My Food is Trying to Crawl Off My Plate, or, Chajiko to Ugokeru Wasyoku.

Did I mention that I bought an arrow? Sasaki-kun has declared me unfit for residence in Japan. Something to do with my brain having a meltdown or something and all my sense dribbling out of my ears.

But THIS is a SPECIAL arrow. See the five colours of silk? And the bell? And the paper wrapped around the shaft? This arrow is ready to do some serious demon-cleansing action.

...maybe Sasaki-kun is right.

Anyway, back to the food.

So...Sasaki-kun and I are, frankly, pretty darn experienced. We’ve lived with native families, had to solve complex problems of logistics in Japanese and have managed to make friends all over the country. We were NOT prepared, however, for the food that would be served to us here as part of our traditional and (high class) Japanese dinner. Granted, this is not the sort of food ANY everyday person would eat, indeed I doubt if even a small percentage of people ever really eat this stuff in their whole lives. Suffice it to say, however, that most of it had eyes.






And tentacles.




But the kicker--the kicker was the little roasting/steaming plates next to each of our dishes. The tops kept moving around oddly, and I thought it was the steam doing something strange, as both were lit and burning merrily.

So I lifted the lid and peered in.

Have you ever seen...no, I can’t think of a simile that will do it justice. It was grey/ and bulbous and slimy.

...and it was moving!!!

As I stared at it in horror, frozen, hoping beyond hope that what I was seeing was simply a trick of hot meat (whatever sort it may be) on a cooking plate, but...no. It was still alive, I realized.

“Cover it! Cover it back up!” Sasaki-kun shrieked, snapping me out of my paralysis. So I clapped the cover back down. It continued to move, back and forth...and eventually it stopped.

I don’t think I shall ever recover. The nice lady serving everything took it out of its shell and informed me very politely that it was a delicacy and everyone loved to eat it and said “Eat some and see!” So I had to. It was nasty. It didn’t taste like much but...but...OH THE SLIME!

So I couldn’t finish it. And Sasaki-kun ate a bite too because she felt bad for me.

Anyway, we sort of picked the edible parts out of dinner and ate the strawberries that were provided for dessert (to our intense relief) and ended up full. Then we both availed ourselves of the lovely hot mineral baths (my limit is about five minutes of soaking in hot water before I literally pass out) and are finally starting to feel a little relaxed. We are both travelstained, worn, paniced and BRUISED.

Now we are devouring Sakura manju--little pink buns filled with sweet red bean paste and a mild cherry flavour--and writing in our blog and journal respectively.

One last thing that I forgot to mention, and didn’t fit anywhere in the narrative above--never, ever try to take massive luggage on the bus up to Hakone. I ended up crammed into a seat with my knees tucked up to my ears, hanging on for dear life to two gigantic suitcases (one mine, one Sasaki’s) so that they didn’t go bouncing about the bus and killing people) with another bag under my feet and another about my neck which was slowly dragging me down, and seemed determined to make a pretzel out of me. All this with a demon-slaying arrow poking jauntily out of my pack.

My only solace is the fact that I am sure the rest of the bus was in near hysterics over the antics of the crazy gaijin. Even the other gaijin. Ah well, at least I gave someone a laugh, and at least they’re happier for it!