There are things that happen below the surface. Things that require intricate nocturnal guarding.  Yes, those are sharpened chopsticks.I took a ferry across the Sea of Japan this weekend to a land of explosive architecture and delicately marbled beef.

Kobe cuts a Caligari horizon. Crystal towers, red archways, and a jagged white structure like the fallen skeleton of a giant praying mantis (you know, if mantis’s actually had skeletons) tear into the sky.  My eyes grew dizzy with tracing.

Unfortunately, if you dig any deeper into Kobe you will find an empty shell, a standing cardboard set with not much happening behind except supporting wooden planks and a smoking janitor.

Except one thing.

The names of Japanese restaurants are . . . misleading . . . to say the least. The Skylark Gusto, which to my mind calls cherub spotted waterfalls, swans, and twirling maidens, could be more adequately described as Denny’s bastard child. So when my friends brought me to a place called Steakland, the aching anticipation in my stomach turned to churls of disgust.

Oh, how wrong I was.  Steakland just happened to be the classiest restaurant I’ve seen here.  Immaculate white napkins draped over arms, the walls cobbled not with stone but the round purple eyes at the bottom of wine bottles.  But that would soon melt away in reverence to what was on the menu.

If I’m being honest (and I’d like to believe I exude truth from every pore) then I would say I’m not satisfied with the way we get meat. If I had my druthers, anyone who wanted to dine on flesh would get a bow and arrow in their hands, a cleaver in their belt, and a map to the nearest forest.

I listened in awe to the Kobe cow royal treatment. Filled with beer, swooned with Mozart and Beethoven, their relaxed muscles tenderized by professional masseuses. These cows have it better than I do, envious only of the Hindu cow . . . and even then I’m not sure.

A man with no teeth prepared the meat on a piping black surface.  I couldn’t help but wonder if his gums could partake of his own creation. With a whip of his sharp toothed blade, he X’d the meat and lay it before me.  I stabbed my fork into the lightly browned cube, placed it on my tongue.

And I understood.

Here are some phrases I hate that I’ve heard describe the steak I tried: Succulent. Savory. Melts in your mouth. But to insult this delicacy with such mundane phrasing is impossible.  In order to do it justice I would have to call upon dead languages, all of which are unavailable to me. So I’ll only say.

Go. Taste. Live.

-Christian

This entry was posted on Sunday, October 19th, 2008 at 12:00 am and is filed under All Comics, Incompletes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.