F riends , fellow students. I write to you as a humble man. I don’t ask for much in life, only the basics. When I took the position of staff columnist at Technician, I said the Columnist’s Oath: “I, Ahmed Salah Mohammad Metwally Amer , promise to always expose untruths, injustices and conspiracies that matter to the NCSU student body, especially those that are omelette-related.” Then the Technician editors said they didn’t have an oath for opinion columnists, and I should stop talking. They also seemed a little perplexed at the specificity of the oath.
With that said, I can no longer sit idly by while thousands are being oppressed. I must uphold the Columnist’s Oath.
Today, oppression takes the form of a sloppy, runny and depressing omelette .
For those of you who aren’t as outraged as you should be, put yourself in my shoes – Nikes in case you were wondering. Endorsement deal, please.
Imagine you wake up eager to start your day with a delicious and well-balanced breakfast. If you’re a foodie like me, then you’ve been contemplating what you’re getting on your omelette since the night before. You go through your morning rituals, and as you do so, you grow hungrier and more excited about your omelette . At this point, your mouth is watering, your stomach is growling, you may even be slightly aroused at the thought of your breakfast. I don’t judge.
You make your way out of the door and over to Clark with a smile on your face, playing with your student ID card in your hands, anxious to swipe it.
You’ve finally made it; you swipe your card, sanitize your hands and start for the omelette line where you wait patiently. It’s finally your turn; you’re bursting with excitement, rocking back and forth on your heels and saying, “Can I please get an omelette with peppers, mushrooms, onions and tomato? No cheese, please, and I’d like it well done…thank you.”
When the omelette finally comes off of the grill and is plopped onto your plate, you immediately know something’s wrong. In your mind, you expected a golden yellow, fluffy half-circle of protein stuffed with an array of colorful vegetables. Instead, you’re looking at an uncooked, watery slap in the face to the French culinary gods. Oh, and there’s cheese on it. Even the vegetables look depressed to be part of such an abomination.
Since there’s a long line behind you, you don’t ask for it to be remade, nor do you return to the back of the line since, as I mentioned before, you’re starving. With no other options, you reluctantly gather the rest of your breakfast and find a seat.
As you stare down at your mutated egg pile, you think, “I’m lucky, starving kids in Africa don’t have runny omelettes to eat.” Out of guilt, you decide to cut into the oozing yolk puddle and take a bite. As you chew you realize there are other things in your omelette that shouldn’t be there, like the turkey sausage and turkey ham from previously made omelettes … and bacon. Not turkey bacon, bacon. If you’re one of the many Muslim students on campus with a meal plan, bacon is your Kryptonite , so you stop eating.
I know this injustice makes you want to hurl this copy of Technician to the ground and punch out the person closest to you out of sheer disgust. I don’t blame you. Considering how much we pay for a meal plan, a well-made omelette isn’t too much to ask for. What I received was much less than an “omelette du fromage ,” as the French say. It was more like an “omelette du dommage.” Ask one of the French students on campus what that means. If they say it doesn’t make sense, then you’re talking to someone who’s only pretending to be French.
When we start giving up our basic omelette rights, and other basic rights, then we open the floodgates to oppression and disaster. Well I say nay, and you should too. Help me help you, Wolfpack Nation. Demand quality omelettes . More fresh fruit wouldn’t hurt either.
