Ramen Girl: Finding Your Path by Finding Your Heart

I had forgotten about this movie. I watched it on a plane in 2008 during my Yahoo! International years. I must have watched this movie a dozen times.. Starring the young and beautiful Britney Murphy, may she rest in peace. It takes place in Japan, where a young American girl named Abby is dumped by her boyfriend, sad, lost and alone in Tokyo, she stumbles upon a small ramen shop. And her life changes as she experiences ramen for the first time. The full description and synopsis can be found here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ramen_Girl. 

She starts off as a server helping out but expresses her desire to become a ramen chef . She undergoes a brutal apprenticeship under the ramen master, but she slowly learns despite the language barrier. Along the way she meets a handsome Japanese man, who, like Abby, feels trapped by family and social expectations, sacrificing their dreams by following the career of a salaryman when he just wants to explore the world and write music. 

Abby seems to be able to get the technical aspects correct but for some reason the ramen still feels off. So the chef brings her to meet his mother. This is where the insight happens and why I think Japanese food is so good. The mother says the reason the ramen does not taste perfect is that she cooks from her head which is full of noise. “You must learn to cook from a quieter place deep inside of you.” 

Because there is no soul. No feeling. You put and infuse your feelings into the food you cook:  “Each bowl of ramen you prepare is a gift to your customer. The food that you serve your customer becomes a part of them. It contains your spirit. That’s why your ramen must be an expression of pure love. A gift from your heart.” When Abby says she has never felt love, only sadness & pain, the mother says, “put your tears in your ramen”. And it works. 

I won’t go into the rest of this movie which was lovely and touching. But It reminded me of why I love Japan. It reminded me of what is missing in most of the world. It reminded me of what excellence is. It reminded me of craftsmanship. 

It’s about putting all your heart and soul into something. Whether it’s your business, your food, your family. People can tell. People can tell whether you have put effort into something. This is why I hate eating buffets, it’s just one big industrial line of food. How can it be good? You can tell when a chef puts their heart and spirit into the food. 

We can all do with a bit more heart and soul in everything we do. This movie was a great reminder. 

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