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the-conversation-pod · 11 months ago

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OM NOM NOM: The What Did You Eat Yesterday? Episode

And we're back! Ben and NiNi finally sit down to talk about their favorite food BL, and unpack all the ways that What Did You Eat Yesterday? made them grapple with queer mortality and long-term commitment. Grab a snack and a drink, and join us for the discussion about our favorite Comfort BL.

Timestamps

The timestamps will now correspond with chapters on Spotify for easier navigation.

00:00:00 - Introduction 00:01:15 - What Did You Eat Yesterday?: The Granddaddy 00:12:08 - Favorite Episodes 00:19:22 - The Show that Keeps Coming Back 00:24:57 - Season 2: Mortality, Family, and Hets 00:43:10 - WDYEY is So Gay and Found Family 00:50:54 - Let’s Talk About The Food 00:56:36 - Final Thoughts (And A Moment to Drag Nobu)

The Conversation Transcripts!

Thanks to the continued efforts of @ginnymoonbeam as transcriber, and @lurkingshan as an editor and proofreader, we are able to bring you transcripts of the episodes.

We will endeavor to make the transcripts available when the episodes launch, and it is our goal to make them available for past episodes (Coming soon thanks to @wen-kexing-apologist). When transcripts are available, we will attach them to the episode post (like this one) and put the transcript behind a Read More cut to cut down on scrolling.

Please send our volunteers your thanks!

00:00:00 - Introduction

NiNi

Welcome to The Conversation About BL, aka The Brown Liquor Podcast.

Ben

And there it is. I’m Ben.

NiNi

I’m NiNi.

Ben

And we’re you’re drunk Caribbean uncle and auntie here sitting on the porch in the rocking chairs.

NiNi

Four times a year we pop in to talk about what’s going on in the BL world.

Ben

We shoot the shit about stories and all the drama going into them. I review from a queer media lens.

NiNi

And I review from a romance and drama lens.

Ben

So if you like cracked-out takes and really intense emotional analysis…

NiNi

If you like talking about artistry, industry, and the discourse…

Ben

And if you generally just love simping…

NiNi

There is a lot of simping on this podcast…

Ben

We are the show for you!

01:15 - What Did You Eat Yesterday?: The Granddaddy

Ben

And we're back. Finally, my time has come. [NiNi laughs] NiNi has finally set down some time for us to talk about my favorite show after they embarrassed me in the Clip Show.

We are finally talking about What Did You Eat Yesterday?

NiNi

We are. You must know by now, dear listeners, that this is the granddaddy. This is the show of all time for us, this is the yardstick by which things are measured. What Did You Eat Yesterday? is an article of faith for Ben and I.

Ben, why don't you tell the people what What Did You Eat Yesterday? is about?

Ben

What Did You Eat Yesterday? is a slice of life food drama from Japan that is about two gay men in their forties-approaching-50, and it's about the daily challenges of their life as they try to maintain a long-term relationship with each other, and grounded around the meals they share at their dinner table.

NiNi

So simple a description. So, somehow, deep and devastating a show.

Ben

NiNi, how about you try describing our leads in this show?

NiNi

Hoo! Okay, let's see! So our two main leads are Kakei Shiro, played by Nishijima Hidetoshi; and Yabuki Kenji, played by Uchino Seiyo. These two are legends of the stage and screen, and it shows in the show. There's a cast of fun characters that surrounds Shiro and Kenji.

At Shiro’s job—Shiro’s a lawyer—there is Mom-sensei, Mom-sensei’s son, and various other lawyers in the office. At Kenji's job at the hair salon, there is his boss, who is a serial philanderer; his wife who he runs the salon with; and a cast of other hairdressers and assorted hangers on. And then you've got their friends who steadily become more and more important to the show as they go along. Shiro's friend Kohinata and his partner Wataru, otherwise known as Gilbert. There are a lot of other characters around. There’s Shiro and Kenji's families, there's their neighbor, Koyama. There's so many, so many fantastic characters in this little show. Each of them so distinct, each of them so fully fleshed out and human in a lot of ways.

I don't know how to talk about this show. I love it so much. It goes so deep for me. Like I said, it's an article of faith, almost, and I just get a warm feeling when I think about it. When I watch it, when I see all the characters on it interact, from the intensely important characters like Shiro's parents, all the way down to the lady at the supermarket where Shiro and Kenji buy their groceries—who is Shiro's partner in keeping his food bills down by pointing to the sales without speaking to him. Ever.

[both laugh]

Ben

I love their dynamic. It's so funny.

To talk about What Did You Eat Yesterday?, let's talk about BL, and why What Did You Eat Yesterday? feels unique in relation to BL. In BL, you're in traditional romance. You got two pretty people. They looked at each other. They liked what they saw. And they gotta figure out if they can be together. In What Did You Eat Yesterday? we're past the figuring it out portion. They decided they want to be together and now they're navigating what that means. Unlike in a traditional BL, where your ongoing arc is, “Are these two going to finally kiss?” this show is structured episodically, where each episode is about something going on in their lives that they have to contend with, and then we move beyond that particular issue.

There is an ongoing throughline about these two coming to a greater understanding of each other, learning to love themselves better, building more intimate relationships with the people around them, and building their relationship. But that's so different from the rest of BL. What Did You Eat Yesterday? episodes, in a lot of ways, can stand on their own. You can go back for What Did You Eat Yesterday? and watch some of your favorite episodes individually in a way that I don't think is as accessible with a traditional romance.

NiNi

I think what it is is that it's a traditional situation comedy. So it's not necessarily a serialized story, although there are elements that you keep up with—runners that go through the story—it is more of a “There's a situation. They deal with the situation. Sometimes there are hijinks, sometimes it's more serious. There's always some kind of a heartwarming moment, and they always cook something because food is the center of their home.”

