Tasting more wierd foods and refusing even more

Online Travel Vietnam: For the first few days, we lived almost entirely on Japanese traditional foods like rice, sushi (uncooked fish), noodles, etc.

From Vietnam, we went to the Japanese island of Okinawa which was where Hitomi originally came from. For the first few days, we lived almost entirely on Japanese traditional foods like rice, sushi (uncooked fish), noodles, etc. Sushi takes a little getting used to but I found it quite palatable after a couple of days of living on it. Incidentally, the island, having been occupied by Americans during the second world war, has very good restaurants everywhere which cater to European and American tastes.

On the last day of our stay in Okinawa, Hitomi suggested that we tasted some traditional Okinawan food. She ordered three plates of snake steaks (see below). I have had snake-meals in Vietnam and thought no more of them. But the Okinawan snake-steaks looked particularly gruesome.

Just one look at those steaks and I was on to French fries again! But it was time to leave for China.

In China, Long suggested that we eat in the Xin Li Zhi chain restaurants, China's version of the Macdonalds. Here, Long stressed, we can have good tradtional Chinese food at reasonable prices. When we went to one of them in Guangzhou, eyes of frogs, wings of bats, rattlesnake steaks and tails of rats were available as special treats. As I was not sure of what to order, Long ordered a surprise dish for me: a plate of snake-steaks (see below):

Needless to say, I could not eat anything from that plate! So, I was back on French fries and fruits for the remainder of our stay in China. And, of course, Long had more of, what had, by now, become customary for him - snake blood mixed with Chinese rice wine (see below):

From Long's apparent liking for some of the wierd foods on my Asian wanderings, it would be tempting to think of him as a typical Chinaman. Nothing could be farther from the truth: Long and Hitomi, like me, came to the UK for their higher studies and then just stayed on. After living in the UK for a few years, they became naturalised and now regard themselves as British rather than Asian. Long did not eat everything that was eaten by other Chinese people. For example, he found the Chinese custom of eating dogs and cats as quite uncivilised. One day, he narrated a real story which his father, a retired PLA officer, had told him when he was a little boy. When the PLA marched into Tibet in 1950, there were stray dogs and cats everywhere they went. But within months, all these stray animals disappeared having ended up on the dinner tables of Chinese armymen!. Long thought that the only reason why China solved its food-shortages before India was because the Chinese had none of the taboos which plagued Indian eating. In his opinion, a western popular belief about a Chinaman's concept of what non-vegetarian food to eat was absolutely spot on: eat anything on four legs except, perhaps, a table and; eat anything that flies except, perhaps, an aeroplane!

Source: sulekha.com/Oratrip.