We arrived in Johor Bahru, the Malaysian gateway to Singapore, late at night, and checked into our slightly swanky hotel (my choice) where I hoped to be united with my second cousin, who has lived in Malaysia for years with his wife and children. The hotel was within a compound designed for westerners and duty free shopping, but everything was shut at that late hour, so we decided to walk out a little way along the main street.

It was a little bizarre walking along that dirty pavement at 1am. We stuck out like a sore thumb; two young european girls in western clothes wandering around unescorted looking for a place to get some food. Local men sitting at plastic chairs and tables stared blatently at us, and so we sat down at the nearest cafe and tried to blend in!

Nobody spoke a word of English, and the menu was in malaysian, so ordering was a little tricky! We ended up randomly pointing at an item and hoped for the best! The man brought over a wicker basket full of what looked like banana leaves, and something was inside that looked a little like red gelatin. Emily suggested that we try it, in order to embrace the local culture.

It was utterly hideous.

It had a slimy mousse-like texture and tasted of sour chemicals that was not unlike mosquito repellent. Suddenly a dawning realisation hit me. I looked around to see if anyone else was eating their funny baskets of goo, and noticed that no other customer had touched this strange fragnant offering.

"It's mosquito repellant!" I hissed. "We just ate the mosquito repellant!"

"Oh god." Said Emily. "It does taste and smell exactly like mosquito repellant."

We looked furtively around.

"Why didn't they stop us, oh, I'm so embarrassed." I whispered.

We attempted a quick escape, but a man came running over to us holding the banana leaf basket of mush, and was saying something about paying for it. I was a little confused to say the least. I turned to a table near the exit and saw it's occupants tucking into the peculiar parcels as if it were completely normal.

Anyway, to cut a long story short. The funny parcels were actually maashed up fish guts, which is a Malaysian delicacy, (albeit a very gross one) and the reason they smelt specifically of mosquito repellent is because we both had liberally sprayed ourselves 30 mins earlier with strong DEET and forgotten to wash our hands. All in all a culinery disaster, but a well-deserved learning curve, in which I learnt to always wash my hands before eating fish guts.