mr shiao took us to this dinner at this place that served a specialty food, ¡°tomato fish.¡± they bring out a big pot of tomato based soup and it¡¯s basically hot pot style. the twist is the live fish they throw into it. you pick out a type of fish (catfish in our case) and they bring it out squishy and squirmy for your approval. then they bring it back to the ¡°chef,¡± cut a few big gashes into it and then drop it into your pot. the fish is still nominally alive and it slowly twitches as the boiling water slowly saps away it¡¯s energy. that and the big bloody cuts in it¡¯s back. when the fish¡¯s bones are brittle enough to break, the fish is done and you can dig in. i was fascinated by it¡¯s death throes and slightly disgusted but i just kept on reassuring myself that this is no worse than eating sushi and sashimi.