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My Turn
by

Wayne Chan

From The Asian Reporter, V33, #10 (October 2, 2023), page 7.

And on the fifth day, there was DWS

On the sixth day of my amazing stay in Italy’s famed Amalfi Coast, the sights were amazing, the people were friendly, and the food was out of this world.

Pizza and pasta — what more could I ask for? Who doesn’t like pizza? Who doesn’t love pasta? It was like I was in a pizza and pasta heaven. Don’t even get me started on the variety offered — hoo-wee!

Every type of pizza imaginable — margherita, tomato with mushroom, salami, all cheese — you name it, they had it. And the pasta! Holy cow! Fettuccini, spaghetti, rigatoni, pici — every shape and size possible.

It was a pizza and pasta wonderland. Yup — that’s right. I could eat pizza, or have pasta. Ahhh …

OK, if I’m being perfectly honest, while I do love pizza and pasta, after five days of only pizza and pasta, something happened to me. There was an ache, not just in my stomach — it was more palpable than that. It was a longing, a sudden urging, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.

So, I turned to the internet, hoping to figure out what ailed me. I entered all my symptoms and it popped up right away. I double checked with ChatGPT and it immediately came up with the same answer. It was so simple and it was right in front of me.

I was suffering from … I believe the condition is called … DWS. The clinical term is "Dumpling Withdrawal Syndrome."

Here’s the definition:

DWS: Medical diagnosis — Malady in which a patient develops the inability to digest non-Asian foods. Onset of symptoms typically occur on the fifth or sixth day of Asian food deprivation. Common symptoms include night sweats, severe irritability, and an irrational aversion to restaurants with names ending in "ini" or "oro," coupled with an unreasonable disdain for any food that would be awkward to eat with chopsticks. Diagnostic tests often show DWS patients suffer from low levels of MSG and hot chili oil.

Now knowing what was wrong with me, my mission was to find a cure. The problem was, we had taken a ferry to the Italian island of Capri, where pizza and pasta were the only food in sight.

But then, Yelp came to the rescue. Yelp and its ready list of available restaurants immediately found what I was looking for — a Japanese sushi fusion restaurant.

It didn’t matter that we had to find an elevator to take us to the top of Capri (and pay for the elevator ride, too). It didn’t matter that we had to walk by 50 pizza and pasta places on our way. It didn’t matter that it was a warm, summer day and we also passed by about 30 or 40 enticing gelato places.

The bottom line is that my DWS condition was about to be addressed.

We walked into the fusion place and were handed menus. My lovely wife Maya ordered a plate of sashimi and a sushi roll. I decided to address my medical condition directly and ordered shrimp egg rolls and, most importantly, shrimp and vegetable dumplings. Doctor — heal thyself.

As I anxiously awaited my food/prescription, I wondered what would happen if I hadn’t discovered this restaurant and my DWS amplified. Would I have run into the next ini-ending restaurant and demanded that the owner add egg, sausage, green onion, and soy sauce to spaghetti? I don’t even want to think about the ramifications.

The food arrived, and there was, predictably, a sigh of relief. As I bit into the first egg roll, Maya asked me how it was. I said the filling tasted like mashed potatoes. As for the shrimp dumplings — shrimp flavored mashed potatoes.

But it didn’t matter. I dipped each one in soy sauce and swallowed each shrimp-flavored mashed potato dumpling with glee.

We went to Switzerland next — fondue and rösti — bring it on!

Humor writer Wayne Chan lives in the San Diego area;

cartoonist Wayne Chan is based in the Bay Area.

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My Turn by

Wayne Chan

My Turn
by