Rotten Meat

Even the best laid plans tend to be foiled in Burkina.  Buses never leave when they are suppose to, you never know when something will or will not be open, things never happen on time or sometimes they will be early, and you can almost always count on meeting times to be an hour or 2 (at least) later then projected.  (I learned this in my first week in village, when Katie and I hurried to make the 2 hour bike ride to the district capital for an 8 o'clock meeting that didn’t start until almost noon).  We’ve come to call this being “Burkina’d”. 

It was Monday November 15th, and I was preparing to leave Ouaga after a weekend of meetings for the Food Security Committee.  The routine for leaving the city is pack up, go to the post to withdraw money (the Post office is also the bank), grab lunch, a quick trip to Marina Market for all grocery needs not found in village, and catch the 14 hundred bus.  I was running a little late, being distracted by one last episode of Mad Men, and got to the post between 11 and 11:30, only to find the power in the city was out, therefore I could not withdraw money.  Having no other choice since I didn’t have enough money to pay for my hotel room otherwise,  I waited.  And waited.  And waited.  Finally at close to 14 hundred the teller told us that they were closing early for the fete, tomorrow was Tabaski (a big Muslim holiday), and so she took our phone numbers down and gave us the money, without checking anything, and said if there was a problem when the power came back up she would call.  Thanks, that’s really nice of you, but you couldn’t have done that 2 hours ago so I didn’t miss my bus? I suppose not.  Guess it’s another night in Ouaga. 

Tuesday everything is going well; find a place that is open for lunch, and head to my bus a little early.  Only no one is there.  Now, I’ve asked a head of time, and was told buses run every day of the year, but my bus stations isn’t looking good.  Thankfully there is an attendant there who tells me that the bus isn’t running until 17 hundred because of the fete.  Great, so much for not traveling or biking home in the dark, but oh well, I really need to get back to village.  So I sit at the gare with a book and wait.  The 17:00 bus leaves pretty much on time, everything is going well, until we get to my stop.  Or at least I think it might be my stop- nighttime has fallen and every small village along the road looks the same in the dark, a few thatched shacks on the side of the road.  Usually the bus attendant calls out telling you where we are if he knows someone is getting off there, but I hear nothing, and we barely stop for even a second before the bus keeps going.  I stare out the window for something I recognize- finally I see the Mosque that is the turn off for Katie’s house and run up to the front of the bus to ask them to let me off.  By the time the bus stops we’re just outside of the village where Katie lives.  No worries, it’s just a 20 or so minute walk back into town to her house, where my bike spent the weekend.  At least it’s a beautiful night, big, bright, almost full moon.  I get to Katie’s and we chat for about a half hour or so while she feeds me the food she had been given/ made for the fete.  It seems that Tabaski is a big excuse to eat a lot of food, kind of like Thanksgiving.  Finally around 19:00 or so I start strapping my bags onto my bike for the hour ride home.  Before I go she hands me a bag of mutton that a neighbor had given her, she is a vegetarian, and says something to the effect of, “here’s some conciliation for being Burkina’d,” in regards to not being able to get home in time to celebrate the holiday in my own village.  Sweet, meat is vastly missing in my diet.  By the time I get home it’s late and I’m tired.  I throw my bag down on the floor and put the meat and other food items on the kitchen table, since I don’t have a fridge. Bed quickly ensues. 

Wednesday I get up and do my normal village routine- get dressed, eat breakfast while reading newspaper articles sent form home, and off to the CSPS.  Most people are still feteing, and the President on Burkina is campaigning in our district capitol, which a good number of people were attending, so it was a quite morning.  I leave the CSPS a little early because cheese and crackers (from a care package) and a magazine are sounding really good right now.  While reading I realize how sleepy I am in the midday heat, and take a nap.  When I woke it was 3p.m., obviously too late to make lunch or I’ll ruin my appetite for dinner, so I go about my day.  Finally at 18:30 the hunger pains start nagging me and I head to my kitchen.  As soon as I open the kitchen doors this smell hits me in the face.  I had forgotten about the mutton.  I hadn’t been in the kitchen since 8 a.m. when I made oatmeal and coffee, it’s the first time I’ve had my hands on real meat in this country, and I forgot I had it. Balls! 

There was no way I was going to waste my one chance for real protein, so I set off to salvage what I could.  First step, try to hack it off whatever bone it was on.  Not easy, now I see why people here cook bones and all.  I also tried to cut off any parts that looked a little discolored, a little greenish, or a funny texture.  It all smelled bad, but I was desperate for meat.  There was voice in the back of my head that told me to boil it, that’s what is done here with meat, but I had this vision of chunks of juicy stir-fired meat that I couldn’t shake.  I put everything I had that could possibly make the meat palatable into the dish: my last garlic and peanuts, spices, even my precious quinoa, and thoroughly cooked the meat trying to cook the bad out of it. 

Finally I sat down in my chair under my hanger to eat by candlelight.  The meat still tasted funny.  I sadly forced a few bites down, unfortunately the bad had leaked all over everything and the hole meal tasted like rotten meat.  As I sat, hopeless, a dog meekly poked his head into my hanger.  I’m rarely visited by dogs, maybe he could smell the mutton.  Dogs aren’t fed here, they live off of “table scraps,” so they are always hungry, and this dog looked about as sad as I felt.  With a feeling of defeat, I picked out the rest of the mutton chunks and threw them to the dog, which greedily gobbled them up without a second thought.  I was unwilling to surrender the entire meal, and forced down the potato chunks and quinoa, fully knowing that I would most likely feel sick afterwards, which I did.  This was my first experiment with Burkina meat, and it ended rotten.  Oh Burkina, how you got me again! 

Side Note: I couldn’t actually get an explanation of what Tabaski is a celebration of- I know it’s 40 days after the end of Ramadan and is either the end or the beginning of the pilgrimage to Mecca.  Also, white sheep are sacrificed.  If anyone can tell me more I would love to learn about it!