It's lovely and predictable in that way that you know what you're going to get in a What Did You Eat Yesterday? episode, but also, you never know how things are gonna turn for Shiro and Kenji. Not in the sense of, “Oh, are they gonna break up over this?” Not something like that. But you never know if this is the moment that one of them is going to have a revelation, or there's going to be a moving forward in their dynamic. You just never know if that's gonna happen. So there's parts of the show, particularly around Shiro’s very complicated relationship with the closet, that sometimes you think it's gonna zig and then actually it zags and you're like, “Oh, my God, Shiro is growing.”

It's so fun to watch, especially at my age, to know that you can still grow, and learn, and change, and learn to adjust and compromise for other people if you care enough to do so. You ain't dead yet. [laughs]

Ben

I think what makes this show special for me is it doesn't exist in the bubble, and the issues that they have are specific to gay men.

The very first issue that we encounter for them is how closeted Shiro is compared to Kenji, who is a flamboyant hairdresser. Kenji and Shiro's first fight that we experienced, Kenji brags to one of his clients about his boyfriend, and he gets a little racy about it. And then later, when Kenji and Shiro are walking down the street together, they encounter that client, who comments on the details of their relationship that she gleaned from Kenji and embarrasses Shiro, who is deeply-closeted and doesn't want people walking around talking about his business. Kenji gets really upset about this and begins to cry and asks, “Everyone else gets to talk about their families and everyone they love that's important to them. Why am I not allowed to?” And Shiro doesn't really have a great response to that, because he knows he's in the wrong, and so instead he just makes some of Kenji's favorite food. [laughs] Which is one of the ongoing ways they solve their issues.

So much of this show is about the long term impacts of the closet and homophobia on gay men, and the ways it informs how we make bonds with each other. We mentioned Kohinata and Wataru earlier. They only meet Kohinata because Shiro has an encounter at the grocery store with a woman who also wants to take advantage of a sale on watermelon, but the watermelon is too big for their refrigerators, and so they decide to split it. They become friends. And, in time, they introduced Shiro to one of their other gay friends. And they do that thing that's kind of annoying from straight people. They're like, “You're both gay! Go, you know, mingle with each other.” And like, that's super awkward as hell, but it ends up being genuinely helpful. They do actually become friends. They start hanging out as couples together.

There's a really good examination about the fact that Kenji is not exactly Shiro's type per se, but Kohinata is, and Kenji gets worried that if he leaves Shiro alone with Kohinata, something might happen. And they have a really sort of ugly breakdown where Kenji admits this jealousy is in him, but he feels like he's wrong in that regard because he once cheated on a partner, so he doesn't have the moral high ground here. But it's still something he's deathly terrified of because he loves Shiro so much and doesn't want to lose him.

What's so special about this show is when they introduce something interesting in an episode, they're able to use that later, where you benefit from having seen that interaction earlier, but it doesn't matter if you don't remember all of it. You don't have to remember all those details about how he and Kayoko met to appreciate that they are grocery friends now, who take advantage of sales together and like to cook things together when there's a way to benefit. There's a beautiful examination of the mundane in this show that is really heartwarming.

12:08 - Favorite Episodes

NiNi

I wanna get a little bit into this idea that you had about the episodic nature of this and maybe do a little fun thing. Do you have a favorite episode of What Did You Eat Yesterday?

Ben

Depends on my mood at the time.

NiNi

What are some of your tops?

Ben

I think, in the first season, I really like the Christmas episode, they host Kohinata and Wataru. We had already seen Shiro make that meal for Kenji as the first thing he cooked for him. He tried to make the best dishes he could make the first night Kenji moved in with him, and that just sort of became their Christmas tradition because it just happened to be the holiday season. And I liked him sharing that with other gay people. That's also the episode where Shiro says plainly that he wants to take Kenji home so that his parents can see that he's not a sad person because Kenji's at his side. And that gets me.

We've seen the Christmas moments three times in this show now, because we have Kenji first moving in, their dinner with Wataru and them, and then we had Christmas again in the second season. But in the second season, they end up changing their menu because of their changing health needs. That was really well earned because we, the audience, were primed for another Christmas meal and we're excited to see it, but it was really lovely to see them unpack that their Christmas traditions are something that they have control over. This is really significant for me as a queer person, because we have to create our own traditions.

We don't get to have all of the same ones that straight people do. Some of us are not necessarily welcome with our partners around our families. We don't necessarily go home to see them. We often do events with other people at the holiday season. One of mine is getting other local homos together to watch the seminal classic by Rob Williams, Make the Yuletide Gay, a not great film from 2009, but one of my favorite films.

The other episode I really like is from the first season, the episode where Kenji invites his friends to meet Shiro to talk about adult adoption, particularly because we had follow up on that episode in the second season. Adult adoption was the right choice for Kenji's friends, but Kenji later in the second season refuses to be adopted by Shiro, because he wants to hold out for marriage. Once Shiro adopts him, marriage is not possible, and that is what he wants. For pragmatic reasons, older couples have to choose adult adoption to protect the younger partner from family members that the older partner does not like. But adult adoption is not marriage. Gay people want to partner with the people that are most important to them, like other people do, and it is kind of shitty that we have to do all this roundabout stuff just to protect the people we care about.

What about you? Do you have any favorite episodes of this show?

NiNi

I always like the episodes where Kenji cooks. Because Shiro is the one who does the majority of the cooking for the two of them. It's how he shows he cares, and he enjoys it, and he's good at it. And Kenji is always incredibly appreciative of the meals that Shiro makes.

But I always like when Kenji cooks for Shiro. Sometimes he cooks for himself because Shiro was not there, and those will be times he indulges himself and makes something that he knows that Shiro wouldn't necessarily approve of because it's unhealthy. But I always like when Kenji cooks specifically for Shiro, because he's so deliberate and thoughtful about it. There's one episode in particular when he makes some kind of soup for Shiro when he's sick.

