SOS Meat Crisis

Trip Start Sep 15, 2007

Trip End Oct 20, 2007

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Where I stayed

Shalom Hotel

(Juba hotels)

Flag of Sudan Juba, Central Equatoria, Sudan
Friday, October 29, 2010

Hi people

I'm having a grown up crisis! There you have it – but like Fred Sanford (an actor in an old American comedy called Sanford and SON) THIS IS THE BIG ONE!! – I’m also clutching my breast and flailing around. Growing up is hard work – suddenly there are responsibilities, deadlines and restrictions – what happened to a life without limits – hectic. But put all that griping aside and help me have my current breakdown (in techni-colour thank you very much – after all this is Wadzi – everything has to be larger than life). The crisis (DEEP BREATH) prepare yourselves, here goes - my lovely doctor tells me that I am eating too much red meat! If this was a movie the sub-title would say "go to slow motion" and there would be one of those moments where the camera is still and everything seems to come to a standstill! I ask you what next – no red meat and then no alcohol and then next thing it will be just drink water and purge or something! (Sub-title DEEP BREATH)

So there I was eating and drinking my way blissfully through east and southern Africa – I’ve been to Kampala, Dar-es-Salaam, Johannesburg, Harare and am currently in Juba since my last communication with an overnight stop in Nairobi – the world of barbecued meat. I digress, anyway, there I was doing the nyama choma (barbecued red meat) route – you know in some countries there is the spice route, and the wine route and whatever route – my particular passion – the red meat route! And what happens? I go for an annual check up and lo and behold too much red meat. How can one possibly eat too much red meat? I cannot even begin to compute that. How come there’s no such thing as too much vegetable? Why then is there such a thing as too much red meat? This whole growing up thing, honestly! I am the champion of the carnivores and I’m being asked to desist! I hope you can begin to understand the level of my trauma!   I was right when I saw that grey hair - it was the beginning of the end and then there was the turning 40 crisis (okay I know that was like 4 years ago) but there was a reason – soon they will tell me I cannot eat meat at all and my teeth will start falling out! So forget calm, cool and collected – let’s talk pulling my hair out – CRISIS!!

I know the confirmed vegetarians and the healthy eaters are wondering what all the fuss is about – what about the whole fulcrum of my existence has been supplanted and I am drifting in infinity don’t you understand – I think most of you can empathise. I am in turmoil, my body is about to go into full shock and I cannot be held responsible for the aftermath! I thought turning 40 was it - you know I don’t do age well at all – this whole ageing gracefully is for the brave and NOW minimise red meat. The trouble with having controls is that soon it will be stop red meat and then what? Just put me out to pasture – people!! I mean who can live their life eating white meat – can you imagine – just the thought and the name “white meat” sounds healthy and bland. Red meat on the other hand just brings connotations of juicy danger and “je ne sais quoi” – it’s exciting. Anyway I just had to vent and it buys me time as I am finalizing a rather difficult and time-consuming report so venting is good.

Kampala the city was lovely as usual with the traffic - boda-bodas (the little motorcycle taxis) weaving their way in-between the lines of stuck Japanese vehicles of all descriptions - and red meat. I celebrated my birthday in Kampala and guess what I had loads of meat ok I admit there was some chicken in there somewhere but I was also taken to the prime steak place in Kampala (just explaining the red meat route). And I needed the comfort of familiar things (red meat and alcohol) after having to grapple with assisting the ministry of agriculture articulate their 5-year budget. Please understand this is no criticism of the ministry of agriculture but honestly I have never had more grown men (and one woman) give the run around. The ministry had a summary budget that they had crafted and so they asked for expert assistance to provide a detailed budget – elementary my dear Watson! If there’s a summary budget one would presume the summary would have come from some sort of detail – guess what – uh uh. In some instances summary denotes just that, and this was one such instance. Now I could have happily dealt with the realisation that the summary budget was essentially a guesstimate had they just said so – I’m African I understand ballpark – hell I’m Zimbabwean I understand trillions of unexplained dollars – but NOOO the ministry officials kept telling us that the technical teams had derived the summary budget from some form of detailed analysis.   Well, after the first week it was crystal clear that there was no such analysis – hence my default to comfort food (red meat and alcohol).

But this is Uganda and strange things happen in Uganda – one example – the Catholic Church in Kampala has sold their cemetery. Yes a cemetery is a piece of real estate. Now in Europe there would most probably have been a notification to the families of the long deceased who have graves that the land has been sold and people should exhume their dead and move them right? Well that was not the case in Kampala. It just so happened that my lovely friends whom this affected wanted to move their parents to Northern Uganda and this happened to coincide with the sale of the cemetery. The deceased had been buried in Kampala during the civil war and once the civil war was over the family took it upon themselves to exhume the bodies and fulfil the wishes of the dead. Having watched a lot of Crime Scene Investigation I think one should leave the dead well alone and being African I really think what is buried and covered should stay buried and covered but as I said strange things happen in Uganda! Well the family made their way to the cemetery and the church was very happy that they had come to exhume the bodies because had they come any later they may not have located such bodies. I have no idea who has bought the land but they are very brave!

