Tell Me What Your Friends Eat

"Tell me who your friends are and I'll tell you who you are." Do you get how that crap works? To some extent, yeah I guess the friends that you keep reflect your personality. Of course you'd wanna hang out with people who are more or less like you. But sometimes don't you find yourself being cozy with somebody you'd never imagined you'd ever like? I've been there several times! So really, you can't judge somebody that easily based on the friends that person keeps. How about sizing them up based on what and how they eat? I've taken some shots of my friends and their lunch a few days ago. Lemme see how my friends' lunch reveal their personalities.



These are the subjects of this study. At the far end of the table is Peter, the only girl is April, and nearest the camera is Gil.



This is Peter's lunch can. He brings baon everyday without fail. His lunch can's usually half-filled with rice and an assortment of ulam, mostly fried fish and chicken or pork adobo. He also buys an additional ulam in a jollijeep downstairs and mainit na sabaw.

Analysis: You can tell that Peter's family (at least the katulong who is technically part of the family) cares for him a lot judging from the time they spend every morning preparing his lunch. However, considering that Peter has hypertension, you'd wonder if the katulong has good intensions feeding him fried fish and adobo everyday! Lunch is always a hearty meal for Peter, which is pretty appropriate for a hearty person like him.




This is April's lunch. She buys lunch at Juday's or at Manang Sungit's or at Mother and Daughter's everyday. She especially loves Mother and Daughter's huge fried chicken, which is puzzling since she's not a huge eater at all. She revels looking at the big chicken but almost always never finishes it. It's a marvel that in this picture you see no leftover in her plate. If you look at the picture really close, the leftover's inside that white plastic bag.

Analysis: April is what you'd call "takaw tikim." She has a big appetite that gets easily sated just by looking at and/or smelling food. On the one hand, it says that April's easy to please. One doesn't have to exert extra effort to get on her good side. On the other hand, if you are not aware of this, be prepared to not regret putting your extra efforts to waste.




This is Gil's lunch. Like Peter, he always has baon prepared by his mom. The difference is that Gil's baon is placed in clear plastic bags like he bought it from a carinderia on his way to work.

Analysis: In Gil’s case, I’d like to focus on the way he eats rather than what he eats. Notice how he holds his spoon and fork. Pay closer attention to how he holds his fork in his left hand. There is a certain grace in the way his pinky finger is flicked. It is not hard to tell that Gil is gay. Enough said.

Of course these analyses are not objective at all. But seriously, isn’t it fun to discover that no matter how different friends are from each other, their mutual respect and love make them want to stick together for a long time, if not forever, to share more of themselves with each other?

Now going back to Gil’s lunch, here are some pictures of his food. We caught these fried fish kissing.