Keeping Up With Bento

It seems that bento-making adds to the pressures of Japanese motherhood:

"According to Anne Allison, food is prepared in a presentational style that is determined by a number of codes. One code calls for “smallness, separation, and fragmentation,” another for opposition by means of color, shape, texture and even between the food and its container. The foods should oppose each other in that pink is placed with green, smooth surfaces with rough ones, and circular foods in square dishes should rest next to angular foods in round dishes. There is also a code that calls for the stylization of nature. Foods should remain in their natural, raw, state (and) should also be decorated with natural objects such as flowers or maple leaves. Mothers can spend up to 45 minutes per obento every morning for each child’s lunch.

 
Nursery schools have established regulations for obento. All children must bring one for lunch and each obento should have the following properties:

1) Food should be prepared in such a way that it is easy to eat.
2) Food must be prepared in such a way that it can be eaten with chopsticks or with the fingers.
3) Portions should be small.
4) Food that a child does not like should be slowly introduced so that the child will not be a fussy eater.
5) The obento must be pretty and pleasing to the eye.
6) Obento should be as handmade as possible, including the obento bag (obentobukuro) in which the obento is contained.

Mothers take extreme care in following the rules because each obento serves as a connection between the home (uchi), and the outside (soto), represented by the school.
 
Once at school, the child is responsible for completely finishing his or her obento. Often recess or lessons will not start until every student is finished. The logic behind this rule is that the child must meet certain expectations as an introduction to the future “rigors” of the Japanese educational system. Schools create many ploys to encourage children to eat such as sing-alongs and collectively thanking Buddha. The bottom line, however, is that the obento signifies a message to follow directions and accept authority. The lunch-time rules form an approval of ritualistic tasks that will be carried by the children into later years.
 
Because the obento signifies both uchi and soto it is important for the mothers to create the perfect obento for each child. It must be attractive and must encourage the child to eat all the food within it. However, mothers do not have to form ideas for the obento by themselves, hundreds of magazines are published about obento giving tips and ideas for creating the ideal lunch. In fact, although dated, a 1998 survey in Osaka concluded there were 474 magazines available pertaining to obento. Many schools hold PTA meetings to discuss obento, especially during the first months of the school year. These meetings focus on how the food should be “packed and wrapped” in order to ensure the best results. Often if a child fails to be able to finish his or her obento the blame is placed on the mother’s inability to prepare a proper lunch."
 

And all we had to do was make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.