Now imagine those people who cannot handle radical change such as I (red meat remember) who travel or live outside the country and assume that things like cemeteries (and red meat) do not change. Imagine their horror when such people arrive at what they thought was the cemetery and find something else, a shopping mall complex for example, and no grave sites – could be the cause of massive heart failure – right? Anyway that was not the only thing – after exhuming the bodies (please note these are died in the wool Africans) the bodies were placed on a truck which had had to be replaced because the original truck refused to start. Ok we are not superstitious right – well listen to this on their way from Kampala just after the border where Northern Uganda officially starts, the bodies decided they were in their territory and had enough of the indignity of a bone shattering truck ride and so the second truck spontaneously combusted (yes caught fire people – by itself). Not the engine which remained perfectly intact, which would make perfect sense right because engines can spark – no the back area where four coffins where lined up (are you beginning to get the picture? My reaction – why not let sleeping corpses lie? This is a true story (Ripley’s believe it or not)! I know the people involved and I saw the burnt truck! The truck spontaneously combusted burning two mattresses, some food items for the ceremony and charring two coffins. At this point one would think that a more discerning African would ask themselves why am I doing this and abandon ship right? What about these bodies did not want to go did the transporters not understand?

So can you imagine, the average motorist driving between Kampala and Gulu who happened upon this spontaneously combusting truck? If they were going on a journey of significance they would have turned back quickly – burning truck, four coffins – you do the math and if you’re black like me you do not need to wait for the ghosts to communicate you get the hell out of there! Luckily the truck was in a convoy of 4X4 vehicles, given road conditions in Uganda, and several drivers leapt out of their vehicles and placed the four coffins on the roadside – cause for traffic accident really. Needless to say the corpses made it to Gulu in four 4x4s – I think the parents just did not want to ride on the trucks and they were interred at their home. Cause for comfort food right (I feel a red meat fix coming on just thinking about it)

Then I made my way to Dar-es-salaam and being a glutton for punishment I once again was assisting the ministry of agriculture to articulate a 5 year budget except the Tanzanians made no pretensions to having a budget whether summary or otherwise which was refreshing. I realised as I left Dar that I had not actually made it to the beach having been waylaid by – yes you guessed it – the pursuit of meat and alcohol - and may I say in my own defence my host, a lovely young man, took it upon himself to ensure I was well fed and dined and have subsequently gained 5kg but I’m laying that squarely on my doctor’s doorstep as the depression induced food binge brought on by the denial of red meat.   That’s my story and I am sticking to it! The strange thing about Dar is that sea food is relatively expensive which makes absolutely no sense given that it’s a coastal city – but then again TIA (This is Africa). Dar is happening people with a young middle class developing and a night life so if you are thinking of a holiday destination this is it just don’t expect to eat lots of sea food.   I did try to do the all night wining and dining on my last night as I had to catch a plane at some ungodly hour and I lasted until 03:00 a.m. but I am still in recovery (more red meat to build up my stamina please).

And now I’m back in Juba having been to Tombek Boma (like a Ward) in Terekeka   which was quite sad in a way to see how war ravages a community. The current debacle was caused by the youth. You see in Mundari culture when a young man wants to marry he is asked what he will bring to the table by his father. This being a pastoralist community the young man may have been given a cow as his seed capital, but needs to acquire more so logically the only way to increase one’s herd is to raid the other pastoralists who happen to be the Dinkas as the young man cannot take from his own community. Remember for pastoralists raiding is not stealing because every cow on earth belongs to them thus they are just taking what rightly belongs to them – simple mathematics really! Now this is the national pastime between the youth however the fall out affects women, children and small ruminants (goats and sheep) – I won’t even deign to try to attribute which of these has more value than the cows because the Dinkas in retaliation came and kidnapped some women, children and small ruminants. Then there had to be dialogue where the elders sit around drinking local brew and discussing the folly of the youth – the women, children and goats continued to be held captive and not really discussed – the matter was amicably resolved a few beers later and a few small ruminants slaughtered and life goes on. Hopefully, the women and children are returned to their original homes – the young men censored – I’m not too sure what happens about the cows but the young men grow in stature and life goes on until the next round. The sad thing is that the capture of cows, women, children and small ruminants is a battle and there is collateral damage and trauma. However, the area is beautiful located along the river Nile with lush vegetation and great agricultural potential. As the chief said “The animals are problematic.” The chief also called me a daughter of the soil and allocated me a piece of land and being Zimbabwean you know that is of great significance!

Southern Sudan is so interesting and filled with wondrous tales. One fascinating thing is that in a place called Pi-Bor where the project is going to expand its operations, the Murle tribe, who are a minority tribe living in Jonglei state which borders Ethiopia, have decided that they like children and instead of wasting time trying to make their own – that whole 9 month cycle is really rather time-consuming and onerous - they just raid other tribes and take their children as their own while taking the cows as well by the way. I think anthropologists would just find Southern Sudan a wonderfully captivating country as I. The amazing thing is that given the somewhat bloody pursuit of cattle the Mundari are the most democratic society electing their chiefs by open ballot where three candidates stand and the population lines up behind the strongest leader – so chieftainship is a matter of worth not inheritance - fascinating! Southern Sudan is like a wonderland of interesting and beautiful sites yet to be explored.

But that’s what I’ve been up to. I am off to eastern Equatoria state over the weekend were there are no pastoralists but equally fascinating Equatorians and I shall commiserate by eating white meat

Huge hugs