A Cook's Tour Part 5

I was eventually disturbed from my maharishi-style meditations by the familiar sound of bread being sc.r.a.ped. I took that to mean my snack was ready, so I loped down the dune and returned to camp, to find my Tuareg buddies brushing the last grains of sand off a fat cooked loaf of meat-filled bread. Not a grain of sand or grit remained when one cut me off a thick wedge, a waft of spicy aromatic vapor escaping from inside. We crowded around a small blanket, eating and drinking tea as the sun finally disappeared completely, leaving us in blackness.

The camels picked their way across the desert in the pitch-dark, moving slowly up and down the steep rises and dips. At one point, I could see the dark shape of poor Global Alan, asleep on his camel, nodding off, then nearly falling off his animal. He woke with a start and a cry, frightening the whole formation. We traveled for about two more hours in near-total absence of light, the only discernible sight the off-black surface of the sand sea. Then I began to glimpse a few winking lights in the distance. As the camels trudged on, the lights grew larger. I could make out a bonfire, sparks rising from the flames, the outlines of what looked to be tents, moving bodies. There was the sound of drums, and singing or chanting in a language I'd never heard. The spectral apparition disappeared as our camels descended into another hollow, where I could see nothing, the only sound once again the breathing and snorting of our camels. After a long, tedious climb over a last rise, suddenly we were there.

A vast floor of ornate carpets stretched out for fifty or sixty yards, surrounded by tents. A covered table, fabric-wrapped stools, and pillows waited under an open canopy. A mud-and-straw oven, like a giant cistern, or the muzzle end of a sixteenth-century cannon, glowed to the left, away from the tents. Musicians beat drums and sang by a huge pile of burning logs, everyone dressed in the same blue or black head-to-toe robes of our escorts. And wonder of wonders: A full bar, nearly ten yards long, stocked with iced bins of beer and a row of liquor bottles, shone under a string of electric bulbs next to a humming generator.

It was a good old time: the Blue Men whacking drums with hands stained blue from the vegetable dyes they use on their clothes, singing and dancing by the fire, a capable and friendly French-speaking bartender in full headdress. In no time, I was fully in the spirit of things, banging on the drums with my blue pals, rolling a fat blunt, watching as one of the tribe rubbed my whole lamb with onion, pepper, and salt, then wired it to a long pole. a.s.sisted by two others, they hoisted my dinner onto their shoulders and walked to the smoldering, volcanolike mud oven.

'See?' said Abdul, nursing a Heineken in one hand while sticking the other hand into the glowing opening atop the oven. 'Something very special. Very hot.' The Tuaregs leaned down to the base of the oven, to another, smaller opening, and removed with a stick every ember of coal and stick of burning wood. Then they quickly sealed the opening with fresh, wet mud. My meshwi meshwi went in the top, straight down, securely held to the pole by wire, placed vertically into the wide, still-nuclear-hot oven, a round meat lid placed on top. The lid was sealed in place with more mud, the Tuaregs carefully examining the oven from every angle to see that it was completely sealed, pausing now and again to patch or reinforce any holes or weak spots, any flaw that might allow all that residual heat to escape. Abdul and I retired to the bar. went in the top, straight down, securely held to the pole by wire, placed vertically into the wide, still-nuclear-hot oven, a round meat lid placed on top. The lid was sealed in place with more mud, the Tuaregs carefully examining the oven from every angle to see that it was completely sealed, pausing now and again to patch or reinforce any holes or weak spots, any flaw that might allow all that residual heat to escape. Abdul and I retired to the bar.

We were brought water and soap on a silver tray, as in Moulay Idriss, washed our hands, and were soon being fed with the usual array of tasty olives, salads, and bread. A thicker, lambier version of harira harira soup arrived in a tureen, very welcome on what was becoming an extremely cold night. Abdul had loosened up considerably after many beers, entertaining us with a high-spirited round of joke telling most of which, sadly, led me to believe that jokes about Jews are very big in Morocco. I found that Polish and hillbilly jokes work just as well in the desert, if you subst.i.tute Libyans. Finally, after about an hour and a half of eating and drinking, the soup arrived in a tureen, very welcome on what was becoming an extremely cold night. Abdul had loosened up considerably after many beers, entertaining us with a high-spirited round of joke telling most of which, sadly, led me to believe that jokes about Jews are very big in Morocco. I found that Polish and hillbilly jokes work just as well in the desert, if you subst.i.tute Libyans. Finally, after about an hour and a half of eating and drinking, the meshwi meshwi arrived, stretched out on a long, flat board, a Blue Man with a long and sharp-looking dagger right behind. Still sizzling-hot, the lamb had been roasted crispy and straight through far more cooked than I would have done in the world of knives and forks. The skin was black in places, the rib bones poking through shrunken muscle. It did, however, smell amazing, and I found that well done, while almost never my preferred temperature, although, unfortunately, the chosen level of doneness for most of the unrefrigerated world, was in this case absolutely necessary to the kind of hacking, tearing, peeling, clawing, and sucking the meal required. There were no steak knives, after all, to be cutting tidy pink loin chops off the lamb. arrived, stretched out on a long, flat board, a Blue Man with a long and sharp-looking dagger right behind. Still sizzling-hot, the lamb had been roasted crispy and straight through far more cooked than I would have done in the world of knives and forks. The skin was black in places, the rib bones poking through shrunken muscle. It did, however, smell amazing, and I found that well done, while almost never my preferred temperature, although, unfortunately, the chosen level of doneness for most of the unrefrigerated world, was in this case absolutely necessary to the kind of hacking, tearing, peeling, clawing, and sucking the meal required. There were no steak knives, after all, to be cutting tidy pink loin chops off the lamb.

The chef broke the lamb into primal sections, then broke those down into smaller pieces, small enough to wield with a fist. I invited the chef and my new Tuareg buddies to join me at the table, and after a few bismillahs bismillahs, everyone was poised to dig in. The chef made a quick motion with his dagger and lifted free a dismayingly large t.e.s.t.i.c.l.e from the lamb's crotch. With some ceremony, and a few appreciative smiles from around the table, he deposited the crispy, veiny object in front of me, then sat down and helped himself to a thick slab off the other nut. Abdul contented himself with ripping steaming-hot chunks of shoulder and leg with his fingers while I, G.o.d help me, tore off a sizable piece of gonad and popped it in my mouth.

It was sensational. Tender, even fluffy, with a subtle lamb flavor less intense than shoulder or leg; the whole experience, the chewing and swallowing, was reminiscent of sweetbreads. It was certainly the best t.e.s.t.i.c.l.e I'd ever had in my mouth. Also the first, I should hasten to say. I enjoyed every bite. It was delicious. Delightful. I'd do it again in a hot second. If I served it to you at a restaurant, as long as you didn't know what it was, if I called it, say, 'Pave d'agneau maroc,' you'd love it. You'd come back for more. I felt proud of myself. I'll try almost anything once, but I often feel let down when I fail to enjoy myself as much as I'd hoped. Telling people about the cobra bile you drank when you were in Vietnam makes a great story, but it's dismaying when the experience was just as unpleasant as it sounds. Sheep's b.a.l.l.s, however, are great. I would recommend them unhesitatingly and without reservation.

