The Decline of the Fortune Cookie

There was a time when Fortune Cookies had tiny little fortunes inside. These fortunes were an integral part of the Chinese food experience. They told you about life, happiness, love, deceit, betrayal and which lotto numbers to play (they still do that.)

These days Fortune Cookies are less fortune, and more everyday advice. "Today you will find happiness in the World" has changed to "If you work hard at it, you can find happiness." (Sometimes they use a farming metaphor, but as my grasp on agriculture extends as far as picking the weeds around my parents grapefruit tree, I rarely get what they're saying.) But, alas, this is assuming you get a fortune in the first place. Twice now I've opened my after meal cookie to find it quite fortuneless. Certainly a third such incident would spell my doom. (My father has had similar luck with the moist towelettes you can find at any wing joint, but this normally only results in him not smelling of lemon after dinner.)

I'm not asking for specific fortunes here. I don't want to read about how after this meal I will walk into the parking lot, stub my toe on the sidewalk, fall headfirst into a passing car, luckily survive, only to be subsequently sued by the driver who whacked his spine out of alignment in an effort to avoid hitting me. I don't want to know this because I have a fear of self fulfilling prophecy.

However, the mini-advice column that the modern day fortune cookie has become is quite depressing. Half of the fun of eating Chinese was reading about the possibilities of your future (and saying "in bed" after reading a fortune.) They've taken that away from us by giving us structured (and rather bland) sentences with metaphors that make little sense to anyone who doesn't speak Engrish.

Further more, tonight's meal (Chinese) was accompanied by a fortune that I could not read.I don't even live in Miami! Honestly, I'm not actually too grumpy with the fortune being in Spanish, the plaza I ate in happens to be one with quite a few Latino shops, and one of the facts of living in Florida is that the population is diverse. Rather, what really irks me, is that they still weren't fortunes. The two fortunes, if you didn't read them, translate into: "Do you feel lucky?" (A question, you'll notice.) And "Laziness is the key to their poverty." (Which just strikes me as a generalization and borderline racist...and again...not a fortune.)

At this point I'm questioning the entire concept. Who do you go to about these things? Where can I file my complaints? Is there a Fortune Cookie Committee somewhere that oversees Fortune Cookie affairs? Makes sure that all fortunes are up to date and steeped with some kind of mysticism? Or is this a worldwide conspiracy against the concept of fortunes? If I wanted really lame advice, I would just ask my...well I wouldn't go eat Chinese food for it.

I want to sue for false advertising.