Ben

Okay, that one is so funny because Shiro’s so independent, Kenji never gets the chance to take care of Shiro. So the way we will run around excited about BL tropes, like, “Oh, someone's sick. Oh, let's get some lukewarm water. It's time to fucking get this boy a sponge bath!”

[both laugh]

That's the moment that Kenji is having. Shiro is really sick and so has to be cared for. And so he's really excited to make a simple meal for Shiro and take care of him. But he's such a nervous wreck about it. We get to watch Shiro listening in the whole time. Like, “What the hell is happening up there?”

NiNi

[laughs] Shiro is so particular about everything and Kenji knows it, and so it's going a little bit badly. It's a little bit of a disaster. He pulls it together in the end.

Ben

Kenji actually did a good job.

NiNi

Kenji always feels like Shiro does so much for him, and Shiro doesn't let him do things for Shiro, and so he will always grab the opportunity to do something. He's always like, “Oh, we need something? I'll run, I'll go get it. I'll do this. I'll do that.”

Ben

Kenji cares about Shiro, so he takes care of their home.

NiNi

There is a situation where the washing machine overflows and part of the apartment gets flooded. Kenji notices that this is a thing that is continuously happening, and he goes out and buys a hose and says, “Well, you know, next time this happens, you can just drain it into the sink rather than it flooding the thing.” And that's when Shiro stops and he looks around at all the things that Kenji does to keep their home running, and he starts to cry. It's a very heartwarming moment, because you don't get the sense that Shiro takes Kenji for granted at all. That's not what this is about.

But it's just one of those moments where you really stop and take stock of how loved you are and it just overwhelms you. And that's the moment that he was having. But that moment was so earned by all the moments that had come before, where you see all the small ways that Kenji tries to take care of Shiro, and how Shiro feels like it's his responsibility to take care of himself and Kenji. And he doesn't like it when he doesn't feel like he's taking care of them. Well, he's realized at this point that, “Yeah, Kenji can take care of me, too in some big and small ways, and I knew he loved me, but I really feel like he loves me.” It's just a really lovely moment.

19:22 - The Show that Keeps Coming Back

Ben

This is our fourth outing with What Did You Eat Yesterday? I've been pretty close to this show the whole time it's been airing. What's it been like for you seeing the show come back three times now?

NiNi

I could watch this show forever. That's honestly how I feel about it. And the way that the show is set up, as long as Nishijima and Uchino want to keep doing it, I think we could get this show basically forever. It feels like meeting up with old friends every time you see a new bit of it, whether it's the special or the movie or new episodes.

It always feels like you have these friends, Shiro and Kenji. They've been living their lives. You haven't seen them for a while and then, boom. They’re here, and you're so happy to see them and you just want to know everything that's been going on with them. You wanna sit up at night and chat and catch up with their lives. Every time the show comes back, that's how I feel about it. I can't wait to sit down and catch up with Shiro and Kenji, and see what's going on with them now.

I feel like there's more stuff that maybe you're more aware of regarding the cultural significance of the show and what it means for Japan to be doing a show like this. So why don't you get into some of that stuff?

Ben

So the first show airs, and it's decently popular. Like it performs well in its time slot, which is one of the late night time slots. “Here's a quiet, easy to watch show. Now go to bed. You have to work in the morning.”

Uchino and Nishijima are veteran actors. Both of them have well over 100 credits. They are very successful actors who are sought out and are busy. And it was really surprising that they agreed to be part of this. I cannot overstate how significant it is for queer TV… talented, veteran actors are willing to play gay characters in a gay way, and are really proud of that work, and want to keep coming back and doing it. Uchino and Nishijima say plainly all the time: They are longtime fans of the manga and were very determined to bring it to air. They worked to rearrange their schedules to make sure that this show could keep coming back.

[Nishijima] is an Oscar winning actor now. He's becoming more internationally famous because of Drive My Car. So it's not like these guys are getting less busy. Both of these guys are so good.

If you've only seen Uchino play Kenji, you owe it to yourself to see Uchino play a veteran Japanese historical military leader or a fucking yakuza. He is so good. You get a small flash of that when he wears the suit in the movie, and in I think episode 3 of Season 2 where he flashes the macho thing. That's Uchino teasing the rest of us about the rest of the work he's done. He's played some intensely macho characters in his career, so it's really fun seeing him in particular playing someone as flamboyant as Kenji.

What's so surprising is the show keeps coming back. Like season one, we go from the fight in episode one, where Shiro yells at Kenji for even telling someone else that he's in a relationship with him, to them meeting Shiro's parents in episode 12, and Shiro reassuring Kenji that he doesn't want either of them to die, that they're gonna eat well and live a long, happy life together. I would have been okay. It would have still been one of my favorite shows if we just ended at episode 12.

The arc of season one is so strong of Shiro letting go a little bit and not being so stiff. He can't give Kenji all the things he maybe wants, but he can be a little less stiff about some of these things. And then they announced the fucking New Year special and I'm like, what the fuck is going on? And they're like, “Oh, yes. We’re going to a whole new year special.” What's it about? “Well, Shiro's really busy at work, so he's not gonna be home a lot.” And I'm like, oh my God. [laughs] This is so much fun.

We got to see Kenji and Shiro dealing with separation anxiety and missing each other. That was so much fun. We got to see Kenji trying to play the role of brave housewife for a while. We got to see Kohinata and Wataru's internal dynamic for a bit. That was a really fascinating thing for us to get to experience. We got to see Kenji tell Wataru straight up, “Stop testing your partner. They're going to fail eventually. And then what? Stop holding back. You ain't brave. You ain't doing nothing.” Great stuff.

And then we get the movie! And I was not expecting the movie either, and the movie ended up being heavier than I expected. The movie ends up having Shiro's parents regress and say they don't actually want Kenji to come over anymore. And that was a huge pain point that played out in season 2. I was not expecting them to hold on to that as long as they did. The delivery from Nishijima when he tells Kenji, “I know you're hurting over this,” was so good.

