I can certainly relate to this bit.
Living as a foreigner in Japan, for all its attractions, has many such small humiliations. You may be on a noble quest to plumb the depths of the Japanese soul, but you will take so many wrong turns you end up wondering whether you are indeed too brutish to make sense of it.
I thought I would stop in a traditional Japanese bar/restaurant by my place last night for dinner - as we don't have a fridge, any pots or pans, or microwave yet. I sat down and the guy working behind the counter had already placed what looked like some kind of sea snail in front of me, kind of a palette cleanser I guess.
Now going into this place I figured that the menu wouldn't have English labels or pictures. Really I'm gastronomically flexible and adventurous enough to just order anything at random. What I hadn't counted on was the place not having menus. This made ordering food rather challenging as I couldn't just point and say "これ お願いします(kore onegaishimasu)" or "this one please give me."
There was a black board behind the counter that had the list of dishes on it, of course since most of these involved Kanji I couldn't read (although I knew a few of the meanings) I couldn't say which one I wanted. After trying for a few minutes to explain that I just wanted him to pick anything and bring me some food, he gave up trying to understand and just came back with a beer.
Nice and all but I'm very hungry.
I sat there for 15-20 minutes trying to think about how get some food.
Then it dawned on me,
すみません (sumimasen - excuse me)
I point at the food board and say
He says something to the chef - great success!
He comes back a few minutes later with a small bowl of what looks like raw octopus on seaweed, and some small raw pieces of white seafood - not entirely sure what they were but they didn't have the texture of fish. Turns out those Kanji did not mean what I thought they meant.
Interesting meal wasn't bad, but interesting.
I spilled soy sauce on my shirt...
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