Feeling a bit queasy

Imagine you are at a party, you are hungry, it is hot, there is no fresh air, you are squeezed in a room, you have to sit uncomfortably on the floor, and all there is to eat and is horse meat/innards brewing in front of you (pictured to the right). This was my Friday.

My favorite interviewer, Mr. Khoa, invited me to his 35th birthday party. I really enjoy spending time with him and his wife, even though we cannot speak the same language. We know about 5 words in common - OK, tofu, bye, hello, and good. Anyway, for his birthday they cooked up a traditional specialty (eaten about once per year) for Mong people: horse.

At the end of the 3 hours of sitting over the brewing horse, I had eaten lots of horse-like-smelling greens which were cooked in the horse broth, as well as some tofu (dido, cooking method). I sprinkled soup broth powder over everything to placate the horse taste. A few times I thought I was going to add some of my own liquids to the stew, from becoming sick over the pot. Luckily, this did not occur.

Horse, sadly, is not the strangest thing I have eaten this week. My odd food tally for the week includes pig heart, horse meat/innards soup, goose innards, duck blood pudding, and probably some other odd stuff I was not even aware of.