Abdul, the crew, the Blue Men, and I made short work of the lamb, getting serious with our hands, until the thing was only well-picked-over fragments, looking like an autopsied burn victim. When the fire began to die down, as the musicians, servers, and camel drivers melted away to their tents, I was left with Global Alan and Matthew, and a big hunk of hash and that cla.s.sic emergency smoking device of sixties legend: the toilet paper roll and tin foil pipe.

As it was near freezing now, we wrapped ourselves in heavy camel blankets and staggered aimlessly into the desert, heading in the general direction of a waxing moon. With the blankets covering us from heads to shins, we looked like lepers, stumbling on uncertain feet into the dark. When we finally agreed on the right distance and the right dune still reasonably certain we could find our way back to camp we sat down on the cold sand and smoked ourselves into a state that once, many years ago, might have been mistaken for enlightenment, our coughs and giggles swallowed up by the dunes. I lifted the description 'a bewildering array of stars' once from a far better writer I can't remember who now, only that I stole it and that expression came to mind as I stared up at an awe-inspiring sky over the Sahara, the bright, penetrating lights, the quick drop of comets, a cold moon, which made the rippling patterns of sand look like a frozen sea. The universe was large all right, but no larger, it appeared, than the whole wide world ahead of me.

Highway of Death

I just had the closest near-death experience I've ever had.

And I'm about to have another one. Then another.

I'm hurtling full speed down Highway 1 on my way to Can Tho, sitting with Philippe in the back of a hired minivan, horn honking constantly, heading right up the center line into oncoming traffic. There's a water truck about a hundred yards ahead, coming fast in the opposite direction, showing no sign that he intends to pull back into traffic, also honking wildly. Linh and a driver are in the front seat, with two shooters behind us and I'm convinced that any second we're all going to die.

During the war, Highway 1 was said to be dangerous: snipers, sappers, ambushes, command-detonated mines, the usual perils of guerilla insurgencies. I can't imagine it's any less dangerous now. Understand this about driving in the Mekong Delta: The thing to do is keep up a constant attack with the horn. A beep means 'Keep doing what you're doing, change nothing, make no sudden moves, and everything will probably be fine.' It does not mean 'Slow down' or 'Stop' or 'Move to the right' or 'Get out of the way.' If you try to do any of those things on Highway 1 after hearing a car horn behind you if you hesitate, look back over your shoulder, slow down, or even falter for a second you will immediately find yourself in a burning heap of crumpled metal somewhere in a rice paddy. The horn means simply 'I'm here!'.

And there are a lot of people here today, just like us, tearing down the two-lane road at full speed and hammering their horns like crazy. The water truck ahead is getting closer. And closer. I can make out the grille, the Russian manufacturer's logo on the hood. Our driver still has his foot on the gas, not slowing down in the slightest. We're right in the middle of the road, what would be a pa.s.sing lane, if they had such a thing here. There's an uninterrupted line of fast-moving cars to our right, with no room at all between them in which to pull back in, a steady torrent of oncoming cars to our left, and the shoulders of both sides of the road are choked three-and four-deep with cyclists, motorbikes, water buffalo, and scooters all of them loaded with crates of food, washing-machine motors, sacks of fertilizer, flapping roosters, firewood, and family members. So there is no room, none at all, should our driver suddenly decide at the very last minute to abort mission and pull out of the center. If he decides suddenly that the oncoming driver is definitely not going to yield in this maniacal high-speed game of chicken, that he's going to have to veer off the road to avoid collision, there is nowhere, nowhere, to go!

We're close enough now that I can make out the features of the truck's driver, the color of his shirt, the pack of 555 cigarettes on his dashboard. Just when our b.u.mpers are about to meet, vaporizing all of us in an explosion of brake fluid, safety gla.s.s, blood, and bone, two cars to our right suddenly open up a s.p.a.ce for us and as if part of some h.e.l.lish high-speed chorus line, we slip back into traffic. The water truck whips by with a terrific blast of wind, avoiding contact by less than a centimeter, and there's that peculiar vacuum pressure-drop effect you feel when on a train that is suddenly pa.s.sed by another hurtling in the opposite direction. Philippe just looks at me, shaking his head, says, 'Are we still alive? . . . I . . . I was sure that truck went right through us.' He's not joking.

Every few moments, we do the same thing again, pulling out to pa.s.s often pulling out to pa.s.s a vehicle that is already pa.s.sing taking up the whole highway, three-deep, screaming straight into cars and trucks doing the exact same thing in the other direction, horns blaring and honking, a sea of farmers and grandmas and children on rickety bicycles on both sides, the occasional added hazard of oxcart or water buffalo protruding dangerously into the road.

Again.

And again. This time, it looks like an army truck, olive drab, the back loaded with standing soldiers in fatigues. They're coming right at us, not slowing down at all. Our driver doesn't seem concerned. He's having a nice conversation with an equally oblivious Linh, hardly, it seems, paying attention to what must certainly this time be our imminent doom. He honks the horn. He keeps honking. He leans right on that thing like it's a magic wand that will somehow alter the laws of physics. His foot is still on the gas, the motor racing. I see Philippe's knuckles getting white, then whiter on the armrest of his seat, see Chris the shooter's eyes grow huge in the rearview mirror. There's a collective holding of breath among the Western contingent as we all brace for impact, think fleetingly of loved ones, prepare ourselves to be thrown through the windshield . . . Again, somehow, we're back in traffic, a momentary blast of air as the two vehicles nearly kiss paint. Then we're right back straddling that center line again, honking wildly at a slow-moving car in front of us, tailgating at 120 kliks per hour.

Whatever magic safety zone our driver thinks envelops our car, protecting us from harm, we're beginning to think he must be right. There's no other explanation for our continued survival. Again and again and again, we just miss colliding, so frequently and regularly that, after an hour on the road, we actually begin to believe it, even count on the idea that we are invincible that some Vietnamese juju does indeed prevent us from slamming head-on into another vehicle. We run straight at the most unroadworthy twenty-year-old Soviet-made contraptions on four wheels, gas pedal flat on the floor each time, enduring that queer Doppler effect as they whip by, the horns going WHOOoooANNnngggg WHOOoooANNnngggg as the shock wave blows us sideways toward a family of four on a wobbly bicycle. On more than one occasion, we come so close to rolling right over a pedestrian or an overloaded bicycle that I'm sure we touched them. I think all of us, long ago, would have screamed at our driver to slow down, maybe even attempted to wrestle the wheel away from him (he's clearly a madman intent on destroying us all), but there isn't a single second when we're not paralyzed with fear, bracing for impact, or at least certain that if we were to speak, or distract him for even a split second, it would surely cause our instantaneous deaths. as the shock wave blows us sideways toward a family of four on a wobbly bicycle. On more than one occasion, we come so close to rolling right over a pedestrian or an overloaded bicycle that I'm sure we touched them. I think all of us, long ago, would have screamed at our driver to slow down, maybe even attempted to wrestle the wheel away from him (he's clearly a madman intent on destroying us all), but there isn't a single second when we're not paralyzed with fear, bracing for impact, or at least certain that if we were to speak, or distract him for even a split second, it would surely cause our instantaneous deaths.

