Episode 15 Recap
In the time that Wang Mai Zhi and Wei Qi Zhen takes time away from the group, Wang Mai Zhi comes to know that he is the one Wei Qi Zhen likes.
He comes to know this fact when he asks to use Wei Qi Zhen’s phone to contact Han Jie to help them out after finding his phone is out of battery. Unlike the previous time where Wei Qi Zhen manages to snatch the phone out of Wang Mai Zhi’s hand when she’d forgotten to take it with her after her meeting with Wang Mai Zhi at the eatery (Episode 12), Wei Qi Zhen isn’t able to this time and Wang Mai Zhi finally finds the picture of him playing basketball as the wallpaper of Wei Qi Zhen’s phone.
“It’s fact that I like you,” Wei Qi Zhen says to Wang Mai Zhi after Wang Mai Zhi asks for the picture of him to be deleted because he worries about not being able to explain it to those who see it. The response Wei Qi Zhen gets from Wang Mai Zhi is rejection: “You can like Ma Chong Sheng, Tang Xiao Niu, Kong Meng Zhe (Jarvis), or even Qiang Na Sheng (Lin Guan Ting). But, you can’t like me.” Wei Qi Zhen doesn’t accept the answer and asks Wang Mai Zhi why. “Because Liu Xuan is the one I like.”
Wang Mai Zhi had rejected Wei Qi Zhen with the reason of liking Liu Xuan. However, after Wang Mai Zhi and Wei Qi Zhen return back to the main camp site and we come to a scene at Wang Mai Zhi and Ma Chong Sheng’s tent, we find out that Wang Mai Zhi had settled the feelings he had for Liu Xuan very quickly. When Ma Chong Sheng apologises to Wang Mai Zhi for the outcome, Wang Mai Zhi tells Ma Chong Sheng he’s fine, only being upset for about three minutes. He also tells Ma Chong Sheng that he can have Liu Xuan and he won’t be taking Liu Xuan away from him anymore.
With Liu Xuan not being the reason why Wang Mai Zhi doesn’t want Wei Qi Zhen to like him, it then seems to be his image that is the reason he’s not wanting Wei Qi Zhen to like him. When Wang Mai Zhi found his picture on Wei Qi Zhen’s phone, he had asked for it to be deleted because he worried about others thinking she liked him and worried about not being able to explain it to them if they saw it. And during the trip back to the main camp site, Wang Mai Zhi told Wei Qi Zhen to not let others know what had occurred—him being rejected by Liu Xuan, him running away because of the rejection and her liking him—all of it can’t be revealed because it will affect his image.
Wang Mai Zhi’s reaction to Wei Qi Zhen’s like has Wei Qi Zhen wanting to give up, feeling her like towards Wang Mai Zhi is creating problems for him. But, once more, Han Jie is there to bring Wei Qi Zhen back to continue persisting when he tells Wei Qi Zhen that love itself causes problems regardless of being the one being liked or the one liking and running away will have her forever not know what she missed out on. When Wei Qi Zhen describes herself as a convenient imagawayaki (Japanese cake sandwich filled with red beans) and Wang Mai Zhi as a macaron, Han Jie draws upon this view Wei Qi Zhen has of herself and Wang Mai Zhi. Han Jie has Wei Qi Zhen see that similarities exist between two things that seem to be from different worlds: there exists a macaron flavour of matcha (finely grounded green tea leaves) with red bean paste filling—a macaron that has similarities to the convenient imagawayaki. Han Jie further tells Wei Qi Zhen that there are no set rules in relationships just like in cooking and he will be her cheering squad if she chooses to continue persisting with her like towards Wang Mai Zhi. With Han Jie’s words and him cheering her on, Wei Qi Zhen resolutely chooses to put in effort and continue persisting.
Wei Qi Zhen’s choice to continue is the right choice when Wang Mai Zhi upgrades Wei Qi Zhen to someone who was once simply convenient and useful in his plans to being a friend and maybe someone more important to him than he lets out when, back at school, he gives Wei Qi Zhen a new phone to replace the one he made fall to the ground and damaged when he wanted to delete his picture on Wei Qi Zhen’s phone at the camp trip.