24:57 - Season 2: Mortality, Family, and Hets

Ben

Let's talk about Season 2, NiNI. What were the big things for season 2 that stuck out to you as sort of the big ideas?

NiNi

There was a definite throughline about mortality. There's a lot of death, and discussions around death, and inheritance, and family, and the next generation, and what happens when you are gone. That really sort of permeated the second season. But not in a melancholy way, more in like a contemplative way, a way that makes you think about who are the people who are important to you? What do they need? What do you want to share with them? What do you want them to have of you when you're gone? What matters about your relationship with them now? Those are the kinds of themes that the show used that runner to explore.

Themes of moving forward and growing up in certain ways, because one of the things about Shiro that comes to the fore at work, Shiro is the kind of person who has avoided too much responsibility at work. He's avoided being promoted. He took the job that he took because he would be able to leave work on time and go home and have dinner.

This is culturally related as well, because he's seen as a little feckless at work because he's not married, because Shiro’s not out at work, at all. He is becoming more out in other aspects of his life, but he is completely not out at work. So as far as anybody at work is concerned, Shiro’s a single man, and the idea of a single man of Shiro's age in Japanese society and culture. It's seen as him being sort of flighty and irresponsible, which is the opposite of Shiro, which is just so funny to me.

One of the things that he does this season, because of the nature of what they're trying to explore through this idea of mortality, is that he starts taking on more responsibility at work. His boss tells him that she wants to retire and she wants him to run the law firm. This is something he would have never agreed to, never even considered before now, but because he's in a place where he feels stable and secure in his life, things are good with him and Kenji, he is coming to an accord about things with his parents. He feels stable, he feels like his life is good, and so he's more willing to take on that additional responsibility at work.

I found that to be a really interesting part of this season, how the discussions of mortality threaded its way through the season and manifested in different ways. What about you? What are some of the things that you took away from this season?

Ben

Before I get into that, I really want to follow up on one of the things you mentioned about Shiro taking on this responsibility at work. This was a runner because it comes up about four times this season. I like that the thing that finally pushes Shiro over the edge is Kenji taking on more responsibility at work. Once he realized that Kenji was going to be a manager, and wasn't going to be home at normal times anymore, and was embracing this new responsibility in his life, that inspired Shiro to also do that as well. I really like that it was Kenji just accepting this sort of thing and being brave about it, that pushed Shiro. And I like how Shiro did it because he wanted to also help Osamu.

You get the sense that Shiro intentionally took a job in this law firm because he wanted to work in a small law firm where there wasn't a lot of room for growth and promotion, where they wouldn’t be constantly expecting him to take on more responsibility and deal with juniors coming up underneath him. He wanted to work in a small family law firm where the mom had a son who was intended to inherit and take charge of the firm so he wouldn't be expected to. You get the sense that he was surprised that he was asked to take on partnership in this, but it ends up being something that's positive for all of them because he likes and respects Osamu. But Osamu's passion is criminal defense law, which is not very lucrative for their firm, but it's what Osamu's passionate about.

We got to see Shiro and Osamu work together this season, and that this is not something that Osamu is being, sort of half-assed about. He got super worked up for one of their clients. I think in the first season, I thought of him as maybe a little lazy, being able to take it easy because it's his mom’s firm and Shiro’s really determined, but it was really nice to see that Osamu had his own backbone as a lawyer about things that were really important to him, that he wanted to do professionally. And some of that involves him not necessarily being hands on with the firm as he's not as good about these things.

I really liked that Shiro is able to extend his tendency to want to help people in a more accessible way this season. He gets so scared about the gay thing that he just ends up hiding from so many people. I really enjoyed seeing Shiro be more flexible this season. He took the fact that his vision is getting worse almost completely in stride. [laughs] Even though he was so grumpy about having to spend a bunch of money on lenses.

I actually liked the through line about how they're getting older and things are changing. I liked that the first episode this season was about them having to change grocery stores because Nakamuraya closed, and that was devastating for Shiro. That was the grocery store that he liked and trusted the most, and he had to go and find a new grocery. Thankfully, we find the same clerk at that one who is still helping them out. Speaking of her, we mentioned her earlier. I love that she has a completely distinct relationship with Kenji and Shiro, where Kenji’s like, “She talks to me all the time! She's great!” and Shiro’s just like, “What? She only ever glares at me.”

[both laugh]

NiNi

She speaks to him one time in the entire show.

Ben

I love it.

NiNi

That's when he goes to the grocery store and she sees him in his glasses for the first time and he's self-conscious about them. And when she sees him, he takes them off really quickly and she goes, “I think they really suit you,” and that was it.

Ben

I love it. [laughs] I almost cried! I was like, yes!

NiNi

I was like that's your friend! She cares about you! [laughs]

Ben

I think she also commented once this season that the fish is actually good at the new store. She actually protected Shiro once. She was being told to go around and mark a bunch of sketchy food off that needed to go, and she saw Shiro eyeing her with the sale button, and she didn't put it on the food that she didn't think was gonna be safe for them to eat because she knew Shiro wouldn't take it if it wasn't on sale. [laughs]

I really liked in this season how Shiro was really trying to accept that things were changing in their lives. I love Shiro accepting that Kenji was going to take on this role of manager after the whole thing with the philanderer friend of Kenji's, whose wife, now that their daughter has graduated, was like, “I'm leaving this man. I can't be with him anymore.” And then he decides to fuck off to Vietnam, and so Kenji's left running the store.

I like that Shiro accepted that they're getting older and that their food needs and eating habits are changing. That Shiro, despite his determination to save up as much as possible for their futures by being really pragmatic about their food budget, and probably other things in their lives as well, because he and Kenji never seemed to buy a lot of new things or go shopping a lot. Shiro increased their food budget in response to inflation and in response to the fact that Kenji’s cholesterol was maybe a little high, and wanting to make sure that Kenji ate the right food so that he would stay healthy.

