I love living in metropolitan cities and I love visiting them too. You can find everything and anything in cities like these, as different cultures crash and wash over each other, the sounds of life emerging from the babble of a hundred voices — it’s something, strangely enough, that you can recognise wherever you go.
And like Russian dolls, big engulfing small, they can nest inside each other, like finding a Chinatown in Berlin or Petaling Street in London. Or Little Tokyo in Hong Kong.
We walk aimlessly, running occasionally into one shop after another. In one hidey-hole we find a wall of boxes, of glass-walled compartments, offering to anyone who cared their precious contents for sale: Wrist watches from the 80’s, plasticky and neon-coloured. Anime action figurines in their original packages, unwrapped and in mint condition. Audio cassettes capturing in their tapes music unknown and unheard of, likely pop kitsch. Everything you never wanted, you can buy it here.
.
.
And what is a visit to Little Tokyo without sampling its fare? From sprawling franchises like Yoshinoya (far more porky fare here than what we get in their Kuala Lumpur outlets) where Ekin-san buys takeaway ōmori (yummy beef rice bowl) for his hungry, much-deprived Japanese wife Marie in Macau (but more on that later) to authentic Japanese restaurants like Ootoya where no sushi is served, no California rolls… just some plain good ol’ eating.
I pick strands of cold soba that has been resting on an iced bamboo tray, dip into its sauce — slippery, clear, pristine soba tsuyu — and slip it into my mouth. Something that tastes like a fresh spring day. I may never need to eat unagi ever again.
And the oceans are being overfished, I know. And I hope this isn’t one of them rare, endangered tuna species that will die off if I just ate one more bite. But Al Gore and Leonardo DiCaprio forgive me, I can’t help myself. I just must have that one more slice of raw tuna dipped in this unearthly wasabi soy sauce, I must. I may never be a food critic, sure — but I think I finally get what them food bloggers have been rhapsodizing so orgasmically about all this while.
This may not be as good as sex (don’t let them fool you) but damn. It bloody well could be.
Maybe if I ate another slice..?
.
.
Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dum went up the hill
And made strange faces at each other
Tweedle-Dee farted and Tweedle-Dum couldn’t keep still
And they both stayed dum dum ever after.
.
Postscript.
Hmm. Some friends have been telling me, it must be so nice to travel to so many places. Well, yeah. It helps clear our minds and make us realise the world is still so big out there we are so small and life is so precious.
But it’s not all fun and play and travel and whatever. In between trips, we moulder as most average joes do, sweltering in our automobiles under a hot, beating Malaysian sun, or freezing from central air-conditioning in tiny office cubicles.
Travel opens us up. They remind us, we are alive. Still. Life is out there, yes, but it is also here, right now. And so. What do we do next? Hmm.
.
Copyright © 2010 Kenny Mah Ying Fye.
Macau & Hong Kong & Back Again: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5 & Part 6.
Like Mr Baggins, there and back again, and never the same for it? =)
Would love to travel, really. But I just wish passports knew enough to renew themselves. =p
Travel makes people think, and makes us realize things need not be done the same old way every single time.
Who’s more interesting than a well traveled man?
Soba that tastes like a fresh spring day — beautiful description, Kenny.
Food post! Fess up, you’re a closeted Food blogger
Love the post…
“This may not be as good as sex (don’t let them fool you) but damn. It bloody well could be. ..”
haha.. just the act of sex, or do u mean the climax?!
oh… i miss gyuu don (beef rice)!! i used to have oumori… i tried it in LA but suckzzzzzzzzzzz just like other sushi restaurants outside japan… still you gotta go to japan eat their food… i miss japan!!!
your opening sentence had me rushing to dictionary.com to discover the difference between “metropolitan” and “cosmopolitan” … but then, i got distracted by your, ermm, photos, and i never found out. damn.
anyways, reading this blog is a real test to my resolve to travel abroad as LITTLE as possible. please, let’s see more entries about the pleasant thoughts that come to people during the 90-minute drive from jalan sultan ismail to subang jaya on any given evening, or the simple pleasures of decorating a tiny office cubicle
Little Tokyo in KL!! I think you’ve identified my life’s purpose!! Please don’t say someone’s already done it! I’ll type out my resignation letter right away!
I totally agree with your opinion on travel because if one doesn’t travel & extensively explore, how can one open those awaiting doors in our lives?
Our lives are full of mysteries — always waiting to be unraveled. Don’t you agree?
Oh yeah it’s definitely time for my feet to travel again!
okay for a moment i thought, “what! kenny & the devil went to Tokyo already? I thought it is later this year?” Then i saw little tokyo: macau & hong kong …
hahahahaha love the way u describe the pristine soba and overfished ocean!
i’ve heard good things about yoshinoya elsewhere, but why does the ones in KL pale in comparison? hmm…
Somehow most foreign franchises seem to taste better beyond our shores ..
oh what fun! what adventure. And cold soba sounds soo soo soo good now in our hot hot weather!
wishing you, devil and your family a happy, healthy and prosperous Chinese new year!