Eventually, nerves shattered, blind faith takes over and we either try our best to ignore what's going on outside the thin layer of metal and gla.s.s around us or we simply pray, nearly hysterical with fear and nervous exhaustion.

The city of Can Tho is a low-rise river town with the colonial architecture of its French planners. We check into the Hotel Victoria Can Tho, one of the many luxurious foreign-run hotels one sees more and more of in Vietnam. It's stately, beautiful, with an airy whitewashed lobby, black-and-white marble floors, a pool and boathouse on the sh.o.r.es of the Mekong River, hardwood teak and mahogany rooms with comfortable beds, and satellite TV. There's a business center, a health and ma.s.sage studio, a very decent restaurant and bar and an anti-aircraft battery down the street. As we drive by the gun emplacement, Linh reminds the shooters, 'Not to photograph, please.'

I order a mango daquiri as soon as we check in. G.o.d, there's nothing like a fine hotel when you've survived multiple brushes with death. I splurge and send out my moldering clothes to be laundered, schedule an hour-and-a-half ma.s.sage, and treat myself to a traditional Vietnamese lunch of chicken BLT club sandwich. Philippe, in a monogrammed hotel bathrobe, is already at the pool. Soon, I'm oiled up on a table, half-asleep, a tiny Vietnamese girl walking on my back, by now only vaguely aware how lucky I am to be alive.

I'm also beginning to think that there must be a lot of penile dysfunction in Asia. There's no other explanation for it. Just about every d.a.m.n thing you can think of seems to have been thoroughly investigated for its potential wood-raising properties. If your waiter or a friend urges you to put something in your mouth that a few weeks ago you never would have thought of eating, chances are it is believed to 'make you strong.' Only desperation can account for what the Chinese, for instance, do in the name of 'medicine.' That's something you might remind your New Age friends who've gone gaga over 'holistic medicine' and 'alternative Chinese cures.' They say there are sun bears in China, hooked up to kidney drips like catsup dispensers, leeching bear bile into tiny bottles. Rhino horn. Bear claw. Bird's nest. Duck embryo. You've got to be pretty anxious about your p.e.n.i.s to contemplate hurting a cute little sun bear.

And you've got to be really concerned about your p.e.n.i.s to eat at the My Kanh Restaurant in Can Tho. Our waiter greets us and proudly takes us on the obligatory premeal tour of the grounds. It's a large wooded park with a narrow cement pathway that winds and twists around zoolike cages of menu selections. Everything here is available for dinner. I lose my appet.i.te as soon as I see the sun bear. There are snakes, bats, lizards, crocodiles, cranes, an eighty-kilo python, monkeys, and dogs. The dogs, our waiter a.s.sures us not too convincingly are not for sale. We pa.s.s ponds where one can catch one's own elephant fish or catfish. And in the middle of this torture garden, where the cages seem to radiate fear, are cute little bungalows where Chinese and Taiwanese businessmen come for dirty weekends, their mistresses in tow. They come to eat animals that most Americans have seen only on the Discovery Channel, to absorb, I'm guessing, the animal auras at close hand before killing and eating them. The plan, then, I can only a.s.sume, is to settle the check quickly, rush back to the bungalow, and endeavor mightily to produce a hard-on. The management of My Kanh, our waiter proudly shows us, is putting in a swimming pool. It's a horrifying theme park of cruelty. And I'm sickened by it all. Bad enough to want to eat some of these creatures. But to want to stay here, close to your victims, to lie in bed with your mistress, listening to animals die what kind of romantic weekend getaway is that?

Philippe and I settle for catching our own elephant fish in a murky, stagnant pond covered with green film, a small boy helpfully pointing out exactly where to drop our hooks. It takes about thirty seconds to catch our entrees.

For appetizers, we go for the relatively benign curried frog legs, a little ground snake with shrimp cracker, peanuts, garlic, and mint, and some braised bat (imagine braised inner tube, sauced with engine coolant). We eat no animals with cute bunny eyes. I just can't take that today. Philippe and I pick at our food unenthusiastically, a strong cloud of fermenting fish from the nearby nuoc mam nuoc mam factory doing nothing to improve our appet.i.tes. factory doing nothing to improve our appet.i.tes.

No one should come here.

Our waiter is a friendly-enough young fellow, soft-spoken and attentive, but I can't get it out of my head that if I should suddenly decide to order some monkey, he'll happily slit the little fella's throat with the same friendly expression on his face.

I'm in much better spirits the next morning when we board a riverboat to go to the nearby floating market at Cai Rang. It's beautiful out, the sun creating pink-and-orange coronas around the edges of the clouds, the light on the water hypnotic. Bamboo-frame houses with thatched roofs, tall palms, the crowded waterfront of Can Tho pa.s.s by. The river itself teems with activity. Net fishermen, their handwoven nets extended like the wings of giant moths over the water, dip and pull with ingeniously crafted levers of bamboo poles. Families in sampans pa.s.s by, sampans with lone women paddling from the stern and baby sitting aft, boats overloaded with cinder blocks and building materials. There are floating gas stations: a thousand-gallon floating gas tank piloted by a chain-smoking old man sitting on top. The river traffic gets more intense as we near Cai Rang. Sampans are so overloaded here, so low in the water, I can't imagine how they stay afloat. Boats are piled high with sacks of rice, fertilizer, produce, potted palms, cages of live poultry.

And there are floating food vendors.

A chugging sampan pulls alongside our craft and inquires if we'd care for coffee. He's got a whole Starbucks rig set up at the helm. Attaching his boat to ours with a frayed rope, he sets immediately to work filling our order, one hand keeping his boat aligned as we speed along the river, the other steaming, filtering, and pouring some of that fabulous Vietnamese coffee into tall gla.s.ses. Another boat, this one selling baguettes, comes along the other side, and we buy a few of those, too. They're still warm, crunchy, and delicious, as good as any you'd find in Paris. A boat selling pho pho joins us and soon Philippe and I are digging greedily into bowls of outstandingly fresh spicy beef and noodles, a slice of liver, those brightly colored and crunchy garnishes making the flavors pop. I could eat here all day. Just float along and everybody comes to you. Pate sandwiches, roll-your-own beef, spring rolls, sweets all this in the middle of busy river traffic. At the market, there are floating fishmongers, livestock pens, fruit and vegetable wholesalers, bakers, plant sellers, all of them in waterlogged, porous-looking, questionably seaworthy vessels of indeterminate age. Slurping down the last of my morning joins us and soon Philippe and I are digging greedily into bowls of outstandingly fresh spicy beef and noodles, a slice of liver, those brightly colored and crunchy garnishes making the flavors pop. I could eat here all day. Just float along and everybody comes to you. Pate sandwiches, roll-your-own beef, spring rolls, sweets all this in the middle of busy river traffic. At the market, there are floating fishmongers, livestock pens, fruit and vegetable wholesalers, bakers, plant sellers, all of them in waterlogged, porous-looking, questionably seaworthy vessels of indeterminate age. Slurping down the last of my morning pho pho, I'm thinking that this is living. Everyone smiles. Children shout 'h.e.l.lo!' and 'Bye-bye!' and 'Happy New Year!' all wanting nothing more than to practice the few words of English they know. A dessert boat sells candied mango and banana, skewered melon, chunks of pineapple, whole jackfruit, durian, mangosteen, dragon fruit, and custard apple. Boats chug by with bundles of beautifully wrapped square and triangular banh banh dangling from the wheelhouse, an entire convenience store aboard, selling cigarettes, sodas, beer, and fruit juices in plastic bags. Women cook in woks of boiling oil on fast-moving boats, grill little packets of ground meat wrapped in mint leaves, fry little birds, boil noodles. Everything smells good. Everything looks good to eat. dangling from the wheelhouse, an entire convenience store aboard, selling cigarettes, sodas, beer, and fruit juices in plastic bags. Women cook in woks of boiling oil on fast-moving boats, grill little packets of ground meat wrapped in mint leaves, fry little birds, boil noodles. Everything smells good. Everything looks good to eat.

