You don’t expect little old ladies to have their hands all over the fruit display in supermarkets. But there they are, squeezing the stone fruit so vigorously, you know the pretty purple plums are going to bruise. So why doesn’t the store manager say something? What’s going on in the power dynamics over there? Get the scoop!

First published:

The Torch
Thursday, November 2, 2006 – Volume 53 Issue 9
Arts & Entertainment Page 11

So. Interesting products, fair variety, loads of alien hieroglyphics, occasionally alarming English translations, friendly and smiling proprietor-couple. I’m not going to tell you too much because that will make you all curious, and then you’ll want to visit, which might be problematic. Especially if your mom has a habit of doling out “I told you so”s.

Stereotypical Behavior (Number One on a List where Nobody’s Counting):

If you’ve ever observed an Asian Obasan (term of respect for a middle-aged woman or “Aunty,” not necessarily denoting familiar relation) riffling through fresh produce in a grocery store, you might have noticed her giving the specimen in hand a surreptitious squeeze. Squeezing the plum, pepper, whatever, supplements the original visual appraisal: it lets her know if it’s firm and, therefore, fresh.

Photograph from Sveeta on Flickr

Obviously, doing so gives the proprietor of the store lots of grief. Because squeezing = bruising = more unsold produce = lesser profits. Catching you in the act on a bad day (or if they’re simply snarky that way) may prompt a vicious tongue-lashing or a “nose held high” proclamation that your business is unwelcome.

It is a silly, silly, proprietor though, who would give the Obasan such ungenerous treatment. And that is because of what I call the Aunty-Aunty Network: a powerful, word of mouth, information relay system among the drivers of the free world’s market economy.

These mighty holders of the purse strings are the go-to people for “the goods.” Need a caterer? They have contacts for the Barefoot Contessa’s mentor at 50 percent off mate’s rates. Looking for a parking lot in the city on a Friday night when the Red Sox are playing? They know the secret squirrel underground and can get you in, gratis. Powerful, powerful people.

Anyway. Unlike the indelicate behavior of these Asian Obasans, it seems their Western counterparts engage in no such faux pas. The Western Obasan is content to place the first watermelon she lays hands on into her cart, and will not proceed to thump each and every orb in the heap, listening for the reverberated guarantee of sweetness.

The bastard child of multiple cultures (me) therefore exerts her first act of rebellious independence by refusing to grope produce in supermarket aisles. She will not poke, she will not prod, she will not do anything to incur the wrath of said proprietor… she will triumphantly place virginal produce in her cart.

Which will lead to her being duped by the friendly and smiling proprietor-couple, who cheerfully assure her that the cut-throat priced sweet Korean rice cakes (dduk, similar to Japanese mochi) she had been craving were delivered on that very day. Which will make her resist the evolutionary instinct to grope for freshness. Which will culminate in her spitting stale, sesame paste-centered, rubber tires on the asphalt, give her pause about its biodegradability (unlikely), and prompt her to write a rambling piece about why you should always molest your fruit.

Photograph from Mrs. Maze on Flickr

Now, I am not saying you should not give them and their rubber tire factory a visit (did I mention they also stock dried deer antlers?). I’m just saying Asiana on 92 Warren Avenue in East Providence has beautifully soft mochi that’s absolutely delish, and you won’t even have to give up your first-born.

How to keep warm when Jack Frost hates you.

 

 

First published:

The Torch
Thursday, December 14, 2006 – Volume 53 Issue 14
Arts & Entertainment Page 8

A long time ago, when I lived on a tropical isle and everyday was a t-shirt, shorts, and flip flop day, I thought snow was pretty.I envisioned rosy-cheeked kids in scarfs and mittens and bobble hats gamboling about… little puppies wagging their tails behind them. I sighed over crackling log fires, hot mulled cider, the resiny spice of fairy-lit Christmas trees. I pictured melting moments fresh from the oven, catching snowflakes on tongues, little boys tee hee-ing as they competed at chiseling snow moats with hot pee.The fantasy, of course, was before I decided to roast my own chestnuts, and had to spend the rest of the day cleaning chestnut insides off half the free world. (The chestnuts. They explode. You have to slit them first.)

Totally not my fault, because on that tropical isle…? They use these funky rotating drums filled with coal chips to roast them. No slitting, no kabooming, and you have the bonus of looking like a sexy, rugged, coal-miner when you’re done. (Sensitive new age men shell chestnuts for their dates. Real men extract them whole.)That was also before I had to wake up a full hour earlier to scrape snow off my car and slide around on roads, or when I had to battle the wind, straining to put one foot before the other, so cold that my words would come out half-formed and wonky. Gah, gah, gah, gah!

Suffice it to say, I am no fan of the cold. Each year, it’s me against Jack Frost. Each year, I battle a relentless, cruel, elemental warfare.

But I’m getting smarter. Not necessarily winning, but no longer whimpering home tucked-tail either. Whereas before, I dismissed the girls who prance around in their cute little boots and mini skirts, using the Chinese dialect phrase “ai sui mai mia” (to value beauty over life); this winter, I stopped to ask them what the deal was.

