This piece grew out of a free-written exploration of subjects I didn’t know much about. I revised through several drafts, blending online research into octopi behavior and the preparation of sannakji (A Korean dish using live octopus) with personal experience and reflection to create what I hope is a vivid rendering of a familiar, somewhat controversial cross-cultural experience.
Tentacles
Watch the octopus unfurl from the crag and reach an articulate arm into a jar resting nearby on the sand. The arm thins as it stretches. Flexed over the jar rim, it stabs downward. The suckers on its end stick one at a time to the blue-shaded carapace of a crayfish that, after a dusty tussle, disappears into the octopus’s billowing maw.
This octopus was caught, too, but not for food. Hunger takes many forms. Curiosity is one; feeding it can lead to growth, change. Just as it curiously stretched part of itself into the jar, sensing the presence of a shelled little monster, the scientists who caught the octopus wished to study how octopi manipulated their arms in concert. Through observation and analysis, the scientists found that the octopus’s central brain picks which of the arms must move. The suckers, like tongues, taste and send signals. The brain sends back a command, and the chosen arm stretches, curls, pulls, encircles, squeezes, and retracts as the peripheral nervous system orders.
Now, watch a Busan fishmonger pluck a younger, grey-dark octopus from a water-filled tub and tuck it into a green plastic bag like those dog owners use to grab shit off the ground. He tips a cup of water into the bag, knots it, then places it inside a larger plastic bag he hands, along with several hundred won in change, to a mid-thirties American male. This man and his companion take the bagged octopus to a restaurant a few blocks from the market, where cooks prepare fresh seafood brought in by diners. The preparer, whose face we’re never shown, rolls up the sleeves of his Adidas hoodie and whacks at the upended octopus with a chef’s knife, leaving a writhing, glutinous mass on the cutting board. After dousing it with sesame oil, he slides the knife underneath and flips the wriggling carcass onto a white plate, topping it with sprouts and a dab of gochujang aioli.
The tentacles still live, it seems. One enwraps the knife’s blade, suckers clinging to the greasy metal. The cook tries pinching it off. Finally, he picks up another knife, cuts the tentacle, and pries each small segment from the blade, letting them fall onto the plate beside the gochujang. The red paste looks a shade lighter than the gochujang resting near the honey Dijon and hickory-smoked BBQ in one tourist’s fridge. He’d tucked a finger inside to taste; it hit his tongue sharp then sweet, fading to smoke as he swallowed. A dab more went into a mayo-based dip he shared for dinner that evening. Other recipes calling for gochujang linger untried—Bookmarks on his iPhone’s Safari browser.
It takes the cook less than a minute to unbag, chop, plate, and season the octopus. The tourists watch silently. Or they’ve scrubbed their commentary from the video before posting. Either way, the audio is dominated by sounds of preparation: knife striking the cutting board, whisper of running water, clinking of cookware. The cook works with practiced efficiency, seemingly unaffected by the men filming him. These likely aren’t his first tourists or his first octopus—this living thing he chops to death on the cutting board. Killing it is part of the job. Then it’s just protein-dense tissue rich in B-12, iron, and selenium.
The tourists see on the plate the cook slides to them something more. Though cut to pieces, the octopus’s peripheral nervous system remains active. What’s left of the tentacles convulses, adding the flavor of risk to the peppery spice lurching up the tongue after each swallow. Some diners have choked while eating, tentacles contracting inside their throats. No doubt these men know this. They’re likely courting the risk, believing that when they ingest sannakji, they’ll not only survive; they’ll be enlarged.
The cook, meanwhile, moves on to the next dish, chopping more quickly and forcefully. This time, no tentacles cling to his blade. Glancing at the tourists, he goes strangely cold when one shoots out a hand, beating his playfully indignant companion to the last bite of sannakji. Its suckers hold fast. When it finally lets go, the plate claps the table. Other diners turn and watch the tourist smile sheepishly as he swallows.
Patrick Faller 