I really liked the final conversation with Shiro's parents where they talk about how they want to make sure that Kenji is in their will, that they accept him as Shiro’s other half. That they chided him not to fuck things up with Kenji.

NiNi

That they found a columbarium that would have enough space so that Kenji could be with them.

Ben

Right, and Kenji took this as the peace offering it was from Shiro's mom and started thinking about himself as the beloathed daughter-in-law. [laughs]

NiNi

It's so funny because this is basically Shiro's mom saying literally over my dead body, but in a nice way, like.

[both laugh]

“Over my dead body,” but that's the acceptance? It was just so funny because all the things she's talking about, the columbarium, the inheritance, it's all well after I'm dead. But she's fine with it? Basically? This is the way that she's chosen to accept him. And he immediately understands that and he takes it absolutely in the spirit in which it's meant.

Ben

I love the way that they do it is the only way that Shiro and his family could. “Well, it's very cost effective for us to buy into this together right now. They're having a sale, so.”

I really like that his parents were very stern with him about it, but they're like, “We're not going to move to the nursing home that's closer to you because it's more expensive. “We will deal with the hassle of being further from you because you're 50 now. We don't know how much longer we're going to be around, but if we're here for a long time, we want to make sure that there's something for you to have to make sure that you're okay as well.” And I liked how Shiro had to learn to accept that from his parents, not as a knock against him for being a bad son, but as for them trying to do right by him as his parents. I thought that was a really significant move from the show, considering how much the idea is that the kids are supposed to put everything they can into taking care of their parents as they get older. I thought it was really inspired for aging parents to be like, “No, we wanna make sure that we are not a burden to you in our final twilight years.”

NiNi

The relationship between Shiro and his parents is so fascinating from the very beginning of the show up until this bit that we've seen so far. Not just in terms of the way that they are learning and growing, and finding ways to accept who their son is, and he in his own way, finding his ways to accept who they are without losing himself.

The structure of their relationship is also so culturally interesting to me. It just feels very Japanese. I don't know how else to explain it, the way that they deal with each other, the way that his dad never lets Shiro pay for anything for them, just things like that. His parents are so traditional. For a long part of the show, his mother would only wear kimono. It's only later on in the show that she stops wearing kimono all the time.

Ben

It's a really subtle thing with the costuming choice, but every time that she takes a step forward, she's not wearing traditional clothes.

NiNi

The dynamic is also interesting because Kenji's relationship with his family is so different than Shiro's relationship with his family.

Ben

Oh, let's talk about that episode, since you brought up Kenji's mom and sisters.

NiNi

So Kenji is the only son of a single mother, and he has two younger sisters. His family is very comfortable with Kenji being gay, with everything around that. He is very open with his family, he talks to them about Shiro all the time, but still his family have never met Shiro. With all the death-flagging that was going on around this season, his mom was just like. “Oh well, I, I want to meet your Shiro,” and he immediately starts panicking. He's like, “Are you dying?”

So they have the meet up. Shiro picks this really nice restaurant for them to meet up. He's very considerate and thoughtful about how he chooses the restaurant in terms of what distance they'll have to go, and he wants it to be a nice experience.

Ben

It’s also the restaurant that Oo-sensei took him to the first time when he started working at the firm.

NiNi

Yep, he picks the restaurant with a lot of things in mind, basically. And so they have this lovely meal, and then Kenji's mom explains why she wanted to meet him. A friend of hers, her son died, and she started thinking about what would happen if Kenji died and Kenji's like, “What the hell?” and she's like, “No, no, no. Just listen to me.” But basically, she didn't want it to be a situation where, if anything happened to Kenji, that Shiro would not be able to stand with them as Kenji's family. So she figured at the very least if they met once, then they're not strangers and Shiro has the right, then, to stand with them if anything happens to Kenji, and mourn him as part of the family, basically.

Ben

That was so touching. I legit sobbed after that episode ended. [laughs] I'm getting hot right now thinking about it. That was such an incredible episode. Oh my God.

NiNi

It was so much. Kenji's family is so the opposite of Shiro’s family. They're teasing and they're chattering a mile a minute.

Ben

They're leaving the restaurant and his sisters and trying to take the receipt from Kenji so that they can pay part of their share and he's like, “Go away. Stop it. I'm the oldest. Let me do this.”

NiNi

It's a very different dynamic than Shiro’s family, and it's not one that Shiro’s necessarily entirely comfortable with yet, because he's so much more stoic than Kenji is. But he is starting to lean into it a little bit. He's still kind of on the outside of things in that regard, but they're teasing him and he's doing his little shy smile thing. He's not entirely comfortable with them yet, but you can see how he will possibly get there. I don't think he'll ever be the one who's teasing back, but he will become comfortable with them. You can see it. And that's what Kenji's mom wanted. That's the ball whe wanted to start rolling. She wants Shiro to feel like family with them.

There's so much of that in this season. This season is just emotional hits after emotional hits in that regard. There's so much about family, and caring for people. Like, thoughtfully caring for people, not just absentmindedly caring for people, which is a big thing for me. Putting thought into how you care about somebody, and how you show that care for somebody, it's a big, big thing for me and something I enjoy seeing.

Ben

I really like how this season made me get super invested in a bunch of heterosexual characters. Like I ended up super invested in Osamu and his desire to become a prosecutorial educator for criminal defense attorneys. That was a big deal for him that he really wanted to take on this educator role, even if it didn't pay well, because it was really important to.

I got weirdly invested in the sort of flaky hairdresser. The other guy who works at Kenji's shop, and his relationship with his girlfriend who can't cook.

NiNi

Incredible. So incredible. I love that so much.

Ben

There are so many layers to this whole thing.

