Dien Bien Phu: The Temple of Doom

I have come to refer to the meals at the very local restaurants as the Temple of Doom, a play on the 1984 Indiana Jones film. Before moving to Vietnam, I was somewhat of a picky eater, reserved to eating only chicken and fish, repulsed with the idea of red meat (since the age of 12). In my first visits to the third world, I quickly realized that I would have to kick this first world bourgeois handicap...I found myself funneling down hairy meats and tough muscular objects suppressing my gag reflex as politely as I could. Eating with very poor families can be a very humbling experience. When a family who may only eat meat on very special occasions serves you the choiciest parts of pigs ear, you must eat happily and thankfully. The Harvard Dr. Paul Farmer talks about such meals as the fifth food group. You can see what he means....