This is my ode – a little too wordy, perhaps just slightly bitter, probably overdramatic, but wholeheartedly sincere – to my rice cooker.
As a born-and-bred Korean, I carry the stereotypical but sincere love for rice deep in my bones. Yes, I’m aware of how that sounds. Racially expected? Perhaps. But I stand by it. Rice is the superior carbohydrate: versatile, comforting, and always just right.
This devotion became more than a dietary preference when I started life as an international student. Suddenly, food wasn’t just fuel; it was memory, identity, home. A bowl of doenjang-jjigae after a long day? Therapy. The sharp tang of good kimchi? A taste of my mother’s hands.
Meanwhile, the dining hall – undoubtedly trying its best to cater to a wide range of tastes – served me… roasted potatoes. Again. I’m sure it’s perfectly fine for many, even comforting to some. But for me, the meals often felt like polite small talk when what I really craved was a deep conversation. Food that nodded at me, maybe, but didn’t speak the language of my gut – or my soul.
And so, naturally, I committed a small act of culinary rebellion: I snuck a rice cooker into my dorm room.
Now, before judgment is passed, allow me a few words in my defense. The alternative of instant rice? A tragedy. The real thing, freshly steamed, is a different species altogether. And cheaper, too. Could I have just used the communal kitchen? Theoretically, yes… if it weren’t half the size of my room and required a cross-campus hike just to check if a single hob was free. It serves 150 people. I am one of them, and also not one of them.
Of course, I knew the rules. And yes, I got caught. I uncomplainingly accepted my punishment: a cleaning duty sentence and a handwritten essay on fire safety (in my best repentant cursive). The rice cooker was temporarily confiscated – banished to the land of seized appliances – until I could negotiate its parole to the shared kitchen.
Let me be clear: this is not a complaint. I broke the rule. I got the consequence. No hard feelings. I don’t mean to justify my infraction.
But this is, as the title promises, an ode. A hymn to the quiet hero of my university life. It was the rice cooker that fed me when my homesickness boiled over, when deadlines piled up, when Western-leaning meals just wouldn’t do. It gave me warm, steady comfort in a new and wobbly world. It hummed while I cried over an essay. It steamed through moments of joy, too. It was home in a plug-in pot.
So yes, this is an ode – and if I may, a few gentle suggestions.
What if dining halls made rice not as an afterthought, but as a main character?
What if kitchens were actually usable, not battle arenas?
What if safety-checked rice cookers were allowed, like kettles and toasters are?
We don’t need rule-breaking, but we could benefit from better rules. Ones that understand that for some of us, food is culture, comfort, and survival – especially when home is thousands of kilometers away.
And so, I return to where I began.
O steadfast keeper of warmth and grain,
You hum with quiet purpose, feeding hearts and homes the same.
In your silver belly, comfort blooms — each fluffy spoonful a gentle flame.
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