Their answer? Adorable, Hello Kitty-emblazoned belly-warmers or haramaki.

It’s a Japanese thing, this haramaki. If you’re familiar with “hara-kiri” – honor suicides carried out by the Japanese warrior class where disgraced samurai plunge their katana (swords) into their bellies – and with “maki” – sushi rolls wrapped in roasted seaweed – then you would be able to put two and two together. Haramaki means “belly wrapper.” Essentially a piece of stretchy, tube-like fabric that goes on snugly over your belly, it draws on the Traditional Chinese Medicine concept of your body’s chi or energy.

Contrary to what Western science says – that you lose most of your body’s heat via your head – if you visit the Land of the Rising Sun, you’ll see boisterous toddlers running around bare-headed. Every single one of them, though, will have their bellies warmly swathed.

The idea is that your body prioritizes keeping your vital organs warm. So if your belly isn’t warm and toasty, then your body starts channeling heat from the extremities (fingers, toes) inwards. So, keep the belly balmy and the extremities stay warm – or stand a better chance of not freezing off, anyway.

And since we’re talking about keeping warm from the inside (while masquerading as a food column), may I introduce you to the humble ginger root? A FIERY RESTORATIVE (I read this description on some hippy barefoot doctor manual a long time ago, and since then, I’ve made it a point of booming it out every time… go on, say it with me!), ginger contributes a distinct scent and a pleasant warmth wherever it shows up. It’s like the cute guy (or girl) who smells amazing, loves to cuddle, and boasts a rapier sharp wit to boot.

Pregnant women and the motion sickness-plagued nibble on candied morsels of ginger to stave off nausea – much better than the chemicals your pharmacist will try to push on you (and take it from someone who never had to fight anybody for the window seat, it works). And on a cold, dreary, rainy-snowy day, nothing beats sweet, gingery, yam “soup.”

It’s not a soup, really… more like dessert. The Chinese believe all food is therapeutic and, therefore, even desserts are good for you… but that is material for another column.

Here’s what you do: Grab a knob of ginger about half the size of your fist, scrape off it’s skin with a spoon, slice it poker chip thin, then dump it into, say, five quarts of water with a generous handful of dried dates and a couple of skinned, chunked yams.

Quantities aren’t exact here. Want it spicier? Throw in more ginger. Sweeter? More dates or some dark brown sugar (I like the molasses flavor). Love yams? The more the merrier. Bring everything to a boil and keep it on a slow simmer for at least 45 minutes. By then, your kitchen will smell, well, gingery, datey and yammy… way better than hot chocolate.

Photograph from Uplifting Arts on Flickr

We’ve all done it. Laughed hysterically at half-baked English translations on menus, street signs, packaging, and the like. The seafood special of “fried rice with crap” doesn’t sound terribly appetizing, and you and your buds can’t wait to patronize the Gentlemen’s Club that boasts “special cocktail for ladies with nuts.” Yet, would you rather there be no translation?

First published in:

The Torch
Thursday, May 10, 2007 – Volume 53 Issue 28
Arts & Entertainment Page 9

Photograph from Moyogo on Flickr

I would be lying if I said I wasn’t amused… maybe even slightly mortified. But I’ve also encountered more than my fair share of otherwise perfectly reasonable and intelligent people who readily go beyond good natured ribbing into dancing around, sniggering “Nyah, nyah, nyah… your English sucks!” territory.

And while I agree that the “seafood special” of “fried rice with crap” doesn’t sound terribly appetizing, I can’t help but ask: Would you rather there be no translation?

After all, if you could read the menu/road sign/etc. in the original Japanese/ Spanish/ Tagalog/ Indonesian, the descriptions, I’m sure, are likely to be eloquent enough. So what these people have done, pretty much, is attempt to make your experience in their restaurant/city/place of interest more accessible.

And you sneer at them.

What’s that? What’s that you say? They’re mangling English, YOUR language? And you “can’t stand it”? You should hear yourself butcher your “Just Enough French” phrasebook. And thank the market vendor for keeping a straight face when you asked for “un gros carottes.”

Oh yes, I’m perfectly aware it’s not one-way. That market vendor probably tells everyone how the bold American chick unabashedly asked for “un gros carottes” – in broad daylight, no less!

Just keep in mind that basketballer Marcus Camby has the Chinese character for “ghost” tattooed on his neck. Not a prank, merely the unfortunate fact that “I’ve got soul” lost its original nuances and gained new ones in the translation process.

You know the drill. Languages are so complex that flawless translations are almost impossible. Which is why tonight, I’ll be tossing back “wine that leaves you nothing to hope for” with the beau, while we puzzle out the wisdom on a fortune cookie slip I got recently: “Confucius says, love in triangles not in squares”.

Smiling, not sniggering.

Photograph from tankgrrl on Flickr

Photograph from SiFu Renka on Flickr