Durian Day!!

So we finally did it! Shauna took us to this little market a few minutes from the school, and at one of the fruit stalls they had durian. For those of who don't know, durian is a tropical fruit grown in this area that is known for it's pungent STENCH. Seriously, it smells like rotting flesh. It smells so strongly that it's generally not allowed in shops, restuarants, or public transportation. Shauna and I have been wanting to try it since we got here though, and we persuaded a few other strong souls to join us.

There it is at the fruit market, in one big spiny pile! And look below, they're HUGE!!

These fruits are so huge and heavy its considered dangerous to be in the area where they're growing. They are not hand-picked, but are left to grow on the trees until they are so ripe that they FALL, into HUGE nets under many trees that catches them! So you are guaranteed one RIPE smelly fruit when you buy it!

Will it be good...

Or bad? Because it certainly doesn't smell too good!

After everyone took some pictures with it as a whole fruit, we cut into it!! We were sure to do this in a nice OPEN area outside without anyone really around, and a trash can nearby. We wanted a trash can nearby so people could throw up if they felt sick from the taste, and so that we could toss it and run after trying it!

So I've been trying for DAYS to get the video up that we took of us eating it, but it's not working. What we did was just split the fruit open, and inside are like 4 big meaty pods of fruit with a big pit. It smelled foul when we split it, but we grabbed our forks and bravely dug into the fruit! In the end we decided it tasted like a sour banana custard. Not as bad as we had imagined. Not something I would voluntarily eat it again.... unless my only choice was between this and stinky tofu; I would take this over stinky tofu ANY day!

I other news... I had my first big exam here 2 weeks ago for one of my HDFS classes, and I got a 92%!! Woohoo! This is really good news because we heard that the scores were not really up to par as far as what our professor had expected!

We're getting busier and busier ALL the time. This week we have 2 field trips and a big lunch for classes, then this weekend we plan on going to the Zoo, Maokong tea plantation, Taiwan Storyland (a museum), and to get massages. THEN we leave for a week long trip to the other end of the island! So I will definitely have to get plenty of rest!