Anko Pathos, the Taste of Love?! (あんこ悲しや、恋の味！？, Anko kanashi ya, koi no aji!??), known as "Bean Paste: The Taste of Love?!" in the Project ILM Scanlation, is the 171st chapter of the Urusei Yatsura manga.
Summary[]
When Rei kisses her on the cheek on one date, Ran believes she's finally won Rei's heart! But is she reading more into that kiss than she should...?
Plot Overview[]
Whilst on a leisurely flight through Tomobiki, Lum stumbles across Ran buying taiyaki for Rei. Lum tries to greet her old friend, but Ran immediately takes the oni's casual conversation as a hint that Lum is jealous over Ran's "relationship" with Rei and storms off. That evening, Ran and Rei sit in a tree under the moon's light, with Ran feeding Rei taiyaki. She privately muses on how even if it's not much, this is still better than nothing, only for Rei to suddenly bend over and lick her cheek. He was actually licking up a stray smear of anko paste, but Ran takes this as a sign that Rei has finally fallen in love with her, and is overjoyed. She's so ecstatic that she excitedly invites Lum to her UFO when she gets home and tells her that their feud is over, revealing how Rei "kissed her". Lum is delighted for her old friend, and happily flies home, envisioning an end to their feud... only to find Rei playing cards with Ataru, Ten, and Konatsu-Neko, having come to see her. Realizing that Ran may have misinterpreted something, Lum flies into a panic and tries to get rid of Rei, but Ran suddenly arrives. Lum tries to make an excuse, but Ran immediately accuses Lum of seducing Rei... with the male oni having no idea what Ran is talking about when she brings up their earlier kiss. Konatsu-Neko offers the angry Ran a taiyaki, and she eats it so messily that anko smears on her lips, causing Rei to grab her and "kiss" her in order to eat it. Ran is over the moon with joy once again, whilst an exasperated Lum puts two and two together.
Characters in Order of Appearance[]
Trivia[]
- "Pathos" means "a quality that evokes pity or sadness", which is a very fitting description of Ran's relationship with Rei.
- Taiyaki (鯛焼き, lit. 'baked sea bream') are a classic Japanese pastry dish made from crispy grilled batter and stuffed with various fillings. Whilst sweet fillings are iconic, especially the original anko, there are also savory taiyaki stuffed with things like cheese, sweet potato, okonomiyaki, gyoza or sausage. They earn their moniker because they are stylized to resemble tai (鯛), the Japanese name for red sea bream, and were first invented in 1909 in Honshu by a man named Seijirō Kobe who was having trouble selling his imagawayaki - anko-stuffed griddled batter cakes. So he shaped and styled his imagawayaki to resemble tai, which at the time was an expensive luxury fish normally only available to the elites of Japanese society, and the dish took off, becoming a Japanese icon.
- Anko (あんこ or 小豆餡) is a thick, jam-like paste made from red mung beans - known in Japan as Adzuki (小豆) - boiled with sugar or honey. There are actually multiple types of anko with distinct names used to distinguish how they were prepared, such as if the beans are left whole or mashed to create a paste, whether the skins are sieved from the mixture during the boiling, if they include other ingredients, and so forth. Anko is one of the most iconic sweet fillings and confectionaries in Japan, and is used in a wide variety of desserts.
- An eagle-eyed reader will see that in the second panel of the first page, when Ran is buying taiyaki for her "date" with Rei, there are four signs offering distinct taiyaki fillings; cream, chocolate, Ogura anko, and white anko.
- Ogura anko, also known as Ogura-an (小倉餡), is a preparation-based anko variety which takes its name from Mount Ogura in western Kyoto. This variant of anko is a combination of Koshian (漉し餡) (anko that is passed through a sieve to remove the bean skins) and Tsubuan (粒餡) (the simplest form of anko; whole red mung beans boiled in sugar and otherwise untreated).
- White anko is anko made from lima beans or butter beans instead of the traditional adzuki.
- This chapter is one of the few times in the series we see Ran dressed in her skimpy "Oniboshi" clothing, consisting of boots, wristbands, a choker, individual breast cups, and a bikini bottom, instead of the full, frilly, Earth dress that she usually wears. She wears this distinct outfit on her first date with Rei early in the chapter.
- When Ran first arrives at Ataru's room and catches Lum and Rei together, a picture can be seen on the right wall of Soichiro; the dog belonging to Kyoko Otonashi (音無 響子), the female protagonist of Rumiko Takahashi's second long serial story Maison Ikkoku, which was running concurrently alongside Urusei Yatsura at this point.