My Nasty Hamburger (Life In The GDR)

My Nasty Hamburger (Life in the GDR) by Emma D.

It is a sopping fish. The buns slap together.
The lettuce limps. The ketchup saturates
the buns. It drips. It is not very good.
I do not like it. I do not like fish. Even if
I liked fish, I do not think I would like this hamburger.

Bite. Every day the same.
Sopping fish for lunch or dinner. I have
these choices, see, pizza and inedible
chinese food, and other things, but I don't like them.
They are not very good. And even though
I am studying East Germany,
I feel like an East German.
Bite. Every day the same. Every bite
unsatisfying. And yet I am hungry.
And yet I every day dutifully accept my 
sopping fish which is not very good
because I have been taught
that I need the protein. Bite.
Each bite repulsive. Napkins pile up.
One two five eight on my tray. They look like 
toilet paper from the end of a period. 
Three bites is enough for now. I wipe my hands.
The napkins pile up.

Liking fish would not be bad. They serve
fish here, and I would have more choices.
Now I look at my hamburger and am not hungry.
Ten minutes ago I was starving. In
another ten minutes, I will feel the same way
if I do not eat more. I sample the apple pie.
It is nasty. I feel a pang of East Germanicity.

My tray is the tray of despair.
There sits my fish carcass, attacked by sharks.
There is the out of season melon
I was tempted into getting again. (It tastes bad.
Like watermelon rind. I have choices.) And
the communist apple pie. And
a glass of milk, half-drunk. The milk
is always there. The apple pie varies.
Sometimes it is a dry cookie
or a flavor-poor cake with too much icing.
The fruit is sometimes a salad,
scantily dressed and boring, but edible.
It is just boring. The raw bleeding fish
that is my hamburger rarely changes.

So every day it is a day of despair
when I eat. Sometimes I walk in and
see my choices and leave in despair.
Sometimes I only bite the fish once
or two times, or three. Sometimes
I do not even finish my milk.
Will I bite the fish again today? My stomach
winces at the concept. Bite. Wipe.
Repulsive. I think of the hunger.
Then I think of taking another bite.
Then I down my milk and throw my food away.
Throwing away my food makes me feel
like a typical westerner.