Sometimes It’s Hard to Eat Local

One of the delights of traveling is sampling the food from the various locales you visit on your journey.  At least that’s my opinion.  I’m always surprised by the numbers of people who don’t subscribe to this.  Tour groups are the worst, opting for food as close to home as possible, although I suppose that can be expected.  But what about other travelers who choose to stick with only the familiar?  If you’re going to put out the effort to venture half way around the world, wouldn’t you want to at least sample what the locals eat?

Eating where the locals eat is one of the best ways to experience the flavour of your destination.  In SE Asia this means eating at food stalls, either along the street or at the market.  It can require a bit of an adventurous spirit, but brings you face to face with locals, and isn’t that what travel is all about?  My preference is to just dive in with arms waving and fingers pointing, and see how it all turns out.  Usually it comes off without a hitch, but sometimes, it can be hard to eat local.

Take today, for example.  I spent the morning cycling around Siem Reap, Cambodia, running some errands, and as I was about to expire from the heat and lack of sustenance outside coffee, I spotted a bustling market area.  Counting myself lucky I waded through the piles of fruits and vegetables and headed straight for the food stalls.  It was midday and the place was alive with locals having lunch.  I picked a stall that looked busy and had a series of soupy looking dishes on display.  I pointed at a rather innocuous looking one and was directed to take a seat.

And that’s when things got interesting.  People in SE Asia are small, and seats at markets and street stalls are accordingly tiny.  Westerners are often seen squatting uncomfortably on them, with their knees up around their ears.  The people in Siem Reap didn’t look any smaller to me, but judging by the seat they gave me they are the smallest people on earth.  I may as well have been sitting on the floor.

Everyone else had the same stool, though, and they weren’t complaining so I did my best to relax and wait for the food.  That’s when I tuned in to the racket going on around me.  Over and above the usual market din I was in earshot of at least three televisions and a couple of stereos.  People in Asia only watch TV or listen to music at one volume – 11!  I was being inundated with the dubbed soundtrack to Free Willy, an Asian martial arts flick and as best I could tell a bad horror film (judging from all the screaming).  All that, plus duelling Asian “Top of the Pops”.  So much for relaxation.

A smiling, nodding woman, not the one I had ordered from, approached with a tray of food strangely dissimilar to that I had ordered.  She placed in front of me a plate of rice and a bowl with whole eggs, spinach and meat products.  I pointed back questioningly at the stall where I had ordered, a stall which had only vegetable dishes on display, and she continued to smile and nod.



Knuckles Never Tasted So Good!



Accepting my fate, I proceeded to pick through my plate of assorted goodies.  It gave the term “mystery meat” a whole new meaning.  I’m not sure what animal or cuts the bits with actual meat came from, but they all had knuckles.  The other morsels were gristly, tripe filled and/or congealed. 

I looked around and noted that everyone else was eating sort of similar stuff, and no one was laughing at me, so figured this was legit.  I dumped the whole bowl over the rice and feasted.  This proved to be less of a challenge than I had feared.  First, I ate whatever meat parts could be broken down, which amounted to about 10% of it.  Following that I mushed up the eggs with the spinach (I’m assuming it was spinach), broth and rice and kind of slurped it all down.  Other than the bone shards, this was quite easy and surprisingly yummy.  Again, no one was laughing at me so I guess I didn’t look too ridiculous.  Mind you, Cambodian people are notoriously polite.

About the time I was polishing off my last spoonful, I started to become aware of the unmistakeable aroma of shit.  I had noticed wafts of it earlier, but now it was pretty strong and seemed to be getting even stronger.  There was no sewerage or toilets around, so I started to worry that I had stepped in something.  I was only off by a couple of inches. 

Under my table was one of the mangiest dogs you have ever seen, and it had curled up right at my feet.  My guess was it had started farther away and inched closer as it realized I was otherwise distracted and wasn’t going to whack it over the head like probably everyone else at the market.  Even so, once I saw and smelled it I swung around on my chair (no small feat when your knees are at eye level) and waved frantically for the bill.  I had reached my limit.

Ah, the bill – the other reason to eat with the locals.  My total for the meal, including two iced coffees with sweet milk, was $2.  That’s a far cry from the price in town, by more than an order of magnitude.  I felt much better about it as I rode away.  Now, the only remaining question is whether my stomach will feel the same way.

My lunch spot, complete with ghoulish TV figure!