A feast for one..

Ali flies choppers for the air force. As a sideline he has some water tankers that supply our labour compound with drinking water. His brother got married on Thursday. I was invited, but for various reasons couldn’t attend. So Ali promised to send a plate of food around…

I get a call at about lunch time from reception, telling me they’d put the food on the boardroom table. There wasn’t one plate of food. There were two. The first was a bowl of fruit, about half a metre in diameter. Must’ve weighed about 20 kilo’s. The second plate was even bigger. It was a metre in diameter (I actually measured it). The base layer was a bed of spiced rice, about 15cm thick. On top of it, the meat. One whole roast goat (hooves, tail, head teeth, roasted eyeballs – the whole goat). Next to it, half a camel (ok ok, I exaggerated a little bit – there were four joint knuckles. But they each weighed about 5 kilos). How the fuck am I supposed to eat all of this by myself? I tried – the camel meat is delicious. I had one knuckle. And nibbled on the goat, cuz by that time I was well and truly full. I gave the camel joints to the two Jack Russels at home, who spent the rest of the weekend growling at anyone who came within ten metres of their bones. The goat? I gave it to the guys in the compound. It lasted about five minutes..