When my mother announced she would finally be coming to visit me in Japan this September, I asked her if she had any questions. She replied, "Yes, do I have to eat with those sticks?" This is when I realized that perhaps a lesson in "chopsticking" would be helpful. Mom, this one's for you: Chopsticks 101.
Most traditional Japanese food such as noodles, rice and fish are eaten with chopsticks. Chopsticks allow you to grab the food, a concept entirely different from that of the Western fork, which is used to pierce food. Udon noodles are very thick and don't lend themselves to being wrapped around a fork, and some sashimi isn't soft enough for a fork to pierce. So it's best to try to use chopsticks if you want to eat real Japanese food.
There are other benefits to using chopsticks besides gastronomic ones. Many an explanation at a business luncheon has been aided by the use of chopsticks to mark the increase or decrease in sales on an imaginary chart. For skiers, chopsticks are necessary props to add exciting visuals to ski-crash anecdotes, as in, "I crossed my skis like this, then . . ."