You're hardly the only one who had the same reaction to durian, despite having a totally positive attitude toward eating it (as your shelling out so much money makes clear). Honestly I think there's a genetic component. For example, it's already known that people's ability to smell an offensive odor in urine after eating asparagus is genetic - and it happens that some of those same chemicals are among the dozens in durian that contribute to its smell and taste. Likewise with smells, some people can taste things that others can't - for example, to some, cyanide is flavorless while to others it tastes like bitter almonds. Again, genetic.
And gene distributions can vary geographically - for example, 90% of east asians are lactose-intolerant while only 5% of northern europeans are. And the reason is simply that traditional diets in most east asian areas didn't include dairy while in northern Europe dairy was a major component, and people adapted to the foods available in their area. It's not a 100% adaptation, but neither is like / dislike of durian.
Of course that's just one possibility - for example, it could be something that people adapt to with exposure as a child. But as Michiganian and many others on this forum have demonstrated, some westerners take to durian quickly or even immediately while for many it's just simply disgusting. Which again suggests some sort of genetic component.
