A photo of sushi with an excessive amount wasabi served at Ichibazushi, a restaurant in Osaka, posted on an online community of Korean travelers.

/ Captured from internet



By Kim Se-jeong

Wasabi, the green spicy condiment widely consumed in Japan especially with sushi and sashimi, is at the center of a new controversy between Korea and Japan.

Some Korean visitors to an outlet of the sushi restaurant chain, Ichibazushi, in central Osaka accused the restaurant of serving them an excessive amount of wasabi on their raw fish "to make fun of them."

The restaurant has been popular among Korean tourists recently.

Some people who visited the Osaka outlet said on an online travel community that the restaurant served sushi with too much wasabi on it to foreign visitors who don't speak Japanese. They said they saw the restaurant's staff giggling at them while their eyes were watering because of too much wasabi. Others wrote the restaurant serves Korean customers poor-quality fish, and the excessive use of the condiment was a way to cover it up.

They claimed it was an ill-intended act against them, calling it "wasabi terror."

"I thought it was just me," one wrote on the website. Another wrote, "It's not new for Ichibazushi to discriminate against Korean customers. I knew about it."

As the controversy grew and some even called for a boycott against the restaurant. The restaurant operator, Fujii Shokuhin, apologized in a statement, Sunday.

"We apologize for causing trouble on the internet about our service to customers," it said on its website. But it denied the accusation of ill intention. "We have not confirmed any discriminatory intent involved here. But we'll intensify training and education to staff for more customer satisfaction."

It added the chefs put extra wasabi without asking the customers because foreign customers often requested more wasabi.

Its website is currently down.

The issue has gained attention from media outlets in Japan and other countries as well.

In a report by the Japan Times, readers posted a wide range of comments.

"This doesn't surprise me a bit. So the moral of the story is that Japanese businesses in Japan employ many such tactics to tell foreigners that they're not welcome in their shops," one wrote.

Some defended the restaurant. "I have a lot of Chinese friends here (Hong Kong) and whenever I eat sushi or sashimi with them, they'll definitely ask for extra wasabi," according to another.