And the winner is...

 

Pizza Olympics

Tonight at Young Life, we had our 2nd annual Pizza Olympics. I am sure that most of you are very familiar with a Pizza Olympics but just in case you are not, here's how it goes:

At the beginning of our Young Life program (club) three students call three different pizza companies and order pepperoni pizzas. Then we sing songs and do our thing until the first pizza arrives. At that point, we drop everything. We turn on loud Olympic music and welcome the pizza man with out of control screaming and cheering. The first pizza man is awarded the gold medal and the second two are given the silver and bronze, respectively.

Last year there was some sort of miscommunication and only one delivery guy arrived. This year was much better with all three guys arriving with enough time between each to give them a proper celebration.

The first guy tonight was named Sam and looked to be from some other country. He was very confused by all the cheering and shouting and music. When my friend, Andres asked him how he was able to win the gold medal in the pizza olympics, he attributed it to respecting his parents. I am not sure about that correlation but a good lesson for the kiddos, nonetheless.

The second guy was a fairly young, built black guy named Josh. He seemed even more confused than the first guy. I was afraid he was going to run away. He said he was going to work more in order to get the gold next time. Apparently afterwards, he told another leader, Christie that even though he looked scared, he had a lot of fun and wanted to see the pictures we took later.

The bronze medal winner was an old white guy. He, too seemed confused by the whole production. I think he was a bit disappointed to come in last.

After the three pizzas arrived, we had a pizza eating contest. I thought our boys would be able to put away more pizza than they did. They would be no match for that little Japanese dude who wins all those professional eating competitions- Kobayashi or something. Anyway, after club we had pizza for all the kids. It really wouldn't have been too fair to make the kids smell the pizza and then deny them the pleasure of eating it.

All in all, with over 40 kids and a pizza olympics, I pronounce our first club of 2009, a great success. I am glad to get back in the swing of things.

Testing, testing yee-haw!

Today was the last day of the dreaded Stanford test. This is a test that my whole school district takes every January. It covers all the subjects and all the grade levels. It's supposed to calculate at which grade level a student is performing. It also compares their new score to their score from the past to see how much they've grown. Students' growth is how the district determines the teacher bonuses. The system is not entirely fair since the test is given in January and I have only had my current students for 4 and a half months. So, it really measures half of what I did with them so far this year with half of what their previous teacher taught them. It doesn't really seem fair to base our bonuses on only half a year's work. Oh well, I will certainly take whatever money they give me.

Testing week is super boring for the teachers. We have to walk around and make sure kids aren't cheating or sleeping. I used to look at what answers the students put but I got extremely frustrated by the dumb answers they put, so I had to stop. The best thing about Stanford testing week is that there are no after-school tutorials. Life just seems so much better and more productive when I get home at 4:00 instead of 5:30. Yesterday, I managed to take a nap, write emails, go to the gym, take a shower, watch The Bachelor, do a Chinese lesson on Rosetta Stone and have a little God time. Not too shabby! If only I could be that productive everyday...

I am trying to take advantage of this extra time I have before my 2-night a week Young Life commitment starts up full swing next week. February will be a bit crazy. The Reading TAKS test (the one I am responsible for) is March 3rd and the kids and I will be forced (against our will) to live and breathe that test until it happens. I am not looking forward to it but I know I can handle it. It's only a month, right?

I'm 27... no make that 28.

Saturday was my birthday. It started off really great! My dad had made some really strange comments regarding my birthday. About a month before, he told me to make sure I reserved Saturday for a family celebration. This seemed strange. I kind of forgot about it and decided to have a little slumber party that night. My dad said we could do the family celebration on Friday instead. My family goes out to eat together about once a week so I figured we had to do more. My guess was that we would go to a comedy club or something. My mom told me to wear something nice because we would be going to a nice restaurant. This is why I was very surprised when my mom called on Friday about an hour before I was going to be picked up, to ask where I wanted to eat. I thought the whole point was for them to surprise me with a fancy place. I was pretty confused. Then my mom drove me to the restaurant. My dad was going to meet us there and called about every five minutes. I knew something was up but I wasn't sure what.

When I walked into the restaurant, my dad was sitting alone at a table with an odd expression on his face. I sat down at the table and he told me to turn around and tell the waitress what I wanted. I turned around and there was Amy, my best friend from YWAM! I was speechless, which doesn't happen very often. I just couldn't wrap my head around the idea that Amy had come all the way from Canada and was indeed standing before me. I don't think it really felt real until dinner was over.

