Authentic Thai food and the steady-state theory

Okay, you left-wing pinkos (pinkoes?):

Fred Hoyle. Heard of him?

A scientist from England, he was responsible for the phrase "the Big Bang". This is not say, however, that he was a proponent of the associated theory. Oh, God no. He coined the phrase in a flash of inspiration, and felt nothing but derision towards those who felt that something could come from nothing.

What Fred Hoyle was advocating was a steady-state universe: something that always was, and would always be. The idea that a universe could be either expanding or contracting was anathema to him. In his world, the universe stayed exactly where it was, and that was that. I'm not too sure his specific rebuttal to the evidence that the universe was expanding (proved through Doppler studies and the red-shift of distant galaxies), but the reader can rest assured that he wasn't too fond of the idea.

This leads me to cuisines of the world. When it comes to migration policy, there are essentially two groups of people -- those who favour the arrival of immigrants, and those who don't. Similarly, when it comes to exotic dishes, there are also two groups of people -- those who fancy all of the cuisines of the world (and, inevitably, think of themselves as "cultured" because they do), and those who don't.

There appears, on the basis of my research, to be a correlation between these two sets of people. Namely, that the people who favour pronounced immigration are likely to be the same people who enjoy eating many and varied cuisines of the world.

This isn't my problem, really -- these people can eat whatever they want, and invite whomever they want into the country. What I'd like to point out to them, however, is that they're poisoning their own well. Bringing it back to Fred Hoyle, the "steady state" model is infeasible. Just as a steady-state universe would fast run out of energy and cease to function (look it up in an encyclopaedia), so would a steady-state culinary model such as the one advocated.

Let's talk through this so that I may demonstrate the point. The old Thai woman who runs a shop down the street and produces the most fantastically spicy Thai food is a product of her birthplace. She was born in Thailand, educated in a Thai frame of mind, and acquired her cooking skills based on the knowledge passed down from her teachers and ancestors (all of whom, coincidentally, were Thai). This old Thai lady then migrates to a different country, and begins selling her Thai cuisine. "See the fruits of multiculturalism!" the people chime, citing the authentic Thai food and revelling in the spice and variety of life.

This is my point. Note the word "authentic" in the preceding paragraph. This Thai woman's cooking is special because it was the product of an "authentic" Thai upbringing. This woman is also, presumably, set enough in her ways that she will continue to produce authentic Thai food, no matter what her geographical location.

The problem, of course, is the children of this Thai lady and, even more likely, the children of the Thai women's children. By this point in time, the authentic Thai influence has been dilulted -- presuming the children even do remain in the restaurant business, their culinary viewpoint will have been cross-pollinated. A hamburger here, a curry there, a stir-fry here, some spaghetti there. This appears to be a trend in cooking at the moment. It's called "fusion".

Okay, so far so good. This shouldn't matter, however, as long as there remains authentic Thai chefs growing up in isolated corners of Thailand to perpetuate the authentic style of cooking. What happens, though, if the vacancy the Thai woman leaves in Thailand is filled by a person from a different country moving to Thailand? The some cross-pollination policy occurs, only this time in reverse.

My point is -- give this time (and, I'm not kidding you people, it will take a lot of time), and all differences will be mitigated. The food will become essentially the same, thus removing the spark that makes authentic Thai food special in the first place. This already happens at a lower level when we see established national cuisines -- the French cook a certain way, and the Germans another, because there is a consistency to the people and their experiences. Prior to the twentieth century, travel restrictions and the lack of an international media experience ensured that there was enough separation to keep different food streams authentic.

This can be demonstrated in a similar fashion using the English language. Prior to the world wars, the different strains of English in the world were quite distinct. There was the occasional traveller, but the volume of traffic was not enough to effect a significant change. Indeed, scholars of that time feared that the strains of American and British English would travel down separate paths, with the end result that speakers of one language would be unintelligible to speakers of the other.

However, with television, radio and films, differences begin to be discarded. That which was common to all strains remains, and the idiosyncrasies are ironed out -- usually, the dominant strain's methods are imposed on the subservient strain. We can see this happening in our fair Australia -- most young children will now pronounce "clerk" as "clurk" and "territory" and "terry-tor-y". The sad thing, I think, is that most young people will not even realise that they are, in effect, breaking with tradition.

This is a roundabout way of saying that, by advocating the multiculturalism that makes life so appealing, certain people are wiping out the very spice they are advocating. This would be a problem for me if I actually liked Thai food, but since I think the food is the spawn of Satan's butthole (to use the proper culinary term), I've got nothing to worry about.