Tam Brahm in Tokyo (Genre - Satire)

I have been a member of PETA (People Eating Tasty Animals) since I was a kid and because I started early it never pricked my consciousness that I am filling my belly at the expense of another living creature. Whenever someone pointed this out I would feel bad for sometime but eventually succumb to temptation of the aroma and flavours (I will blame Adam of ‘Adam and Eve’ fame for my temptations). I know it’s a sin and one day I promise to quit. How, when, where ….are questions for which I don’t have an answer right now. It may happen anytime in the future and if not then definitely at my deathbed, when I shall have the last bowl of chicken soup for the soul and thereafter rest in peace ;) :P

I am a self-confessed food lover. I love to cook, to learn different recipes, taste , experience different flavors from different parts of the country and the world. And being a non–vegetarian is definitely helpful in my quests to relish the culinary delights of the world. I must also confess that I have a fetish for fruits and exotic sounding ingredients and dishes and make it a point to try them and experience the flavor, texture, taste and aroma of those dishes. So except for the guilt at times I have enjoyed my membership to the non-vegetarian club. Being a travel afficado it comes very handy when you go travel to less known places and have very limited choice to fill your ...'Paapi Pet' a.k.a..your belly.

I have many friends who are pure vegans and some being followers of Jainism are even more particular about not eating certain staple vegetarian items. Having spent time with them I can understand the difficult choices they have to make when they travel places and don’t have the luxury of eating anything that’s available. Because of my experience I would like to share a well written article (Tam Brahm in Tokyo) on a ‘Brahmin’ journalist (Sharmila Ganeshan-Ram) during her stay in Tokyo...its food for thought for the non-members of PETA. Bon Appetit :)

"If the accented air-hostess hands you an extra piece of orange, banana, bread and other healthy duty-free items without asking, it’s not always hospitality. Sometimes, this is an apology. Like, when you are a vegetarian passenger who does not eat ‘Japanese fish rice’ and haven’t bothered to specify that in your air ticket to the land of the rising yen. That’s precisely the turbulent aerial point at which herbivores like this reporter, while crossing over the Pacific Ocean to Japan, realise that their food struggle has officially begun.

The pack of peanuts served on the flight suddenly becomes too precious to be consumed immediately. It’s the kind of misery that has no company—everyone, including your three Indian co-passengers loves pork, the smell of seafood hangs in the air, English will not get you far and the coffee shop server points at bread toast when you ask for "no meat, no chicken and no fish". The virgin Tam Brahm bloodstream doesn’t seem so virtuous anymore in this alien land with few PETA activists. "Are you religiously vegetarian?" a fellow journalist asks.

"No. It’s only a matter of habit," you lie, while carefully digging into French fries at McDonald’s, the only restaurant open at 11pm in Makuhari, which is about 25 minutes from Tokyo.

The fries taste very different. "Pork oil," chides your well-meaning fellow journalist. An instinctive image of your grandfather reacting to this ancestral sin interferes with digestion but you recover to say, "What happens in Japan stays in Japan," secretly hoping the next day will be a new one. That, of course, is ambitious. Hotel Maharaja, an Indian restaurant situated across the street, looks inviting but is too expensive. 7-Eleven, you realise, is called a convenience store for a reason. With its potato snacks, this store becomes the vegetarian’s shrine, despite its lack of English instructions and buns which cost 105 yen (around 55 rupees) a pair. Bread was never as expensive or tempting.

"You don’t even eat egg?" someone asks solicitously.

"Nope. Not unless it’s disguised in a cake," you reply.

"What if I put a piece of chicken inside a cake?"

"Ha ha," you oblige.

The fact that you don’t drink only makes things worse, as plum tea is not exactly known to absorb sugar let alone sorrows. Those packs of roasted snacks packed by the mother-in-law come in handy to quieten midnight abdominal growls, but you also feel obliged to offer them to fellow journalists as accompaniments for their sake and beer.

The fear of sinning at every point leads to three days of forced detoxification. It’s funny how a daily routine of orange juice, lettuce, bread, butter, tea in the face of dried octopus and lamb, can cause you to introspect. "Bejitarian no ryori ga arimasu ka?" (Japanese for "Do you have vegetarian food?") you ask every time, aching for a warm meal. There’s vegetable with rice, vegetable soup and tofu, but bland as boredom—nothing nice and spicy that will require you to use the lovely ‘spray action’ button in the famous Japanese electronic loo where the seat opens by itself.

The free Tokyo map gives a list of steak restaurants complemented with pictures. The fact that TV screens in souvenir shops beam images of the throbbing pink colon (a colonoscopy advertisement), does not help the churning intestinal juices. Outside, someone suggests a trip to the toilet restaurant, where chairs are made of toilet seats and food served in a commode-shaped dishes.

An online search later on reveals many links for survival as a vegetarian and even as a vegan in Japan. There’s a list of tofu restaurants and other Indian restaurants in Tokyo run by south Indians. But no one in the vicinity is in the mood to try Indian food. So, the last day in Tokyo leads us to a suspicious barbecue restaurant where four people have a room to themselves, the waitress knocks before entering and you have to pay to roast your own food. There’s barbecued vegetables, much to everyone’s relief, but it contains uncooked pieces of brinjal, corn and a large mushroom (Who wants to eat fungus, even if it’s vegetarian). Thankfully, there’s ice-cream, which could contain all the eggs it wanted for all you cared.

It’s easier for a vegetarian who hasn’t eaten a real meal in three days to bid sayonara to the lovely city. On the way back, the connecting flight from Hong Kong to Mumbai is full of Indians, making it noisier than a BEST bus, but what makes it all worth it is a Chinese air-hostess coming up to you to ask, "Non-vegetarian or vegetarian?"