What a huge blessing to start off my birthday! I had actually hoped that one of my friends from out of town would come surprise me since I had a 3 day weekend but I never guessed Amy would come down from Calgary! What a great friend! A lot went on this weekend and I will continue it in my next post.

Reverend Butter

This weekend I went on a date to go see this ice sculpture competition in Houston's newest downtown park, Discovery Green. Weird events are always good ideas for dates as there are plenty of things to talk about. Apparently ice sculpting is a sub-culture that I did not know existed. I muswt admit that most of my ice sculpture experience is limited to cruises. I have a feeling that these guys look down on the cruise sculptors. It seemed like most of the spectators were regular folk like us. There were a few groupie-ish angst-ridden teens. Some of them were wearing chainsaw t-shirts. Yay!

The sculptors themselves looked a bit like carnies, though some had stage names or personas. They gave the winner a trophy that looked like some sort of old bowling trophy that they covered in glitter and mardi gras beads. Talk about classy! After 8 hours of back-breaking ice sculpting, the winner got a trashy trophy. Well, and a $2000 check. The winning sculpture was called "Marlin and Me" and featured a large marlin being ridden by a cowboy. I liked the punny title.

After the winner was announced, they brought out Reverend Butter. Apparently he is a wannabe rockstar ice sculptor. There was a heavy metal-esque band on stage playing behind him as he... uh... performed. I felt bad for one of the guitar players who was one of those guy/girl rocker types with the coiffed hair and tight jeans. The guy was down wind of the sculpting and was basically getting soaked. I was freezing in my sweater and coat and this poor guy is being spritzed with ice water in a rocker t-shirt.

Reverend Butter took his art form seriously. His moves seemed choreographed to the band's set as if they had practiced in advance. He kept doing extreme pelvic thrusts at the block of ice with his chainsaw. I must say I had never seen that before. It was really cold but we wanted to see what Reverend Butter was making. In the end, we left before he was finished but we could tell he was making some sort of giant wings. So, I highly recommend that everyone witness Reverend Butter's magic sometime in your life. You'll never look at ice sculptures the same way.

Resolutions and such

It makes sense to make my first blog of the new year about New Year's resolutions. I don't tend to get very formal with my resolutions but I do like the idea of being able to say I have been doing something all year when it is January 7th and I have been doing it for 7 days. My strictest resolution this year is to read the entire Bible in a year. I have done this twice before and I always gain new insight as I read. If I don't have a concrete plan like this, my daily Bible reading often turns into a weekly Bible reading instead. This makes me more disciplined.

So far, it has been interesting. The day after I started, my dad brought up a theological subject that I had read about only the night before. Pretty cool. It felt like it was God reminding me that I am doing this for a reason and it will impact my daily life. I am also reading a book called "The Year of Living Biblically." It's an intriguing book about a nonreligious guy who decides to try to follow all of the Bible's commands, including the obscure and strange ones. Many of the passages he has written about, I have already read in my daily Bible reading.

My other resolutions are the usual "eating better" and "working out more" that we all vow to do at the beginning of each year. I've done pretty well on the working out so far; joining the resolution resurgence at my gym. I am also trying to use my Wii Fit (X-Mas gift) to gauge my progress. My parents were so into my wii fit that they are going to buy one themselves when they are in stock again. The eating better part is coming along pretty well mostly thanks to Lean Cuisine. It has only been a week in 2009 so far so I will have to see where I am at in a month.

Christmas Changes

Today is Christmas Day. My brother is with his wife's family right now and should be arriving later this evening, in time for X-mas dinner. We usually do a Christmas lunch but compromises have to be made when there are in-laws to be factored in. My mom is having a hard time adjusting to the change.

Our former traditions are as follows: Christmas Eve service at good ole' CLPC, the church I grew up with. Last night, I went there with only my parents. In the past, I would see my good friends, Jocelyn and Emily at church that night. Emily's parents have moved away and Jocelyn is with her in-laws. I don't like that change much.

On Christmas morning we usually wake up and open our presents. This year it seemed too strange to open all our gifts without Andrew. We didn't want to wait and open them all with our extended family. They would be opening two or three gifts while we opened a dozen. That seemed a bit too weird also. So, my mom, dad and I opened all of our non-surprise gifts. I'd opened my wii fit weeks ago at my dad's insistence but I did open my new slippers, iPod and biking shorts.

