A Little Wasabi Before the Crowd

The room was almost empty when I walked in.

Just past eleven, and the sushi counter sat quiet, the fish laid out fresh under the case, glistening a little. A chef wiped down his station. Somewhere a fridge hummed. No queue, no clatter, no lunchtime noise pressing at my back.

I picked a seat by the counter. Any seat, really. That’s a small luxury you don’t get later.

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There’s something almost secret about eating early. The city hasn’t caught up yet. The offices are still working, heads down, watching the clock creep toward twelve. And here I was, chopsticks in hand, a beat ahead of everyone.

You know the rush I mean. That 12pm surge when the whole island seems to stand up at once. Lifts fill. Hawker queues snake around corners. People half-jog to beat the crowd, wolf down lunch, and rush back before the hour’s gone.

We eat fast here. We’ve been trained to. Lunch is a task squeezed between meetings, a thing to finish, not to sit with.

But not yet. Not this early.

I dabbed a little wasabi onto a slice of salmon. It was cool and soft, that clean fattiness spreading slow across my tongue, the wasabi rising sharp behind it. I chewed without hurrying. Nobody was waiting for my seat.

The rice was still faintly warm. I noticed that, the way you only notice small things when there’s room to. A busier lunch, and I’d have swallowed it without a thought, already checking the time.

Outside the glass, the mall was beginning to stir. A cleaner pushing a trolley. A shop shutter rolling up. The quiet before the tide comes in.

I ordered a second plate. Tuna this time, lean and clean, and a piece of tamago that was gently sweet, faintly warm. I ate them slowly, one at a time, letting each sit for a moment before the next.

This, I think, is what the rush steals from us. Not the food. The food is the same at noon. What we lose is the pause. The small pleasure of eating something while your mind isn’t three steps ahead.

By half eleven, the first office workers drifted in. Lanyards swinging, phones out, that familiar hurry already on their faces. The counter began to fill. A queue formed near the door.

I felt the room change around me, the pace quickening, the noise rising. My little pocket of quiet was closing.

So I finished my last piece, paid, and stepped out just as the crowd came in. We passed each other in the doorway, them rushing toward their squeezed half-hour, me walking out slow and full.

Next time you can manage it, come early. Beat the crowd by twenty minutes. Sit with your food while the room is still quiet, and eat like you have the time. Some days, that small head start is the whole gift.

• Sue Lin