I used to cut my fingers all the time at the sushi bar. I cut my finger on my first day as a sushi chef. It was embarrassing. Well, it always was.
Most of the time, they weren’t, but occasionally, some sushi bar customers noticed me cutting my finger or my fingers bleeding.
Yes, that, was really embarrassing.
Usually, there is little pain because the sashimi knife is very sharp. The damage is more mental.
After you cut your finger, then it’s like you’re in a hockey penalty box. Go into hiding to the back kitchen where no customers can see you. You apply salt (yes, it quickly stops blood!), cotton pads, band-aid from the first aid kit. Anything to stop the blood is good.
After five to ten minutes, you are ready to go back, except you have a small but 100% visible finger condom.
You tell yourself you will not cut your finger again, but in a few days or weeks, you do it again.
Yes, it’s embarrassing.
It’s not the blood, the knife cut, or the finger condom.
It’s the why — how did that happen, kind of why.
“It’s usually when you are thinking of something else,” a sushi chef told me once. I cannot agree more.
That was when I read this article which had this quote from a sushi chef. “I used to cut my fingers all the time, probably a thousand times. But now? I don’t cut my fingers anymore.”
Just like one of those same mistakes you kept making until one day, you realized you don’t make it anymore, I am unable to recall the last time I cut my finger at the sushi bar or the kitchen.
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