Vanilla

Forty Seven

A/N: Hello Beans! I hope you are safe wherever you are and that this intense chapter of food somehow lifts your spirit by just a little. Hehe. Oh! And and and I watched this anime called Shokugeki no Soma? And apart from the fact that their clothes start disappearing when they taste good food, um, I actually really like the anime! Haha! 

The music/score was stunning and although the characters are archetypal, I did enjoy the food. The Erina (?) girl also had some magic tongue thing that resembles Vanilla's ability to identify ingredients upon tasting so that was really cool. The main character, Soma is very outgoing and cheery and positive boi with many girls (and guys) flocking to him huhu. Do check it out if you're interested in culinary stuff! It's the only show I've seen so far that incorporates a culinary school in the story and revolves around it. Enjoy this chapter! 

I'll see you on Sunday ^^

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[Vanilla]

If the question was whether I'd somehow considered an alternate, parallel universe in which Uncle Al had never decided to take me in and become my legal guardian, the answer would be no. There were better things to be thinking about. And while I do, indeed, subscribe to the astronomical theory of the multiverse, there simply wasn't any practical use in entertaining a different story I could have lived.

Pulling up outside the orphanage did nothing to jolt the memories I'd long discarded. Realistically speaking, no two-year-old was going to remember the exact details of the kind of infant lives they used to lead and the apparent week I'd spent at a baby adoption centre before Uncle Al returned from the other side of the world to cradle me in his arms was... well, quite forgettable.

"So the head welfare officer wants to remind us about the no-swearing rule and that conversation topics should steer clear of anything regarding past or ex-families. Remember—be nice. Smile like you're permanently high, and uh... yeah." Lee Jungwoo raised a thumbs-up to conclude before disappearing down the front exit of the bus.

Most of us had decided to alight from the back instead, where boxes of craft and equipment were stacked atop one another and required our assistance to transport. Half of it was filled with vibrant origami paper, ice cream sticks and rolls of felt, materials that were to be used during the hour's-worth of activity time while the party was being set up.

"Hello everyone. It's so nice to see you all and so kind of you to be thinking about our children despite your busy schedules," a bespectacled, dark-skinned woman greeted us as we gathered in a semi-circle around the front gate of the facility. "I'm Tiana, welfare officer here at Sunbeam. The kids call me Mrs. Tea, which I do like, so I hope you have something tea-flavoured on your menu today." In mere sentences, she had managed to lift the dual nerves of meeting new people and competing in a foreign environment, all whilst putting smiles on our faces at the same time.

"We'll start with a quick tour of the orphanage—just the dorm, the living space, where we have our pre-school classes and activities, then we'll show you guys the kitchen so that we can get started on the party."

After leaving the boxes of materials with a pair of friendly teacher volunteers, we were shown around the facility and given a brief explanation of their daily schedule. The main building housed an activity centre, where the younger kids of kindergarten age had their morning classes before joining afterschool care with the elementary school children.