Going Native

Tonight we went to a tiny hole in the wall restaurant that we'd seen packed with locals the last couple of days.  Thought we'd be brave - but we nearly came undone.
There was an English menu; by that I mean a 1 word description per item and the amount of English actually understood could be put on a  postage stamp.  Almost everything we recognised was sold out/or didn’t have any/or couldn't understand us so said sold out. What was left;  tongue, cheek, flap, offal of every imaginable type, some stuff I didn’t understand even in English, and even pork rectum (I kid you not).   I just wanted to leave but they had made an effort to accommodate us and it would have been extremely rude to depart at that point. Eventually we settled on skirt steak and some vegetables.  A half pint tankard of sake was plonked in front of me which looked mighty scary until I realised it had been watered down with hot water. A good plan.  The meat arrived for us to cook at the table, a tiny portion that wouldn't have fed 1 person at home & this was for 3. The potato salad turned out to be cold mashed potato sprinkled with something crispy. Kim, I imagine you are turning green at this point!
It was different… but surprisingly tasty. 
The place grew more and more hectic… as people arrived they were greeted by roars of welcome from the staff and other diners. It was hilarious watching it all. And the meal was delicious if miniscule. In very short order we were made to understand it was time to go - obviously we were mucking up their schedule so our coats arrived beside us - subtlety seemingly irrelevant. This meal cost 3x the price of last nights and was about 1/3rd the size. But for all that, it was a great experience.

The black vertical thing is the flue for the hot plate