A taste of Afghanistan

Today one of our interpreters brought us a bag full of food from the local market! One of the guys came in and started laying the food out and to be completely honest I was repulsed! The food was in a nondescript white plastic bag, but each thing was wrapped in newspaper. At first all I could think was how many dirty hands touched that newspaper before they wrapped fresh food in it? And how OLD is that newspaper?! The first thing out of my mouth was, "Is that newspaper?! Where on earth did you get that!" And they replied, "Outside the wire, at a local market, duh!"

So I sat back and sorely missed my American food standards and health codes for a couple minutes. Then I thought, I can't wait to tell Matt about this food! That is when I realized that Matt has been to far more countries (and continents) than I have and he would say, love, that's how the food is in less developed countries. Take your doxy, stop being a baby and try the food. Enjoy the experience.

So after my inner monologue pep-talk I put my big-girl pants on, put my micro-biology professor's voice out of my mind and investigated the food.

The left is plain bread, the back right are like spicy afghani sopapillas, and the right front is like a falafel wrap with imitation French fries in it.. 

For you observant readers, yes that newspaper is in English. As a matter of fact it is a copy of the 'Daily Times' from July 6th 2013... Yep... Over two months old.

I can practically feel the viruses, bacteria and amoebae crawling all over my mouth! :/ 

 These are like falafels with an unknown meat and spicy peppers.

After my investigation of the food, and deciding I did not like the spicy afghan sopapillas, I made myself a little helping (I would say plate, but we didn't use plates, serving utencils or silverware).

I have absolutely no idea what the names of any of the dishes are, but my afghan, pizza crust bread burrito, mystery meat concoction was pretty good :) I also added some of my "hooter sauce" because I found it a little dry (and I was looking for an excuse to use my sauce)! 

If you are wondering how I ate the food, it's because I made a conscious effort to NOT check the newspaper date until after I ate. 

Taste the food of Afghanistan, check!

Oh I have another afghan bucket-list item to check off! I successfully bargained with a local and bought a hat for $10 instead of $20! 

For those of you that know me, you probably know that I avoid all situations where bargaining, negotiating or haggling prices are involved, so this is pretty big for me.

Bargain with a local at the market and don't get completely screwed, check!

I'm guessing that since the left over pad Thai didnt kill me, this won't either. Buuuut if you don't hear from me it's probably because I ingested some deadly bacteria. Bon appètit!