I was actually craving for a junky burger, but entered the new ramen shop anyway. I’d probably thank myself for it later. 

An elderly man, who looked to be the owner greeted me and took me to an empty table for two. 

I ordered a Japanese beer and browsed through the menu. The menu wasn’t extensive, but it had all the classics. 

I decided on the shoyu ramen and waited for my food.  As I was observing the restaurant’s interior, a young blonde girl came sitting in the chair on the opposite side of my table.

“Um, sorry, I think you’re sitting in my seat,” she said.

“The owner himself assigned me this table, so I think you’re just messing with me,” I returned with a smile.

“No, really, I’m supposed to be sitting here,” she said, now a little more insistent.

“Okay, let’s ask the owner” I said, after which I waved my hand at the elderly man.

“Am I sitting in this girl’s seat” I asked him.

“Oh, no, no, no, she’s sitting in your seat. I’m so sorry, please move to that table over there,” he said, pointing the girl to a table in the corner.

“I don’t want to sit at that table, it’s disgusting,” the girl said with a pouty lip.

“Don’t give me this shit again Laura,” the owner said with wide eyes, tilting his head to the side.

“Fine,” she said, before standing up. As she was leaving my table she smacked my beer glass across the restaurant with her open palm. It shattered against a wall, right behind a middle-aged couple eating sushi.

“Hey!” I yelled, now standing up.

“What the fuck is your problem?” Laura said, turning around to face me.

“You just threw my beer glass against the wall!” I said.

“So what? It’s just a fucking beer glass,” she said.

“It’s the principle of the thing,” I said.

“Whatever, just leave me alone,” she said, before turning around and walking back to her table.

I was fuming.

Right after Laura sat down at her table, I grabbed a handful of sushi pieces from the middle-aged couple’s plates and threw them at Laura like a fastball. Glass pieces were crunching underneath my soles.

Bullseye.

A mixture of rice, fish and soy sauce shot up like a fountain from Laura’s chest after impact. The whole restaurant was silent. You could hear a pin drop. Laura’s face was pale and her eyes were wide open in shock, but no words were coming out of her mouth.

The middle-aged couple gasped and started muttering to each other in Japanese, while the owner ran over to Laura’s table in a panic.

“Are you okay?” he said, shaking her shoulders.

But Laura was unresponsive. She just sat there, frozen in shock, with sushi all over her chest.

At this moment, the woman of the middle-aged stood up from the table.

“This is our anniversary dinner!” she screamed, as she flipped over their table. The remainder of their dinner dropped to the floor, plates breaking into pieces.

“We were supposed to have a nice, quiet dinner, but because of you two idiots, our anniversary is ruined!”

The woman then started to cry and the man tried to console her.

The owner was now in a state of panic, running between Laura’s table and the middle-aged couple’s table, not knowing what to do.

I took this opportunity to make my escape. I walked out of the restaurant calmly, as if nothing had happened.

As I was walking away, I heard the woman screaming, “I hope you get food poisoning and die, you bitch!”

I didn’t know what to make of what had just happened. It was all so surreal. I had never seen anything like that happen before. I didn’t know whether to be scared or amused.

I guess this is just another day in Japan.