Looking at the far sh.o.r.e, I can see doorless shacks built out over the water, nearly without furniture, except for an occasional hammock, the glow from a much-repaired television set. There are television aerials over medieval-style privies built out over the water. Watch the sh.o.r.e and you see every stage of domestic river life: mothers bathing their children, pounding laundry, scrubbing their woks in the brown water, laying out circles of rice paper to dry on rooftops, fastidiously sweeping their tiny primitive abodes, every inch clean and squared away.

It's something I'm seeing everywhere in Vietnam; what makes its food so good, its people so endearing and impressive: pride. It's everywhere. From top to bottom, everyone seems to be doing the absolute best they can with what they have, improvising, repairing, innovating. It's a spirit revealed in every noodle stall, every leaky sampan, every swept and combed dirt porch and green rice paddy. You see it in the mud-packed dikes and levees of their centuries-old irrigation system, every monkey bridge, restored shoe, tire turned sandal, litterless urban street, patched roof, and swaddled baby in brightly colored hand-knit cap. Think what you want about Vietnam and about communism and about whatever it was that really happened there all those years ago. Ignore, if you care to, the obvious that the country is, and was always, primarily about family, village, province, and then country that ideology is a luxury few can afford. You cannot help but be impressed and blown away by the hard work, the attention to detail, the care taken in every facet of daily life, no matter how mundane, no matter how difficult the circ.u.mstances. Spend some time in the Mekong Delta and you'll understand how a nation of farmers could beat the largest and most powerful military presence on the planet. Just watch the women in the rice paddies, bent at the waist for eight, ten hours a day, yanking bundles of rice from knee-deep water, then moving them, replanting them. Take awhile to examine the intricate interlocked system of Stone Age irrigation, unchanged for hundreds and hundreds of years, the level of cooperation necessary among neighbors simply to scratch out a living, and you'll get the idea.

These people survived bombing, strafing, patrols. They outwitted the CIA, the NSA, satellites, AWACS, blacked-out C-130 cargo planes that had been tricked out with sensors and Gatling guns, staffed by whole teams of airborne intelligence a.n.a.lysts searching the ground below on winking monitors, B-52 strikes, hired killers, special units of 'counterterror' teams, regime after regime of clannish leaders who cared nothing for them. They survived The Beverly Hillbillies The Beverly Hillbillies and Bob Hope and the worst that America's l.u.s.ts and America's culture had to offer. They beat the French. They beat the Chinese. They beat the Khmer Rouge. And they'll survive communism, too. A hundred years from now, the Commies will be gone like us, another footnote in Vietnam's long and tragic history of struggle and the rice paddies of the Mekong Delta, this market, and this river will look much as they look now, as they looked a hundred years ago. and Bob Hope and the worst that America's l.u.s.ts and America's culture had to offer. They beat the French. They beat the Chinese. They beat the Khmer Rouge. And they'll survive communism, too. A hundred years from now, the Commies will be gone like us, another footnote in Vietnam's long and tragic history of struggle and the rice paddies of the Mekong Delta, this market, and this river will look much as they look now, as they looked a hundred years ago.

I like it here. I like it a lot.

Tokyo Redux

I'd only been to Tokyo once before, but I knew that as soon as I hit the ground, I'd be tapping into that main vein again, a dead-bang, surefire, king-h.e.l.l rush. For me, Tokyo is like one long film trailer one of those quick-cut, fast-moving highlight teasers for a noisy action flick with only the best parts shown, in molar-shaking, heart-pounding surround sound, the pace getting quicker and quicker, the action more frenzied, leading up to sudden blackness and the promise of more excitement to come.

No place I've ever been, or even heard about, is as guaranteed to cause stimulation in the deepest pleasure centers of a cook's brain. No cuisine, broadly speaking, makes as much sense: the simplest, cleanest, freshest elements of gustatory pleasure, stripped down and refined to their most essential. Unlike Tokyo's streets and much of its popular culture the traditional sectors of food and relaxation are austere, uncompromising, devoid of all distraction and repet.i.tion, beautiful in the manner of a single long-stemmed calla lily: unknowable, serene. The j.a.panese, hardworking, hyperregimented, obsessively well scrubbed, and painfully repressed, live lives of powerful even lurid imagination and fantasy. Over the centuries, they have given a lot of serious thought as to what, exactly, is needed and desirable in the taking of pleasure. The unnecessary, the extraneous, the redundant, the less than perfect these are discarded. What is left is often an empty room, a futon, a single perfect flower.

Their streets may be noisy, riotous Mobius strips of flashing lights, screaming jumbotrons, rank after rank of tightly constrained, identically dressed humanity (this year, all all young women young women will will dye their hair red!), their TV variety shows insanely over the top, hysterical a.s.saults by break-dancing reindeer, hyperactive hosts, cloyingly cute, fluffy, pyschedelic-hued animal characters and doll-eyed cartoon heroines, their p.o.r.n some of the ugliest, most brutal, and most disturbing on earth, their popular s.e.xual obsessions may make even the Germans look well adjusted, and they may indeed teach their school children that all that nasty World War II nonsense never really happened, but from a cook's perspective, who cares? I was there to eat. When it comes time to sit at a table, or take a long weekend relaxing in the countryside, no one on earth has figured things out so well or so thoroughly as the j.a.panese. dye their hair red!), their TV variety shows insanely over the top, hysterical a.s.saults by break-dancing reindeer, hyperactive hosts, cloyingly cute, fluffy, pyschedelic-hued animal characters and doll-eyed cartoon heroines, their p.o.r.n some of the ugliest, most brutal, and most disturbing on earth, their popular s.e.xual obsessions may make even the Germans look well adjusted, and they may indeed teach their school children that all that nasty World War II nonsense never really happened, but from a cook's perspective, who cares? I was there to eat. When it comes time to sit at a table, or take a long weekend relaxing in the countryside, no one on earth has figured things out so well or so thoroughly as the j.a.panese.

