My first paan

After a very long day of touring around Dhaka, which included food and tea everywhere we went, we had a formal dinner with some women leaders of Bangladesh. Since we have to stay up another couple hours before the World Cup final game begins, the Bangladeshi faculty invited me to have some paan. I never turn down new experiences!
Paan is a digestive and stimulant(which is why it's good to have after lots of food) made of betel nut, various spices, limepaste (calcium hydroxide) and some other mystery ingredients all wrapped in a betel leaf. Apparently every paanwallah has their own mixture and recipe. Since it was dark and I didn't have my camera, I don't have actual documentation of the event, but I found some images online to share.
Here's a simple mixture:
There are various flavors and spices used--we ordered a 'mishti" or sweet version. There wasn't much that was very sweet about it, and Bengalis really like their sweets, so I don't think I'd like to try a sour or plain version!
It had so many different flavors as I chewed it! They roll all the stuff up in the leaf and you put the whole thing in your mouth slowly and chew it. It serves as a digestive and mouth freshener. First it tasted like herby and leafy, then a bit spicy from the masala mixture, then there were some bitter and sour flavors, and finally my mouth went a little numb and the flavor mellowed and was quite pleasant.
Here's an image of a paanwallah in Delhi:
Here they mostly sell them out of little carts and they're EVERYWHERE. You can see the wrapped paan on the front of this guy's table. They make them up fresh while you're there, and you can order to your liking. They're very social places and all the locals enjoyed watching me eat my first one.
These are addictive and, like anything addictive bad for you in the end. People who eat too many of them for too many years chip and stain their teeth, like this guy:
I see a lot of people with stained orange/brown teeth and gums from too much paan. Overall, a fun and enjoyable experience that I can't get even in the south asian neighborhoods of the Bay Area in California. I wouldn't necessarily order one of these on my own--it's been over an hour and I'm still tasting it--but I like the social aspect of it. The paan stands are the closest thing to a bar/coffeehouse around!