Usually after we have our little family Christmas, we head over to my grandma and grandpa's to have Christmas lunch and present opening time with my mom's family. The family always has to eat before we open the presents. This proved painful during most of my childhood. I am not the most patient person especially when I see presents stacked under the tree. The only thing standing between me and my presents was always my aunt Kathy's painfully slow eating. It was excrutiatingly painful to wait. I would go to the tree and sort all the presents paying special attention to how many I had versus how many my brother had. Now my grandparents live in a fancy old folks home and don't have room to host. My parents have become the hosts.

After lunch, I would distribute the presents and we would all unwrap. Gifts from extended family are always random and usually amusing. This year, my brother and his family won't be here until later so we will have a Christmas dinner. A few years ago, we started going to the movies after our Christmas lunch/ present unwrap. I don't think it will work this year with our Christmas dinner. Well, change is not all bad. I did get to watch Home Alone today, which is not a real tradition yet but may become one.

We just have to get used to the end of old traditions and the beginning of new ones.

Cool Christmas Story

Those of you who get emails from my dad might already know this story.

My parents got an unexpected check due to proceeds from their Arkansas land's mineral rights. Since it was essentially found money, they decided they wanted to donate the money to a deserving YWAMer. A few months ago, my friend and current YWAMEer, Joey fell while hiking and got seriously injured. He has recovered more quickly than the doctors expected which I fully attribute to the many prayers lifted up on his behalf. Despite his accelerated healing progress, he has an upcoming knee surgery to repair damage to his ACL and insurance does not cover all the expenses.

My parents wrote Joey a check and I sent it at about 2pm on a Saturday. I knew Joey was going home for the holidays so I was praying that the check would get there by the end of the week. On Monday afternoon, Joey left a message on my phone that said that he had some news for me and my parents. I immediately thought that he had received a check from someone else and no longer needed my parents' money. I knew there was no way that my parents' check had arrived on Monday since I had only sent it Saturday afternoon. I lived in Maui for two years and it usually took about 4 days minimum to receive anything from the mainland.

I finally got a hold of Joey and was astounded by what he told me. On Monday, he had gone to his pre-op doctor's appt. He was told how much his surgery and the fancy brace he would need afterwards would cost. He didn't know how he would pay for it but felt God would provide. Then that afternoon, he received my parents' check as some sort of mail miracle and the check was for $5 more than the cost of the surgery and brace. God gave Joey a little extra for a cup of coffee at Anthony's. How cool is that?!!

There were too many coincidences to deny God's involvement. The quickness of the mail may not make much of an impact on most people but anyone who has lived in Maui knows how long it takes. How could it get there in one day? How did my parents know almost exactly how much it would be? This is the kind of stuff we need to remember when we question God's existence. He always provides for His children.

Oh yeah, I have a blog...

This may be the longest stretch of non-blogging ever by me. I am tempted to try to catch my blogging public on all that they have missed but I fear that it would be far too long. I will just catch you up on what's going on right now. I have less than a week left of school before Christmas break. Hooray!

I went on a Young Life retreat this past weekend, which was fun but wasn't really relaxing. I am excited for longer time off. I have been spending a lot of time at my parents' house lately. Shella, Andrew and Samuel have been in town and spending the night at the same house as them is the easiest way to see them. It's been really nice to hang out as a family. It's been too long.

Tonight we all watched a delightful new reality show called "Momma's Boys." It is a dating show ala The Bachelor but with another twist. There are three bachelors and each one is on the show with their mom. One of the moms is absolutely ridiculous. She is blantantly and ignorantly racist. She makes a bold statement that she does not want her son to be with anyone who is black, fat, mixed race or asian. She explicitly wants a white girl. This seems ironic since she is from Iraq and therefore middle eastern, I think.

There has already been a huge clash between the mom and the black girls on the show. One of the girls confronts her after the TV producers wisely decide to show all the ladies the tape of the mom's racist ranting. The girl tries to be civil but ends by shouting out how she is a "Nice Ass Woman." The mom says that her skin is blacker than the girl's anyway. This causes the girl to throw a glass. This was only the beginning! This could be the next best thing to Temptation Island! Temptation Island!

Fortunate Misfortune

I seem to be suffering from some sort of tire curse these days. If there is someone out there with a voodoo doll type model of my car, they must be poking that needle into my tires on a daily basis.
A few weeks ago, I was driving to Young Life when I heard a weird clank noise. I pulled into the Young Life parking lot and stopped to talk to my friend,Ann. We could both hear a loud hissing noise like someone deflating a pool float. It turns out that it was not a pool float rapidly deflating but my tire.
Upon further inspection, we found a large bolt protruding from my tire. Ann thought we could try fix a flat. Apparently fix a flat is not for gaping holes and the liquid quickly flowed out of the tire.

