rocky

Alas, my trip back home to Australia is already at an end. Despite being able to check a number of things off my list of things to do, namely eat food and meet up with friends, it feels like this trip was still a little too short. I did end my trip on a high note though, catching up with friends for lunch, before having a final family dinner at my all-time favourite restaurant in Melbourne.

Unfortunately, my favourite restaurant just also happens to be a sushi restaurant. Even the sushi chef there was asking me why the hell I'd be eating Japanese food when I could do so for in a couple of days. Part of the reason I did go though was mainly to reminisce as it was always the restaurant I'd make my family go to for special occasions, like my birthday, or something like that.  And for the awesome sushi of course. Plus, in Japan, I so don't make enough money to be able to go to a fancy sushi restaurant, so I did also justify it by thinking of it as awesome-grade sushi that I myself would never be able to eat in Japan anyway.

But after tonight, I'm totally glad I went. After gorging myself with awesome fancypants sushi (highlights: yakiniku-style grilled beef sushi, and marinated kingfish belly sushi) and while driving home, we encountered one of the less-often visited mascots of my city: Rocky.

For those who aren't completely familiar with the story of Rocky, he's developed a loyal group of fans - namely me, and any of my friends that I can convince to also be supportive of an unconventional city mascot.

As you can see, Rocky's kinda.... special. He originally started off as humble roadkill, unfortunately situated on a stretch of street that many people pass over. What resulted is Rocky being pancaked and presumably difficult to uh.... remove from the road.

The city's solution? Cover the corpse of Rocky the Roadkill Possum with a pile of gravel. That way, no one would know that anything was wrong. Except for the unusual pile or rocks in the middle of a frequently used road. What seemed to eventually happened though, is the rocks directly on top of Rocky adhered to the outline of Rocky's body, while all other rocks  that weren't directly on top of him seemed to disappear after countless drive-overs, leaving a perfectly preserved outline of Rocky's almost-forgotten self.

While I was lying in bed, trying unsuccessfully to get a nap before my flight back, I thought of how each city in Japan was famous for something. Granted, my city in Japan seems to be famous for one of my least favourite fruits, at least it's famous for something. What can my city back home in Melbourne boast about? Well, I guess other than fantastic sushi, it also has a pretty large roadkill animal as well... and that's pretty much it. I wonder if they ever made a marimokkori for my city, what would it be...?