It's all about fish, fish, fish, daddy-o. You like fish? You'll love j.a.pan. They've scoured the world's oceans looking for good stuff to eat. And they'll pay anything anything for the good stuff. (I watched my friend Taka at Sushi Samba in New York unhesitatingly pay over eighty dollars a pound wholesale for a hunk of o-toro o-toro.) I actually get high walking through their fish markets; my pulse quickens even thinking about them. I missed a lot last time I was in j.a.pan. I wasted a lot of time working and wandering blindly about. Early on, I'd been intimidated by the strangeness, the crowds, the different language, I'd been reluctant, at first, to throw myself into it, to plunge right into packed noodle joints and businessmen's bars. This time, I was determined, at the very least, to miss less. My quest for 'the perfect meal' would be put on hold. This was j.a.pan. I knew I'd be getting a lot of perfect meals here. That's what they do.

It was a packed flight out of JFK, and I was too excited to sleep. After three movies, three meals, and fourteen hours to Narita, with the plane's engines droning on and on, it reached the point where I yearned crazily for that telltale change in the engine's pitch, that moment when velocity slows, the plane begins its final descent, every ticking second of monotonous hum a fiendish form of torture. They ought to issue rubber chew toys in coach cla.s.s. I needed one by the time the flight attendants started strapping down food carts and checking to see that our seats were in the upright position.

I was staying at the Hotel Tateshina in Shinjuku, a tacky businessmen's lodging on a side street. My dollhouse-sized room had a hard but comfortable bed, cheap bureau, a TV set, and a pillow that sounded and felt as if it were filled with sand. The walls were thin. Outside the room was a bank of vending machines selling my brand of cigarettes, coffee, Asahi beer, and plastic cards for the p.o.r.no channels (Cherry Bomb). I showered in the hermetically sealed bath pod, dressed, and walked in the rain to Kabuki-cho, taking a hard right off a neon and billboard-lined street, ducking through a quiet Shinto shrine and into a bustling warren of pac.h.i.n.ko parlors, hostess bars, pantyless coffee shops, yakitori joints, and wh.o.r.ehouses. Turning onto the Golden Gai, things were even narrower and the streets were bordered by tiny one- and two-table bars. Above, through a tangle of fire escapes, power lines, and hanging signage, skysc.r.a.pers winked red. Welcome to Tokyo. I squeezed into a phone booth-sized place, pa.s.sed a bank of glowing hibachis, sat down, and ordered a draft beer.

A hot towel arrived with my beer. I ordered pickles and crudites with miso paste, a bowl of onsen tamago onsen tamago (a soft-boiled egg with mountain potato and seaweed), cooked collar of yellowtail with radish, some chicken wings, stuffed shiitake mushrooms, and some roasted gingko berries. Life was good again. The grueling hours in cattle cla.s.s, knees pressed to my chin, staring at Mel 'f.u.c.king' Gibson and Helen 'Two-Expression' Hunt you know them from such films as (a soft-boiled egg with mountain potato and seaweed), cooked collar of yellowtail with radish, some chicken wings, stuffed shiitake mushrooms, and some roasted gingko berries. Life was good again. The grueling hours in cattle cla.s.s, knees pressed to my chin, staring at Mel 'f.u.c.king' Gibson and Helen 'Two-Expression' Hunt you know them from such films as What Tony Does NOT Want What Tony Does NOT Want, costarring Gene 'He's Good in Everything' Hackman, playing (surprise) a gruff but kindhearted football coach, and Gene 'Me Again' Hackman playing a gruff but kindhearted former NSA agent all of it faded into ugly memory.

That night, I woke up at 3:00 a.m. and made myself green tea in my room, on the thoughtfully provided denji denji server. I tried to write. I attempted to telephone my wife back in New York but got the answering machine (Elvis Costello singing 'sometimes I wish that I could stop you from talking'). I hung up, feeling, for the first time since I'd hit the road, truly and permanently cut off from my former life a universe away from home, everything I'd ever been and done somehow an abstraction. I'd thought I was alone in the Tateshina annex, until a toilet roared through the thin walls. Soon I could hear the sounds of moaning. My neighbor was catching up on Cherry Bomb. server. I tried to write. I attempted to telephone my wife back in New York but got the answering machine (Elvis Costello singing 'sometimes I wish that I could stop you from talking'). I hung up, feeling, for the first time since I'd hit the road, truly and permanently cut off from my former life a universe away from home, everything I'd ever been and done somehow an abstraction. I'd thought I was alone in the Tateshina annex, until a toilet roared through the thin walls. Soon I could hear the sounds of moaning. My neighbor was catching up on Cherry Bomb.

I slept for a while, and had a vivid dream that Nancy had renovated our apartment and thrown me a surprise party. All the guests were Asian. Everyone was doing a lot of hugging. For some reason, Leslie Gore was there, singing 'It's My Party.' When Nancy hugged me in my dream, I could feel it.

I woke up early and bought a hot can of coffee from the vending machine. Out front of the Tateshina, I met my fixer/translator, Michiko, a pretty, smartly dressed, extremely capable young woman the TV people had hooked me up with. Behind the wheel of a rented van was Shinji, my driver, a longhaired guy in a Yankees cap. Both spoke excellent English, and Shinji was completely up-to-date on his Yankees stats and recent trades, so I knew I was in capable hands. On the ride to the Ginza district, Michiko kept up a steady stream of patter on a slim silver cell phone, making arrangements, while Shinji and I worried over the implications of a possible Brosius trade.

This time around, I had a definite agenda. At the top of my list was Edomae sushi. Edo was the old name for Tokyo, and the term Edomae Edomae when used with the word when used with the word sushi sushi implies that it's old-school, Edo-style, the unvarnished grand-master version of sushi (in a culture where sushi is already revered). Michiko had introduced me to Mr Kiminari Togawa, the chef/owner of the Karaku restaurant in the expensive Ginza district and a master of Edomae sushi. implies that it's old-school, Edo-style, the unvarnished grand-master version of sushi (in a culture where sushi is already revered). Michiko had introduced me to Mr Kiminari Togawa, the chef/owner of the Karaku restaurant in the expensive Ginza district and a master of Edomae sushi.

While I had visited the awe-inspiring, life-changing mother of all fish markets before, this time I would be going with an expert. The plan was to meet Togawa-san at his restaurant, run over to Tsukiji to do his day's shopping, then return to his restaurant and eat myself silly. I've written about Tsukiji in the past, and used up most of the superlatives I can think of. Just take my word for it: It's the Taj Mahal, the Colosseum, the Great Pyramid of seafood. All that unbelievable bounty, spread across acres and acres of concrete, wriggling and spitting from tanks, laid out in brightly colored rows, carefully arranged like dominoes in boxes, skittering and clawing from under piles of crushed ice, jockeyed around on fast-moving carts, the smell of limitless possibilities, countless sensual pleasures I am inadequate to the task of saying more. There is nowhere else. Believe me.

