How to Eat Fried Worms

Last weekend, my boss took me and two other foreign teachers to Nagan Folk Village.  I had been before but the two other foreigners’ hadn’t.  The folk village is a village with traditional houses, no electricity or technology, and people still live there.  Tourists are invited to walk around the village and buy things that the village people sell – food, crafts, pottery, etc…

One of the “foods” they sell is toasted worms.  They look disgusting and they smell disgusting.  One of the foreign teachers prides himself on his openness to trying new foods.  So he bought a cup of the bugs…worms…whatever.  As he ate one I observed his unflinched reaction and decided maybe they didn’t taste too bad.

“Should I try one?” I pondered.

“Yeah, try it.” Robby steadily replied.

We were standing right in front of the woman that sold us the worms.  I put one in my mouth, bit down and then went “BLEEEHHHH!!!” and spit it out right in front of her.  (How embarrassing!  Dumb foreigners.) 

“That was disgusting!!  The most disgusting thing I’ve ever tasted!!.”  I perplexedly yelled to Robby. 

“Yeah me too,” said Robby.  “Sorry I didn’t warn you how bad it was.”

“Sorry?  You’re sorry??  My palate is scarred for life, and you’re sorry??  Buy me a new tongue.”

Robby gave the cup of worms to our boss and told her to give the worms back to the woman who sold them to us; he didn’t want them.  This is why people hate America (in case you ever wonder.)

So we tried to chew gum to get the taste out of our mouths but then the gum started to taste like worms.  It didn’t work.  As we walked around the village, whenever we passed someone cooking the worms and caught a whiff of the smell we could taste the worms again in our mouth.  It was revolting, not to mention nauseating.

Anyway, for anyone who ever feels the urge to taste a worm let me tell you: what you imagine a worm tastes like, that’s EXACTLY what it tastes like.