Tsunami My visit to this simpering shithole coincided with the first day of classes at UCLA, so I was taking a risk even attempting to have lunch on campus … my thought being that a Japanese noodle dish would most likely be a fast, easy route to sustenance. WRONG.
First, my fault, but I had no cash, so while I waited in line, Work Friend (WF) got money. Once WF arrived, it took two people two tries to get our order straight. I ordered the "Veggie Fun Bowl," which consists of rice noodles, mushrooms, cabbage, and tofu in a "veggie broth," while WF bought the pre-packaged edamame (green beans?) and "spicy shrimp sushi." Once we'd ordered it took literally FOREVER for my "fun bowl" to arrive, and by then I was no longer having any fun. You see, I'd watched the moron fix my fun bowl – he had to look up at the wall menu like four times to remember what was in the damn thing. Meanwhile, 180 people who'd ordered behind me were already enjoying their meals. Finally I got the fun bowl, filled to the brim with colorless lukewarm broth (so that every step I took I spilled some on my hands) – and my medium Sprite, which they served without a fricking lid.
The Veggie Fun Bowl was about as tasteless as food can get … just bland noodles, tofu, and flavorless mushrooms in warm water, completely unpleasant. The cabbage was flavorful – the flavor of horsecrap, that is – and it left a weird numbing sensation in my mouth that made me speculate it had been boiled in cocaine. Finally, after dumping about five soy sauce packets in, I gave up and, with a final bitchy flourish, dumped my napkins into the fun bowl, where they could have "fun" mopping up the crappy meal I didn't finish. Furthermore, the Sprite was flavorless too! All carbonation and ice, and zero syrup.
WF's edamame was ok, and I didn't try the shrimp sushi cuz I don't eat no animals no mo'. Still hungry, I went to the mini-mart in the union where I purchased a truly delicious apple muffin.
The only thing that saved this horrible experience from reminding me completely of the Singapore Death Camp (where we were forced to use our food bowls for latrines, and where I was assigned as a moving footstool, crawling along the hot, rocky ground with General Chan sitting imperiously on my aching back) was that it was a very sultry first day back at school for many of the luscious, nubile young teenyboppers, and while the food was awful, the eye candy was sweet as cherry pie, if you catch my drift.
Review by Crimedog, October 1999
Ackerman Union, UCLA Campus, Los Angeles, CA, USA 