The last time I found myself in all-you-can-eat sushi situation, my sister Mel and I were ordering a large portion of the Pacific Ocean from a Thai waitress who kept looking at us as though all the stories of a starving Africa were troubling and true.
The spot was called ‘Sushi in the Sky with Diamonds’. It’s this big old bar/restaurant in Chiang Mai where, if you have no shame, no tight clothing and no sense of self-preservation, you can find yourself lying flat on your back, tummy gargantuan from gluttony murmuring ‘Mel, I think I need to go to the emergency room.”
The thing about sushi is that I don’t recommend it to anyone.
Like heroine, crack and everything else that ends in cold turkey, sushi is instantly addictive. So, in the spirit of not leading blissfully ignorant souls down a dark and desperate road, my answer to anyone inquiring as to whether they should try it is: “Don’t do it, man. Once you know, you can never not know and you’ll be thinking about the stuff more often than you think about world peace.”
Mel and I?
We’re irretrievably far gone.
This is why we’re sitting in Thailand ordering everything from salmon sashimi to spicy tuna to tuna tempura at an all-you-can-eat buffet that seems sent to us by a beneficent Poseidon himself.
So we eat.
Endlessly.
We send out for it raw and in heaps but the buffet also includes the like of yakisoba and chicken satay so we waste little time in ordering that too. Naturally, what with piles of plates surrounding us like an army against relationships, we laugh about how two dishkillers like ourselves are destined to die lonely, loveless deaths.
While it’s a terribly long time in the making, at some point, we feel a little uncomfortable. The plates keep coming and we vaguely remember that we’re oceans away from our gym memberships but soon a couple of 2-for-1 margaritas all but drown out the cries from our toi-toing stomachs.
Though it’s heaven for all of seven buffet plates, the catch is that while you pay a measly 350 Thai Baht for the pleasure, everything you don’t eat is billed at cost price. In sober terms this means that you have to eat every last morsel you order or your N$116 buffet becomes a N$500 regret.
With that in mind, an eventual, desperate and cheapskate stuffing of sushi down my neck to avoid paying an extra N$400 is what lands me on my back at our backpackers.
Somehow my sister half carries me home while my stomach spasms and, when we get there, I think it wise to drank a gallon of water to try and soothe my aching abdomen.
In later life, my sister and I will tell people that the water caused a mountain of sushi rice to expand in my stomach and wreak havoc on surrounding organs. The pain then resulted in me crying black eyeliner rivers as I clutched Melissa’s wrist while swearing my need for the ER.
Eyes sparkling, spirit broken and with a stomach akin to what you would see in a Kwashiorkor segment on National Geographic.
Mel will tell you that at some point I just plain passed out.
Though people laugh about eating themselves into a coma, I am one of those rare specimens who can eat sushi into unconsciousness bordering on death, disaster and an afterlife in which I swear off sushi and promise less greedy behaviour.
Yes, a noble and necessary oath for sure but despite crying, coma and contrition, the truth is…
I lied.
Which is why I’m sitting at Daisho Sushi & Wine Bar in Windhoek. Eyes gleaming, stomach in thrilled throes of amnesia, licking my lips while a waiter places a massive plate of sushi in front of my stupid self.
Of course, Mel’s back in the mix.
You’d think she’d know better than to let me anywhere near anything sushi centric and all-you-can-eat but, clearly, the girl wants to see me dead.
So we eat.
Endlessly.
And I write a little something in my column so you can all go out and support the best of service and value for money sushi in town.
As for Mel and I? Idiocy and odds are good that we’ll see you at the next one.
Well, there…and in casualty.