9/10/10 Healthy Fear Continued

I met Space at his office after classes were over. Once his students left, I walked up to him not saying a word and put a bottle of gin and a thick long slice of pork belly on the table. A momentary look of fear swept over his face as if he was about to be attacked by a swarm of flying face eating squirrels (species Squirrellius Royce). Then with absolute calm he said “What are we going to do with this?” He didn’t give me time to answer and quickly followed with “Where did you get this?” which was a stupid question since pork practically grows on trees here. Seriously, the stuff is everywhere. But I suspect he meant the gin, which is comparatively rare. You can find the dreaded mijo all over the place (I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s available in nursery school kitchens) as is scotch and vodka. But gin is an elusive beast. I managed to find a bottle at a larger grocery store during a visit to find weird foodstuffs to bring home. Smiling with gin in hand I lost my train of thought when I found the huge slabs of pork belly. I must have looked like a complete mental case checking out with only those two items, quietly and swiftly destroying the reputation of all foreigners with one simple shopping excursion.

“We’ll save these for later” Space said, “but first we should get some beer”. Earlier that day while searching for a souvenir shot glass for a friend we found some Taiwanese microbrews in a local craft store. We vowed to return since Space had tried them once before and insisted they were well worth the price premium over the other swill we had been so eagerly consuming. We walked the streets, beer in hand (quite civilized no?) but were soon finished Microbrew Round I. A serious problem presented itself…no bottle opener. “No problem” I insisted, I would pop off the cap using the sharp metal corner of this lamp post base.

Problem: a small part of the bottle top broke off during the quite violent cap excision.

No problem: turn the bottle upside down for a bit and pour some beer out surely taking any possible traces of glass with it.

Problem: 30 minutes later I felt like I had something in my throat.

We arrived at our destination, the All Star Pub, a place frequented by English speaking residents of Hualien. Space didn’t go there much anymore because the owner was a little nuts and changed prices in the bar depending on her mood. But the All Star Pub had live music, so it was the first stop of the night. There we met Lois, the aunt of Charlie (one of Space’s surfing acquaintances). Lois was stopping in from England for a couple of days on her way to Australia. She came to the bar to see Charlie play drums with a new band that had recruited him.

So we’re sitting in the bar having polite conversation with Lois and Charlie when Space says “Do you have the pork?”

“Sure I do, but we’re here now” I replied.

“Don’t worry about it” he said dismissively.

“But don’t we need a plate and some utensils?” My caveman tendencies had taken a serious blow, likely owing to the fact that we were sitting with a seemingly polite older woman from the

… that damn accent just sounds so proper!

“Just give it to me” Space said as he tore through the plastic exposing the porky goodness that lay resting inside.

Lois closes her eyes to avoid the tyranny of the bagged pork belly.

Lois was horrified. Like potheads passing the dutchie, we passed the pork belly; it was fantastic. I tried to get Lois to join in the pork fueled fun, but she stood firm. Pork belly out of a plastic bag was simply unacceptable. But as she sat there smugly with her facade of dignity intact I was also content. Eating pork belly out of a bag in a slimy bar was no worse than a seemingly refined British woman drinking her beer out of a bottle when there were glasses all around. Lois had broken one of my cardinal rules for women; it was her reputation that had been sullied.