We strongly suspect the re-beginning is on da way, as the teasing preliminaries are opening up and the before mains whiffing from the sides, which oriental travels far & between are won to unravel
Hardwork makes a vacation more meaningful, no?
‘what do we do next?’ -> chungking mansion
hej! Kenny…Gong Xi Fa Cai and let the tiger roars…
yes agree that travel will teach us ways we never know we would/could
Self-renewing passports? Great Idea!
Now add in self-applying visas, and we got it made!
Who’s more interesting than a well-traveled man? Well, maybe a cute young thing whom the well-travelled man can take on his travels and show the world, the Big Beautiful World…
It really, really did taste like a fresh spring day. Just perfect.
I think I never truly appreciated Japanese cuisine till I met you. And HairyBerry. And Devil. And now just-returned-to-NYC Ekin-san. Yay for friends introducing us to goooood stuff!
Love Post lah. As in, love for food…
Awww… thank you, dear.
Cuisine and Copulation for Ciki, Part 1:
Well, if you want to get down to details… the first glimpse of the dish that may be bestowed upon us via the descriptions and the photographs in the menu is like the first sight of someone to whom you are unavoidably attracted to.
Then you make your order to the waiter, not unlike signalling to the object of your desire you are interested. Very.
And there is the wait. Whither for the food to be prepared or your lad/lass to respond, it may be deliciously excruciating.
O! but when the first whiff of the aroma wafts from the kitchen as the server brings it forward, ’tis like the first scent of a lover, a well-chosen fragrance molten and mellowed in all-natural musk…
Cuisine and Copulation for Ciki, Part 2:
… then comes a careful lick, a swirl in the glass, a deep inhalation, a kiss upon the rim, a slow swallow, a milky gurgle, a nibble here, a naughty bite there, a chaste murmur as the flavours and the fondling of tastes begin…
You chew.
You sniff, some more.
Your eyes light up in surprise.
Oh.
You masticate and you marinate yourself in the throes of this dish, this dining, this feasting. Your senses thrust and tremble, your skin glimmers with beads of sweat, this is spicy, this is sure, this is sunshine bright and pure…
Cuisine and Copulation for Ciki, Part 3:
And comes the apex, comes the height of your delight…
Comes the elephant and the white horses in solar flight.
There is a myth of a man, a very rich man, the richest in the world, it is told, who wanted to die in bed with a hundred virgins, and at the moment of climax, be crushed from above by an elephant. La petite mort? I don’t think so.
This pleasure, this sweet death, is enormous. As, one would imagine, is the damage to the wallet, for something this bloody good.
Ze End. Oh la la.
I miss Japan too… and I haven’t even been there yet! (But plan to rectify this, of course, in the coming months. Hehe.)
blardy hell.. remind me never to ask for the LONG answer .. chis ..
I THINK ITS TIME TO GO HOME AND HAVE HOT SEX!
What, now? You AND me? Wow, that’s rather forward of you, don’t you think, young missie?
*considers*
Okay, let’s go!
hahaha
don’t pretend la you 
Cis. I mana ade pretend? I’m all over you, babe.
You did tell Cumi, right? You know, your hubby?
Oh, don’t worry. Cumi’s well taken care of, eh Ciki? *wink wink*
Hehe. Who’s taking care of Cumi, again? *wink WINK wink*
Bunny. Bunny’s taking care of Cumi.
Bunny? Siape Bunny ni? *scratches head*
1. Eeks! Did I use the wrong word. Oh well. My Engrand not very powder.
2. Happy thoughts for distracting photos! Hehe.
3. Entries about the pleasant thoughts that come to people during the 90-minute drive from Jalan Sultan Ismail to Subang Jaya? Sure. Suuuuure. Maybe. One day. Anything is possible, right?
No, don’t worry — no one’s done it yet! Hehe.
But when you do go about creating Little Tokyo in KL, do count me in your creative team hor? It’d be so much fun!
(Or at least your food-tasting team lor. That should be the best bit, hehe.)
I totally agree. Sometimes it’s not the mysteries themselves that matters, it’s the unravelling. Not the doors, but the opening and closing…
Ooh. Where to, Sir Paul?
Heh heh. You know I love my soba.
And Tokyo still seems so far away… *sighs*
I dunno… maybe the locally-sourced produce just ain’t right? Some things can be transplanted successfully… others not so. Ah well.
Maybe. But our own local fares taste the best on home ground, fer sure!
Oh it does, doesn’t it? I can eat cold soba or chasoba every day in this weather! *sweats sweats*
Thanks, dear! We wish you and Capt’n Hook a very prosperous and excellent Year of the Harimau too!
Re-beginnings. Hmm, that sure is a concept I’d like to wrap my head around these days…
Chungking Mansion? Er, I think I best move to Macau else the Hong Kong portion of my series may never be finished!
Hark! I hear the Tiger roar…
And sometimes… ways we never knew we should?