At this point I remembered that I had a full-size spare. David, a fellow Young Life leader, came to my rescue and changed my tire for me. I love nice boys.

I intended to get another tire to replace my spare. I figured that flat tires were not common so it wouldn't be a big deal to wait a month or so. I didn't want to add more to my already busy schedule and figured Christmas break would afford me plenty of chances to get a new tire.I was wrong.

Last night Sarah came over to watch OU versus Texas Tech. With two highly ranked teams, we were sure it would be a good game. We were wrong about that too.

We decided to go to Fry's Electronics before the game started. There was traffic on the freeway so I decided to go another way. We were driving down Airline near 610. The road was not in the best shape and I didn't see the pothole before it was too late. There was a weird noise and the car seemed unbalanced. I feared that the tire was flat and the gesturing of a man next to our car only confirmed my suspicions. We pulled into a nearby gas station to survey the damage.

The man who had been gesturing to us, came over as we got out of our car. It was pretty clear that the tire was a goner. I didn't know what to do. My parentsn my usual saviors, were out of town and I couldn't get a hold of my roommates or nearby friends.

Sarah and I are not car experts so we really had no choice but to let this guy help us. I took off my tire and said that there was a tire place only a couple of blocks away. He had his girlfriend watch our car while he walked with us to the tire place, wheeling my tire along as we went. During this time, he told us a bit about his situation. It was the kind you hear people tell before they approach you for money, though his seemed very sincere. He was from Louisiana and trying to get enough money to go back home. He works at a Buick dealership detailing cars but was between paychecks. He and his pregnant girlfriend were trying to get a room at a nearby hotel but we refused for lack of I.D. Apparently cheap hotels in this part of town require I.D. in case something shady happens involving prostitution, drugs, violence or all three. They want to know who to blame it on. So, this guy, Gary and his girlfriend were hanging out near the Shell deciding what to do with little money and no place to stay when we drove up.

We get to the tire place and some guys who don't speak English patch my tire for $10. Not bad! Gary chivalrously rolled the tire back to the Shell station for us. I never felt unsafe with Gary, though I can't vouch for Sarah. He never did anything that seemed shady. I had already decided I would give him some money. He really deserved it for helping us so much. My only fear was that he would demand more money than I felt his help had warranted.

We got the tire back to the car and Gary put in on for me and everything. I gave him $40 thinking that was fair for the amount he had helped us. Again, I was afraid he would try to get more. Instead, he seemed genuinely surprised by the money and defintely grateful. His girlfriend said she was going to cry and Gary said "God Bless You." It was the perfect reaction.

Getting a flat tire in a shady part of town was definitely not my plan that night and I hope it does not happen again. But, I can't help but think that maybe God put me and Gary together that night for a reason. I definitely wouldn't have given him that much money if he asked. Clearly, he and his girlfriend were in a jam. I was able to pay him for a very needed service that he provided for me and he showed me that there are genuinely nice and helpful people out there. Hopefully Gary and his lady friend found a better place to stay that night. It was worth the extra trouble to have this experience.

Really, Oprah? I mean, really?

I recently read a quote from Oprah Winfrey in US Weekly magazine. About Obama's election victory, she said, "There's never been a night like this one on planet Earth." Talk about being self-centered! And people wonder why the rest of the world sees the citizens of our country as prideful, arrogant, and self-absorbed. On planet Earth? Uh, what about when Nelson Mandela was elected president of South Africa after years of Apartheid? What about the fact that there is a female president in Bangladesh, a Muslim country that oppresses its female citizens. I am sure there are plenty of other examples that I don't know about.

The election of Barack Obama, the nation's first biracial president is an important event in America. It definitely signifies that our country has come closer to equality among all people than ever before. But Oprah, to say that there has never been another night like on planet Earth is a display of egocentric ignorance bordering on hyperbole.

