Portioning Frozen Thin-Sliced Pork Belly

I ordered frozen thin-sliced pork belly online. It’s imported. In my country, imported meat is considered inferior to domestic meat. Fresh pork belly is considered inferior to honeycomb-cut pork belly. Thin-sliced pork belly is considered inferior to fresh pork belly. Frozen meat is considered inferior to refrigerated meat. So, by that logic, I bought meat that is inferior of the inferior of the inferior. The price was 1,170 won per 100 grams. Two one-kilogram packs arrived.

When I opened them, I found that each kilogram was just one solid lump of meat stuck together. It already felt like it was going to be a hassle. I left the frozen meat out at room temperature and waited for it to thaw. Then I planned to divide it into four portions, seal each portion in a plastic bag with as little air as possible, and store them in the freezer, eating 250 grams per meal.

However, once it had thawed, I tried to cut it with a knife and found that the thin-sliced pork belly was layered over itself, making it nearly impossible to cut. As it thawed further, the fat became sticky and greasy, making it even harder to handle. In the end, I barely managed to cut it using kitchen scissors and succeeded in dividing it into eight portions and putting them into the freezer. It was a very annoying task.

I took one portion out and cooked it. One of the biggest advantages of thin-sliced pork belly is that it doesn’t require careful cooking. I put it into a frying pan, covered it with a lid, set the induction stove to medium heat, and waited, regardless of what happened. After about ten minutes, it had cooked itself. I flipped it once, waited another five minutes, and ate it with rice. Surprisingly, it was very good.

This new experience led me to a new thought. Humans always want to justify their own actions. If an action is a new experience, it becomes a new justification. For example, suppose someone drinks a can of sports drink after intense exercise. After intense exercise, thirst is extreme, so the utility provided by the first drink is quite large. But if the person drinks a second can in that state, even if it is exactly the same drink and the same amount, the utility provided by the second can will be less than that of the first.

The way we cherish new possessions at first but gradually lose interest over time, the way games feel incredibly fun at the beginning but become less enjoyable as time passes, pushing us to look for other games, the way enjoyment in life seems to diminish as we age, the way increases in salary beyond a certain level make little difference in satisfaction... all of these can be explained by the same principle.

Among the things people in my country cite as sources of national pride are convenient and fast food delivery and the quick processing of paperwork at public offices. Of course, speed is good. Many people complain about inconvenience when they go abroad. But my experience led me to form a hypothesis: the “marginal utility of laziness.”

Humans usually work. When they work, they earn money. With that money, they buy what could be called a “right to be lazy.” For example, they buy the right to eat out or order delivery instead of preparing meals themselves. From one perspective, these may cancel each other out. But what if that “right to be lazy” has already reached its limit? What if additional laziness no longer increases satisfaction, while the total amount paid continues to rise?

After saving time in this way, what people usually do is lie down and watch YouTube. This activity is itself another form of “consumption” carried out for others. In that sense, humans begin to resemble the characters in the novel Momo, devoting their entire lives to something else. So when, exactly, does an individual’s balance sheet ever turn positive?