A phone where Wang Mai Zhi has already entered his phone number in, Wang Mai Zhi contends with Wei Qi Zhen’s reluctance to accept his good gesture and a back and forth of Wang Mai Zhi insisting and persisting and Wei Qi Zhen not accepting and leaving takes place: “I don’t need it. I’ll go and repair my old phone,” Wei Qi Zhen says before she returns the phone to Wang Mai Zhi and motions to leave. She gets pulled back by Wang Mai Zhi. “It’ll be good if the phone is fixed!” he says before he goes for her blazer pocket and asks to have a look at her phone to see that it’s fixed. He exclaims Wei Qi Zhen to have lied when he finds it not switching on. “I’m used to my old phone,” Wei Qi Zhen says then grabs her old phone back and motions to leave again. She gets pulled back by Wang Mai Zhi. Wang Mai Zhi snatches her old phone and gives her the new phone, explaining he doesn’t like owing people and tells her that she can use the new phone until he has her old one fixed. Still, Wei Qi Zhen is unwilling to accept it and tells him that with no one ever calling her, she doesn’t need it. She puts the phone in Wang Mai Zhi’s breast pocket, takes back her old phone and motions to leave again. But once more, Wang Mai Zhi pulls Wei Qi Zhen back to him, takes her old phone back in his hand, gives the new phone to her and tells her that he will call her. He walks around the corner some metres away and calls Wei Qi Zhen.
It’s during this call that Wang Mai Zhi reveals to Wei Qi Zhen that he has placed her number in his friends list. It does come with conditions, however: she can’t take too long to pick up his calls; and miss his calls more than three times and she is out of his friends list.
In this conversation, Wang Mai Zhi also tells Wei Qi Zhen to not wait for him in the mornings to teach him how to ride a bicycle because he wants to temporarily stop the lessons. He says this after, only moments ago, he told her that he bought a new phone for her so he can reach her in the event he wanted to learn how to ride a bicycle.
He provides one final instruction to Wei Qi Zhen: often getting hungry in the afternoons, she must always keep a bun for him to eat. She must keep it for him and not sell it even if someone like Liu Xuan wishes to buy it from her. This instruction of Wang Mai Zhi’s is in light of a situation in the previous scene where he is seen missing out on buying a bun from Wei Qi Zhen because Liu Xuan beats him to it and leaves him disappointed from not being able to obtain the last one that Liu Xuan managed to grab.
While Wang Mai Zhi and Wei Qi Zhen are slowly getting closer, Han Jie and Fang Xiao Rou are officially a couple and Han Jie publicly announces his relationship with Fang Xiao Rou to his group of students and fellow colleagues when they return back to the camp site. All but two people are happy to hear the change of relationship status between Han Jie and Fang Xiao Rou: the announcement disappoints Wen Zhen Yu and Chen Meng Chen.
Wen Zhen Yu is heartbroken and is seen sulking back at the tent he shares with Li Zhi Chao. Wen Zhen Yu’s broken heart is brief, however. With one kiss from Jiang Pei Ying—a kiss Jiang Pei Ying forces upon Wen Zhen Yu as means to stop Li Zhi Chao from chasing after her—Wen Zhen Yu’s heart beats with excitement and has him head in for another kiss with Jiang Pei Ying after Jiang Pei Ying successfully makes Li Zhi Chao retreat, heartbroken. Wen Zhen Yu doesn’t receive a kiss from Jiang Pei Ying, however. Wen Zhen Yu gets pushed away, arm forced behind his back and a kick to the knees.
Meanwhile, Han Jie and Fang Xiao Rou’s new status as boyfriend and girlfriend has Chen Meng Chen fuelled with displeasure and disapproval. When Chen Meng Chen chances upon a conversation between Han Jie and Raymond (the manager to his restaurant, Olives House) and hears some information disturbing to her ears, she uses it to try separating Fang Xiao Rou from Han Jie.
