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***Some of the following imagery may not be suitable for all viewers as it deals with indigenous food preparation***
It’s near closing time for our project and our local crew want to throw us a going away meal. It’s pretty special. Meat isn’t eaten all that regularly here. The American diet doesn’t even exist in the same universe as this place. Goats carry wood and function as pack animals more than they do as meat.
Today, a goat will be cut down, cleaned and dressed. The meat will be cubed into chunks the size of large, square ice-cubes. Inset leaves will be splayed out as a working surface, keeping the dying goat, our meal, off of the thick red mud. A knife will be quickly plunged into the goat’s throat, a hand under the chin as the animal looks towards the sky. Arteries will shower the ground and the goat will slowly drift away as his blood volume drains, mixing with rain and mud, diluting into the small rivers that run under our feet. His trachea makes a disturbing sound as he passes. His body jerks periodically over the next 10 minutes. It’s not pretty, but I wanted to know where my food was coming from. I’ve grown skeptical of the disconnect we have with our food’s original form and what ends up on our plates. It was important for me to experience it. I felt some pity for the animal, but it also made me so much more thankful for the life that was given to feed us on that day.
The leaves will catch the organs as they are carefully removed and placed amongst the bright green of the inset. Burgundy drops continue to pool in the veins of the large, banana-tree sized, leaves. One of the local dogs will make it off with one of the testicles. It’s quite a feat since goats are naturally well endowed and these dogs are not much large than an adult fox. The dog will swallow it whole. I don’t understand the physics of this, I’m just a witness.
My friends work like surgeons. This is not their first time. What appeared to be rusted pieces of sheet metal shaped into blades are really incredibly effective knives. They cut with precision, pulling fat and hide away from the smooth fascia incapsulating the muscle. The hide is kept intact, never punctured, and left attached to the head. The meat on the head is the only meat that the hide workers, the lower cast, will get.
Inside, the air stays thick, but is warmed to near humid conditions by body heat and cooking steam. The house is compartmentalized into three sections. A living room with cow hide benches and two other adjoining rooms. On one side of the living room there is an opening in the wall that leads to the sleeping area. Food prep’s sit on their beds, sun cascading in through mud-framed windows, as they cut meat into squares, ready to be cooked. One of our drivers joins in. He often wears a clean polo and reads the newspaper daily. He’s from the capital and feels much to metropolitan for this kind of work. He does it with ease.
On the other side of the living room lays a stall. Cows move in the dark, steam ejecting from nares. All the products of cow bodies funnel into a trench that runs out of the back of the house, under a rear wall, and into the abutting corn and inset crop...fertilizer on demand.
At the rear of the stall, opening into the living room, sits a dark, closet-sized space. It’s open to the cows peering in, following the movement of the cook with their large, obsidian eyes. Our master chef hunches over a wide rimmed clay pot, about 5 times as big as a trick or treat pumpkin bowl. I have a feeling that it really hasn’t been “cleaned,” maybe ever...heavily seasoned. Meat drops into the dark abyss of the pot, flame fingers up the sides from below. The meat smells good. Peppers and onion are dropped in and mixed with the freshest of protein. My sense of smell is red-lining, my stomach is indicating that it’s ready for the incoming feast.
Fresh buns are brought in from town. A local woman bakes them in a clay oven. Heat warps the light as it rises from the yeasty dough.
Tej is known colloquially as “Darfur” or “Al-Qaeda” — I don’t remember which. Both are incredibly insensitive names. One refers to the crazy drivers that are very few in number, but rage through the mountainside in large work trucks. They’ll kill you if you’re not careful...such as is the case with the above names. Whichever name was relegated to this drink is meant to indicate that it will put you on your ass if you drink to much of it. It’s a rich homeywine, a mead, with bee parts still floating in the brew, in some cases the whole bee. I pick the insect corpses out of the liquid with my fingers. It’s thick and yellow, a sweet nectar. It creeps up on you and will drop you if you’re not careful. It’s very, very good.
A platter is passed around. Meat is pulled from the heap, the goat mountain. Right hand only. We all flash big toothy smiles to each other in the dark. Steam seeps from the corners of our mouths. We look at each other warmly. There’s not much to say. We don’t share the same words. Our voices sound foreign to each other because they are. We laugh and nod. We care deeply about the other. I would do whatever I could for them, as I would any other friend. Our connection isn’t really limited by our lack of speech. It’s emboldened by the fact that we are in this space, appreciating the same food, paying reverence to the offering that was given to us. The goat gave its life. My friends sacrificed a workhorse for this meal. Resources lost for the enjoyment of this day. I appreciated it so much.
In the dank humidity of a cold mud house, fingers dripping with fat and goat juice, a bit lit from the tej, rosey cheeks, I sat with my friends and broke bread.
It was a good day...
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