Ocean Dragon, Unit A1/A3 Arcadian Centre, Birmingham. T: 0121 622 4559s
Exotic, multi-coloured fish are swimming around Archie’s head and an Arctic blast is hammering down the back of my neck.
When I checked out the menu earlier, I came across indecipherable faux Latin, reminiscent of the sinister Opus Dei mumbo jumbo in The Da Vinci Code. Where’s a symbologist when you need one?
Three different waiters ask us if we would like a drink, which becomes a repetitive theme. The same thing happens three times. Another symbol?
I don’t know where I am. After a while, I don’t know who I am.
That’s the surreal effect of walking into Ocean Dragon, Birmingham’s newest, undeniably most flamboyant, Chinese restaurant. It’s a quiet Wednesday night, very quiet; and it’s odd, just plain odd.
“It feels like Twin Peaks,” says Archie, laughing nervously.
I keep looking over my shoulder for a knife-throwing dwarf, although lateral movement is restricted by my frozen neck.
Let me explain.
My dining companion isn’t actually underwater, although nothing would surprise me here. The appearance of marine life around Archie’s head is due to a large fish tank directly behind him. One of those large whiskery, sucky critters is doing a passable impression of Mick Jagger as he works his way up the glass. Poor sod. There’s no escape for him.
The early-stage symptoms of hypothermia I am experiencing (chilled extremities, disorientation, visualisation of roaring log fires) is down to the cold air being pumped down on me from a vent. I think the aircon is on and it’s 0C outside. I am carrying a bit of extra weight after the excesses of the festive season but I’m not polar beer, I am a sissy and I like being warm.
It is on the restaurant’s website, which is devilishly hard to find (it’s www.welcome-to-twinpeaks.com) that I come across the baffling menu script. I click on the “about” tab, seeking to get some background. Usefully, readers are informed: “Pellentesque habitant morbi tristique senectus.”
And it goes on: “Donec eu libero sit amet quam egestas semper.”
And on.
Two unhappy terms of Latin instruction some 30 years ago tells me that this sounds like Latin, but isn’t.
I later discover it is something far more prosaic: a templated form of gobbledegook known as lorem ipsum, which is used as filler text to illustrate what the graphic elements of a finished document will look like.
It’s spanner language, meaningless, and it’s all over Ocean Dragon’s website.
For any new restaurant, or indeed plug-hole manufacturer, this would be poor. But for a restaurant pitching itself at the high end of dining (the prices of some menu items rival Mayfair establishments) it’s rubbish. If you expect customers to pay £65 for Australian abalone and £48 for Beijing imperial duck, they expect you to finish the website.
