Lunch in elementary school

For the later part of elementary school we took Camren out of local private school to attend the Science Park school with Catriona. This was how they spent part of the lunch hour, eating at their desk, like many of their parents who would eat at their desk while at work. They start preparing them for work life early.

At lunch time most students had a hot meal prepared at home. Box lunch’s could be delivered, but they were, in elementary school at least, infrequent. Not all kids ate well of course. Parents are overworked in Hsinchu, and often squeeze as many hours of sleep in as possible. Last minute trips to the convenience store for whatever was available at breakfast, sometimes somewhat healthy, often times not, was common.

This was their first big adjustment upon moving here. Eating fresh whole food here at school time is difficult. Food allergies rampant, industrial and fast food preferred. At Birchwood they have a whole cooler devoted to chocolate milk. They have microwaves at the schools, but the kids complained of long line ups and the inability to have time to eat and socialize.

The new healthy food program has helped us divert their diet from the monotony of the sandwich, and all its carbs and salty meats. But we do miss the ability to be less restrictive with our food.