Flumesday Celebrates the Year of the Jew
When I first came to China, I distinctly remember a menu item I saw that scared the ever-loving shit out of me. At a Beijing-style restaurant in Shanghai, I was handed an “English” menu that the manager of the restaurant was extremely proud of. After all, English menus are hard to come by. I opened the menu to find a bunch of absurd-sounding menu items like “Majestic Fish-Flavored Chicken” and “Forbidden Drunken Shrimp” and a bunch of other translations of dishes that I assume make a little more sense in Mandarin. I turned the page. On this new page I read a menu item that I will never forget. “Fried Jew Ear.” Spelled exactly like that. I was somewhat terrified. But a few days later I learned that “jew” (spelled “zhu”) means “pig” in Mandarin. This didn’t make me run back to the restaurant to order some, but at least this place hadn’t been importing Semites and frying their ears. And as you may or may not know, this week is the first week of the new Chinese year, the Year of the Pig, or in Chinese, the year of the “jew.” And while other sites may use the English name for the new year, on this China-based site, I will refer to the new year by it’s Chinese name: The Year of the Jew.
Those of you who have come here the last few days looking for an update, unfortunate for you and fortunate for me, I have been away from the Flumesday World Headquarters without internet access. I am far away actually. In a place where the Jews outnumber the jews. I actually just overheard an old female one talk about her hysterectomy. She was 36 and she would have had more children had she not had it. When I said I’m far from Flumesday World Headquarters, I meant it. I’d like to take the opportunity to wish you and yours good fortune in the Year of the Jew, an easy Lent and an inspired last few days of Black History Month.