Inmates Serving Hot Plates?

It’s 5:00 pm and you’re stuck in rush hour traffic. All you can think about is what’s for dinner. You don’t feel like cooking, so you scan all of the nearby restaurants in your head. Luby’s? Not fun enough. Taco Bell? Not healthy enough. Ruth’s Chris? Too fancy. The Clink Cymru…complete with delicious cuisine prepared by inmates???? WTH?! This is just what’s about to happen at Cardiff Prison in Wales, UK. Award-winning chef Alberto Crisci. All dishes are prepared and served by inmates…inside the prison. Gone are the days of nasty prison food. These inmates have skills in the kitchen and are ready to prove it to willing customers.

Here’s what Alberto Crisci had to say about this risky business: “We want to try and stand on our own two feet as a dining experience and be seen not as competition by other restaurants, but as a sort of recruitment agency so prisoners can go on to find work in quality establishment, develop pride and motivation and provide well for themselves and their families.” The mantra of the restaurant is quality food, with no gimmicks. The Clink Cymru will have its grand opening exactly one week from today on September 19, 2012. It will be fully staffed with 30 inmates who will be paid £14 (Approximately $22.50) for a 40 hour work week. Oddly enough, sex offenders are the only inmates not allowed to seek employment here. But those who are eligible must have between 6 and 18 months left to serve on their sentence. The Clink is actually the second restaurant of its kind after HMP (Her Majesty’s Prison Service) High Down in Surrey.

Several red flags were raised when I first read this article. First of all, people can deal with an open secret, but how many people will really go to a restaurant where they know for sure prisoners are serving their food? More than likely, murderers, thieves, and sex offenders have all served us food at a restaurant before, but we really don’t know so that makes it easier to deal with. After all, everyone deserves a second chance right? But what happens if one of the workers gets upset and decides to take a knife to a customer??? The inmates are chosen as Category D, those least likely to escape or pose high risks. Hmmm…. Plus, even though a world renown chef owns the place, how much training has been done to make sure the employees can actually cook? Surely, Alberto Crisci isn’t preparing all the meals himself.

The Clink Cymru will only be open for breakfast and lunch. I’m sure dinner wasn’t an initial thought, since the night could provide an easier getaway for prisoners. Could you see yourself eating dinner at a restaurant like this?

Quiet The N.O.I.S.E.

I love going to the movies. If it weren’t for the expensive cost of movie tickets, I probably would go every weekend, provided there was something I wanted to see. No matter what movie or theater you’re in, you will always see an ad or commercial to keep quiet during the movie. Life is a lot like being in a theater. There’s action, drama, violence, romance, comedy and even horror. But we’ll never understand life (or movies) if we don’t quiet the N.O.I.S.E. When our mind’s aren’t probably focused on the featured presentation before, we can misconstrue the plot and miss important aspects of the film.

One of the noisiest, self-destructive emotions we can ever display in life is insecurity. Insecurity is extremely dangerous for this very reason: Not Operating In Security is Exhausting. In a sense you can say insecurity = N.O.I.S.E. Do you really want to keep up all that ruckus in your life? The funny thing is people usually associate insecurity in romantic relationships only. But it goes so much further than that. Insecurity can keep you from reaching your dreams, supporting those around you and living your life to the fullest.

Have you ever been guilty of being insecure (don’t all raise your hands at once)? I know I have. Let’s all remember to quiet that noise of insecurity so that we don’t miss any important details in life.

Check out the recent poem I wrote below, called “In Security”. Let me know what you think about it.

In Security

Somebody please take these

Handcuffs off of me

With urgency

It’s an emergency

My bitterness, my lust

My analytical mistrust

Is what’s got me traveling

Through this confusing intra-state of mind

A rebel against the limits of reciprocity

I don’t really mean it

So you should understand me

And search within the core

That’s where you’ll find the best of me

Never mind the jagged edges along the way

Because the way to love is pain

As this metal begins to scrape against my veins

This ignorance ain’t bliss

Cause after several failed attempts

I’m that hopeless penny with not one

But two holes in it

You see I never really learned

That the way to love is gained

By none of the actions I exhibited

Uninhibited acts of jealousy on the left wrist

And premeditated malice on the right

If I could just get these handcuffs off me

Maybe I could teach myself to sleep at night

But because I didn’t operate in security

By rationalizing events ever so insecurely

I failed to realize that surely

Love is never a sense of stable instability

The sirens are coming closer

Somebody call security