The Dragon & I

No, folks, this has nothing to do with the creature with wings and breathes fire. This story is about the dragon fruit. According to this link, it is also known as pitaya. When I was a small boy, I had never heard of this fruit in Sabah; after all it did not originate from this part of the world.

Many years ago, while I was walking the Gaya Street on a Sunday morning, I was fascinated by the many dragon fruits which were on sale that day. It was something new to me. Apparently, there're several species of dragon fruits, but the most common one I've seen in KK is the pinkish-purplish species. Beside the stall, there was a small notice board with newspaper cuttings pasted on it; informing the passers-by about the fruit. I can still remember standing there reading intently for a while—the fruit had some sort of medicinal properties. The article claimed that the fruit contained numerous vitamins and other health benefits. But in the end, I didn't buy any that day.

Then about 4 years ago, during a lunch break one day, I was not feeling very hungry and decided to have something light. I went to a shop selling fruits near to my office. It happened that I was in the mood to be a bit adventurous that day. Amongst the many fruits in that shop were some dragon fruits. I saw one of the customers eating one, and it was quite messy. Then I saw some fruit yogurts in the fridge. There was one with the label "Dragon Fruit" on it. It looked appealing, and I thought, "Why not?"

So I bought a dragon fruit yogurt and brought it back to the office. But when I finally started to sip from that plastic cup, it was really awful. It was sour and tasted like vomit! I had expected the yogurt to taste a bit sour, but not to that extent! It was worse than any kind of medicine that I've tasted before. But then foods with medicinal properties do not normally taste good, if you know what I mean. I forced that whole cup into my stomach anyway. Then that evening, I started having a bit of stomach discomfort. By around midnight, I was already having diarrhoea. It was such a terrible experience.

That was the last time I had dragon fruits. Somehow, in spite of all those vitamins and medicinal properties, my stomach just wouldn't agree with the fruit. I guess I will just have to get my vitamins from other fruits.

After several more years had elapsed, it came a time when I was lucky enough to secure a ride with Hunters "R" Us in the MAH Treasure Hunt last year. My flight was delayed for several hours and I arrived late that night. I missed the hunt briefing which was held earlier that evening. The team members of Hunters "R" Us were very kind. We had a late dinner that night. Then they told gave me a brief account of what to expect during the hunt the next day. They said during the briefing it was mentioned that the hunters will be stopping in one place for a challenge. They said they are familiar with that particular stop—it was a dragon fruit farm. They therefore guessed that the challenge might have something to do with eating dragon fruits. I was fairly alarmed, but did not express my concern to my hosts.

Then my host suggested that we go round to buy some dragon fruits that night itself, just to give me a feel of the fruit. I was worried sick. It's not amusing to hunt all the way to Malacca while having diarrhoea. But I didn't resist the suggestion anyway.

And so we went to one of those fruit shops and bought a couple of dragon fruits. When we reached home, my host calmly cut up the dragon fruit and offered me some. The ugly experience I had 4 years ago came back to me...

I bit into the fruit... and God dammit, it tasted so good! It was sweet and if not for my full stomach after dinner, I would have had more that night. It took me that long; and it took the MAH Treasure Hunt to make me realise that 4 years prior to that I actually spent RM2.50 to buy a cup of dragon fruit yogurt that had gone bad. How the hell did I force myself to finish the whole cup anyway? I felt like a total idiot up to this day!