The Lineage and Development of the Modern Chopstick Wrapper
By Dildog
Hey guys, today I am going to share the product of a LOT of research and discovery: the geneology of chopstick wrappers. We'll go through them in roughly chronological order, and then review them all by looking at the overall "family tree". I hope you find this interesting.
Front Description: Company symbol at top, followed by four shrines with tassels each with a different Chinese symbol. Text is printed at the right side in a serif font.
The English text reads: ------------------------------------------------- Welcome To Chinese Restaurant. please try your Nice Chinese Food With Chipsticks the traditional and typical of Chinese Glonous history. and cultual.
BAMBOO CHOPSTLCKS PRODUCT OF CHINA ------------------------------------------------- Back Description: Decorative border and three images depicting the holding and usage of chopsticks. Also a circumscribed 'S' is in the upper left hand corner. It appears as if the 'S' is rotated 180 degrees.
The English text reads: ------------------------------------------------- Learn how to use your chopsticks
Tuk under thurnb and hcld firmly
Add second chcostick hold it as you hold a pencil
Hold tirst chopstick in originai position move the second one up and down Now you can pick up anything:
PRODUCTOF CHINA -------------------------------------------------
Notes: This design is the most popular, and contains the most spelling mistakes passed down to other wrappers.
To note, most of the spelling mistakes are due to some English characters looking like a combination of other characters. For example, in 'thurnb', the characters for 'r' and 'n' when placed close enough, form the 'm' character. It becomes apparent that the text was typed in by someone who had a printed or handwritten copy of the text, but did not know enough English to type it in correctly.
Front Description: Same as parent Back Description: Same as parent Notes: The opening cut is is diagonal, while its parent's is curved. The same company symbol is used, so it is inferred that it was probably faster to produce the diagonally slotted opening rather than the curved one, and hence this design developed economically.
Front Description: Same design as parent, but the 'shrines' were re-drawn for clarity (most notably in the bases, but also in the tassles, and the tops). The spelling of "CHOPSTLCKS" was changed to "CHOPSTICKS". Also, the letter "p" in "please" was capitalized to "Please". And the period "." was removed from after "glonous history."
Back Description: Same figure drawings as parent. Type was re-set slightly smaller, thicker ink was used, and the border was re-drawn, this time without shadowing, and slightly different corner-pieces. The spelling and justification are the same as the parent.
Front Description: Company name is printed as 'GOLDENSMELL' within circular icon featuring a boat and three characters. Otherwise the front of this wrapper is no different than its parent.
Back Description: Same as parent.
Notes: One should note the reversion to a semicircular cut-out in the opening, as opposed to the diagonal cut of the parent.
Front Description: Company name is same as parent, but has top bar of kanji split. Design is the same, but it has been completely redrawn, and re-typeset. The shrines contain the same characters, but the design of the tassles have changed considerably. The text has been changed to a sans serif font.
The English text reads: ------------------------------------------------- Welcome to Chinese Restaurant. please try your Nice Chinese Food with Chopsticks. the traditional and typical of Chinese glonous history. and cultual.
PAMBOO CHOPSTICKS I ODUCT OF CHINA -------------------------------------------------
Back Description: Completely redrawn. Same design. Better details in the hands, and the wonton being picked up in the third frame appears more plump. The mysterious circle-s is present in the upper right, also in a sans-serif font.
The English text reads: ------------------------------------------------- Learn how to use your chopsticks
Tuck under thurnb and hold firmly.
Add second chopstick hold it as you hold a pencil.
Hold first chopstick. In original position move the second one up and down Now you can pick up anything.
PRODUCTOF CHINA -------------------------------------------------
Notes: Periods have been added everywhere in the text. Most lines end with a period now. The "p' in please was decapitalized again though. Spelling errors such as 'tuk', 'chcostick', and 'originai' were fixed. "PAMBOO" and "I ODUCT" appear to be spelling mistakes and not printing errors, strangely enough.
Front Description: Company name was changed to an icon of a tree with three characters. The 'shrines' are the same as the parent. The text has been modified with crude overlay cut-and-paste using a slightly different font. 'glonous' was changed to 'glorious', and 'and cultual.' was changed to 'and cultural'. Also, 'CHOPSTLCKS' was corrected to 'CHOPSTICKS', as the entire lower right corner was retyped in the newer font.
Back Description: Back completely redrawn. Hands have less detail, border is thinner, wonton looks smaller. The circle-s is there in the corner. All spelling mistakes are fixed,
The English text reads: ------------------------------------------------- Learn how to use your chopsticks
Tuck under thumb and hold firmly
Add second chopstick hold it as you hold a pencil.
