I'm A Director, Get Me Out Of Here...

We are out as a team tonight at this place called Waterlily, a pretty decent Balinese restaurant near the office. During course of the evening, and probably fuelled by a couple of beers, I declare that before my assignment is over I will eat a whole durian. 

What the fuck!? 

Anyway, this mutates into a challenge I set for myself as a sort of “I'm A Celebrity” where every Friday the team get to choose something for me to eat that they think is pretty weird / smelly / disgusting. The only rules that I set are that it must be something edible and something they are prepared to eat themselves, plus I get to chose someone form the team to do it with me.

What have I done? 

Anyway, the team revel in this challenge and all I can hear is "fish" "fermented" "smelly" and the first challenge (tomorrow) is something called cincalok, which I try to Google but have no idea how to spell (and the team won’t tell me either!). I try to use Google’s voice recognition search, but all I get back in return is “Cinzano”, “Internet” and, appropriately, “Team Challenge”, so I am none the wiser.

When I get home, I Google "smelly fish fermented Malaysia food" and I find it - a Malaccan food made from shrimps that have been left to ferment in the heat for three days. Sounds lovely.

Anyway, Friday comes and after our team meeting I am stopped from leaving the room: time for my first food challenge! Tuan is still here, so he has the chance to join me too... They bring out this bottle containing pink sludge, some cucumber and lime (plus water and paper towels in case we gag, and a bucket in case we throw up!) I select the person with the next birthday to join me and then scrape some of the pink goo onto a slice of cucumber and put it in my mouth, trying not to smell it too much: it’s actually not too bad – a bit like an anchovy paste, but the smell is rather evil.

I survive the first challenge, and wash my hands thoroughly to get rid of the smell. 

I felt sorry for the next people into the meeting room after us...the place stank!