This time, instead of simply gaping, slack-jawed, I was doing it right. Mr Togawa was with me, and when the fish sellers saw him coming, it got their attention. A friendly but serious fellow of about my age, Togawa-san was looking for a few select items today: fresh live eels, live octopus, sea bream, tiger prawn, and o-toro o-toro the best of the best of the tuna in season. We spent a lot of time yanking living creatures out of fish tanks and examining them. Mr Togawa showed me something I hadn't seen before. Lifting a flipping and flopping sea bream out of a tank, he took a knife and whacked it behind the head with the blade. The cut opened it up just enough to expose the spine. Mr Togawa quickly took a long, thin wire and inserted it into the fish's marrow, running it up and down its length like a deep root ca.n.a.l. He explained that he was basically paralyzing the sea bream. The fish would live in a comalike state of suspended animation until the very last second, back in Mr Togawa's kitchen, when he'd finish the job. Walking down one of the busy aisles, the chef caught sight of a large square of fatty the best of the best of the tuna in season. We spent a lot of time yanking living creatures out of fish tanks and examining them. Mr Togawa showed me something I hadn't seen before. Lifting a flipping and flopping sea bream out of a tank, he took a knife and whacked it behind the head with the blade. The cut opened it up just enough to expose the spine. Mr Togawa quickly took a long, thin wire and inserted it into the fish's marrow, running it up and down its length like a deep root ca.n.a.l. He explained that he was basically paralyzing the sea bream. The fish would live in a comalike state of suspended animation until the very last second, back in Mr Togawa's kitchen, when he'd finish the job. Walking down one of the busy aisles, the chef caught sight of a large square of fatty toro toro, and he veered over to examine it more closely. After gazing at it reflectively for a while, and a little discussion with the fishmonger, the piece of tuna went in a bag. We bought a few kilos of very lively eels, an octopus which very reluctantly released its grip on the gla.s.s walls of its tank some brightly colored prawns, then headed back to Ginza.

The chef's cooks were waiting for us when we arrived, and they immediately fell on the morning's shopping. They salted and pounded the octopus for slow cooking in mirin (rice wine), then butchered the tuna and sorted various parts for different purposes. The small, stark cellar s.p.a.ce was soon filled with the smell of steaming rice and freshly grated ginger and wasabi. There came the sound beautiful really, almost musical of a very sharp knife cutting through the tiny pinbones of a very fresh fish, the blade sc.r.a.ping quickly along the spine with an extended ZiiiipppP ZiiiipppP! The cooks' blades moved confidently through the eels, then finished off the sea bream with that distinctive sound: Ziiip! Ziiip! Ziiip! Ziiip! I sat at the sushi bar, watching them work, until, embarra.s.sed by my growling stomach, I withdrew to a table. I sat at the sushi bar, watching them work, until, embarra.s.sed by my growling stomach, I withdrew to a table.

Finally, as zero hour approached, Michiko, Shinji, and I took our places in a small, private tatami room. Hot towels and cold beer were served; then one of the doors slid open and we were off.

Octopus with fresh wasabi the color and shape of a cherry blossom came first; then grilled sardine with ponzu ponzu sauce and sauce and yuzu yuzu, the flavor electric, dazzling; followed by a platter of traditional sushi, each piece, as should be the case with Edomae sushi, containing a nearly identical number of grains of rice and, as is also the style with Edomae, still warm and more loosely packed than the cold, gluey rice cakes you might be used to. I'd watched Mr Togawa make some of these earlier for another customer. His hands flew, twirled, an entire ballet with ten digits. It had taken him, he told me, three years, during his training and apprenticeship, just to be considered as having mastered rice alone. For three years in his first kitchen, it had been all he'd been allowed to touch.

Half-beak came next, a pointy-nosed transluscent little fish, silvery and alive-looking, then maguro (the lean section of a tuna), marinated twelve hours, tiger prawns, flounder, o-toro o-toro, all served over the sticky yet fluffy rice, which was still warm. Everything every fish (except the toro) was from the Tokyo area. All of it was of the absolute highest quality. No price is too high for the best fish. And with Edomae sushi, one always buys the best.

The meal continued in an uninterrupted flow of delights: a miso soup with tiny steamed c.o.c.kles, a course of pickles and microgreen salad, a slice of tamago tamago (omelette), big sh.e.l.l (whatever that is), abalone, sea eel. Was the meal over? No way! A tray of hand rolls came next: sea cuc.u.mber, ark sh.e.l.l, more eel, dried radish with powdered, dried king prawns, chopped (omelette), big sh.e.l.l (whatever that is), abalone, sea eel. Was the meal over? No way! A tray of hand rolls came next: sea cuc.u.mber, ark sh.e.l.l, more eel, dried radish with powdered, dried king prawns, chopped toro toro with fresh chives. Bigger hand rolls arrived, each containing with fresh chives. Bigger hand rolls arrived, each containing tamago tamago (egg), shiitake, and cuc.u.mber, accompanied by a plate of dried, then pickled daikon. The sea bream appeared squeaky-fresh; it seemed alive on my plate. Then we were served a little bowl of b.u.t.terfish roe poached in court bouillon, some luxuriously portioned (egg), shiitake, and cuc.u.mber, accompanied by a plate of dried, then pickled daikon. The sea bream appeared squeaky-fresh; it seemed alive on my plate. Then we were served a little bowl of b.u.t.terfish roe poached in court bouillon, some luxuriously portioned uni uni (sea urchin roe). (sea urchin roe).

The screen slid back and Mr Togawa joined us with a jumbo-sized bottle of frozen sake. He sat down and poured me a gla.s.s of frozen, delicious, slushy goodness. In keeping with local custom, I poured back, returning the favor. This usually initiates a lengthy back-and-forth, and that day was no exception. Just when the beer and the frozen sake had combined to give us all mild, blissful grins, a final dish arrived: a few pieces of that incredible o-toro o-toro, lightly seared, still raw in the middle, with a subtle sweet-and-sour sauce. Perfect.

Perfect Perfect. The best sushi ever. The best. Far and away. Let me repeat: the best, finest, freshest, best-prepared sushi meal I've ever had. It took every bit of discipline I had not to moan and giggle and gush throughout the meal. If you're reading this, Togawa-san, and you ever need a favor at four o'clock in the morning, anywhere in the world, I'm there for you. You showed me the light.

That night, my belly still distended from lunch, I strolled over to the old train station and Yurakucho alley, where the air was heavy with the smell of grilling chicken parts and caramelizing marinade. Every little chicken joint, every low-to-the-ground stool and upended beer-crate table, was packed with salarymen drinking and eating yakitori on skewers. I wandered for a while, amazed to find my appet.i.te returning. Down one dark and narrow street, I found a single free stool next to a large and raucous group of business people, all from the same government office, letting loose after a hard day. One of them, in a gregarious mood, reached over and pulled my table near theirs, offering warm greetings and a big portion of hot sake. In a mix of broken English and slurred j.a.panese, we made introductions, and I found myself plunged unexpectedly into yet another orgy of drinking and eating. Trays of skewered yakitori ground chicken b.a.l.l.s, gizzards, marinated cartilage, and breast and leg meat began arriving. As soon as my gla.s.s was half-empty, someone would fill it. Food kept coming, and soon everyone at the table was making jokes, telling stories, complaining about their spouses. One celebrant at the opposite end of the table slumped periodically onto his outstretched arm, unconscious, waking only for more sake. The others gave him little notice. My stated mission, to eat my way around the world, got a lot of interest. Suggestions rang out from every direction.

