Real Rain Forest and N chan's Papa's Sauce

　　Borneo would make most Japanese people evoke the rain forest. I am one of them. N chan's family took us to Marimari Cultural Village which was established to show tourists their original culture and was located deep in the rain forest 20km away from KK. When we visited the village, however, all the performances had unfortunately finished. The second picture was shot in front of the ticket booth of the village. Though I didn't see inside of the village, I was able to see the deep rain forest of Borneo on the way to the village. It was darker and greener than the Japanese forest. Seeing the rain forest and local people's life along the way really drove my curiosity.
　　Going back to our hotel, we took a rest for about an hour. Then, N chan's family guided us to a seafood restaurant, which is shown below. The restaurant was so noisy, and we were overwhelmed by its heated atmosphere. We would hesitate about entering the restaurant without N chan's family. They were really helpful. We might have made do with box lunches from the shelves of a convenience store if they hadn't helped us. At this restaurant, the customers chose their food from the lots of kinds of displayed live materials at first, then order its cooking method, such as simmering, grilling, and so on. We just obeyed their suggestion. My Mandarin, which didn't help in Taiwan, was useless also this time. I wasn't able to understand what people around were talking about. Their language wouldn't be Mandarin, but I didn't even know that the language was Chinese or Malay or another.
　　The last picture shows a plate of soy sauce, roughly mashed garlic, and some spicy seasonings like red peppers. How do you think you eat it? It's N chan's father's favorite. I followed his way of eating. He mixed these materials into soy sauce and put them on the rice. It was an unpredictable taste, and I tried it. Now this became my favorite. His recipe is called N chan's papa's soy sauce in my house. It's served only on the previous night of holidays, ,,you know, due to foul breath. However, the taste of this special sauce is different between KK and Japan, though I tried various seasonings with soy sauce. I'm not sure, but soy sauce in KK might not be made from soy beans, but from fish. Fish sauce, which is made from fermented salted fish, isn't popular other than a certain restricted area in Japan. I'll resolve this question on my next visit to KK.

(Vocabulary)
red pepper  [C] 赤ピーマン; [U] (粉末の) トウガラシ
foul　〈におい・味などが〉むかつくような, ひどくいやな, 悪臭のある
fish sauce 魚醤

マレーシア旅行記：　超ローカルなレストランで
　
ボルネオと聞いて多くの日本人が想起するのは熱帯雨林だろう。熱帯雨林やボルネオの文化を知るために彼らが連れて行ってくれたのがマリマリ文化村。ただ、この日は主なショーが終わっていて文化村の中を見ることはできなかった。しかし、そこまでの往復は圧感。車窓に映る熱帯雨林、日本の森林とは別物だった。熱帯雨林とそこで暮らす人々の暮らしを眺めながらのドライブに好奇心をかき立てられた。２枚目の写真は営業を終えて閑散としていたチケット売り場の前で全員で撮ったもの。
　
ホテルへ戻り、１時間ほど休憩して夕食に出かけた。で、写真のようなレストランに入ったのだが、我々二人だと注文することさえ怖じ気づいてしまうような熱気だった。Ｎちゃん家族がいてくれて本当に助かった。二人だとコンビニ弁当で済ませていたかもしれない。レストランは食材を選び、調理法を伝えるようだった。どのような調理法が適しているのかもわからない。Ｎちゃんご家族にお任せするしか手は無かった。料理はどれも美味しく、大満足。台湾でも通じなかった付け刃的僕の北京語。今回も全く聞き取れず、多分北京語ではないと思うがマレー語なのかシナ語なのか？それさえもわからず(^_^;)
　
最後の写真は醤油とニンニク、唐辛子などの香辛料。これをどうするのか、Ｎちゃんパパを見て真似てみた。なんとこれを醤油に混ぜてご飯に掛けて食べる、、、あり得ない食べ方だったが、試してみると結構いける！我が家では今、『ニンちゃんパパの醤油』と名を付け、休日前の食卓に並んでいる。なぜ休日前か？わかりますよね。その強烈なニンニク臭が、、、ただ、この写真をヒントにいろいろ薬味を混ぜてみてもＫＫで食べたこの味にはならない。ひょっとしてこの醤油は魚醤だったのか？これも次回のＫＫ旅行で確認しなければならない。