When did I become a vegetarian? I am asked that even more frequently than “why.” The answer to the two questions is the same. My wife, Virginia, returned home one evening, about 30 years ago, and stated that we would no longer eat meat. She asked “how did I feel?” Chicken? Nada. Fish? Zip. My cooking skills are absent. As a bachelor I survived on fried wiener sandwiches, Vienna sausages (which my Dad still calls “vienners”), frozen chicken pot pies, and Wolf brand chili. Love to, dear.

For the past 30 years I have been meatless and guiltless. Yet over the past couple of years I have begun to slip, to stray. I am off the meat wagon. I can finally admit that I am an invertebratarian. I consume animals without a face, a mother, or a backbone.

Since dragonfruit and I only recently met, I decided to get to know it better. To my surprise, dragonfruit comes from a cactus, the genus Hylocereus. The fruit is cultivated in the tropics around the world, and I am not sure why I have not come across it before. In Japan, the fruit is grown in Okinawa.

Hylocereus is one of several cacti genera that are known as “night blooming,” such as in night-blooming cereus or queen of the night. The plant and fruit are also known as pitaya, and apparently several types are cultivated. We commonly see tuna (the fruit of prickly pear cactus) in our markets, but not pitaya.

How often do you cook with a blowtorch? Not canned heat (the fondue pot type), but an industrial grade blowtorch? We have now eaten our way across half of Japan, but tonight we witnessed a new style of Japanese cooking – flame thrower.

We left Nara around 11 AM, and arrived in Osaka in the early afternoon. I am behind in my accounts, but I must again take a side track and tell you about the food. Cassady has a good friend in Osaka, Besu, and we met her for dinner. She wanted us to go to a local takoyaki restaurant, the Pizza Ball House (Takonotetsu). The translation is loose. Trust me, there is no pizza in this cuisine other than melted cheese.

Okonomiyaki is among Japan’s gifts to the world (along with soba, udon, ocha, anime, and Godzilla). Translated the word means “fried, your choice.” In practice Okonomiyaki is a fritter-like concoction of whatever is at hand – seafood, vegetables, pork. Hiroshima is famous for its particular style of Okonomiyaki, and we spent an evening in the Okonomimura (Okonomiyaki village) delving into the intricacies of this local cuisine.

America imports oil from Saudi Arabia, cars from Japan, wine from France, shrimp from Viet Nam, coffee from Costa Rica, jalapeños from Mexico, and even toothpicks from China. We have perfected consumption, and the world feeds our insatiable appetite for stuff.

In return, America exports pop culture. No matter where you might wander, blithely expecting to be swallowed in a culture unlike your own, your first meal likely will be accompanied by the viral voices of Michael Jackson or Lady Gaga.

Jet lag is the one aspect of international travel that, at least initially, erodes the pleasure of the visit. At this moment it is 4 am in Naha, and I am sitting here, bright eyed, pecking at the keyboard. We have a full day ahead of us, and I will probably fade by early afternoon. With luck I will begin to adjust later today or tomorrow.

I spent many summers with my grandparents in Paris, Texas. I worshipped them, and never tired of the time I spent there. We would eat take-home barbeque from Bono’s on spindly TV trays, watch Lawerence Welk , sip Coke floats, and play Scrabble and 42 until the wee hours. I saw Jim Shoulders splattered against the fence at the Paris rodeo, squirmed through interminable wakes, and listened, awed, as she told stories of my mother before she became “mom.”