WHEN IN JAPAN IT IS CRITICAL TO KEEP YOUR GUTS DRY

This story was again framed around the time of our arrival and demonstrates how worldly I had become, and how sophisticated I was, in discovering and experiencing new and exotic tastes. As I mentioned, I had arrived a couple of weeks before Deysi and dug right into the local foods. One of my first shopping forays, was to pop into the local store and stock up on the essentials, beer and chips. I had no idea what they were, but made my choices from the pictures on the front of the bags.

For example if a bag displayed a chip like picture with a shrimp lying on it, I then assumed it must be shrimp flavoured chips, if a cow then beef flavoured, a little red pepper then I expected it was gonna be “hotsui”, etc. etc. Beer was beer, I had no trouble picking it out, you can write whatever you like on it, but you cannot disguise beer. I also bought a few bags of things that I had absolutely not one clue of what they were. Fully loaded, I headed to my room to consume these weird and wonderful treats.

I settled in and embarked on a new world of experiences. I opened the first bag and sure enough it contained chips in a familiar form. It also contained a little bag of spice. Very proud of myself I opened the spice and sprinkled this dark grey powder type substance onto my chips. Loaded one up and crammed it into my mouth. It was wonderful, although I must say, I found the spice a little hard to come to grips with. However I thought, if 125,000,000 Japanese can eat it and enjoy, then I sure as hell can also.

Each bag I opened contained a similar bag of flavouring and no matter the type of chip, the flavour packets seemed to be consistent. I decided that this flavouring must be a “one spice fits all flavour”. So I persevered over the next couple of weeks and I might say I consumed quite a few bags of chips and chip like snacks. Each and every time, I used the packet of sprinkles, and started to become a bit more used to it. Although, I cannot quite say, I ever grew real fond of it. I was proud of myself, and feeling quite Japanese by this time. Then along comes Deysi.

She arrives, and starts getting my routine sorted out, and interrogates me about how much I missed her in the last couple of weeks. Soon everything is back to normal. One evening shortly after her arrival we were sitting around chewing the fat with my friend from work and having a beer. I busted out the snacks and gave everyone a packet. Soon we were all involved in eating these new and wonderful treats. As normal I open my bag, then opened my spices, sprinkle them on and start to enjoy. All of the sudden out of nowhere she yells “WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING”. I jump about two feet and say “Wha, Wha, What’s wrong”?

She looks at me with this look of utter amazement and says “why are you eating the desiccant from the chips”? “What do you mean desiccant, this is the chip spice”! She turns to my buddy and says “why did you let him eat that”? He says “well he seemed to be enjoying it so I just left him alone”. Then she freaks out on me. “you coulda killed yourself, are you crazy, what’s wrong with you?” and other such nurturing type words. It was then that it hit me like a thunderbolt, this is the reason I have not been able to go to the bathroom with much success in the past couple of weeks. My guts were dried up! This is about how worldly I was at this state in my life.