Lunch rules

Some weeks ago I posted about one of the elementary schools switching from milk packed glass bottles to that in paper cartons. It would seem that a change is happening in the school lunch system at some schools too, because my latest school has mysteriously dropped last year's system where the kids serve each other using proper crockery, to individual, ready packed lunches in plastic bentou containers. I have a feeling that the food is being shipped from a central school lunch factory, just like the schools in Koriyama up north, instead of being prepared fresh on the school grounds.

This is the change I'm talking about:


It's probably not my imagination that the oishii factor in the lunches has taken a beating since the switch. Maybe it has something to do with soaring food prices and the snowballing petrol price crisis, but I have a feeling this happened at the beginning of the school term in April, before these things became a problem.

The other thing I wonder about is what happens to the plastic trays once they finish lunch. I see them all stacked up and returned to the kitchen, but what happens afterwards is a bit of a mystery. I asked the teachers about it, and it seems that the trays get returned to the supplier where they might be washed and reused. "Might", I say, because even the teachers weren't sure. I can only hope that they don't get dumped into the incinerator like I suspect.

Maybe it's just me, but if this system gets introduced to more of my schools I'll sorely miss the kids doling out the food to everyone in the queue during lunchtime. Taking away the kids' involvement in their school lunch kind of lessens the communal experience, methinks, not to mention it might give kids the idea that lunch should always come ready to eat in a sterile plastic tray. Welcome to TV dinner land.