A Chinese Egg for Easter

Those of you who have lived outside of the States may have experienced the fact that in many places eggs are not refrigerated in the grocery store. (Probably another example of how divorced we have become from our food chain's origins but I'm not getting into that now...) I've learned long ago to get over my Western hangups and just get on with it but the other day I found this egg in my carton after I brought it home:

I guess the good news is that if I had a potential prayer of navigating the system I could call the supplier and track it's origin based on it's i.d. stamped on the bottom!

I have not decided what I want to do with it so it is languishing in my fridge. Place your vote now; should I:
open it and then cook it, or cook it and then open it. What would you do? My curiousity is building, but is not yet strong enough for me to actually open it...I'm still too afraid of what I might find!

In the meantime I boiled the rest and a few neighbors came over to help us decorate them.

Happy Easter Everyone!!

Virgin Boy Eggs (You are NEVER going to believe this one!)

Yesterday I picked up a copy of the March 31 edition of the Shanghai Daily and read a second page story so unbelievable that I was convinced it was an April Fools' Day Joke, a day early. Sadly, further reearch has told me that this is for real.

According to the Daily:

If You've A Taste For The Unusual Then Urine For A Treat...

It's the end of a school day in the eastern Chinese city of Dongyang, and eager parents collect their children after a hectic day of primary classes.
But that's just the start of busy times for dozens of egg vendors across the city, deep in coastal Zhejiang Province, who ready themselves to cook up the unusual springtime snack favoured by local residents.
Basins and buckets of boys' urine are collected from primary school toilets. It is the key ingredient in "virgin boy eggs," a local tradition of soaking and cooking eggs in the urine of young boys, preferably below the age of 10.
There is no good explanation for why it has to be boys' urine, just that it has been so for centuries.
The scent of the eggs being cooked in urine is unmistakable as people pass many street vendors in Dongyang who sell it, claiming it has remarkable health properties.
"If you eat this, you will not get heat stroke. These eggs cooked in urine are fragrant," said Ge Yaohua, 51, who owns one of the more popular "virgin boy eggs" stalls.
"They are good for your health. Our family has them for every meal. In Dongyang, every family likes eating them."...
The eggs are not only bought from street stalls. Residents also personally collect boys' urine from nearby schools to cook the delicacy at home.
The popularity of the treat has led the local government to list the 'virgin boy eggs' as an intangible cultural heritage.

Intangible. I can't argue with that assessment. Inedible, however, is the first word that comes to my mind. I'll take my chanes with the heat stroke.
There are so many things I want to share with you all as I catch up after seeming months of computer issues and family energies spent elsewhere, but this one was just screaming at me that it had to come first. And as far as I can tell, it is no April Fool's!