Sandra and I just recently moved to Japan on September 27, 2006. Yesterday was our one year anniversary. Please do not run for your barf bags. This article is not about that. It is however, about the meal I prepared for us on that special day.

In Canada, our favorite restaurant is the Korean BBQ. There is a gas fired grill in the middle of your table and the waiter brings you unlimited amounts of beef, chicken, fish, etc for you to cook. Some are marinated and there is a delicious sauce on the side.

In Japan, I have seen these miniature BBQ type grills (hibachi) that are used for the same purpose of cooking your own food at the table. So I'm thinking, how romantic is this? I'll get one of those BBQ thingies, prepare and beautifully display some chicken, beef, etc on a platter and have a bunch of different sauces in cute little dishes as well as some rice. Add some flowers and a bottle of wine and we have one heck of a nice anniversary dinner.

So I go shopping and acquire all of the ingredients I needed as well as the flowers and of course ...... the hibachi. I got the hibachi at Konan department store or as we call it, “Wal-Mart”. Anyway, they had the cutest little table top grill made out of cast iron and set on a wooden plank. They told me, as best as they could without speaking a word of English, what to burn in it and how to use it. They sell these charcoal type trays that look like two egg cartons forming a sandwich around some black burnable substance.

I got home, prepared all of the food, set the table complete with flowers and bottle of wine and of course .... the hibachi. When Sandra got home from work, she was so excited about this very romantic meal we were about to experience. So we sat down and I lit the egg carton. It burned really well. REALLY WELL. The flames were about two feet tall and after about five minutes of scary flames ..... the smoke started. Sandra said, "Is that ok? I mean, what it's doing?" I replied, "Of course it's ok. It's supposed to do that." (Thanks for that “I know what I’m doing” gene, Dad) Well, when the smoke started BILLOWING and literally FILLING the room, we made the decision to get it the heck out of the house. We were laughing quite a bit at how we (I mean "I") had filled our house with smoke. I brought it out our front door and left it on the doorstep until the smokin stopped, leaving a beautiful bed of red hot coals to cook over. During this time, we used a large fan to blow all of the smoke out of the house. When the coals were ready and the smoking had stopped, I brought the hibachi back in and placed it back in it's rightful spot on the center of the kitchen table. We then enjoyed the best dinner I had made since we arrived and it was everything I had hoped for. Thoughtful, delicious, romantic and entertaining. I hadn't counted on "how" entertaining it was going to be but hey, it made for a good story!

Sandra was so sweet for not making me feel like the idiot I was and for laughing it off with me and enjoying the meal I had worked so hard to prepare. Just another reminder of why (ok, now you can get your barf bags out) I love her so much and how lucky I am to have her in my life.