There's a Reason This Stuff is Banned!

Meet, the durian.

In the spirit of following our trend of trying new things, Ellie and I set off to the pasar after school to buy a durian. Some of you might have no idea what a durian is. I myself first learned of the durian while playing Super Mario Sunshine once upon a time. 

The durian is a curious fruit. It is not known for its unique appearance or for its potentially life-threatening spikes. The durian is instead famous for its insanely pungent odor. 

I truly cannot put into words a just description of the smell that eminates from the durian. The smell of the durian is so foul that you can literally smell it from a mile away. It is forbiden on public transportation. It is banned in hotels across Asia. When I say that it smells bad, you can just imagine the worst thing you have ever had the misfortune of smelling and multiply by 100. Six hours after eating this thing, my house still smells wretched.

This is the woman who sold us the vile-smelling fruit. We stopped on the way home to get noodles, to wash away the taste after eating. When you ask a person to describe the flavor of durian, you are likely to get a wholly unique answer. I have heard everything from stinky-sock garlic-flavored yoghurt to consistency and flavor of snot, so you can immagine my excitement at trying one of the only foods that the conquerer of all things nasty, Andrew Zimmern, spit out and simply could not swallow.

After I mildly wounding myself on the razor-sharp spindles in an attempt to break open the fruit, we watched it for awhile, basking in the odor, trying to decide if this was really something we wanted to continue with. On the outside, the durian looks pretty awesome. 

On the inside, not so much.

I have to admit that the durian was not nearly as heinous as I had anticipated, taste-wise. At least I was able to swallow it. But the smell? It's still lingering today. I accidentally dropped a bit on the table which subsequently soaked into the wood grain and remains as a reminder of the day that we tried durian.