DEATH TONGUE

Mr. Manz, from a small town in Germany, visited New York and tried Mexican food for the first time. And promptly took the restaurant to court because their salsa traumatized him. Horribly. Painfully. He had added it to his food himself, chomped, and was floored by the results. Oh, the heartache. They obviously had tried to kill him. Those evil new worlders. The salsa was by his never having eaten spicy in his entire life standards too insufferably darn hot and someone should do something!

The judge disagreed. Common sense also disagrees, as, in all honesty, IF in this modern world you do not understand that salsa might be spicier than anything in small town Germany, you may have been living under a rock.


Several years ago my family moved to the Netherlands. Where there is Indonesian food. Which I ate before I was even grammar school age. Take-out food often came with a little packet of sambal. Many homes had sambal on the premises.
We also had sambal on the premises.

When I returned to the United States, at eighteen years of age, I was dismayed that there was no sambal on the premises. Anywhere. The entire countrywide premises. Or at least Berkeleywide. How, I wondered, could these people survive?

Was civilization even possible here?

Things have changed. There has been immense improvement. And civiliation may very well be possible here. Now. At least in some parts. There are sambal equivalents.

Every single one of the eateries I have frequented in the last several weeks has had either sambal or hot sauce (Sriracha). The staff at one place takes it for granted I will want the Sriracha, and at another place the waitress is both flabbergasted and not surprised.


I contend that people who never touch hot stuff are some of the most violent warlike individuals on the planet. Modern world events demonstrate that. Prove me wrong.



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