"I'm just a cook" (Under Siege)

Steven Seagal says, "I'm just a cook," right before single-handedly killing a group of terrorists that have taken his navy ship hostage. Non-sequitur...

What to do in SF between my Masters in Int'l Politics and my summer research position with the State Dept? I like cooking. I always wanted to be a chef. Why not just work as a cook? After being brutally rejected by several local French restaurants, I was finally hired part time by Global Gourmet catering. This was a month and a half ago. The excitement begins.

Tonight we cooked for literally 3000 people at the Genentech Bio Conference. I was the "mu-shu chicken" guy, responsible for wok frying bins of chicken. I worked 2 woks simultaneously. First boiled the oil, then added ginger and garlic, then chicken, vegetables (with water to steam), and Mu-Shu black bean sauce. It was crazy with waiters in the "front house" hounding me for food. I literally made 40 pounds of mu-shu over 7.5 hours. The brocolli was tricky because it took longer to soften. It was high stress and fun!

As "back house," people treat me like I'm in culinary school and under-educated. Most of the other cooks never attended college and this is their trade. It's understandable that our bosses and clients can easily look down on us because they're I-Bankers and we're cooks. That's what I love! I love that excitement of experiencing something new, even if it's a whole different identity in which people have a very narrow-minded view of who I am. In the kitchen, my knowledge of international politics and strategy doesn't matter; nor anyone care about my business degree, molecular biology bachelors, work in the Embassy, or student leadership.

It's like I'm a living William Faulkner novel, where the narrative changes as the perspectives of his characters shift. Even so, these days, I'm just a cook.