Thursday, March 17, 2011

Who's following up on the salmon issue?

Grant asks a lot of questions. Here are some classic examples from the last few weeks. I swear I am not making any of these up.

- If sharks could cook their food, would they?
- Could you teach a dog to start a fire?
- If a shark and an octopus had a fight, who would win?
- Who invented the traffic light?
- Do bugs go to heaven?
- If I was riding my bicycle really fast and I hit a pig, would the pig die?

Last night I was cuddling with my inquisitive son before he went to sleep when somehow his thoughts turned to arctic fisheries.

He asked, "What kind of fish do they have on the North Pole?"

I had to guess and said salmon. That could be right, right? I mean, I'm pretty sure I've seen pictures of polar bears with salmon in their mouth. Or are those black bears in Oregon...? Anyway, he's seven, how factual do I need to be here?

"Where else in the world do they have salmon?"

Again I guessed and said mostly in cold waters like the Northern Atlantic and arctic regions.

"Where does the salmon come from that we eat in China?"

At this point I was completely winging it. "I know a lot comes from Norway and Sweden. But it could come from any part of the world, I think." (Totally CMA'ing with that last sentence.)

"What tastes better - arctic salmon or Atlantic salmon?"

Do you ever reach a point where you feel it's best to just come clean and admit you have no idea what the hell you're talking about? That last question brought me to that point. So I dusted off an old phrase that I haven't used since my days as a high tech manager. Come on, it's the one you use at the office all the time. Let's say it together.

"That is a really good question and I'm going to have to check on that and get back to you."

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Great questions! As I understand it, most of the salmon we get in stores these days are farmed, so I'd say that the ones you get in China are either from Canada or Oz where there is significant salmon farming. The salmon sourced from Scandinavian countries tends to be the wild variety, and is VERY expensive.

And get Grant to check out this video clip:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9A-oxUMAy8

(-:

Melanie Gao said...

Anon would you believe we have actually viewed that very video clip together? We found it on the National Geographic Kids website. Who would have thought the octopus could win? Amazing.

Canadian or Australian, huh? Good thing I CMA'd by saying the salmon could come from anywhere in the world. :)

Anonymous said...

To be fair though, the shark in the video is not a good representative of the team. All the Great White Sharks are probably thinking, "C'mon now, a dogfish?" (-:

Melanie Gao said...

LOL Anon. :) It's true, that shark in the video wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed.

Anonymous said...

These are great questions, made us think hard, aren't they? ;-)

Melanie Gao said...

Oh Xiang Xiang they make my head hurt. :)