Tired of eating alone in the Mekong Delta I asked the guest house matron if she could sort me out with a partner for dinner. (she might know a petite Vietnamese model) I was prepared to pay for the meal and pay a tip for acting as my guide. The only pre-requisites were speaking English and a love of food. The model would be a bonus.
After a number of phone calls the lady came to me smiling. "I find you good person," she blurted, "You meet at seven o'clock, here," and with that she disappeared back to her kitchen where she chopped fish on the floor.
My mind worked overtime in the interlude wondering who or what she had chosen for me.
That evening at 19.00 sharp a yellow scooter pulled up outside the house. Its owner, was a 25 year old (male) law student, body builder and part-time model called, "Thai." Well I suppose he was a model!
Hopping on the back of the scooter, Thai explained that it was an honour to help me on my culinary quest. He was currently on holiday and deliberating life as a catholic priest. (like his brother) This was going to be an interesting evening.
As he weaved effortlessly around the frenetically-charged traffic my mind opened up to the size and scope of Can Tho city. I had only seen the riverside bit and hoped that Thai knew of an exciting eaterie.
Stopping at the neon-lit exterior to a very open restaurant he explained it was one of the best places for local things.
He was not wrong, eels, frogs, snake, fish, leaves and other acquatic life in many forms were all present on the menu.
Charcoal-grilled snake-head fish arrived whole on a bed of lettuce. Meatily thick, white-fleshed with almost prehistoric appearance, I enjoyed the clean flavour without the earthiness associated with river fish. We ate whole frog which had been roughly quartered and baked. It was a shame they left the handbag-like skin on. Frog in Cambodia was much better.
Minced eel cooked with chilli and lemongrasswas my favourite dish and combined beautifully with a crispy rice cracker peppered with black sesame seeds.
Our discussions were wide and varied. Vietnamese politics, the complexities of Asian dating, his Swiss girlfriend, eating dogs, and intercontinental monetary imbalances.
He invited me to, "meet the parents," the next day, and, delighted by this, I changed my departure date to eat in their abode.
Prior to a DIY Vietnamese roll making session using gluteous pigs ear, shrimp, noodles, pickled spring onion bulb, and paper thin rice wrappers, I was invited to say grace for the Catholic family. An honour indeed, and one that resulted in me being given a full round of applause.
I had gone down better than Ben Stiller.
Proceedings may have been different if I had tried in Vietnamese.
What I knew for sure was that my perspectives were beginning to change.
Like everybody I had encountered in the Mekong Delta, Thai was welcoming, hospitable and could eat for a living.
