Foreign Muck

When I was a lad all we ate was foriegn food, because mum cooked it. Often I would sit an ponder "just what is it these whitey's eat at home?" (we didn't have political correctness in those days) really, it was a mystery. I knew about some things like fish and chips, toast, boiled eggs and we had a few things at school like stew, mash and jam roly poly. But somehow it didn't fit that people could be eating this at home. In my mind school dinners were kids food. What sort of grown up person would eat a sausage? Just look at it.

So, for most of my childhood I imagined the neighbours were eating fish and chips every night. And it being the thing we didn't have every night, became the object of all desires, as these things do when you're that age.

Nevertheless, I racked my brain for alternatives and concluded that eggs and toast must be a meal. Like this; toast, buttered, with sliced boiled egg, salt and massala (the sort you make curry's with). Like an open sandwich, magnificent and I still eat it to this day. It was an assumption handed down over generations that massala went in every dish, because the preceeding generations lived in India.

Then, some thirty years later, I was in Hawaii (last week) and discovered their speciality: Loco Moco. A bed of rice, hamburger, covered in gravy topped with a fried egg. Now you can get Super Loco Moco which includes fried spam, fried salami and two eggs. Obviously I went for the Super version, being a sucker for fried spam that I am. The amazing thing about Hawaii was during the whole week we only had pineapple once, for breakfast. They eat more papaya and mango than pineapple. But if anything should be their national food emblem, it's Spam, it's everywhere they love it. No wonder they're so fat.

So there you go, no one wants to be known as the spam eating country (or state), so let's stick with the pineapple, even if it's complete bollocks. It's true that travel broadens the mind though. Far from a picturesque paradise, half of hawaii is old run down villages full of poor people with no jobs. True the other half is fantastic beaches, expensive designer shops and mega expensive hotels but there are only tourists in that half.

That's why tourists find Hawaii'ans to be so friendly, is it you they're smiling at or your wallet? They are still people after all and spam doesn't grow on trees (please god, if there is a god...)

JJ