'Bourdain-san! You try chanko chanko?'

'Bourdain-san! You go for onsen onsen? Kaiseki Kaiseki food? Very good!' food? Very good!'

A pile of stripped skewers acc.u.mulated at each end of the table. The sake kept coming. Soon, one of the salarymen was demonstrating what might have been the twist, others making incomprehensible (in any language) mother-in-law jokes. There was a spirited discussion on the subject of who was cooler: Iron Chef Morimoto (my choice) or Iron Chef Sakai (the popular favorite). I did my best to explain the American reaction to the Bobby Flay 'cutting board incident' during the first Flay/Morimoto face-off, an event seen by many j.a.panese, apparently, as the culinary equivalent of the Tyson/Holyfield ear-chewing debacle.

It turned into a very long night of backslapping, drink-spilling, and loud exchanges of 'Kanpai!' (Cheers!). Just before the evening threatened to veer dangerously into karaoke, I made sincere gestures of grat.i.tude and appreciation and staggered home, leaving at least two of the party sleeping deeply, face down in their seats.

We are barbarians. We are big, hairy, smelly, foreign devils, unsophisticated, loud, clumsy, overexpressive, and overfed, blundering thoughtlessly through life. At least that's how you might feel when preparing yourself for the ryokan ryokan experience. The j.a.panese those that can afford it like to unwind and relax. They like skiing. They adore golf. Fly-fishing is an obsession. But the traditional way to kick back is to spend a weekend at a experience. The j.a.panese those that can afford it like to unwind and relax. They like skiing. They adore golf. Fly-fishing is an obsession. But the traditional way to kick back is to spend a weekend at a ryokan ryokan, a country inn, usually in a rural area in the mountains, away from city life. There, one can spend a few days in quiet reflection, soaking in onsen onsen (hot springs), enjoying the healthy benefits of a ma.s.sage, perhaps taking in a little musical entertainment, and dining on (hot springs), enjoying the healthy benefits of a ma.s.sage, perhaps taking in a little musical entertainment, and dining on kaiseki kaiseki, the most refined, sophisticated style of eating in j.a.pan. An outgrowth of the tea ceremony, kaiseki kaiseki is the national version of haute cuisine, an experience designed to appeal to all the senses, and one's spirit, in equal proportion, as well as one's sense of history and location a complete yin/yang workup. What better way for a stressed-out office drone to lose himself completely to pleasure than to step back for a few days into the sixteenth century? is the national version of haute cuisine, an experience designed to appeal to all the senses, and one's spirit, in equal proportion, as well as one's sense of history and location a complete yin/yang workup. What better way for a stressed-out office drone to lose himself completely to pleasure than to step back for a few days into the sixteenth century?

Nervously waiting for the shinkansen shinkansen, the bullet train, to the seaside town of Atami, I was becoming painfully aware of my otherness. Kaiseki Kaiseki, like no other j.a.panese cuisine, offers a minefield of possible behavioral gaffes to the uninformed Westerner like myself. Now, I know how to use chopsticks. By New York standards, I'm impressive. But while reading up on proper dining etiquette at a kaiseki kaiseki meal, the customary practices and procedures when staying at a meal, the customary practices and procedures when staying at a ryokan ryokan, my heart filled with dread and terror.

Don't point your chopsticks at anyone else.Do not allow the soles of your feet to be exposed to anyone else.Do not step on the wooden dividers between mats.Never leave your chopsticks sticking straight up out of your food.When drinking soup or tea, it's one hand under, palm up, the other cradling around from the side.If it's a soup with chunks, hold your chopsticks thus, and lift the bowl to your lips to sip from it.Do not drown your sushi in soy sauce; to leave granules of rice floating in your dipping sauce is the height of bad taste and brutishness.When your geisha pours you sake (hot sake with cold food; cold sake with hot), wash your cup after drinking and pour her some into the same receptacle.That was not not a finger bowl. a finger bowl.Wash for dinner. Really wash.Dress appropriately.Remember to remove your sandals before entering the room.

No experience is more guaranteed to make you feel like a nine-hundred-pound ape than a kaseiki kaseiki dinner for which you are inadequately briefed. I was very jittery. Shinji had driven me to the station in his personal car, a tiny Renault two-seater convertible, top down. I'd sat in the miniature front seat, my head protruding out beyond the windshield, feeling freakish, huge, and b.u.mbling. I knew I would soon be looking sillier and feeling more awkward than I had since sixth grade, when I'd briefly attended a ballroom-dancing cla.s.s. The memory of that particular horror still makes my hands sweat and my face burn with shame. dinner for which you are inadequately briefed. I was very jittery. Shinji had driven me to the station in his personal car, a tiny Renault two-seater convertible, top down. I'd sat in the miniature front seat, my head protruding out beyond the windshield, feeling freakish, huge, and b.u.mbling. I knew I would soon be looking sillier and feeling more awkward than I had since sixth grade, when I'd briefly attended a ballroom-dancing cla.s.s. The memory of that particular horror still makes my hands sweat and my face burn with shame.

The shinkansen shinkansen are magnificent machines. They slide quietly into train stations, their great bug-spattered nose cones looking like s.p.a.ce shuttles. A cleaning crew in pink outfits rushed on board as soon as mine arrived. A few minutes later, liftoff. I was on my way to Atami, gliding at high speed through the outskirts of Tokyo, a are magnificent machines. They slide quietly into train stations, their great bug-spattered nose cones looking like s.p.a.ce shuttles. A cleaning crew in pink outfits rushed on board as soon as mine arrived. A few minutes later, liftoff. I was on my way to Atami, gliding at high speed through the outskirts of Tokyo, a bento bento box of box of unagi unagi (eel) and rice and a cold Asahi in front of me. The bullet trains can reach speeds of 270 klicks an hour. Mine moved like a high-speed serpent. From the rear of the train, I could watch the front of it as it whipped like a snake head past Mount Fuji's snow-capped peak, through mountains, fields, small towns, and tunnels, the sea appearing and disappearing to my left as the train hissed through s.p.a.ce. About an hour later, I was in Atami, climbing the steep, twisting mountain roads in a taxi. It was sunny and relatively warm for wintertime. Up and up we went, one impossibly angled switchback after another, until we pulled into the hidden driveway of Ryokan Sekiyou, near a mountaintop high over the sea. (eel) and rice and a cold Asahi in front of me. The bullet trains can reach speeds of 270 klicks an hour. Mine moved like a high-speed serpent. From the rear of the train, I could watch the front of it as it whipped like a snake head past Mount Fuji's snow-capped peak, through mountains, fields, small towns, and tunnels, the sea appearing and disappearing to my left as the train hissed through s.p.a.ce. About an hour later, I was in Atami, climbing the steep, twisting mountain roads in a taxi. It was sunny and relatively warm for wintertime. Up and up we went, one impossibly angled switchback after another, until we pulled into the hidden driveway of Ryokan Sekiyou, near a mountaintop high over the sea.

