Why I Need Wasabi

I eat sushi just like everybody else: Dragon rolls, tuna rolls, special rolls - you name it, I'm there and square. Over my extensive experience with sushi, I only incorporated the wasabi into my eating experience about four years ago, and I did it by mistake. I was having sushi with a friend, and I didn't notice that there was an enormous amount of green fury on the bottom of my sushi. I stuffed the sushi into my mouth with excitement; I knew I was getting the regular degular. A mouthful of expensive goodness, I continued to chew and broke down my food with pulverizing bites. Then I finally realized my nose began to burn. My eyes began to water, and I started to choke. 'What roll did I just eat?' I asked my friend, my voice distressed with confusion. My ears were ringing, and I couldn’t comprehend what we were eating anymore.

I was losing balance and drank water, but nothing helped. I swayed my head back and forth to see if some air would pass through my nostrils and cool down the stinging sensation. Because it was my first time, it was almost unbearable. I looked down and saw I had taken about half of the wasabi on my plate with the single roll I ate. It was chaos. I cooled myself down with my tears. But that stinging sensation and pain left a weird impact on me. And it really shouldn't have. I became addicted to that pain. I started associating sushi with a little bit of pain. Now, whenever I eat sushi, I need just a little bit more than an acceptable amount of wasabi to enjoy myself. I know it sounds weird, but I can't eat sushi if it doesn't hurt. It has to hurt just a little bit; it reminds me of the time I survived a near-death experience. I am now that person who asks people if they are gonna eat their wasabi. I turned a terrible experience into something fun. You can too."

Pearl