Super-Size Me

So- tonight after work, I rode my bike out to McDonald's (about five miles, give or take- everything's in metric here, and my American brain rejects the decimalized system) in Kusatsu, in search of a Big Mac. After all that smoked fish and authentic rice noodles, I needed to center myself and remember who I was. America is the Big Mac of the world- a monument to excess, we need only one all-beef patty, but we take two. Our sauce is special, we have condiments we can't even taste, like lettuce, and our bun comes in three parts rather than the standard two. In short, I really, really wanted a burger.

So I'm sitting down to my big ol' plate o' fat when a tall, blond, blue-eyed guy lopes in from the street, tentatively approaches the table and utters the international greeting of goodwill: "God, I hope you speak English."

Turns out that this guy- Josh, from here on in- is an Australian teaching for the Nova program (a private language-learning shop in town) and that he arrived in Japan TODAY. Just got off the plane in Osaka this morning. Brand new. There is now officially a Gaijin in Japan newer at this than I am. Now, he's studied the language for five years. He's definitely better-qualified in the teaching department. But we're all in this together- there are few enough foreigners that establishing a communications network just seems like a good idea. So we chat for awhile, swap "business cards" (in fact, our respective McD's and KFC reciepts with our contact info on the backs) and wish each other luck.

On the way home, I stop at the 7-11 for some snackyfoods. The Big Mac has awakened the slumbering glutton within. So now, we get a Wierd Japanese Snackyfood Review (I am TOTALLY doing more of these in the future):

Peanuts Bread: It's a PB&J sandwich sans both the J and the crusts, pressformed into two little pockets. The label reads (in english): "This snack contains peanut butter made from peanuts of good quality. You can enjoy it as it is or after toasting it light."

I enjoyed it as it is- toasting it light seemed a bit too complicated for me. The peanut butter is slightly sweet, like in a Reeses' cup, and creamy rather than crunchy. Drat. This is strange, because things in Japan A) are usually less sweet than their stateside counterparts and B) usually have this strange fruity aftertaste that tastes a lot like the entire country smells. It's not a bad smell, anymore. It was pretty rough at first... it's kind of a cloying, sweet, fruity smell, that is nearly toxic in big doses. Big Doses usually happen when there's any amount of upturned earth. I personally think this is just how this island smells, and that smell permeates EVERYTHING, especially the food and drink. But this dubiously-described peanut snackwich has evaded the fruity aftertaste.

Final Grade: B. Coulda been an A with chunky peanut butter or more substantial bread.

pax.