Teaching Tourists How To Cook Tarantulas In Cambodia

[geovalin]

Teaching Tourists How To Cook Tarantulas In Cambodia

Ann Field

You can call it the Airbnb of unusual travel experiences. But that wouldn’t really do this social enterprise justice.

Backstreet Academy is a one-year-old peer-to-peer online platform through which tourists visiting Asia can sign up for experiences unique to that locale, activities the usual sightseer wouldn’t take part in. (Examples: cooking tarantulas, which apparently is a big thing in Cambodia; fishing on the Mekong; wood carving in Kathmandu; wine-making in Laos.)

Jamon Mok eats a tarantula.

Most important, the Singapore-based startup provides a way for local artisans and tradespeople–most of them illiterate, with no access to technology and living on subsistence wages–to increase their income dramatically, since they’re the ones teaching tourists how to do these exotic tasks. (Of course, the activities aren’t exotic for the locals, many of whom making their living by engaging in them.)

It’s the brainchild of Jamon Mok, who, a few years ago, was working at a micro-social venture fund in Nepal. By his office, there was a narrow alley, where a mask carver plied his trade. One day, Mok found a translator and approached the artisan, who, on the spot, offered to teach him the basics. At the end of the lesson, which Mok paid for, the man offered to teach anyone else who might be interested. Over the next few months, he tripled his income and Mok decided to look for other craftspeople who might want to give similar lessons, tapping NGOs and other artisans.

With that, Mok realized the word of mouth process he’d been using wouldn’t cut it and decided he needed a technology platform to make the booking process easy for customers. Artisans and tradespeople, who would be trained by the company in how best to set up a class, would participate through a local call center and translator network. He and two co-founders raised about $50,000 from angel investors early last year and, soon after, launched the site with 10 craftspeople. Now there are about 400 in six countries and 24 cities in Asia, with plans to expand to Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines this year. To book an experience, customers put down a deposit, which later on goes to artisans; the rest is paid directly to the craftspeople in local currency.

Money from the lessons generally increases artisans’ income by two to three times. But they derive another benefit, as well. “They get a lot of respect and admiration for their skills, something they never experienced before,” says Mok.

Customers tend to be tourists who, he says, “are more interested in off the beaten track activities.” They’re often adventurous young couples or families. Some, but by no means all, are looking for a way to travel and have a positive social impact. Mok says he doesn’t make too big a deal about that part of the experience, however, instead promoting the unique nature of the activities.

One recent customer was Elliot Rosenberg, who heads a social enterprise called Favela Experience, which connects tourists visiting Brazil with places to stay in favelas. (I wrote about it here). Among other activities, he learned cross-bow making in Laos from a Hmong minority villager who spoke no English. “I knew this wasn’t gong to be your typical Southeast Asian elephant ride,” he says.

About cooking those tarantulas. According to Mok, during the Khmer Rouge reign, many Cambodians were forced to eat insects to survive. But the habit stuck and the food is considered a local delicacy. The insects in question include crickets, silk worms and grasshoppers, as well as tarantulas, which are arachnids. They’re usually fried with basil leaves, garlic and chili.

source: http://www.forbes.com/sites/annefield/2015/07/22/teaching-tourists-how-to-cook-tarantulas-in-cambodia/

[timmyp]

Eating insects are the future. I just got a bunch of Hi-So snacks from Siam Paragon, bags of bugs with chili, seaweed, or cheese flavoring. I recommend the chili, Thais do chili best.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/02/27/us-thailand-insects-idUSKBN0LV09S20150227

They all have a bug flavor, though. Tolerable, but not really tasty... I wonder if arachnids are different. Maybe they take like lobster? Same class, right? I'm giving this a try next time I'm in Cambodia.

[Mudcrab]

Try scorpion.....crunchy and taste like crap.

Mind you the MIL does a nice grasshopper deep fried with pork flavouring!

[thailandforumaddict]

They also put snakes in bottles !!!