Good story so far! Anyway.

I ended up eating a bunch appetizers and the wafers/sauce that are often brought to the table.

By the time my actual food came, I was full.

I ended up eating a little of it anyway, but the waiter was quite concerned that I didn't like it.

When asked about what "spice level" when I ordered, 1 to 10, I said 10 as I always do.

It was quite decent, milder than I had hoped

But that wasn't the problem. I was totally stuffed.

So the waiter asked a couple more times if anything was wrong with my food, and I finally broke down and said it was a little mild for my taste but I still loved it.

So this waiter, who was a cheerful guy, said he'd go fix it for me.

When he said it was already a 10, I said "yes, it's an American 10."

So this guy is deeply amused by all of this.

He brought me a little container with some fresh peppers.

And encouraged me to try one.

If you can see from the photo, though the lighting sucks, I did nibble the end off one of them.

At first I nibbled only the tiniest bit, but then he said nah, you've got to take a really good bite.

So if you can see from the relative lengths, and that's on a small plate from my own kitchen because he handed them to me in a little to-go container, I ate maybe 1/4 of one.

I got punk'ed! XD

It took a minute to start kicking in...

The I spent the next 20 minutes drinking water, flailing, suffering, and trying not to laugh.

He brought me a little dish of rice pudding, which did indeed help.

I kept alternating sips of water and little bits of the rice pudding (it had a baby spoon in it, which was even funnier to me.)

The poor guy, understandably, became rather concerned.

Ehhh, I was fine and kept telling him that.

I really believe he assumed my spice tolerance really was that high.

XD Nope. For an American? Maybe.

On a global scale, I am a mere mortal. XD

So that was my evening. XD

The free rice pudding was pretty good! X3

fftt

Punk'ed so hard. XD

And probably by accident.

I have seen these same peppers battered and fried as appetizers.

In an Indian restaurant.

They're clearly considered normal things to eat.

I rate the pain as roughly equivalent to getting a tattoo on a forearm.

Pretty damned painful for a sustained stimulus, but still within the limits of voluntary experiences.

Then again, I went well past my threshold of "praying I could pass out to get away from the pain" with childbirth, so it's totally legit to rate me as a total wimp. X3

pfft /pats

Though I do believe rather strongly, as a neuroscience major, that the density and distribution of the many different types of pain receptors is highly variable between individuals.

The classic way of measuring human pain tolerance in a lab setting is how long a person can hold their own hand in ice water.

I would last maybe 5 seconds.

ohh interesting

But I find stepping on legos in bare feet to be a little annoying. I really don't understand the meme-level cultural reference about it being super painful.

me either, really

Something I really don't understand is how people react so strongly when their hair gets caught in something or pulled.

I guess I'm just low on that kind of pain receptor in my scalp?