Tabaski: Year 2

Happy Tabaski Everyone! I'm going to try and explain the day as well as I can, I'll warn you it might be a little gruesome and the pictures that I'll post tomorrow are a little gory.

The day started around 8am when the mosque started calling. Eventually at 9am men from allover town had gathered in the open space at the end of my block. I later found out that on Tabaski, the religious leaders pick a few large open spaces instead of having everyone to crowded mosques. The men prayed and, as uncomfortable as I felt for watching them (which I barely did anyway), it was amazing to see all of the men and boys in their brightly colored boubous. While the men were praying the women were at home waiting. Around 9:30 Miss brought out a giant bucket filled with onions and another bucket to put the chopped onions in. Everyone started cutting. Senegalese women cut onions in their hands but, as an American who was raised with a healthy concern of knives, I requested a plate to act as a cutting board. Everyone said what I was going made sense and we all chuckled remember last year when I cut myself trying it their way. By the time the onions were done the men were back and it was sheep killin' time. We had 3 sheep (one for Mor, his older brother, and his younger brother - Miss' husband). Youssou led the sheep into the street and around the corner from the house while the women waited inside. After killing the sheep and letting them bleed out, they were returned into the "drive-way" area under my window and set on pieces of scrap metal. About this time Mor's brothers showed up and brought a ton of soda, bissap juice, bread, tomatoes, and peppers.

After sheep killin' time, it's sheep butcherin' time. We actually hired a butcher to come and help with all of that. Taco (Miss' husband) cut a slit in the leg of the sheep and then used a piece of tubing to inflate the sheep separating the skin from the organs. Then the sheep were skinned one at a time. After a sheep was skinned it was hung on the garage door and the butcher basically played pinata with a machete. He was hacking away parts and throwing them into buckets while Khady (the three year old) stared at the gruesome scene and squealed in delight.

While the sheep were being butchered the women (myself included) skinned potatoes and prepped the rest of the vegetables.

As soon as the animals were butchered the cooking began! First comes the liver (which sounds a lot better when you call it fois). Liver is grilled then eaten with onions and mustard. While Miriam grilled the liver and then the ribs, my host mom was working on the onion sauce for later in the day, Miss was cleaning EVERYTHING, I was peeling potatoes then helping Miriam cut meat, Aisha was cutting the larger pieces of meat into cookable pieces, Youssou was cleaning up the blood, and the men sat outside playing scrabble drinking sprite. At one point in this cooking madness everyone heard what sounded like my host dad calling my host mom from outside the house all of the women looked at her and she said, "I didn't hear anything... did you?" and everyone obviously agreed with her.

After the liver comes ribs and kababs (which Miriam and I put together). Once the first batch of kababs was finished the women and Youssou sat down/crouched around a platter to eat. Overcooked mutton isn't the best but mixed with grilled onions and mustard it isn't bad. I finished eating first and they let me take over for cooking the kababs - which isn't that impressive because they overcook everything so I just sat and watched them cook to far overdone.

Khady had been watching me all day and finally decided that if the women let me cook, or at least help, I must not be all that bad so she took to hanging on me when everyone else was annoying her/actually cooking. She led me around the house and then she pretended to hit me, eventually she was sent to do something else and I went upstairs to digest.

At some point after 4pm the main meal was ready (meat, onion sauce, fries, and bread) but luckily I wasn't called to eat... I don't think I could have at that point. Eventually it became time to put on my nice new dress. I had gone to the market and in a moment of confusion bought a polka dotted fabric. ugh. Then I asked Matar to turn it into a dress that looked like it had no shape... basically a recipe for attractiveness BUT WAS I EVER WRONG! The "shapeless" dress was TIGHT like Senegalese women like their clothes - I was worried it was going to burst every time I sat down or moved too quickly. A girls' camp/group girl had called me yesterday and asked if I could visit her so I was prepping to visit her. While I was putting in my contacts (hey it's the biggest day of the year!) the power cut. I had a Laura Ingles Wilde moment while putting on make-up (even though I don't think she wore eyeliner) and made my way downstairs. My host mom was really concerned with me going in the dark to visit someone so she sent Youssou along. He scared away some kids that were making fun of me...and then realized I was lost. We called the girl and she talked to Youssou and found us (I wasn't that lost - just one block past her house). By this time the power had come back on.

Youssou, who's normally the bottom of the ladder, was my guest/a guest of the house and it was nice to see him get a chair and be offered water (usually he's the one getting things for other people). I got to talk to the girl's older brother (who had convinced her parents that they should let her come to the camp). I'm glad I got to talk to him while his sister was around because he was thanking me for the work I did and I was able to say (loudly so she heard me) that I wasn't doing anything and that it was all his intelligent, hard working sister. It was even better to hear him acknowledge all of that (usually people just ignore when I compliment their kids/siblings). After a while there, Youssou and I returned to our house talking about the rebels in the southern part of the country (fyi - I'm sneaking him a pudding cup for coming along).

Because my household is mostly women who spent the entire day working everyone was tired and there wasn't much going on. After chatting with my host family for a little bit I came upstairs and here we are!

Everything smells like meat and we'll be eating these 3 sheep for the next 3 months BUT I had a really good holiday. Happy Tabaski everyone!