NiNi

And the fact that you thought it was just a one-off thing, but then later in the season it comes back.

Ben

Oh my God. So, Kenji is invited to hang out with one of his coworkers, and Kenji at first is nervous. Like, “Is this hot young guy trying to get me into his house? I'm a married woman, sir!” and he's super nervous about what the hell is going on? But it's—like his colleague’s really intent on him coming over, and he talks about his girlfriend, about how they didn't work out because she couldn't really cook that well. He didn't like her food, and then one night he just got tired of it and made a really nice pasta, and she got super upset about this because she tries so hard to fill this role that she feels like she's supposed to, but she's just not a good cook. And she's never gotten the experience of someone enjoying her food, and they just didn't work out.

I'm like, okay, well, that was a really cool story, but it’s a little bit sad. And then five episodes later in episode 9, we get the reveal that he missed her and they tried to work it out. And he tried to teach her how to cook more effectively. And then he decided to settle on baking. Somebody who’s such a stickler for details as her, “salt to taste” as an instruction does not work for her. So she picks up baking and ends up being really good at it, and then she has this moment where she gets to react to the first time of seeing someone smile and enjoy the food she made. And, besties, I ugly cried.

NiNi

It was a Capital M Moment.

Ben and Nini [in unison]

It was so good! [both laugh]

NiNi

I wept. I wept! It was so beautiful. And you now see that they figured it out. They figured it out through food!

Ben

The biggest thing about What Did You Eat Yesterday? is it is the kindest show.

43:10 - WDYEY is So Gay and Found Family

Ben

What Did You Eat Yesterday? is so explicitly gay. Everything about this show is gay. The fact that Shiro doesn't want to be a super successful, high-powered lawyer is unusual. He does not fit the mold of a traditional Japanese man, despite all of the other things about him. He's just so unusual as a Japanese man that despite all of his attempts to closet himself, he ends up looking weirder to people the longer this goes on. It's so awful for guys like Shiro.

For Kenji, everybody's gonna clock his ass right away, but Shiro’s not going to get clocked right away. And so often the fact that he doesn't get clocked makes him seem creepy to people. Like, there's that whole moment in the first season with the apprentice lawyer that gets assigned to him for a while, where that interaction ends up kind of a mess because Shiro's misreading signals from her, doesn't want her glomming onto him too much, and ends up accidentally really upsetting the girl by making her think he was trying to hit on her.

Oo-sensei is like, “Shiro, what are you doing? You've been a bachelor the 20 years I've known you. What the hell is going on? Please do better.” [laughs] And it sucks because he's doing so good, but he won't tell her exactly that.

Oh my God. Speaking of her. I love her so much. She got Shiro a portable induction burner.

NiNi

I want one. I absolutely want one of those.

Ben

They are so fucking useful. You can cook stuff on your dinner table without worrying that the whole fucking table’s gonna burst into flames.

She lies to Shiro that she got it as a gift from someone else, and she's just trying to downsize some of her stuff, cause she's realized she's getting old and has too much shit in her house. And so she's like, “Yeah, Shiro, I need you to take care of this for me so that I can get rid of it.” “Well, I guess if I have to do a favor, it would be rude not to accept the gift under these conditions.” I love her so much. She can do no wrong. She is my favorite.

NiNi

She knows him so well. I wouldn't be surprised if she has already dialed in to what's going on.

Ben

She absolutely knows.

NiNi

I think she knows he's gay.

Ben

She also knows that he eats with someone. She asked very politely in the first season if he has someone to share meals with, and Shiro said yes, and she just said very good. That was very tactful, ma'am. I approve.

Let’s talk about Kyoko a little bit, because we haven't talked about Kayoko much.

NiNi

I was just about to say all the women around Shiro are so great and Kayoko is definitely one of the greatest. Sorry, before we get into her, I just love the way that she ran into Kenji at the grocery store and acted like she was meeting BTS or something. [laughs]

Ben

She was so excited to meet Kenji, and Kenji's like, “Huh? What do you want?” I also like that Kenji was low-key kind of bitchy [laughs] at the grocery store with this weird woman rolling up on him. We see the version of Kenji where he is home with the man he loves and is loud about it all the time, or we see him at work where he is ON for his clientele. It was so refreshing to see Kenji as just another dude in a grocery store being like, “Why the fuck is this woman looking at me like that?”

NiNi

[Laughs] It was so delightful. I love Kayoko as a character. She doesn't pop up a whole lot, but every time she does, it's truly a delight.

Her main story in this season is she and her husband finally, finally getting to meet Kenji, and they're both so excited about it. And it's this whole event. When Shiro and Kenji go over there, Kayoko’s husband is talking Kenji's ear off and wants to know everything. Everything! He wants to know how they met. He wants to know everything about them. They're just so enthused about their friend's partner, because they know that this is somebody that Shiro loves, and they love Shiro. So they want to love whoever Shiro loves.

Ben

It's really fascinating with the way some of these dynamics play out. Kohinata and Shiro have been friends with Kayoko and her husband for years. Kohinata even longer. But they've never met either of their partners. Shiro has talked so much about Kenji that they feel they know him. But it's notable that it seems like there's this sort of line they can't cross and say, “I would like to meet him.” There appears to be some sort of etiquette line that everyone's toeing here, where they want to meet Kenji. It's impolite to ask. It means that there's some sort of gap in their closeness.

But they are just so happy that Kenji's finally showing up. They have this little dinner party together. And what is his name? Let me pull up his name real quick. Tominaga-san. He is so enamored with Kenji. He is resting his hand on his chin. He is batting his eyelashes at Kenji, he is like, “Please tell us. Tell us the story of how you met Shiro.”

It was fun for us as the audience because Kenji immediately begins retelling the story we heard Kenji say to Wataru and Kohinata in season one, and so we know the story, and so we can roll our eyes with Shiro when he says he looks like Kaiba Ryu again. And Shiro’s like, “Okay, whatever, bro.”

