DO you think you have bidden goodbye to lunch packs after graduation? You're wrong. You become frugal when you spend what you earn. The penny-pincher in you awakens from a deep slumber.
On one hand, daily lunches are either packed from home or bought from your friendly neighborhood carenderia. They visit your office early morning and pass around the menu for the day, with blank sheets of paper where you list down your choices and sign your name. Billing is done every 15th and 30th, so convenient.
I, on the other hand, pack my lunch (thank, God, I have a good son who prepares this; I can't imagine squeezing it into my schedule without getting stuck in traffic), and orders a dessert or a side dish from them.
Oftentimes, I forget that it’s a carenderia. I always have special requests on my order like, “less salt, less oil,” “no flour, less oil, no sugar” for the maruya, and “fresh oil, crispy” for maranay, and these are just a few. The requests overpower the quantity of food ordered.
I’m always the first to make the “friendly” call the moment the food packs are delayed.
Payroll and bonus days, are feast days for most of us. Most people go out or order from cafes and restos. Birthday celebrations in the office became more of a group thing to save on costs; monthly celebrants do potluck.
During the pandemic, all these things stopped and delivery applications like the pink, the green, the blue, etc., became our daily partner every time our tummy grumbled.
Mind you, I still have special requests. Office lunches became expensive, and due to the fear of the unknown then, the cost was no longer an issue. Survival was the order of the game.
Lunch packs from home also became the new norm. Lunch breaks used to be a happy time of the day at the pantry with colleagues (where stories shared should remain there, and that calls for another topic), now it's a party for two at your desk, with you and your phone, watching or reading anything under the sun while eating.
This year, we finally met again our neighborhood carenderia, and the list with special requests continues its saga.
