What I Learned

When I went to Japan, I did not like tomatoes. Not my thing. Then my host mother, who would get up early every morning to make my host sister and I breakfast, would thoughtfully provide huge chunks of tomato to go with my salad and eggs. (Yes, Japanese people eat raw cabbage for breakfast. Actually, they'll eat raw cabbage with everything at every meal. Betcha didn't know that, didja?) Not wanting to offend anyone who actually makes me breakfast, because I know a good deal when I see one, I would force myself to eat them. By the end of four months of daily tomatoes, I actually didn't hate them anymore. Another food to take off the "No, Thank You," list.

One of the most enduring foods on that list has been yogurt. The curdled taste of it repulsed me. And then I came here, where they have all types of yogurt that comes with so much fruit stuff that you don't get but a smidge of that curdled aftertaste. So I started eating that, and then gradually got used to it. I realized that last week I was eating the stuff that I swore I would never eat twice or even three times a day.

Go figure.