Fun and responsibility – gastronomy: maximum presence, minimal visibility

When a bell rings, I twitch together. This is an Atavism from my time as a waitress. When the bell rings, you jump to the breakthrough in the wall through which the kitchen provides the food. This moment is a special one: it is a moment of communication, almost one of diplomacy. The kitchen does not communicate with words, and through the gap you cannot look at each other. But on the other hand, it is still perceived which hands are that the plates take, who is the fastest reacting to the simple sign, ringing the bell.

So you reach the plate, half -bent and without words, a communication in silence. A clockwork whose gear is not allowed to hook at any point. You can tell the guests whether they have an idea of ​​how this clockwork, the ants heap, is structured – in a structure of the dependency on each other. If a particle in the gear is loose, if you are missing or hook, you can feel it immediately. So you communicate with the kitchen without a word, but pragmatic, while you communicate with the guests representative.

Only once I poured a whole chicken curry directly from the space between the kitchen and representation room.

Fun and responsibility

Bahar Kaygusuz

Olga Hohmann does not understand what work is and tries to find out every day. Sitting in her Ortlos Office, she explores her biography and enjoys her own neuroses. All texts on Dasnd.de/hohmann.

If the kitchen wanted to do something good for me – because I was a functional “cog in the gear” – they thanked them in their language, namely culinary. It was known that I liked to eat, from sweet to salty and above all sharp. Strange parts of an animal body that are rarely eaten, such as lamb heads, chicken feet or offal.

So sometimes the bell rang, and when you fell towards the window, there was no dish there, but you were unexpectedly called the kitchen. Then there was a small plate, with a new dessert that had just been tried – or with a dish that had some marginal aesthetic flaw (maybe one who was made towards me) and therefore “unfortunately could not be served”.

The plate was therefore small so that the content, by me, could be quickly consumed – before I would jump back into the representative area of ​​the gear. The kitchen thanked for my work with these small forbidden dishes, forbidden fruits, which I then commented on with loud pleasure sounds. From the beginning, our relationship was expressed in which affection and appreciation were expressed by enjoyable food. My colleague, the chef, told me years later that the whole team was initially skeptical about me – I was thought to be a spoiled prince. Only when I devoured huge portions every time after the shift at two o’clock in the morning did the team began to trust me. It was a moral category for my colleagues. I literally ate myself in the hearts of my colleagues.

For the remains of the star kitchen and the “waste” (such as heads, feet or innards) processed into dishes, we often ordered risa chicken, half chicken, chicken wings and nuggets – and bubble tea.

When the kitchen ended her work, she closed the flap. This could only be opened or closed from one side, the kitchen side – The Message what Clear: Flap. Kitchen too. Monkey dead.

So again and again it is the hands – the visible, the invisible.

I am thinking of the Middle Ages’ method: After the theft was again, thieves were publicly cut off a hand, which then remained publicly exhibited, slowly mummifying.

I learn: When it comes to shop theft, it is best to act as visible as possible. You simply carry the frozen pizzas past the cash register. You have to assume, especially in front of yourself, that the stolen products already belong. Sometimes I fear that it is easier to steal if you know that you could have been buying a product.

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When a bell rings, in the restaurant, I still twitch together. You can immediately feel whether the other guests at the table feel empathy for the “other side” whether they have already been part of this ants heap, whether they can anticipate the “other side”.

Once I am operated on my arm – my whole body is under anesthesia – but I am conscious. From the beginning there was this fly in the operating room. They had not been caught until the end of the operation. I still remember her buzz, it kept me awake. I was not allowed to fall asleep anyway.

“Minimal exertion, maximum performance,” says M. about the appearance of the fly. The absolute opposite of the service staff in the restaurant.

Once, in the opera, I recognize the fly over the head of the soprano in the first act. Until the death of the slowly dying traviata, I see nothing but this fly over her head, like a hasty sign of decay. I almost mean that your sums drown out the vocals.