Where's Anthony Bourdain? In Namibia.

"You'll never get the truly good meals in life
if you don't open yourself out to the bad ones."
I suppose it's pretty pathetic that I have only heard of this country because it is where Angelina Jolie decided to give birth to her child. Thankfully though Anthony Bourdain has decided to explore Namibia on camera to show the wonderful country to us all.

This episode of Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations begins on a boat in Walvis Bay with an oyster farmer. Back on land, they watched as the oysters were processed in the hatchery and Tony commented that they are some of the best oysters he has tried in the entire world. Tony then "rode the dunes" in the exact opposite type of environment - the desert. A snowboard on sand. Wow. It looks hot but thrilling. Tony did a pretty good job and made it all the way down without eating sand.

But the best part was when Tony had breakfast with the bushmen. They made him an ostrich-egg omelette in this neat pit in the ground. The egg is poured right onto the hot sand. Wood is placed to surround the outside and then additional wood is placed on top. The end result is a whole bunch of ash and dirt baked onto of the hardened egg. It looked horrible but it was seen as a special dish to the bushmen because it is not often that they get their hands on some ostrich eggs. I don't see it becoming popular over here in the United States any time soon.

Of course Tony had some of the nasty bits as well. He tried different parts of a warthog including the rectum and brains which he called the worst meal of his life. The bushmen also served him tree beatles which are only found in one certain type of bush. The tribe makes an event of their gathering. Tony had several of them and claimed that they were the single best thing he had eaten all day.

In the city, one of Tony's friend took him to the market. They had all this meat cooking up on a HUGE grill and it looked so tasty. With some other friends while out on a huntin, Tony tried some Namibian truffles. These are not the chocolate truffles, they are from the white truffles that grow wild in the desert. There were no communication problems at this market like he had in Ghana because the national language of Namibia is English.

It was interesting to see Namibia from Tony's perspective. It is a filled with cultures that I can only try to understand. The people are strong survivors and live in the purest sense by living off of the land.

Next Week: Tony visits Russia.