In this conversation between Han Jie and Raymond taking place on school grounds, Raymond informs Han Jie that Olives House is not as popular without his presence; and with the appraisal for Michelin stars coming up, Mr. King (their superior/boss) has requested for Han Jie to return to Europe to take charge of Olives House. Raymond goes to tell Han Jie that in the event that he doesn’t agree to return to Olives House and the restaurant loses a star because he chose not to return, he will lose his position as Executive Chef of Olives House. Han Jie’s response to the message that Raymond has relayed for Mr. King is: he has no intentions of returning back to Europe. However, he also has no intentions of giving up Olives House. Han Jie asks Raymond to pass these words onto Mr. King as well as the plan he has of relocating Olives House to Taiwan.
Chen Meng Chen doesn’t speak of the part where Han Jie speaks of his plan to relocate Olives House to Taiwan or the part after where he says he wants to continue to remain in Taiwan because he’s very happy in Taiwan—Fang Xiao Rou being the reason he’s so happy and wants to stay in Taiwan. When Chen Meng Chen finds Fang Xiao Rou in the kitchen classroom preparing material for her pastry class, after a verbal attack on Fang Xiao Rou’s lack of skill and talent—she finds incompetence in Fang Xiao Rou preparing material for class beforehand and finds the citrus apple pie Fang Xiao Rou has in front of her on the table good but not Michelin star level—and after telling Fang Xiao Rou that her inferior person is undeserving of being the girlfriend of a star in the culinary world, she brings the information about Han Jie possibly losing his position as Executive Chef of Olives House to Fang Xiao Rou’s ears and points the finger at Fang Xiao Rou for being the one ruining not only Han Jie’s dream, but also her dream of being an outstanding chef—where, seemingly, without Han Jie’s star status, she believes she will become a regular chef because she had learnt from a regular cooking instructor.
Chen Meng Chen’s attempt to create a misunderstanding between Han Jie and Fang Xiao Rou with this information isn’t fruitful when the promise Han Jie has Fang Xiao Rou keep has Fang Xiao Rou reveal to Han Jie this new concern of hers at their lunch date.
After Fang Xiao Rou becomes unsatisfied with the gentle critique Han Jie gives to the bouillabaisse she made for Han Jie, she asks Han Jie to quickly start giving her harsh training so she is able to lead her students well in the upcoming national cooking competition—a competition that we are told is taking place soon. Fang Xiao Rou doesn’t give the reason that she wants to start immediately because there isn’t time left with him needing to head back to Europe in a week’s time. She only tells Han Jie that the training needs to start immediately. Han Jie asks why the training needs to be started so quickly when he’s going to be around. Fang Xiao Rou begins saying it’s because he’s needing to return back to Europe in a week’s time, but she stops at the point before revealing that she has knowledge of him needing to head back to Europe.
Habits kick in. Fang Xiao Rou doesn’t answer Han Jie when he asks Fang Xiao Rou to continue and finish her sentence. She slowly gets off her seat, stands by herself and keeps the problem she has to herself. It takes Han Jie reminding Fang Xiao Rou of the promise she made with him to not say one thing and mean another, not let her imagination run wild and to not keep things to herself that Fang Xiao Rou reveals to Han Jie she doesn’t want him to give up his title of Executive Chef of Olives House restaurant. With Fang Xiao Rou revealing this concern of hers, it gets cleared up immediately with Han Jie revealing the part of his conversation with Raymond that Chen Meng Chen chose to leave out and more: he only wishes to stay in Taiwan and be with Fang Xiao Rou even if she’s okay to continue a long-distance relationship with him because he can’t go a day without her around. He has a plan to set up an Olives House restaurant in Taiwan. He also wants to lead the team for the cooking competition with her.
Chen Meng Chen’s attempt to separate Han Jie and Fang Xiao Rou therefore fails. However, Chen Meng Chen doesn’t give up. When she hears about Han Jie and Fang Xiao Rou’s date plans for the evening, Chen Meng Chen attempts to stop Fang Xiao Rou from making it with pretending to have a serious stomachache that has Fang Xiao Rou helping her to the hospital.
