Little India

This story begins innocently enough: Nathan and I took a guided tour through a spice plantation on the island of Penang...however it ends with me curled up in the fetal position with a bright red mouth tasting of urinal cakes and vomit, praying to Kuan Yin the Indian God of Mercy.

During our tour we learned from our Indian guide of a strange custom involving the betel nut. Indians apparently chew it, in combination with other spices like clove and cinnamon. We explored the island for the rest of the afternoon on a motorcycle, then ended our tour in Georgetown's Little India. We parked the bike and went in search of a shop selling 'betel nut for chewing' per our guide's instructions. It took a few stops, and some miming..but eventually we stumbled into a tiny stall where a woman knew what we were talking about. She pulled two green leaves from a stack, rubbed them with limestone paste and then pulled out a tray with tiny cups of mystery ingredients. She expertly tossed a pinch of this and a pinch of that onto the leaves then pinned the piles together using a whole clove. Proud of our ability to procure this authentic piece of local culture, we celebrated with some delicious Indian cuisine.

After dinner we returned the rental motorcycle before heading back to our hotel to experiment with our loot. Chewing these little packets of betel nut cocktail was like eating urinal cakes dipped in shampoo. Our drooling was uncontrollable. One of the ingredients caused our saliva, teeth and tongues to turn bright red. About one minute after popping these doozeys into our faces, we were both dizzy and nauseated. Neither of us had any desire to see our experiment to it's end. We were dripping blood red drool down our chins and walking around like drunken sailors. At this point the real misery began. We both curled ourselves into balls and begged our bodies not to induce vomiting. My body did not comply, but Nathan managed to keep our spicy dinner down. Lucky man.
I will never chew the betel nut again..never.
You win some. You lose some.
Jenny - 0
Betel nut - 1