Slaughtering the Christmas Goat
For those who don’t know, I’m a vegetarian. A lacto-ovo-pesche vegetarian, to be exact (I eat dairy, eggs and seafood, but no red or white meat). However, I prefer to always introduce myself as a tastarian as well – meaning, I don’t eat meat because I don’t like the taste of it. No, there is no big, overarching moral reason as to why I don’t munch on Bessie the cow, although that has always been a nice secondary.
For those that have the means, goat is a popular Christmas meal for rural families in Tanzania. This year, Sean played Santa Claus and bought the family next door their dinner – at a cost of approximately $20 USD.
When you buy a goat, it comes to you, well, alive. Which means it has to be slaughtered, cured, and cooked. Telling myself that this was a cultural thing that I should witness, I steeled my nerves and went to watch the slaughtering of the Christmas goat.
Christmas Dinner was delivered on the holiday’s eve, after sunset. The head of the household, Lozario, pulled out the sharpest knife he could find and with the help of his sons and a few neighbors, wrestled the goat onto a splay of palm leaves on the side of the house. The animal, which had been understandably skiddish until this point, began to mew and buck as hard as he could. Lozario took the knife and began sawing it back and forth. I heard the blood gurgling and my voice saying ‘quickly, quickly’ as I wanted to have the animal’s suffering over as soon as possible, which it quickly was.
In Tanzania, every part of the animal is used and I’m sure the family will make good use of it. I was unable to take any pictures, but Sean videotaped the whole thing, and Carrie and Deanna were able to get in a few good shots.
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