Thoughts
It was really surprising to see Wang Mai Zhi being okay with Liu Xuan liking Ma Chong Sheng and not fighting Ma Chong Sheng for Liu Xuan. We guess it’s that Wang Mai Zhi just didn’t like Liu Xuan that much in the first place. It feels like Wang Mai Zhi only liked Liu Xuan because of her title as the most popular and prettiest girl in the school and she just suited him because he’s the most popular and hottest guy in the school.
It’s so surprising to actually see Wei Qi Zhen’s pictures on Wang Mai Zhi’s phone after he told Wei Qi Zhen to delete his picture from her phone! Wang Mai Zhi said he wanted them deleted from the phone because he didn’t know how to explain them if others saw it. And yet, the photos of Wei Qi Zhen that Wang Mai Zhi secretly took of Wei Qi Zhen before and during his bicycle riding lessons that’s on his phone—isn’t it harder to explain these photos he has of Wei Qi Zhen on his phone over the one that Wei Qi Zhen has since he’s the one who likes people to know that he’s cool and likes the best of the best? The ones he has of Wei Qi Zhen isn’t set as his wallpaper, but it’s still there!
With these pictures Wang Mai Zhi has of Wei Qi Zhen, it looks like he slowly started noticing and liking Wei Qi Zhen in the time Wang Mai Zhi got Wei Qi Zhen to teach him how to ride a bicycle. Thinking again about how Wang Mai Zhi could possibly give Liu Xuan over to Ma Chong Sheng so easily after spending so much effort in his plan, it feels like another reason he gave up Liu Xuan so easily might be because his heart had moved towards Wei Qi Zhen and away from Liu Xuan—well, at least we’d like to think that’s the reason for Wang Mai Zhi being okay with Liu Xuan revealing to him that Ma Chong Sheng is the one she likes and giving up so easily! But thinking about it again, maybe it’s just that Wang Mai Zhi is a good guy and he respects Liu Xuan’s choice… Whatever it is, it’s great Wang Mai Zhi is over Liu Xuan and now noticing Wei Qi Zhen and looking to be really liking her too!
We found the classroom scene where Wei Qi Zhen hands out her buns really interesting! The part where Wang Mai Zhi missed out on buying the last bun off of Wei Qi Zhen because Liu Xuan bet him to it by a step, Wang Mai Zhi sported an annoyed and disappointed expression. This was the first time seeing Wang Mai Zhi finding Liu Xuan a nuisance! After always hearing him call her a goddess, how she deserves the best in the world and always wanting her attention, that sort of an expression from Wang Mai Zhi directed towards Liu Xuan was so unusual that it was such an interesting sight! Wang Mai Zhi’s expression in that scene really made Liu Xuan look annoying!
Han Jie and Fang Xiao Rou—we went into this episode a bit worried that the parts with these two would be filled with the similar kind of moments and scenes that made us wish for it to hurry along because they were tedious. But, we found them very good. They were the kind of sweet, cute and fun we like to see.
We like the beginning sequence of the episode—a sequence of scenes that were recaps of the end scene of the previous episode with additions that we didn’t get to see in the end scene of the previous episode. Yeah. The series did it again with editing some parts of the end scene of the previous episode and kept it for the opening scene of this episode. Fortunately, the extra scenes didn’t do anything to change the actual happenings and made us believe something happened when it’s actually something else that happened like with the previous one.
The part where Han Jie said he wanted to be an ordinary person and not a perfect idol—after it, there was the additional scene of Fang Xiao Rou actioning on Han Jie’s desire to be treated as an ordinary person and not an idol when she asks Han Jie to get rid of mosquitoes for her. This scene is nothing extraordinary, but we liked it because it reminded us of a scene we totally loved in Episode 6. It reminded us of the scene where Han Jie and Fang Xiao Rou were locked in a staff-restricted room at night and Han Jie got rid of mosquitoes for Fang Xiao Rou after pulling her in because she pushed him away. It was the first time we saw Han Jie showing signs of his playfulness as affection and not just simple playfulness. So, this scene stuck as one of the memorable scenes of the series.
