Curse of the plastic pack
COME the next revolution, the new order will sort out the daft things in this world. Top of my list will be banning forever the wicked practice of putting food into one-shot plastic portions.
Such a move would end the misery of millions of honest travellers who have suffered cruelly at the hands of those who pack food into little plasticpackets which are designed to be paid for, but never opened.
My resolve to see the end of impossible plastic packaging began when I carried a tray away from a cafeteria servery with what seemed to be some fairly ordinary items: a ham sandwich in a plastic box, two plastic sachets of English mustard, a scone, a plastic pot of jam, a plastic pot of butter, a plastic tub of fresh milk and a pot of tea.
It was a serious challenge: six pieces of plastic to be opened. First came the sandwich box. Logically, the top of the box should hinge open, but it didn't. I squeezed, pulled, tapped it on the table, pushed a fingernail into the groove, but it was like trying to open an oyster with a plastic fork. In the end, I did what most people do: stabbed a knife into the seal and prised the box open.
Next came the mustard sachets. There was a dotted line that said "open here", but it failed to say how. I pulled, twisted, tried each end, but the seal wouldn't budge. Defeated, I did what most frustrated diners do: gripped the pack between my teeth and pulled to destruction.
This works, but at a price. A dollop of the sachet's contents was sprayed into my mouth, which, in the case of English mustard, didn't exactly warm me to the clot who had designed the packet. Still, it might have been worse - it could have been vinegar for a plate of chips.
Then came the turn of the plastic milk pot. Years of dealing with in-room beverage trays has taught me to treat these pots with great respect. If you are rough with them they spit at you or, more usually, at your clothes.
With the benefit of this experience, the little tag was tweaked up and down until it cracked. A firm grip with finger and thumb, followed by a sharp tug, produced, as expected, a tiny piece of plastic in the hand and a milk pot which couldn't be opened. I grabbed a teaspoon and stabbed it into the lid like an assassin's dagger.
But I had not realised the bond that exists between these little plastic pots. The butter pat and the jam pot must have recoiled in horror at the brutality just meted out to brother milk pot. They wouldn't be bullied into meek surrender.
The butter pat was a tricky fish who knew how to outwit thugs like me. He let the tag end of his foil cover fit snugly between my finger and thumb, but at the moment of tension cast it off, leaving his lid totally impenetrable. He met the same grisly end as the milk pot.
The jam pot was to be the final battle. As my probing fingernails wiggled away at a corner, first a little wisp of foil gave up, then the sharp plastic corner drove deep into the soft flesh beneath the fingernail. With a rumble of despair, I returned the jam pot- intact - to the tray.
Another defeated traveller got back on the road, with the lingering suspicion he was leaving behind a jam pot with a grin on its sticky face. o