KO

Preparations: Beauty

Today Tabaski preparations were all about beauty! Over the past few days everyone has gotten rid of their weaves and let their braids go...all to get ready for NEW WEAVES! The fun actually started a few days ago: Miss and Aisha (Khady's mom) got their hair done a few days ago; yesterday my host mom had her braids taken out. Today's day of beauty started with Adji (the 12 year old) getting her new braids trimmed (the loose hairs had to be cut off). Then it was Khady's turn...her braids had been taken out yesterday so she had an adorable little fro. Miriam is the expert braider in our household so she sat in a plastic chair with Khady on a stool. The second a comb touched Khady's hair she started SCREAMING. She was writhing and Miriam had to hold her in place with her legs but it all finally stopped when Miriam gave up. During lunch everyone told Khady that she should get her hair braided and that she would be really pretty. Eventually Miriam was able to braid Khady's hair this afternoon. This evening Miriam and Ndeye went to get their hair relaxed before getting their weaves tomorrow or the next day.

More Tabaski preparations tomorrow I'm sure!

Are you preparing for the holiday?

I've been asked a LOT recently if I'm preparing for the holiday so eventually I asked what that entailed and no one could give me a direct answer. I've noticed, though, that there is a real festive mood that I didn't notice last year (possibly because last year, Tabaski was the day after Thanksgiving so I was a little distracted). Mor hasn't bought our Tabaski ram yet - I thought he had but it was just another sheep not the special one. He did explain the important things to consider when buying a Tabaski ram. According to him:
-God didn't set a price range, just that you spend what you can
-The sheep must be a male and must be at least 1 year old (so it's not a lamb)
-1 and 2 year old sheep are preferred because their meat is more tender
-A ram loses 2 teeth a year so you check how many teeth a ram has before buying it to make sure you're paying for the right aged ram
-Color and horns don't really matter - size is a way to show off your wealth

So there's a short guide for buying a Tabaski ram for those of you who still need to! The holiday this year will be Wednesday and school is out for the break. The students get a full week of classes off and only went on strike for one extra day off. I'm impressed they only demanded one extra day - usually they take another week or so off on strike.

More about holiday preparations tomorrow!

Tabaski!

Today was the biggest holiday in Senegal, Tabaski in Wolof (Eid-al Adha in Arabic). Overall it was a good day and I feel like I'm going to burst from eating so much. It's a religious holiday that marks Abraham's offer to sacrifice his son when God said he could kill a sheep instead. Muslims honor the sacrifice in a semi-literal way and each husband has to kill a sheep for each wife as well as unmarried people over 30 with the ability to buy a ram to slaughter. There have been sheep ALL OVER THE PLACE for the past few weeks. Every open space in Dakar had been transformed into a makeshift sheep market and one of the cities on my way to Dakar had at least hundreds of sheep ready to be sold. Not only are people buying sheep, but they're also transporting them all over the country because everyone goes home for the holiday. On my way into Dakar there was a ram shoved into the underneath luggage compartment of the bus and we passed many vehicles with sheep tied on top (all live sheep, you can't kill it until Tabaski). I even saw someone put a sheep in a taxi trunk.
As for my household, we had 4 sheep (like I said, people come home). While they weren't some of the donkey-sized sheep I saw in Dakar, they were pretty big, especially for a family who had 4 total (check the photos).

Tabaski itself started, for me, around 8:45am when I went downstairs to help the women cut onions. All I really knew about the day was that 4 sheep were being killed then eaten and at some point I was supposed to put on new clothes (I cheated and wore my swearing in outfit) and ask for forgiveness from people... I was pretty much clueless as to the timeline of these events however. So the morning started with cutting onions for the sauce and boy did we cut onions (check the photos). I was even allowed to cut with them and I'm getting better! After the onions were finished I was told the slaughter would begin and promptly went upstairs (my host family knew that I didn't want to watch). Oddly enough my solution was to listen to Christmas music in headphones and surf the internet a little. I kept peaking down from my windows where I could see the stages progressing from killed, to skinned, to cut up which was when I finally went back downstairs. Overall the mess had been contained and the sheep were already split into buckets with the livers being grilled for appetizers.

Around 3pm we ate grilled ribs with mustard, tomatoes, pickled onions, olives, and pickles. When I got up to leave the bowl I was flat out told "no" and that I had to keep eating. Finally allowed to leave, I went upstairs to take a brief nap and try to digest. The sheep apparently took more out of me than I though because I was OUT for quite some time. Still full, I went downstairs around 5pm and found it was time to eat more. This was actually the full Tabaski meal of cooked meat with onion sauce, fried potatoes, and bread. I was still stuffed so I mostly ate bread and onion sauce along with some potatoes and a little meat, it was still a really good meal. Afterwards we sat around some more until I was told it was finally time to put on my nice clothes. I went upstairs and got ready.

Coming downstairs I was a little nervous: it was the first time my host family would see me in a full Senegalese outfit. It was received well and the asking for forgiveness part commenced. Given I don't have many friends outside my family, I decided to stop by Awa the peanut lady's house, Matar the tailor, and my tutor. Each family was really nice to me and I think they appreciated that I visited. Also the image of me dressed in formal Senegalese clothes is funny and each family found it amusing. I came home to find everyone else out and decided to call it a night. I'm still full and just turned down dinner for the second time. Today's food was amazing but I can't imagine eating anymore.

Since I started typing this the power cut (surprising because of the holiday) so hopefully it'll come back and I'll be able to post this before bed. I hope everyone had an excellent Tabaski whether you celebrated or not!

KO