No matter what your views are on Obama as America's next President, Oprah's comments are just another example of America's dominate ego and lack of concern or attention to the rest of the world. As someone who has been to several other countries and has plenty of friends from other countries, I find her comments borderline offensive. I know there is plenty about the world that I do not know. That's why I would never make that sort of bold claim. America is a great country with a lot to offer but every country has value and America is certainly not unanimously and unequivocally the bestor most important. Sorry Oprah.

voting

This is a bit late but I have been meaning to write about my voting experience. This was my first time to vote for president. The only other time I voted was in college for the mayor of Austin. That was only because I wanted to vote for Leslie, the transvesite homeless mayoral candidate. He was running on a platform of creating teepee communities for the homeless. Pretty original, huh?

My lack of voting stems from a general feeling of apathy and laziness when it comes to voting. I never feel very passionate about candidates or issues so I don't think my uninformed vote should count as much as the people's votes who are actually passionate. I know this logic is flawed but it is how I feel.

This year I knew I needed to vote. This was not because I had lost my apathetic attitude towards voting. I hadn't. It's not because I had strong feelings for either presidential candidate. I didn't. In fact, if a suitable third option was unveiled minutes before I voted, I probably would have chosen him. The sole reason I voted was to be an example to my students.I was in charge of our school-wide election and thought it would be quite hypocritical to not vote after strongly advocating that the kids do it.

I voted early at a polling place near my school. It was an interesting mix of people. I was really struck by the fact that everyone's vote counts the same. There were clearly people there who had a lot of money as well as people who clearly didn't. There were white people, black people and Hispanic people. No Asians, as they are not very prevalant in that area. That all being said, it was a very diverse crowd. I was relieved to see that the line wasn't too long. It was just long enough for me to make these insightful observations but not long enough to make me want to scream. The most amusing part of the whole thing was the way we stood in line.

When, I walked in the room I noticed a sort of waiting lane marked off in tape. It made a giant L. The natural human response upon seeing taped lanes on the floor is to stand in them. For some reason, one of the election workers kept making the people make their waiting line outside of the tape. It was really funny to watch people try to stand between the tape lines and then watch the older gentleman make them stand outside of them. No one could understand right away. They would look down at the lines and then at the man and then back at the lines and back at the man. It was super amusing, though I am not sure my account really gave it justice.

When it came to the actually voting. I am not going to say who I voted for to be our President. As I told my students, it's private. One asked me to just give him the first letter of his first name. Nice try! I decided to vote in every possible race despite my lack of information. My thought process during the voting process was decidedly random. My dad detests Sheila Jackson Lee so I made sure to vote against her. I voted for one guy because his name was similar to that of one of my students. I voted for another person because they sounded Indian and you don't see a lot of Indians in politics. I voted for someone named Sam Houston. I really didn't have a choice on that one. He just had the perfect name for Texas politics.

It felt more meaningful than I thought but I will probably have to fight that same apathy four years from now. Who knows? I may not even be in the country.

Auntie Liz

So, I am an aunt! It's actually a cooler feeling than I expected. My brother and I are pretty close so I already feel a great fondness for this unseen nephew. I have only seen a mini-sized pic of him on my phone but he seems pretty cute so far. I have to give some serious props to my sister-in-law for a whopping 36 hours of labor! That's really intense!

Samuel Christopher Hightower was born November 9th and weighed 6lbs, 13 oz and was 20 inches long. According to my mom, this is how much I weighed and how long Andrew was. I am not sure the significance of these facts but my mom seemed amused by them. I haven't gotten any word on who he looks like. (It was hard to tell on the pic on my phone.) Most newborns look more like aliens than either one of their parents anyway. Shella and Andrew look nothing alike so I really want to see who he looks like. Andrew was really hoping that he would have Shella's blue eyes. He always wanted blue eyes and even wore some ridiculously fake looking blue contacts for a period of time in high school. What a dork!

The baby's name came about because Andrew and Shella wanted a Bible name for his first name and both liked Samuel. The Christopher part is to honor my cousin, Chris who died about 12 years ago in a car crash at age 19.

I should get to see him in early December when they come to visit. I didn't think it would be a big deal to wait only a couple of weeks to see him but now that he's born, I wish I could see him sooner. Hopefully I will at least seem some larger pictures of him soon. It seems unreal that he really exists. I am super excited to be Auntie Liz. I figure I should go with the Hawaiian tradition and be called Auntie. My dad is still trying to figure out his grandpa name. I am pushing for Pop Pop. If I keep telling the kid when he starts talking maybe it will stick.

Hooray for little Samuel! I am so thankful that he and Shella are healthy.

Scantron 3

 

Scantron 2

 

Scantron!

