The Sun Only Rises. But When It Rises, It Rises Over The Meta Verse (Meta Verse 3 to be specific)

 

The sun blazes with the heat of ... A single sun shining relentlessly on The Tropics.  Relentless. Hot. Relentlessly hot.  Threatening to blister tender white skin in seconds.

Oh, wait, we tried to establish that previously.

Lunch was tricky today.  Simple yet tricky.

The warungs open at 1500.  I was hungry at 1300.  I decamped to the kopitam sure I'd find something I wanted on the menu.  Corn dogs?  No.  "Chaos Nachos?" Decidedly no!  OK, French fries and lemonade.  Cannot get any more Malaysian than that.  As the tourism office says here: "Malaysia is Asia!"

(Honestly, that is their slogan.  This meal aside, well and the Subway franchise down the street too, it is very wonderfully true.)

Kecap ("Ketzapt) originated in the Malay Archipleago (The Good Stuff) as a sweetened soy sauce.  The British took it home, back in the day.  And, of course as the British are prone to doing, butchered its name.  Worse, they changed it entirely.  Since the summer of 1986 - when I moved to Chicago - I have understood that ketchup has very little place in my life.  NEVER on a hot dog; only on fries.

But, the British did not leave Malaysia until 1957.  By then the damage was done.  It remains an abomination, even here near its proper home.  Sickly sweet and without a single virtue.  Heinz at least seems to have decided to mix sweet tomatoes with malt vinegar (how very British, eh!) and thus their product is suitable enough for fries.

I will not use sweet ketchup on my fries.  Even here.  Thankfully I could choose mayo.  How very continental of me to sauce my pommes frites with that.


Mama Tudung may have read my post last night.  She utterly ignored me today.  I think she knew I was prepared to wage a war of wits.  What she didn't know is that I wasn't.  I would have just subjugated myself, fearfully, again.

But, a young lady brought me the menu board.  And then served my nasi goreeng ayam.  "Rice Fried Chicken."  It was exactly that.  Lightly fried rice.  With a side of fried chicken.  Rice Fried Chicken.  In a land where I'm sure the sexuality is complex, so are the adjectives.  Teh-O actually made the table too!

Peppered with the sweet hot Thai pickled peppers it was absolutely delicious.  Simple and yet wonderful.  I do not generally like chicken at home.  Here, I prefer it to beef.  (Although I will go pork crazy is Langkawi, which will have a greater Chinese influence.)

Mama T even ignored me at the payment counter.  RM10

Dortmunder remains hilarious.  I am the entire string twisted into once.  Except Tiny Bulcher.

I fear for the young woman; if Mama learns I got what I wanted, there will most certainly be hell to pay.