Food should be cheap, and labor should be cheap, and everything

Host: The wind carried the scent of earth and rain, threading through the open windows of a small café that sat at the edge of a farmer’s market. The evening sun poured across baskets of tomatoes, herbs, and loaves of fresh bread still steaming from the oven. Somewhere nearby, a child laughed as her mother haggled over peaches. The air pulsed with life — messy, fragrant, unrepeatable.

Inside, Jack sat at a wooden table worn smooth by time. His hands rested on a cup of dark coffee, untouched. Jeeny was across from him, her hair tied up, her fingers tracing the grain of the table as she spoke. Around them, the sound of plates, quiet chatter, and the rhythmic hum of life gave the room a heartbeat.

Jeeny: “Alice Waters once said, ‘Food should be cheap, and labor should be cheap, and everything should be the same no matter where you go; whether it's a McDonald’s in Germany or one in California, it should be the same. And this message is destroying cultures around the world. Needless to say, agriculture goes with it.’”

Jack: “Destroying cultures? That’s dramatic. She’s talking about hamburgers, not imperialism.”

Host: Jeeny smiled faintly — not mockery, but a kind of patient ache. She looked out the window at the rows of vendors, at the hands exchanging coins and produce, at the faces marked by the day’s labor.

Jeeny: “No, Jack. She’s talking about sameness. About the way we’re erasing the world’s flavors, one convenient meal at a time.”

Jack: “Come on. Globalization’s not all bad. It connects people. Makes life easier.”

Jeeny: “Easier, yes. But at what cost? If every city smells the same, tastes the same, looks the same — then what’s the point of traveling at all?”

Host: The sunlight shifted, spilling through the open door, lighting up the dust motes that danced between them like floating memories.

Jack: “You sound nostalgic for a world that’s gone. You can’t feed billions of people with slow food and romantic ideals.”

Jeeny: “Maybe not. But you can feed them with respect. You can remind them that food is culture, not commodity.”

Jack: “That’s easy to say from a café with artisan bread and five-dollar coffee.”

Jeeny: “It’s not about elitism, Jack. It’s about preservation. When food becomes standardized, people forget where it came from — and who grew it.”

Host: A nearby barista poured milk into a cup, the foam swirling like clouds. The sound of the steam wand cut through the air, soft but precise — an everyday symphony of craft.

Jack: “So, you think a Big Mac is destroying civilization?”

Jeeny: “Not the burger. The idea behind it — that everything, everywhere, should be identical. That convenience is worth more than care.”

Jack: “That’s just efficiency.”

Jeeny: “No, it’s erasure.”

Host: Her voice was quiet, but it carried weight. Jack leaned back, looking at her — the stubborn fire in her eyes, the conviction that refused to fade.

Jack: “You really believe food can destroy culture?”

Jeeny: “Food is culture. It’s memory, ancestry, geography. When you replace that with uniformity, you’re not just changing menus — you’re rewriting identity.”

Jack: “Maybe identity needs updating. You can’t freeze tradition in time.”

Jeeny: “Tradition isn’t frozen. It’s fermented. It grows richer the longer you let it breathe.”

Host: A pause — filled only by the sound of a knife chopping, a pan sizzling, a door creaking open. A man walked in with soil still under his nails, holding a basket of herbs that perfumed the entire room.

Jeeny nodded toward him. “Look at him. He’s part of a living system — soil, weather, hands, community. But the global machine wants to cut him out of the picture. It tells him his tomatoes should look like plastic toys and taste like nothing.”

Jack: “You’re romanticizing it. Not everyone can afford to eat idealism.”

Jeeny: “And not everyone can afford the cost of forgetting. You think cheap food is harmless, but someone pays the price — the farmer, the soil, the soul of the place.”

Host: Jack said nothing. He watched as the farmer handed a small bouquet of basil to the barista, who smiled in quiet gratitude. The smell of it — fresh, green, honest — filled the space between them.

Jack: “You make it sound sacred.”

Jeeny: “It is sacred. Food connects us to everything — the earth, each other, time itself. The minute we treat it like a product, we sever that connection.”

Jack: “So what — you want people to cook again? Grow their own food? That’s not realistic.”

Jeeny: “No. I want people to care again. To know the name of the person who baked their bread. To taste a tomato and know what season it came from. To slow down long enough to notice the difference.”

Host: Her words lingered in the air like the scent of herbs. Outside, the light dimmed, the sky deepening into a soft blue. The market was closing now — stalls being folded, laughter drifting away, a violinist packing up his bow.

Jack: “You ever think it’s too late? The system’s too big. The sameness is already winning.”

Jeeny: “Maybe. But every small act of awareness is rebellion. Every meal that honors where it came from — that’s resistance.”

Jack: “Resistance tastes good, apparently.”

Jeeny: “It tastes like life. The kind that doesn’t fit in a box.”

Host: Jack finally lifted his coffee cup, taking a slow sip. He tasted it — really tasted it — the slight bitterness, the hint of caramel, the warmth. For once, he didn’t reach for his phone or think about the next meeting. He just sat there.

Jack: “Maybe Alice was right,” he said softly. “We’ve made the world smaller by making it easier. Maybe sameness isn’t progress. Maybe it’s… anesthesia.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. We numb ourselves with convenience until we can’t feel difference anymore.”

Host: The last light of day caught in Jeeny’s eyes — a reflection of something both ancient and fiercely alive.

Jeeny: “But difference is what keeps us human. Every flavor, every accent, every harvest — it’s a story. And stories are what survive.”

Host: The camera panned out — the café glowing against the night, a tiny pocket of authenticity in a world rushing toward uniformity. The laughter from the kitchen spilled into the quiet street, the smell of basil and bread trailing after it.

And somewhere, above the hum of the city, Alice Waters’s words drifted through the air — half warning, half prayer:

“If everything tastes the same, nothing means anything.”

And in that truth, Jack and Jeeny sat — two souls relearning the art of tasting difference, the sacred act of slowing down long enough to remember that culture, like food, only lives if we let it.