Octopus is another sea creature that's better raw than cooked.
My guess is that the bottles contain some kind of high-end soy sauce,
and the bags have seaweed in them, but who knows?
I was watching Alien on DVD with the director's commentary, and
Ridley Scott was explaining why that movie continues to be so creepy,
in spite of, or perhaps because of, its ludicrously low budget.
Remember when they're dissecting the facehugger, how believably
organic-looking it is? It was made of sheep guts, giant oysters
and other animal parts, so as to get that uncanny blend of familiar
and unfamiliar. The whole Tokyo fish market felt that way to me,
all these creatures I've only seen in books or in the aquarium,
and here they are in rows of identical white styrofoam boxes.
Uncanny though it was, for some reason, the fish markety didn't
put me off; mostly I just enjoyed the varied anatomy. For sure,
it gave me pause to see some of the fish and crustaceans arriving
alive and then meeting gruesome fates at the hands of bored-looking
Japanese guys, but if I'm going to eat meat at all, I feel like
I owe it to my victims to look them in the eye once in a while.