 

Halloween

Last year I was the winner of our school's costume contest. I was hoping for a repeat win this year. I knew I couldn't top last year's Hot Cheetos costume. I mean, that stuff is used as currency at school. I thought about being a giant pickle. The kids love those too. They like to put a Hot Cheeto in the top of the pickle and suck on it. Then they drink the orangish greenish juice. It's pretty disgusting.

The only way I could envision a giant pickle costume was stuffing some green garbage bags and trying to wear them. It didn't sound very feasible. I also thought about being Lucas-this tamarind candy that they love. There are too many different varieties to be able to pick one recognizable one.

I decided to be a scantron. In case you are not as school-saavy as I am, a scantron is basically one of those answer sheets you bubble in with a number 2 pencil. I was a little nervous about getting the vote of the below 3rd grade crowd. They are not very familiar with scantrons. To try to win them over, I created a giant number 2 pencil. The costume turned out pretty well. I got tons of great reactions from teachers and students alike.

I thought I had a real chance to win despite my costume's lack of lower grade appeal. The winners were announced at the dance and there was only one winner for individual costume and two winners for group costume. Much to my dismay, I lost to the Joker. His costume was decent but not as out-of-the-box as mine. I mean, Joker was the number one costume in America. Where's the creativity? Those kids don't know creativity when they see it! Several of my kids from last year were around me when the votes were announced. They were all wishing and crossing their fingers that I would win. It was pretty cute. They were definitely disappointed when I lost. One of them tried to console me by saying, "It's okay. You did your best." Hey, at least I was a winner in their eyes, right?

Field Trip De Ja Vu

On Tuesday I went on a field trip to the Bayou Wildlife Park. I planned this particular field trip because of my own field trip to the place in fourth grade. All I remembered was getting to feed exotic animals from buckets while riding around on a tram. I think a camel slobbered on one of my friends. What more could a fourth grader ask for?

The place was just as fun as I remembered. It has all types of animals including: camels, llamas, longhorns, emus, ostriches, lemurs, and just about every type of deer known to man. The tour makes several stops so that the animals can come and feed out of the buckets of food that each child is holding. The children's faces when the animals first started eatiang was simply priceless. The emus were hilarious. They would look around with bugged out eyes and then suddenly dip in their head in the bucket. The kids could barely contain their excitement.

I like field trips because I can let some of my teacher guard down and interact with the kids on a more personal level. We get to have fun together. Sometimes when I am in my classroom, I feel like I am some sort of dictator in a totalitarian regime. I am the boss and they all have to do what I say. Sometimes the power is fun but I get tired of it.

The downside to field trips is that they are exhausting. Having to make sure the kids are not running off or getting eaten by camels takes its toll. My parent chaperone fell asleep on the bus as did I. All in all, though, it was a good day.

Kids are entertaining

Favorite student quote so far this year:
One of my students was commenting on the fact that my nose turns red when I am sick. He said, "Is that the way white people skin do?" I took advantage of this teachable moment to explain to him that white people's skin is like white shoes. Our skin shows stuff more the same way white shoes show more than black shoes. I think he now understands the complexity of race. Don't you think so?

At Young Life last night, we played a game called "Eat or Dance." It was a strange mix of hot potato and musical chairs with a twist. The kids had to walk in a circle and whoever was the closest to Andres when the music stopped, had to either eat a mystery item from a bag or dance. Some of the items were harmless like an apple. We also had two types of baby food- sweet potato and corn as well as sweet potato and Alaskan salmon. The worst food by far was the one I contributed. One of the girls ended up having to eat a piece of durian candy.

Durian is hard to adequately explain. It is a fruit found throughout Asia. It is a spiky melon looking fruit that is about the size of a football with a yellow slimy inside. The worst part about the fruit is its incredibly foul odor. It smells like raw sewage mixed with gasoline. The smell is so bad that it is banned on most Asian subways. There are usually signs that say "No durian." It's hard to imagine how people can like a fruit that smells so wretched. But somehow they do. I bought some Durian candy in China to feed to unsuspecting friends. This seemed like a great way to do this in a public way.

The candy looks harmless but you can smell the stench through the package. The girl who ate it didn't actually react as adversely as I would have thought. She tried to pretend it wasn't awful. The funniest part was watching the crowd's reaction as the smell hit them. Some of the guys literally ran out of the room. People were acting like they were going to puke and one actually did. Everytime the poor girl opened her mouth, the stench wafted out. It was pretty hilarious! I gotta get some more of that durian candy! And quick!