Mean Beans

Everybody knows the story of cheese: a man put some milk in a leather bag, got on his horse, and rode a few hundred miles. When he got to the end of his journey, he was surprised to find that he had a bag of cheese. The story of natto is remarkably similar, except there was no leather bag to contain the soy beans. Instead, the rider placed them on his saddle and sat on them the whole way. In this way, by the end of his journey, the beans had been transformed into natto, with its distinctive, disgusting aroma.

So, next time someone asks you if you've tried natto yet, don't fidget and fumble and feel guilty that you haven't tried out another culture to the full. Just laugh in their face at the outlandishness of their suggestion, or scream hysterically at the horror of their indecent proposal. Natto is not culture. It is the essence of evil incarnate in food form, and the sooner everyone realizes this, the better.

Because it TASTES so bad and SMELLS so bad, and even looks, feels and sounds so bad, people harbor the view that it must have some redeeming features. Hence the notion that it must be good for you! Strangely enough, this theory isn't encouraged if you're drinking from a can of oolong tea that smells or tastes bad, especially if you've just bought it from a supermarket with inadequate surveillance equipment. For my own part, I prefer to stick to the simple rule that stops me eating soap powder, chewing erasers, and licking the bald pates of salarymen: if it TASTES bad, it IS bad.

The truth is that natto is popular by conspiracy. It serves a deeper, more sinister purpose. Like kanji and squat toilets, it is a device designed to exclude foreigners from Japanese society, making it virtually impossible for us to assimilate. It is a barrier dividing us from each other and isolating Japan from the rest of the world. So, in the name of international brotherhood and basic culinary decency, I call upon the inhabitants of Japan, foreign and native alike, to take to the streets and root out the evil that is among us. I will not rest content until every last festering bean has been consumed by the avenging flames. Remember, Mr. Natto, you can run but you can't hide—not the way you smell, anyway.

Tokyo Classified
October 17, 1998