School Lunch

Today, I saw them dishing out the lunches and asked for them to not give me the vegetables, so I wouldn’t have to not eat them and have everyone laugh at me while I threw it away at the end of lunch. I was excited, today’s lunch looked edible! Miso soup, big bowl of white rice, fried something. Yesterday’s trauma of hunk of squid, pickled vegetables mixed with overcooked carrots, and slime laden stew, made me think that this was alright. So I start eating my rice, a little soup, take a bite of the fried mystery. And then, I start to wonder what it is I’m eating, so I ask a passing teacher “kore wa nan desuka?” (What is this?) and he says something in Japanese, and then, with a smile “whale” and I say “WHALE?!” and he looks at another teacher, who gives a confirming nod, and repeats “whale.”

In the file of limited things people know about Japan, right next to sushi, tense textbook relations with China, Hiroshima, robots and geishas sits the controversial issue of whale meat. I remember learning about how Japan gets around whaling rules by hunting under the guise of research, and how they like feeding whale to school children so they can get the taste for it and keep it in their diet because it is a part of their heritage. I always thought this was more or less limited to select areas, and never thought it would come across my lunch tray. My little town does not have a history of whaling, as it is surrounded by mountains and a good 45 minute-1 hour drive, by express highway through the mountains, to the Himeji harbour, which I somehow don’t think has a strong history of whaling.

I ate a piece, I’ll admit. I was curious but then I quickly had enough and threw the rest away. It tasted fine—likely because it was coated in breadcrumbs and deep fried (everything tastes better fried, we know this) so arguments for wanting kids to get the taste for whale falls apart when it tastes and more like fried chicken with a chewier texture than anything else.

I'm sorry whales.