Barba Nikos

1600 Words7 Pages
Learning Never Ends
Education can happen at any time by anyone. People get knowledge from teachers in school; learn the lifestyle from their parents at home; know the friendship from friends around them. There are countless of ways to learn new things. In “The Kitchen” written by Alfred Kazin, the author gets the lesson from his mother in their kitchen which lets Kazin build a sense of make a living is not easy. “Barba Nikos” written by Harry Mark Petrakis, tells of a Greek boy, Harry Petrakis who attacks a Greek grocer, Barba Nikos and gains the lesson from the grocer about the culture and Greek traditional food. Both of them get lessons from people who have a significant influence on their whole life. Sometimes, food and meal can be used…show more content…
Kazin has an initial view of making a living is not easy from his mother and also knows hard-work and enthusiasm for work are significant factors to make both life and work meaningful. The lesson can also be taught by some people that you may only have one chance to meet, and to talk to, like Barba Nikos. Petrakis learn many things from the Greek grocery about culture and life. When Petrakis promised Barba Nikos he would come to grocery to work for the amends, Barba Nikos teaches Petrakis a lot of things about culture and traditional food by cooking the traditional Greek food on his own. Barba Nikos tells Petrakis that “A meal in itself, an experience, an emotional involvement. It is created deftly and with grace. First, you place large lettuce leaves in a big, deep bowl.” He spread his fingers and moved them slowly, carefully, as if he were arranging the leaves”(Petrakis, 20). Barba Nikos uses his body language to show his respect to his own Greek culture. This kind of action teaches Petrakis how sacred the culture is that every Greek should be respectful to their own Greek culture. In addition, Barba Nikos uses the traditional food to teach Petrakis, everyone should love their culture and their food. Since the traditional food is the most symbolic thing to represent culture. Each traditional dish has its own story and history about the culture and is created by ancestors’ intelligence though these ancestors may not really exist. The traditional Greek
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