[both laugh]

City Hunter. It was so much fun.

One of the things I really like this season: we got a sense of the relationship between Wataru and Kohinata, that Wataru had a crush on Kohinata when Wataru was still very much a minor, and Kohinata basically refused to acknowledge it for like five to eight years because he thought it was inappropriate. That Wataru was so gay that he was basically disowned by his own family. That's a really painful thing for the two of them. I was really glad that we got some insight into those details. I also like that Shiro and Kenji were doing the math on their relationship and they were like, “Wait, hold the fuck up, bro.”

NiNi

They were like, “Hold the phone. What did you? What?” He's like, “No, no, no. Nothing happened until he was old enough.” And they're all like, “But still!”

[both laugh]

That is something that felt very gay to me.

Ben

That was very real. I was like, “Ohh, gurl.”

NiNi

I have friends who are with people that they met when they were in high school, who were much older and they're still with them now. Now that they're in their late 30s and 40s it’s not so scandalous, but they've been together a long time.

Ben

Yeah, absolutely.

NiNi

That felt very gay to me.

50:54 - Let’s Talk About The Food

NiNi

This show is so good! It's so enjoyable, and we haven't even started talking about the food yet. Oh my God. The food on this show.

Ben

What are some of the favorite things you've seen made on the show?

NiNi

Mmmm…Shiro did something. He made, I think it was a version of khao man gai with chicken thighs in the rice cooker. I looked at that and I immediately thought, “I have got to try that.” That and the sushi pizza.

Ben

I have made Shiro's lasagna.

NiNi

How was it?

Ben

It's very good. His steps are really traditional. I think that's the big thing I learned when I've been copying some of his stuff. Shiro’s cooking food that you would find in like a basic recipe you would find somewhere else. What Shiro’s really good at is balancing his time for all the dishes he needs to make so that you have all of the four or five side dishes he wants to have every time you sit down, which I don't like to do. That's too many dishes. [laughs]

NiNi

That's very much Japanese cooking, though.

Ben

Five different bowls per person. Hell to the no. I am a Creole food home cook. It's all going in one fucking pot.

NiNi

[laughs] They do some one pot stuff sometimes, though. It's really good.

Ben

They do! Like, they have curry.

NiNi

They have curry and the same thing, the same khao man gai that I was just talking about as well. That was all done in the rice cooker, basically.

Ben

I liked that pasta that Kayoko made. I haven't made it yet, but I think about that one every time it's hot. I really liked that slapped together sushi that Shiro put together when Kenji's friends were coming over.

NiNi

That was good. I am also, like Shiro, not good at hot oil, so I paid very close attention to the tempura recipe to see if maybe I would have the wherewithal and the bravery to try it at some point.

Ben

I like that Shiro, despite being really determined about his own skills, how easily he collaborates with other people in the kitchen. I thought Shiro would be the kind of cook who was difficult to cook around, but he shares space in his kitchen so easily with Kayoko and Kohinata and Kenji when they help him out. Shiro admits that he's not very comfortable cooking with oil. Like, he's not very good at doing tempura, and he let Kayoko teach him when they hung out again. I like that he's willing to learn from other people.

I liked in the movie when Kohinata and Wataru's fridge went out, and they brought a bunch of food over to them, they had like a mini feast and brought some stuff for them to save. They invited Kayoko over to help them make some stuff. In this season, they were like, we really want to get these special type of cheesy pancakes and Kohinata and he are just working through the recipe together, which let us have a really cool moment where Wataru seems like he's also starting to mellow out a little bit. He's just vibing with Kenji and they're gossiping about their boyfriends with each other.

NiNi

I love that demon twink.

Ben

[Laughs] He is a demon twink. He's like, “Is Shiro turning 50?” He convinces his well meaning rich boyfriend to send like a whole party package to them with a big ass balloon saying congratulations on 50.

NiNi

I don't know how well meaning Kohinata was? Because in that same episode, where they're making the pancakes, he says, “I'm so sorry about the 50 balloon,” and he looks Shiro dead in the eye in this kind of way. [laughs]

Ben

But that's not Kohinata being aggressive. That's Kohinata being alarmingly earnest. He very much needs to see you forgive him in that moment. It's the same thing that happened when Wataru kicked him out with the clams thing.

NiNi

The way that I read it, because Kohinata is very into his fitness, right? He looks good. He's very toned and muscular. He exercises a lot. He's got a great body. He doesn't look anything like whatever age he is. And while Shiro looks good for his age, Shiro does not look like Kohinata. And Kohinata’s very proud of his body. He shows it off, like the things that he wears, and all those kinds of things. So I just thought there was just him being a little bitchy as well, but in a nice way because he's Kohinata.

Ben

I’m gonna think about that. I’m gonna rewatch it and see how I feel about it with that in mind. I don't think that's what he's doing. I don't think that's who he is, but I’m gonna think about it.

NiNi

But yeah, it's not just the food. The food always looks good and I'm always like, “I gotta try that. I gotta try that. I gotta try that.” But just the process of watching them cook in this show, the way that it's filmed, it feels very comfortable. It feels like you could actually make these meals. It doesn't feel over complicated. It doesn't feel stressful. It feels like just this calm time in the kitchen and it makes you feel like you could do it, too.

Ben

We've talked to Japanese friends of ours that mention that the food Shiro makes is actually very simple and normal for Japanese people. He's not doing anything spectacular with the food, but that's also, I think, part of the charm. He's doing something really normal really earnestly every day as a way to let his partner know that he still matters to him.

56:36 - Final Thoughts (And A Moment to Drag Nobu)

Ben

This is my favorite show, and it will probably always end up being my favorite show. I say a lot that as much as I like BL, I like the silly little stories about gay boys falling in love with each other. I really do appreciate stories about gay boys staying together. That's why I'm really glad that we're seeing more sequels. We talked about this in an earlier episode this year, I believe, how we feel about sequels, and I do want them to keep trying to tell stories about gay people trying to make their lives work. I really like that this show keeps coming back and has more things to say—that it feels like everyone grew between both shows.