There was the additional scene of Han Jie singing Bii’s Love More song. Fang Xiao Rou asked Han Jie to sing what he was going to sing for her a year ago at that Sunday meetup that she didn’t show up to. This additional scene was what made Fang Xiao Rou apologise to Han Jie for making him wait for a year, thank him for doing so before the kiss we saw at the end of the previous episode. This scene was already sweet in the previous episode. But, with this additional scene, it made it even sweeter!
We like the part where Fang Xiao Rou and Han Jie were at the school walkway and Fang Xiao Rou was ticking off the things she needed to do to be a great girlfriend. It was just so good to finally see these two being fun and cute after seeing so many episodes of Fang Xiao Rou being unwilling and Han Jie trying to get through to Fang Xiao Rou! Relief.
It seems Wen Zhen Yu may truly exit as simply a non-threatening love rival. He’s moved from being a love rival to something like a light comic relief character like Li Zhi Chao and Jiang Pei Ying.
After that kiss Jiang Pei Ying forced upon Wen Zhen Yu, we hoped Wen Zhen Yu would hold onto his sensible and mild-mannered character personality that he was seen to have when he was first introduced. But, he became comedic like Li Zhi Chao and Jiang Pei Ying. Jiang Pei Ying had said in the apartment scene following to this one: "All men who encounter her will reveal themselves and turn into wild beasts." This was what Wen Zhen Yu was described as having acted like. Didn’t like that at all. Wen Zhen Yu was a mysterious, mild-mannered, talented chef and hinted to be a threatening second male lead character in the romance arc and main story. Now, he’s a wild beast? Wen Zhen Yu really hasn’t been utilised much in any way throughout the series and he’s already moved down to being a part of the antics that’s happening in the world of the odd and eccentric supporting characters. Quite disappointing to see Wen Zhen Yu’s character transform in this way. We don’t suppose there is even the slightest chance that he’ll go back to being part of the main storyline?
Chen Meng Chen, she really is the antagonist of the series. She’s the only one! She’s not annoying though because we know she isn’t going to win or break Han Jie and Fang Xiao Rou. With the promise that Fang Xiao Rou has to keep and with Han Jie and Fang Xiao Rou having overcome a lot of problems already, we can’t see her being able to do much damage. She can probably cause concern in either of them like she did in this episode, but it won’t have much impact or last.
Also, Chen Meng Chen really is superficial. She seems to believe that an outstanding chef is created with learning from another outstanding chef. If we’ve got this correct: Fang Xiao Rou’s father has been around the world (or at least around Europe). This was told through Han Jie when, in Episode 1, he was heard saying that he has been, done and seen all that his old cooking teacher has been, done and seen. But, Fang Xiao Rou’s father has never reached the level of status in the culinary world that Han Jie has. We remember Fang Xiao Rou’s father say to Fang Xiao Rou during the period where Fang Xiao Rou hated Han Jie for being the student who ruined his career that his dream has been realised because he taught Han Jie—a student who achieved much more than what he could ever achieve. From this, we assume it’s being able to reach the level of a celebrity chef and be so renown in the culinary world. So, by Chen Meng Chen’s definition, this makes Fang Xiao Rou’s father just a regular cooking instructor not worth learning from because he isn’t a celebrity chef who’s so well-known in the culinary world. And yet!—such a regular cooking instructor made such a star chef like Han Jie! And it’s Fang Xiao Rou’s father at that! Chen Meng Chen’s way of thinking is so wrong! Although, if Han Jie did decide to return to Olives House, it would mean she wouldn’t be taught by Han Jie… Hmm, guess it’s maybe that she simply wants the person she likes to be a renown chef then…
We are glad that there is talk of a cooking competition that is looking to be the focus of the series. If the remaining episodes focuses on cooking with a good balance of romance like how it was during the episodes leading up to the Universiade, then we’d feel the series would have wrapped up well. We are hoping for this sort of thing to come for the next episode to the final episode.
ADVERTISEMENT
