“I’m just someone who likes cooking
and for whom sharing food is a form of expression.”
- Maya Angelou (1928-2014), an American author and civil rights activist
Young children’s dreams for their futures change, just as the wind changes its directions. In a sense, their dreams are mirrors of a future society. But the youth seem to have different dreams in different periods, depending upon the prevalent trends of society. The most popular dream once was to be judokas, table tennis players, short-track speed skaters, figure skaters, or swimmers, when Korean athletes won Olympic gold medals.
Children also wanted to be violinists or cellists when Sarah Chang and Han-na Chang made headlines. Then many wanted to be pop singers, thanks to the abundance of audition programs open to them, like the “K-pop Star” audition series. This year, a prevalent trend of dreams among teenagers is to be chefs.
Many teenagers are showing an interest in learning how to cook and in becoming chefs as their lifelong careers. Being a chef is currently one of the teenagers’ 10 most-desired occupations, according to a 2015 survey conducted by the Korea Research Institute for Vocational Education & Training한국직업능력개발원. Under these circumstances, many students have enrolled in private cooking classes recently. The competition is stiff for spots as a culinary arts major at colleges.
Some teenagers are attending private cooking classes to prepare to enter colleges’ culinary arts departments or to enter cooking competitions of various kinds. Others are even looking for a chance to study at prestigious culinary arts schools abroad, including Le Cordon Bleu.
The boom is due mainly to an increase in the culinary culture as a whole. Food is regarded as more than simply something to eat; many people consider it part of the sophisticated life. Another reason for the current boom is the popularity of many culinary TV shows that feature star chefs. This surely is a wave of cooking. And many teenagers are dreaming of swimming through the new wave.