In the Next Century<\/p>\n
By Calvin Lang
\nI kept the reason that I got fired a secret. I was perhaps the only person in the world that had this job, and now that it is gone, I miss it. I worked at a high class Chinese restaurant that my uncle owned. My job wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t waiting tables, cooking food, or cleaning dishes, but something far more mischievous. My job was to secretly listen to peoples\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 conversations through microphones hidden under the table and write specified fortune cookies for the end of their meals. The waiter served each one on its own plate to the receiver. The idea was that the patrons would then have an enjoyable personal experience at the restaurant and keep coming back. It worked well, the couples who received personalized messages seemed to come back regularly, even though the cardiovascular nightmare of the fried rice we served was no more appealing than at any other unsanitary Asian establishment. There were two secrets to Chinese cooking; the first was to flavor the wok. The wok must cook garlic and onions for hours for the flavor to become surrogate to the pan and spread to the food. It is therefore, important, never to wash the pan. The second cooking secret was an excessive use of oil in each dish equaling that of only John Travolta\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s hair in the 1970\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s. We did nothing special with the food, but patrons kept coming back, it was because of the fortune cookies.
\nThe key in writing the fortunes was to make them eerily personalized yet still neutral enough to have been received randomly. People were always excited to open their fortune cookies regardless of how their dinners were. They would read their message and be filled with joy. Some of them would even open it up, read the message and then not even eat the cookie. Though to their credit, if the people that did eat them knew how many years it had been since we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d last made a new batch of cookie batter, they would not have eaten them either. Did you know that there are no fortune cookies in China? They were invented in the states, so was General Tso\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s chicken.
\nThe fortune cookie idea came to me a couple of years ago when I was at another Chinese restaurant with my friend. We had a greasy feast. I ate so much that I had to unbuckle my pants and let out a heavy sigh of relief. I opened my fortune cookie to see what my bullshit fortune would be. I wondered what could have been on that little slip of paper. A nifty, yet poorly translated, quote by Confucius? A specification to the financial prosperity that I would achieve? A presentiment that I would find my true love soon? (yeah. my cock. at home. Alone.) None of those, not even close. Instead I got the stupidest and most half-assed fortune that any Jewish guy working for the Chinese mafia of Taoist absurdity had ever written. It said, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Maybe you can live on the moon in the next century.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d I was angry. I could feel the blood boil in my cheeks as those damned smiley-faces on each side of the slip of paper snickered at me. I was so pissed that I almost vomited onto the dirty floor that the Sweet and Sour pork sauce was probably scraped from. I felt cheated. What I received was not a fortune, it was an attack on logic and common sense. However, it gave me the idea of creating personalized fortune cookie messages.
\nI realized that fortune cookies were an excitement to the meal. Fortune cookies were the excitement of the Chinese restaurant, like the gorillas at the Rainforest caf\u00c3\u00a9, the fun fact in the lid of a Snapple, and the large breasts of the whores that work at Hooters. They\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re a gimmick, they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re there for fun, but as of yet no Chinese restaurant had been able to take advantage of them. They worked, especially with people on first dates. I could always tell when people were on a first date before I ever even listened to them. They never knew what to do with their hands. Some would sit on them, some would hold their hands together, swirl their thumbs, or keep them in their pockets, all were signs of nervousness and an attempt not to seem impolite by having their elbows on the table. Chinese restaurants were great for first dates because of the chopsticks, you could teach your date how to use them properly, or see if you could pick up this or that without letting it drop on the table. Nothing bothers Asians more than people using forks at Chinese restaurants, how would they like it if I used chopsticks to eat spaghetti in meat sauce?
\nAnother fun part of a first date for people at a Chinese restaurant was trying to pronounce the words in Chinese, that was fun to them. At the end of a good first date I would usually write something like: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The love of your life is sitting right in front of you.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d They would be shy to show one another but secretly full of eagerness to tell each other their ridiculous fortune they received about the person in front of them only to find out that they got the same one. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153What are the odds that we got the same one! Wow!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d they would say to one another, then laugh. Idiots. It was disturbingly effective, like shaving a cat with a lawn mower. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d see the couple come back a week or two later, taking the opportunity in early dating to try other places like French or Mexican or something weird like that. But after that, they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d be regulars, coming in twice a week. With couples that I liked, I kept writing nice little notes reminding them that they had an anniversary coming up in a subtle way. If I had a nickel for every time I helped some poor chump out on his relationship I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d be a fucking Kung Pao millionaire.
