December 29, 2012

• Goat Festa

  It is fun to have a festa in Guinea Bissau.  It happens after funerals, or weddings, or sometimes just to celebrate the championship game of the futbol season.  So Chad and I, both leaving in December, decided to have a festa as a bit of a blessing and celebration for our friends and the Mission Compound.  The initial task involved finding a goat of suitable quality for such a festa, and that was not easy.  My friend Ebraima volunteered to look for a goat for me, and do the negotiating in price, so that we wouldn’t have to pay the “branku” (white man) price.  Well, he found several suitable goats out in the neighboring village of Sedengal, about 10 miles away.  So several days before the festa, we hopped aboard a car, and went there to look.  On the way, I remembered to my dismay that I had forgotten the extra cash that I was bringing, so I only had 25,000 cfa with which to buy a goat.  So the question was this–could we negotiate the price down that far?  We went on a trail about 1 1/2 miles from Sedengal, and found a suitable goat there.  It had a limp that concerned me, but otherwise was a very nice goat.  It immediately became obvious that Ebraima was going to use all of his powers in negotiating, as he was saying that we needed this goat for ceremonies and also that we did not have much money….My Kiriol was not good enough to contradict him, so I kept quiet.  Despite the sob story, he could only succeed in getting the price down to 28,000 cfa–56 dollars, which was an improvement from the intial price of 40,000.  However, I did not have enough money, or rather, Ebraima did not have enough, since I had given him the money so that it would be more authentic that he was buying the goat.  I think the guy was pretty sharp however, and saw through our subterfuge…so it became obvious we would need more money than I had.  So we told him to have the goat out by the main road by 5 pm, and we would bring the rest of the money, and pick it up.

   

  

  Here is my friend Ebraima, posing with me

  So we went all the way home, rested for an hour, and then headed back to pick it up.  We got there by 5 pm, and surprise, there was no goat by the side of the road…or person for that matter.  So, there was nothing to do but to walk down that same path again, 1 1/2 miles to get the goat.  Well, the goat was there, but the fellow who sold it was out in the matu working.  So we sat and waited, and waited, while the ladies there fed us some delicious roasted peanuts. Finally, after 6 pm, the fellow got back to the house.  I was concerned, because it was getting dark, and there is a possibilty that you would not be able to get a car that late…But we paid the rest of the money, and took goat on a leash back out to the road.  By the time we got there, it was dusk, and a car was not a sure thing.  But finally one came along, and it was packed out.  They had room for the goat on top of the car (I say car, because we call them that, but they are really vans used to carry literally everything, people, animals, produce, whatever), but there was absolutely no room in the car for 2 more people.  However, it was probably our last hope so we hopped on the bumper, and held on as we went down the bumpy road back to Catel. (Africans often ride back there, but I had never seen a branku there before.)  It was fun, and it was not too cold, and we delivered the goat to Ebraima’s house in fine shape.  We still had a few days until the festa, and we didn’t want it eating Adrianne’s garden at our house!

  For the cooking at the festa, I enlisted the help of Mai and Aminata, 2 sisters who go to church.  We told them to cook everything just as they would normally, and not to make it “toned down” just for us..so here is what happened

   

  

  Adrianne killed the goat, although I missed that process.  Here Pete and Ebraima are skinning it

   

  

  Here is the large kettle cooking the goat meat.

  Cleaning the insides, or tripa.  There was nothing wasted in this goat.  The only parts thrown away are the gallbladder and the trachea and the hooves.

   

  The ladies doing the cooking.

   

  The pot over the open fire with goat inside

  • 9:44 am
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