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Something’s fishy |
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Thursday, 09 October 2008 |
Just Life
By Stacey Powells
Dinner my first night is typical for them in that there is soup loaded with fish, salad sprinkled with dried bonita (fish), seaweed mixed in with some kind of gray fish that has big, black eyeballs, and a bean mixture loaded with shrimp.
One thing I probably should tell my hostess, Masako, is that I’m not a big fish person, but I’m also polite so I do my best to work around the fish as best I can.
Maybe it is the strange food in my system or maybe it is the long plane ride but my digestive track goes into shock in the middle of my first night in Japan.
At least they heat their toilet seats so if you have to be sitting on one more than usual in the middle of the night you’re comfortable.
By the second day I am ready to venture out and explore. Chigasaki-City is flat and next to the Pacific Ocean. Bicycles are a popular mode of transportation. In fact, the locals revere their bicycles. Most bicycles have two baskets; one in front and one in the back. They carry everything from briefcases to groceries and some even have their kids attached to their bicycles.
We ride bikes along the boardwalk to Enoshima Island, a small outcropping of rocks and rainforest about a quarter mile off the mainland.
After parking the bikes and locking them up we turn to walk up to the marketplace, which is lined with none other than rows and rows of fish markets – and a few tourist trinket places thrown in for good measure.
The fish market proprietors line the streets trying to get the people passing by to try their fish and lure them inside to sample their tasty morsels.
I am having none of it. Then I think I have found something I can eat. It was a round cracker that looks authentic and like something I’ve never had before. It smells strange but how strange can the ingredients in a cracker be?
As I am preparing to munch down on the cracker, Masako says, “Just so you know, that’s octopus.”
The cracker never makes it into my mouth. Apparently they have some sort of ironing machine that smashes a real octopus, heats it up and molds it into some kind of cracker. They also do it with squid.
Throughout my stay Masako and her family try to get me to eat things that my kids, who love sushi, would have no problem ingesting and I know that I do swallow food that has never been inside my body before, but I make it through. With a little help from Japanese pears, imported Chiquita bananas and the box of Quaker Instant Oatmeal that I find in a store, I am home free.
E-mail
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All views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily represent policies and opinions of the staff or owners of the Mammoth Times. Reader response is encouraged. Listen to Stacey’s Exhausted Parent Network on KMMT Sunday nights at 7 p.m.
“The smell was fish...coming from everywhere and nowhere at the same time.”]
Just walking around the oceanside urban center of Chigasaki-City in Japan, I notice almost immediately the permeating smell.
Like everything and everyone in Japan, the smell is subtle. I know the smell is familiar and I try to place it.
Is it something that reminds me of a smell that came out of my grandmother’s kitchen when I was little and was trying to sneak a peek under the lid of a pot cooking on her antique stove?
Maybe the smell was of something that my mother put in my Barbie Doll lunchbox...most likely a tuna sandwich on Wonder Bread?
Then all at once it hits me. The smell wafting around that Japanese city located an hour south of Tokyo is something that I remember smelling when I started to climb up the stairs of the Sierra Center Mall.
The closer I got to Shogun Restaurant, the stronger the smell.
Fish.
The Japanese are a proud culture. They do everything with finesse and class but when it comes to fish, it’s no holds barred.
I first notice the smell as I was boarding the train from Narita Airport on the way to Chigasaki-City. It comes from everywhere and nowhere at the same time. I don’t want to be rude so I don’t say anything to my friend, but I spend most of the train ride breathing through my mouth.
Don’t get me wrong; one reason I love traveling so much is to experience new smells and tastes so I guess it is just a matter of getting used to the smell of Japan.
Dinner my first night is typical for them in that there is soup loaded with fish, salad sprinkled with dried bonita (fish), seaweed mixed in with some kind of gray fish that has big, black eyeballs, and a bean mixture loaded with shrimp.
One thing I probably should tell my hostess, Masako, is that I’m not a big fish person, but I’m also polite so I do my best to work around the fish as best I can.
Maybe it is the strange food in my system or maybe it is the long plane ride but my digestive track goes into shock in the middle of my first night in Japan.
At least they heat their toilet seats so if you have to be sitting on one more than usual in the middle of the night you’re comfortable.
By the second day I am ready to venture out and explore. Chigasaki-City is flat and next to the Pacific Ocean. Bicycles are a popular mode of transportation. In fact, the locals revere their bicycles. Most bicycles have two baskets; one in front and one in the back. They carry everything from briefcases to groceries and some even have their kids attached to their bicycles.
We ride bikes along the boardwalk to Enoshima Island, a small outcropping of rocks and rainforest about a quarter mile off the mainland.
After parking the bikes and locking them up we turn to walk up to the marketplace, which is lined with none other than rows and rows of fish markets – and a few tourist trinket places thrown in for good measure.
The fish market proprietors line the streets trying to get the people passing by to try their fish and lure them inside to sample their tasty morsels.
I am having none of it. Then I think I have found something I can eat. It was a round cracker that looks authentic and like something I’ve never had before. It smells strange but how strange can the ingredients in a cracker be?
As I am preparing to munch down on the cracker, Masako says, “Just so you know, that’s octopus.”
The cracker never makes it into my mouth. Apparently they have some sort of ironing machine that smashes a real octopus, heats it up and molds it into some kind of cracker. They also do it with squid.
Throughout my stay Masako and her family try to get me to eat things that my kids, who love sushi, would have no problem ingesting and I know that I do swallow food that has never been inside my body before, but I make it through. With a little help from Japanese pears, imported Chiquita bananas and the box of Quaker Instant Oatmeal that I find in a store, I am home free.
E-mail
This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
All views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily represent policies and opinions of the staff or owners of the Mammoth Times. Reader response is encouraged. Listen to Stacey’s Exhausted Parent Network on KMMT Sunday nights at 7 p.m. |
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Last Updated ( Thursday, 16 October 2008 )
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