\nWith people who were having a business function, I would write something like \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Your two houses will find financial prosperity together,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and the table would become raucous with excitement and joy. I always wondered if white people read fortune cookies in their heads with really thick Chinese accents? Sometimes writing the fortunes was difficult; I had to listen intently on conversations for something to write positively about, it was especially difficult with the frequent patrons to think of new things to say. Instead I began writing whatever I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d felt like, and the patrons loved them. Already having a reputation for our inspirational and remarkably personalized (though, of course, not at all invasive to the constitutional right to privacy) fortune cookie messages, people loved the new ones that I wrote. One guy laughed endlessly when he finished his meal and read, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I hope you enjoyed your meal, because you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll be shitting it out for hours tomorrow.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d One of my favorites was \u00e2\u20ac\u0153You probably paid more for this meal than I make each year in this factory.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d It filled them with bliss. I had a few more like, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Please don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t report us to the sanitation department,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and one that I was always surprised that no one ever took offense to was, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I hope you enjoyed your Kung Pao chicken, because it was actually a slaughtered poodle marinated in hooker blood. Enjoy the hepatitis.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d
\nOnce, this woman came in with her friend talking about how her father had just gone into the hospital for the third time and that she was worried about him. I wrote, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153What matters most to family is that you are there for them. Nothing matters more to the people close to you.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d It was not really a fortune, but she cried, and I felt like crying for her as well. She came in a couple times after, usually by herself though sometimes with a friend, and I would listen to their conversation when I could. My favorite part was when she would read her fortune cookie and remark to her friend on how incredibly topical the fortunes were to her life, as if the fortunes she received were from fate itself. Little did she know that it was me. Her name was Lisa and I sort of fell for her. I would think about her often, thinking about how I could talk to her. What would I one day say to her? At one point I was tempted to write my phone number in the fortune, and now that I think about it, that would have been a really cool way to give a girl my number, but I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t want Lisa to know that her conversations were listened to.
\nOne day Lisa came in with a guy, I could see in the security camera that she had her hand in his arm. My Lisa was arm locked with some dipshit. I listened to their conversation, noticing only that this guy was a prick, and that Lisa could do much better. Why was she with him? She laughed at things he said, even though he said nothing funny. I hated him. Every smile they shot at each other from across the table, every point of silence, the way he made her laugh, every moment she spent with that asshole pained me. He was also a vegetarian, which meant that he wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t a man. Men that don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t eat meat are weak and pathetic. Real men love meat. Real men like their steaks bloodier than bedsheets on prom night. If God didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t want us to eat cows he wouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have made them out of juicy steaks. I couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t believe she was with him, he talked about his car for at least 20 minutes- all bow down to the king of the douchebags. It didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t seem like it was their first date; it seemed like she knew him quite a while even though I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d never seen him before or heard about him from her conversations. My heart croaked when she coached him on how to use the chopsticks.
\nI immediately regretted what I wrote in their fortunes; I wanted them to be hurt by my message, just as I felt hurt. I listened to them as their checks and cookies arrived at the table. Lisa said, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153These are the best fortune cookie messages you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll ever read. They\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re like the best thing about this place.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Lisa opened her fortune and started laughing. She sat up forward and recited it to him, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Listen to this, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcThe person you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re with has herpes.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122\u00e2\u20ac\u009d They both laughed, I was filled with anger. I hated him, and I hated that she liked him back. I kept listening, my blood rising in temperature to the point that I could feel it in my ears.
\nWhen they stopped laughing, the guy opened his cookie and began reading out the fortune. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153If your girlfriend were Chinese, her name would have been \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcFoo Ling Yu\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6\u00e2\u20ac\u2122\u00e2\u20ac\u009d that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s when the bastard started laughing, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153because she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s cheating on you! HAHAAHA!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d They were both laughing. Those fortunes weren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t meant to be funny. They were meant to cause divide between them. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Fu Ling Yoo! Get it? AHAHAHA!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d The two of them pressed on laughing and I couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t accept their bliss anymore.
\nI ran out into the restaurant area and straight up to their table. I pointed at the guy and faced towards her, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153How can you be his girlfriend? How can you be with this asshole? Don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t you have any self-respect? He\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a total asshole! What is wrong with you?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d They both paused, everyone in the room paused. It was a pretty fucking awkward.
\nAfter what seemed like Dante\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s eternity, Lisa replied uncomfortably, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153This\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 this is my cousin.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d I felt broken. The anger and feelings I had were over a misunderstanding. But it didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t matter what they were, I made an ass out of myself. I was a stranger to her. I was just oddly there, a person she never met confronted her with something she never did. I apologized, said I was sorry, and walked away.
\nSo, that was the story of how I got fired from my job writing personalized fortune cookies at a Chinese restaurant.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A number of people have sent me links to fortune cookie-related art (short story, drawings, even a short film!). The cultural fascination with fortune cookies, particularly with fortune cookie scribes, is So I will start rolling them out over time. Here is a story from Carl Lang (who Facebook messaged me) about a guy whose […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-77","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chinese-food"],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2pydS-1f","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.fortunecookiechronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.fortunecookiechronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.fortunecookiechronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.fortunecookiechronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.fortunecookiechronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.fortunecookiechronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.fortunecookiechronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.fortunecookiechronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.fortunecookiechronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}