By the end of season 2, we know that Shiro and Kenji have been together for at least eight years. I really like how they feel older. It's been almost five years since the first show released, and Nishijima and Uchino have changed in that time, and it was really cool to see the two of them exploring what it means to get older through these characters as well. There is room in this genre to tell stories about beloved couples growing together, and I am so glad that we have such a high bar of a show to refer to when we tell people we want that.

NiNi

You're talking about having this show to refer to, and refer to it you do, sir.

Ben

I do.

[both laugh]

NiNi

One of the things that I really enjoyed about this show is watching other shows come behind it in the same spirit, but not trying to do the exact same thing. Two in particular that really have felt like they came off the spirit of this show were Our Dining Table and She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat. I want to see more shows in this general vein.

Ben

We called episode 6 of Tokyo in April Is… the What Did You Eat Yesterday? homage episode. There's a moment in I Became the Main Role of a BL Drama that we called the What Did You Eat Yesterday? moment where we thought that one actor was channeling Uchino's performance as Kenji when he was enjoying the curry that he was eating.

NiNi

As you said that, watching Kenji eat the food is almost as much fun as watching Shiro prepare the food.

Ben

We got some manga insights from our friend, Turtles. We were hoping to bring her on for this episode, but she's so busy. I love you, girl, but we gotta find a better time to work with you. She talked about how when they first moved in together—they didn't capture this in the show—Kenji was not as animated about enjoying Shiro's food, and Shiro got a little bit stressed about that, because Shiro's trying to communicate that he cares about Kenji through the food and he wasn't receiving a lot of feedback for that. Kenji picks up on this and starts being more animated and more forthright about enjoying the food because he knows it's important to Shiro.

Speaking of partners recognizing what's important to Shiro, let's talk about that motherfucker that Shiro used to live with.

NiNi

Oh my God. Nobu. Oh my God, what the hell?

Ben

I hate that man so much.

NiNi

He's so cruel. It is shitty behavior—absolutely shitty behavior—to not acknowledge and be grateful for somebody cooking for you. I don't care if you like the food or not. If somebody puts effort into cooking for you, you at the very least say thank you.

Ben

And when you use a shared kitchen, you clean up after yourself, goddamn.

NiNi

Cannot stand that character. The actor that they got to play him was so good, though, I really hated his face. Like—

[both laugh]

Ben

It’s the same episode we talked about earlier with the washing machine continually getting clogged and not draining properly. This happened years ago when Nobu was still living with Shiro. Nobu didn't offer to help at all. He was just like, “Clean this up right away before you cause problems for the people underneath us and they want us to pay for it.” And it's like, bro, this is his fucking house. And then he's like, “Whatever, I'm leaving. I'm gonna get me some chicken.” And I'm like, brah, you going to Popeyes right now? Come on now.

NiNi

And you're not even going to the Popeyes for the two of us.

Ben

That's the thing, too! It's not like he realized that Shiro was gonna be dealing with a pretty serious headache, and he's like, “Well, I'm gonna go get some cleaning supplies, and I'm gonna pick up some chicken on the way back.” He comes back like, like, “Oh, so you're still dealing with this. I'm hungry. You need to make some food, too.” I hate that man, so much.

NiNi

It really gives you an understanding, though, of how much Shiro has grown, because part of Shiro’s growing has been learning to love and accept himself. And you could tell in that flashback that Shiro did not love himself, and how much Kenji becoming a part of his life has encouraged him to love himself.

One of the things that I noticed about the flashback with Nobu is how he shrank. He didn't argue with him. He was thinking things in his head, but he didn't argue with Nobu. He just kind of shrank away, and he would never do that with Kenji. He will always fight it out with Kenji, and I really appreciate that. Not only does he feel comfortable in this relationship, but he is also becoming more comfortable with himself. I thought that was a really neat sort of juxtaposition to see how Shiro used to be and how far he's come.

Ben

What I want to reiterate, after musing on it so much, is how genuinely special it is to have an episodic show about the lives of gay people in our list of shows to recommend to people.

NiNi

You know I'm not so much on the recommends as you are, but I will sit and watch this show anytime, any day, anywhere, starting at any point. I will watch one episode. I will watch seven episodes. I will skip around in time. I'll watch the movie. Because for me it's about just sitting and having that moment with these characters that I love. It's like a warm hug. I like this show, I love this show. Long may it reign. Hopefully they come back again. Not too far away.

If I'm talking about a thesis statement of how I feel about this show, it is that What Did You Eat Yesterday? is a show about just going along through life with the person that you love. And that's all it is. There's nothing more to it. It's very simple, but in that simplicity there is so much.

Ben

I really hope we get to talk about this show again. I really hope that Uchino and Nishijima and friends are able to come back together for this show again. I will totally understand and respect if they can't, or don't. But I really hope they do! [laughs]

NiNi

I hope that we get What Did You Eat Yesterday? episodes every other year for the next decade.

Ben

If you have not yet watched What Did You Eat Yesterday? It is available on GagaOOlala. Please go watch it. I hope you enjoy it. If you are a member of our pod team and you are reading this transcript—[NiNi laughs]—and you've still not watched this show, I am begging you, please watch this show.

NiNi

She's gonna get a kick out of that.

[both laugh]

Right, so that is going to wrap us up on Om-nom-nom, our What Did You Eat Yesterday? episode. We out. Say bye to the people, Ben.

Ben

Peace.

#podcast #lgbtq #what did you eat yesterday #kinou nani tabeta #what did you eat yesterday?#kinou nani tabeta?#japanese bl #ben and nini's conversations #the conversation #on art #season 5 #winter series

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