For the Love of Cheese

If you find yourself one of the less talented people, who can't seem to find anything good in cheese, you should just get out your handy dandy imagination. You have to have a pretty good imagination if you live in Neopia. Just give it a try, whenever you have time and you may find yourself liking cheese (imagination or not).

Cheese holds more surprises than you could imagine (unless you have an imagination as superior as mine). I bet you didn't know how cheese was invented! Some old Kacheek was carrying two pails of milk. She was old and the milk pails were very heavy, so she put one pail into a cave to keep it safe. She came back the next day to fetch them and she found cheese! Isn't it amazing?

One evening you might be at home and suddenly, feel hungry. What you need would be a nice healthy, yummy piece of cheese. That's all it takes to make you feel better. Don't have a piece of cheese? Go to your neighbor. Somebody’s sure to have some. You could even just take yourself down to the Marketplace.

Cheese is a very useful thing. It has common, everyday uses, like as food, furniture and even entertainment. You will also find yourself in many life-threatening dilemmas during your life and cheese may just be the solution to some of them. There are only three I can imagine at the moment, so I will tell you all of them:

    You are standing at the top of Terror Mountain. You feel the cold wind whipping at your face and look down beneath you at the rooftops of Happy Valley, which are only small dots from your height. You feel a shove from behind and feel yourself falling towards the tiny speck-sized houses below. You are frozen with fear and can’t seem to find the courage even to scream. You are falling faster and faster and the ground creeps closer and closer. You cringe as you are about to whack into the ground, but something cushions your fall. You stand up and dust yourself off. You turn around and see a wheel of cheese flattened by your impact.

You find yourself deep in the Fungus Caves, lost in its twists and turns. You find yourself in a dank damp cave, lost in its twists and turns. You wander for hours on end searching, searching for that exit that you will never find alone. Then you trip over something. It is a small wedge of cheese laid out in the middle of the cavern. You look ahead of you to see yet another piece of cheese. You cry out with joy to yourself as you follow the path of cheese that leads you to freedom.

You sit peacefully reading “How to Catch a Cybunny” beneath your favourite rotting old tree in the Haunted Woods. You sniff the fresh air- hey wait! What’s that burning smell? You sniff again and sure enough, smoke seems to thicken the air around you. Immediately you spot the source of the smoke; a nearby tree has caught on fire. You know with all this dead wood, all the trees will catch fire rapidly, so you must act quickly. You grab a wedge of Green Jelly Cheese you spotted in an Ixi family’s picnic basket and throw it onto the fire. The fire dies and everyone is saved.

But still, everybody seems to take cheese for granted. Did you ever think of those poor Kaus and farmers on Meri Acres Farm? *looks suspiciously at you* I don't think most Neopians even give those hard workers a thought. Should they be more appreciated? I think so. Everybody recognizes Illusen, Taelia and all the faeries for all their hard work. Shouldn't the creators of cheese be appreciated just as well?

Right now, you are probably wondering, "But what can I do about it?” There is a lot you can do. First of all, you can give cheese a second thought before tossing it carelessly into the Money Tree. Think! Maybe one day you will be starving to death, then you remember! Why don't I eat that piece of cheese sitting in the back of my Deposit Box? Would you ever stop to thank those Kaus and farmers for saving your life? Probably not.

You don’t need to do anything big, like start “The National Day for Appreciating Cheese Workers” (though I’m sure I would enjoy that). They just need something small. Just give them a thought, that’s all. Nothing humungous. They are just farm workers and don’t enjoy publicity and fame as much as we city people do. They tend to avoid things like that.

Think of those poor people. Think of what it would be like if you were one of those farmers. That reminds me of an old saying: “Before you criticize someone; walk a mile in their shoes. Then, when you criticize them, you are a mile a way and you have their shoes!” Oh wait; maybe that's not the right saying. Oh well.

If you were in their shoes (I don't really mean it this time), you would want to be appreciated. Just hearing that one "Thank you for your cheese!" or "I really appreciate your hard work!" would really make their day. Imagine yourself working hard beneath the scorching sun and getting no thanks. I personally think it would be very depressing. Just please make that one extra trip to Meri Acres Farm whenever you can. Think about it.

Next time you lay eyes on a piece of cheese, you won’t just think “Oh joy, a piece of cheese,” but you will think, “Look at that beautiful piece of art, created by those talented Kaus, for all to lay eyes on!” Or at least I hope so.