2008 Woodie Awards
Rollins Food, American Culture
Lindsey Chang
Issue date: 10/14/05 Section: Opinions
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Having boarded at school in America for the past five years, I will illustrate how the American culture affects eating at school, particularly at Rollins. Five years ago, I ate home cooked food regularly and rarely visited fast food restaurants. Attending the American high school, I began to eat as most people did, indulging in french fries, pizza, and chicken tenders.
Nobody believed I would ever gain weight, but I gained ten pounds, which is a lot considering my four foot nine inch frame. I went back home to Jamaica after my senior year of high school and reconstructed my diet. I have lost the extra ten pounds since then, but now, as I attend Rollins, I again struggle to eat healthy and find it especially hard to resist what American culture has made most available to me: large quantities of fattening foods.
Food is almost always available at Rollins, especially the enticing fried foods containing many calories and high saturated/trans fats. In the dining hall, under the sign "Main Course", there is always a selection of more than two fried food dishes accompanied with fried potato slices or bread biscuits, emphasizing how central fried foods and carbohydrates are in our diet. When the dining hall is not open, The Grille and the C-Store are open. At the C-Store, the majority of students buy microwavable foods and cereals, quick and easy made food, typical of the fast paced but lazy American. Then, when The Grille is closed after two o'clock in the morning or when students are too lazy to walk to The Grille, they have to "order in."
When ordering, hardly any students think of getting healthy foods, mainly because there are no healthy restaurants that deliver or are even open past ten o'clock. Here, Dominoes Pizza is on the top of "The Most Ordered Food" list. Looking at the dorm trash cans, I usually see at least one pizza box and cinnamon sticks box at the top of the heap. At Rollins, junk food is not only the most eaten food because of their availability but also because American culture has tagged junk food as leisure food. Different types of foods are eaten depending on the event. For example, caviar and lobster is generally known to be "fancy" food and appear at formal dinners where people behave more reserved and sophisticated. Junk foods, such as cookies and fried foods specifically offered at The Grill, tend to connote a casual atmosphere where the people feel free to be themselves and have fun.
Nobody believed I would ever gain weight, but I gained ten pounds, which is a lot considering my four foot nine inch frame. I went back home to Jamaica after my senior year of high school and reconstructed my diet. I have lost the extra ten pounds since then, but now, as I attend Rollins, I again struggle to eat healthy and find it especially hard to resist what American culture has made most available to me: large quantities of fattening foods.
Food is almost always available at Rollins, especially the enticing fried foods containing many calories and high saturated/trans fats. In the dining hall, under the sign "Main Course", there is always a selection of more than two fried food dishes accompanied with fried potato slices or bread biscuits, emphasizing how central fried foods and carbohydrates are in our diet. When the dining hall is not open, The Grille and the C-Store are open. At the C-Store, the majority of students buy microwavable foods and cereals, quick and easy made food, typical of the fast paced but lazy American. Then, when The Grille is closed after two o'clock in the morning or when students are too lazy to walk to The Grille, they have to "order in."
When ordering, hardly any students think of getting healthy foods, mainly because there are no healthy restaurants that deliver or are even open past ten o'clock. Here, Dominoes Pizza is on the top of "The Most Ordered Food" list. Looking at the dorm trash cans, I usually see at least one pizza box and cinnamon sticks box at the top of the heap. At Rollins, junk food is not only the most eaten food because of their availability but also because American culture has tagged junk food as leisure food. Different types of foods are eaten depending on the event. For example, caviar and lobster is generally known to be "fancy" food and appear at formal dinners where people behave more reserved and sophisticated. Junk foods, such as cookies and fried foods specifically offered at The Grill, tend to connote a casual atmosphere where the people feel free to be themselves and have fun.