Hold first chopstick in original position move the second one up and down. Now you can pick up anything
PRODUCT OF CHINA -------------------------------------------------
Front Description: A red-on-white variant of its parent, enlarged. The company name has changed to a diamond icon with two characters in it. It appears that the 'shrine' artwork is the same, but flipped over the vertical axis (except for the characters) and slightly retouched. Probably laid out with a computer rather than carved ink-blocks.
The English text reads: ------------------------------------------------- Welcome to our restaurant. Please try to use chopsticks. the traditional eating utensil of Oriental cultures in the Far East -------------------------------------------------
Back Description: The circle-s has mysteriously disappeared from this version. The border appears the same, but cleaned up a bit. The artwork is the same for the three hand pictures, but the text has been changed. Also, this wrapper being slightly longer than its parent has the name and phone number of the import company printed on the far right.
The English text reads: ------------------------------------------------- Learn how to use your chopsticks
Tuck under thumb and hold firmly.
Add second chopstick hold it as you hold a pencil
Hold first chopstick in original position move the second one up and down. Now you can pick up anything! -------------------------------------------------
Notes: This a very 'Americanized' version of the original chopsticks wrapper. Any and all references to 'China' have been removed from the text, and the language has been generalized to all 'Oriental cultures'. This is clever marketing, but obvious changes to an astute chopstick geneologist.
Front Description: Wrapper is slightly damaged, and it is unclear who the distributor was. There is text at the left that says 'BAMBOO CHOPSTICK' in white handwriting. The shrines were completely redrawn with different Chinese characters as well, possibly the same characters, using a more block-style rather than a script form.
Text is in same font, but has spelling errors corrected. Also, a nationalistic pitch is made with by changin 'Product of China' to read 'Product of the People's Republic Of China'.
The English text reads: ------------------------------------------------- Welcome to Chinese Restaurant. please try your Nice Chinese Food with Chopsticks. the traditional and typical of Chinese glorious history and culture.
PRODUCT OF THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA -------------------------------------------------
Back Description:
Text is the same as parent, but "PRODUCT OF CHINA" has been removed. A period was removed, and one was changed into an exclamation point at the end. The circle-s was also removed. The border was re-drawn thinner, and with a shadowing. The hand-figures were also redrawn, with careful precision to look almost exactly like the parent design.
Front Description: Design of shrines appears more like a shrunken version of its grandparent , CS-E, but the characters inside are obviously taken from CS-H. Also, a diagonal cut was added. All text was removed from the front, and the name of the company was added at the bottom (HAILIN), along with an icon featuring a globe in front of an "H" symbol, with two character above and below.
Back Description: The back is white with red writing. The border was changed to resemble a series of flying birds. The back was completely changed to humorous poem, with no description of how to use the chopsticks (or pictures) whatsoever.
The English text reads: ------------------------------------------------- Two little sticks They're made out of wood And they help you To pick up your lunch Your lunch And if you practice
Then you'd get good And you'll find you can pick up A bunch to munch Eat noodles with chopsticks Eat dumplings with chopsticks Eat sushi with chopsticks
That's fish! Don't eat soup with your chopsticks That's no good with chopsticks And jello with slide off Your dish I eat with chopsticks
Can you eat with chopsticks Doctor told us Be intell eat by using chopsticks Lots of people use chopsticks So try eat your chopsticks Right Now -------------------------------------------------
Dominic Price
>that text
Liam Rivera
Now I will post full lineage tree, then I will show some examples of some miscellaneous designs and variants.
And then I will go to my New Years' party.
Josiah Baker
Generic wooden chop stick wrapper CS-WOODEN1
Ayden Evans
Din How chop stick wrapper CS-DINHOW1
Elijah Rivera
Black variant of CS-C (probably due to lack of yellow ink) CS-C2
Jackson Cruz
Variant of CS-A with semicircle cut on other side CS-A2
Thats all the wrappers I have categorized so far. If you have or know of any wrappers from this lineage that I have not posted here, please get in touch with my chopstick-hunting email account at [email protected]
Thank you, I hope you find this interesting. Have a pleasant New Year, all.
Mason Smith
That was fascinating.
John Gutierrez
You are a fucking hero. When will this be published?
Adrian Martinez
All that work and you couldn't even bother to translate and figure out what the Chinese characters mean?
t. laughing chink
Blake Cox
This is some serious fuckin autism right here, OP. It was interesting nonetheless, so thanks.