The Professional Hobo

It started with a love-hate affair with KYC (Kentucky Fried Chicken). I so loved getting a big bucket of the greasy, deep-fried-with-southern-love chicken, the fries with peppery gravy that had an unidentifiable foreign taste to it; and the selection of plastic macaroni salad & bright (too bright if you know what I mean) green coleslaw.

I would crave it. Dream about it. If I had the mis-fortune to pass by a KYC in my daily travels I would be driven to virtual insanity. With desire.

And once – once in a very long while – I would succumb. With an empty bucket of chicken and an unrecognizable mixture of artificially flavoured salad remnants and congealed gravy in my wake, I would moan and belch for hours.

“Never. Never will I do that again. Oh – I feel so…..so…..greasy”! I would vow to myself over and over again while rolling around in bloated agony.

Any yet, months or (if I’m lucky) years later, I would repeat the same act of foolishness all over again. Crave. Smell. Succumb. Moan. Belch. Vow. Rinse & Repeat.

I have a similar eat-hate relationship with fish & chips.

Now, I’m the 1st person to embrace a culture and experience the best of any particular offering. And ever since landing in Prince Rupert – the Halibut Capital Of The World – I understood my new mission on the coast was to experience the best fish & chips.

However, I also recalled a recent vow never to have them again after a particularly greasy Moaning & Belching & Vowing experience with “the best fish & chips” in Toronto. So, weary of taking on the mission, I merely threatened to go out for the prized dish. I visited numerous pubs in search of the place that LOOKED to have the best fish & chips from the outside and perused the menus in the window to check prices.

And hiding behind the feign of trying to travel on a budget, I would ultimately stick my nose up to walk away and return to the hostel for a healthy home-cooked meal.

But I’ll tell you without a shadow of a doubt, the grungy looking, fluorescent lit, tiny restaurant on the corner boasting the plain hand-written sign “Burgers and Fish and Chips” most certainly had the best fish & chips in Prince Rupert. I just didn’t try them.

Once on Vancouver Island though, we couldn’t contain ourselves any longer. Off we went on a local’s recommendation to a pub for what were supposed to be some of the best fish & chips in town. We walked right by the other pub I’d already pinned for having the best: all the tables sported both malt & white vinegar alongside salt & pepper as condiments….how can you go wrong?! But instead we marched on trusting the local’s advice instead.

Admittedly, it wasn’t bad. The fries weren’t as I imagine the quintessential fries for the perfect fish & chips should be, but the fish was plentiful and expectedly greasy.
After the feast, I rolled out of the pub, already Belching and Moaning. I still maintain that the other pub had better fish & chips, but I just vowed never to eat fish & chips again, so I guess I’ll never know.