When we were in San Francisco this summer, hidden in an alley in Chinatown was this fortune cookie "bakery." They have been there for years doing just that, making fortune cookies. The engineer in me was curious about the production rate, hours of production, number of employees, and customers. Unfortunately, their English was not the best and my Chinese or some dialect there of is nil. Communication was kept to a minimum. We watched the production for just a few minutes, but the impact was greater. It seemed like these women did the same thing day in and day out without complaint. The cookie comes off the press warm and needs to be folded while inserting the fortune. Their hands are conditioned to not be bothered by the heat of the cookie. We got to try a fresh cookie. That too, was not that impressive. It was the resilience of the place. Here, in the middle of San Fran, these few woman continued the tradition of making fortune cookies.
We weren't the only tourist stopping in for a peak. We left with a bag of sesame cookies. It is the same dough as the fortune cookies with the addition of sesames. They were simple and good.
I know the majority of fortune cookies are mass manufactured somewhere else. But, this small place carrying on the way it did made an impact.
1 comment:
Sounds like an interesting experience! We actually love fortune cookies here... the orange flavored ones.
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