I was not used to have only durian as meal. The Malaysian tour guide bought chicken rice for a few of us who would not take durian meal when approaching the durian plantation.

My son Solomon likes durian. He wanted to come with me when I told him about the tour. As he had a few school projects to complete as well as some part-time jobs of concert and conference to handle, he missed the opportunity.

In order to let him taste the one of the best durians, I bought two durians named Golden Phoenix (金凤).

The Golden Phoenix durian was 22 Ringgit per kilograms. I paid 50 Ringgit for the two durians I bought. It was about 20 Sing dollars. We liked the pulp, taste and smell of those two durians. The seeds were tiny. Solomon and his mother also agreed that the price of 20 dollars was fair.

Solomon thought that we should enjoy ourselves in taking what we like once a while.

When I bare-handed opened the durian with a butter knife, I praised God who created this wonderful fruit. There were gaps on the thorny shell that made opening of durian very easy. Solomon wondered who was the first person took durian. How did he open the durian and know that it was a delicious.

We could always see durians in Singapore. They were mainly imported from Malaysia. Some were from Thailand.

We could only find durians during its season many years ago. We can find durians all seasons round nowadays. But the price would be cheaper during its season.

There were local durians about forty years ago. I remembered there were expositions when I was young. The farmers took part in competitions of their products. There were durians and rambutans.

The land of farmers was then taken over for development. In order to keep what they had produced, they transplanted their best fruit trees and transferred to Malaysia.

The Malaysian farmers had put in more effort and produced more famous types of durians. They were included 「猫山王」, 「金凤」, 「101」, 「D13」, 「XO」, 「D88」, 「D18」 and 「D99」 etc.

I used to see tourists eating durians at one of the durian stall in Chinatown. There were also many durians sellers in Geylang.

When we went to Thailand a few years ago, we realised that the Thai people liked to eat firm durian and we preferred tender durians.

Durian is the popular fruit in Singapore.