The theory of spice

International Exchange Festival

Yesterday, when I went to the library, there was something international going on. Many exotic-looking gaijins were walking to and from a hall. Unable to resist my curiosity, I asked one of them what was going on. He said "International Exchange Festival". "Oh." I said looking at a sign written "国際交流フェスティバル". Wondering whether "international exchange festival" is an appropriate translation of this Japanese, I got into the hall and found small stalls selling foods, accessories, books and other specialties of their home countries. Since I had decided to do one new thing a day, I bought currie-like food at South Africa booth (table) and chicken kebab at Iraq and something like fried gyoza at Saudi Arabia and Kenyan spring rolls(it was so written) at Kenya table. All of them but kebab tasted very different from foods we usually eat in Japan. Where do those differences come from? I decided that they were from spices they use.
There is nothing like spices that speaks more about the nation and people using them. They represent climate. Hot spices are used in hot regions for example. Some spices must be unique to places because of their soil and climate. Some spices must grow only in dry climate. Some, such as wasabi only grow in pure water. So I suspect that spices are the ones that create basically the flavor of local foods. I would like to stop here because I am no connoisseur of spices to tell the truth. I would be more than happy if someone familiar with spices backed up my theory.