I removed my shoes, careful to kick one off, then place a stockinged foot on the raised interior platform before removing the other shoe. I selected the largest of the sandals provided, which still left my heel hanging out by three inches, did my best to bow gracefully to the two women and one man who had hurled themselves to their knees at my entrance and were bowing so deeply that their noses nearly touched the floor. While my luggage was taken to my room, I sat in a small reading room by the entrance, a few coals glowing in a round brazier, mandarin oranges in a bowl, a stargazer lily and a painting by a local artist the only decoration. In a moment, I was escorted to my room by a woman in traditional garb, her feet moving noiselessly over the floor mats in tiny, rapid steps.

My room was not so much a room as a collection of s.p.a.ces: one large area to eat and sleep in (my futon would arrive later), another area with a low bureau and tall pivoting mirror and a few little drawers, and another area with a low writing table and a heating blanket called a kotatsu kotatsu basically a table you can bundle yourself up under and stay warm in while you write. There were a few flat pillows on the floor, a painting, and a single flower in an unadorned vase on a shelf. That was it. Sliding back one side of the room, I found myself looking out at a small garden, an orange tree, the mountains and valleys of Atami, and the ocean beyond. Every room at the inn had been ingeniously angled in such a way as to provide each visitor with a spectacular view and yet maintain the illusion that one was completely alone, the only guest. I looked warily at the flat pillows on the floor. I knew what that meant. I'd be spending two days sitting exclusively on a hard mat floor, my long legs folded up beneath me. I was getting pretty good at contorting my six-foot-four-inch frame into correct j.a.panese dining position, my legs either tightly crossed or tucked under, knees in front. But getting up afterward was becoming tougher and noisier; the crunching and popping sounds of my forty-four-year-old legs reacquainting themselves with sensation after hours of numbness was not melodious to hear. j.a.pan threatened to cripple me. basically a table you can bundle yourself up under and stay warm in while you write. There were a few flat pillows on the floor, a painting, and a single flower in an unadorned vase on a shelf. That was it. Sliding back one side of the room, I found myself looking out at a small garden, an orange tree, the mountains and valleys of Atami, and the ocean beyond. Every room at the inn had been ingeniously angled in such a way as to provide each visitor with a spectacular view and yet maintain the illusion that one was completely alone, the only guest. I looked warily at the flat pillows on the floor. I knew what that meant. I'd be spending two days sitting exclusively on a hard mat floor, my long legs folded up beneath me. I was getting pretty good at contorting my six-foot-four-inch frame into correct j.a.panese dining position, my legs either tightly crossed or tucked under, knees in front. But getting up afterward was becoming tougher and noisier; the crunching and popping sounds of my forty-four-year-old legs reacquainting themselves with sensation after hours of numbness was not melodious to hear. j.a.pan threatened to cripple me.

A server opened one of the screens from the long foyer to my room and motioned for me to sit.

Crunch! Pop! Snap! Crunch! Pop! Snap!

At the low lacquer table in the main s.p.a.ce, she gave me a hot towel, followed by green tea and a candied fig. She left for a while, reappearing later with a neatly folded stack of clothing. To my discomfort, she stayed to show me how, once I'd bathed, I should dress. A long gray-patterned yukata yukata with billowing arms, a belt which took many attempts for me to master tying and knotting correctly an outer jacket, from which my arms protruded ludicrously, and little two-toed white socks, which on my size-twelve feet looked like particularly unflattering Mary Janes. with billowing arms, a belt which took many attempts for me to master tying and knotting correctly an outer jacket, from which my arms protruded ludicrously, and little two-toed white socks, which on my size-twelve feet looked like particularly unflattering Mary Janes.

Left alone to bathe, I pondered my environment. I stared out the window, all thoughts of the outside world quickly banished. There was nothing in my room, just that single flower, the paper walls, the wide expanse of floor. In no time, I felt my metabolism shift, my whole system undergoing some kind of temporary metamorphosis from neurotic, hyperactive, short attention-spanned New Yorker to a character in a Kurosawa samurai flick. The surroundings were identical. I felt I could sit there forever in my yukata yukata motionless, doing nothing more involved than contemplating an orange. motionless, doing nothing more involved than contemplating an orange.

There were two parts to the bathroom. The toilet, a typically j.a.panese device overloaded with gadgets, was in one room. It looked like a regular toilet that had been tricked out by a bunch of speed-freak aeros.p.a.ce engineers. From the array of multicolored b.u.t.tons, plastic tubes, non-English instructions and diagrams, I gathered that the thing could clean and sterilize itself after each use; spinning and washing the seat, it could direct various widths and pressures of warm-water jet at your r.e.c.t.u.m a feature that might cause my old sous-chef, Steven, never to leave; it could wash, sanitize, powder, and emoliate every recess of your nether regions; and it could probably play a medley of popular show tunes while doing it. I was afraid to flush the d.a.m.n thing.

The other part of the room was more in keeping with my idea of superior plumbing. A deep oblong cedar tub sat against one wall, next to an open window, from which one could gaze out at the mountaintops without being seen, along with an adjacent area in which to wash oneself prior to soaking in the tub. There were a small wooden stool, a scrub brush, a wooden bucket, and a high-powered-spray shower attachment. The idea was to squat on the wooden stool, soap up, scrub oneself down with the hard-bristle brush, pausing to rinse now and again with buckets of hot or cold water, as one liked, then shower. The whole floor, tiled in black granite, tilted conveniently into recessed troughs and drains. After one's outer layers of skin had been scrubbed off, one slid gratefully into the waiting tub, soaking for a long, long time, the window open just enough for a cooling breeze, a view of ripe oranges dropping from the trees in the outer garden.

After a bath, I nervously dressed myself in my yukata yukata, socks, jacket, and belt, hoping to G.o.d that Steven or worse, my cooks would never see footage of this event. The yukata yukata was long, ankle-length and tight, constricting the legs like a long skirt, so I had to take short, quick steps. With the addition of the clunky, ill-fitting sandals one wore while moving from room to room, I felt like I was sashaying down a runway in an evening gown as I tottered off to the larger area of the room, which had been prepared for my dinner. was long, ankle-length and tight, constricting the legs like a long skirt, so I had to take short, quick steps. With the addition of the clunky, ill-fitting sandals one wore while moving from room to room, I felt like I was sashaying down a runway in an evening gown as I tottered off to the larger area of the room, which had been prepared for my dinner.

I would be dining alone at the long black table. By alone, I mean that I would be the only one eating. I would be attended to by two traditionally garbed geishas, who would a.s.sist me with my table tactics and food and drink service and provide musical entertainment. Mr Komatsu, the ryokan ryokan's manager, in tie and tails, knelt in front of me at a respectful distance, observing and stage-managing the event. A server ran food from the kitchen, opening a screen and dropping to her knees with each course before sliding it across the floor to the geishas.

I managed to seat myself appropriately behind the low table, without exposing any crotch, and washed my hands with a steaming towel. A handwritten menu with a personalized watercolor of a flower on rice paper (caligraphy and art by the chef) described in j.a.panese what I'd be eating. Kaiseki Kaiseki menus are a reflection of the region in which they are served and rely, to as great a degree as possible, on local products that are in season. The meal is in many