Tabaski or Eid ul-Adha

We have had a great day in Diébougou – it has been pretty much non-stop party since this morning.  A big, big Muslim festival - and in this town it is a real event. The office and even the bank shut at 2pm yesterday so that people could get ready for Tabaski.   Last night little boys stopped by to show me their new clothes, just picked up from the tailor for today’s celebrations.  There was not a chicken left to be had, not even for ready money.  I had pre-empted disaster by getting 5 on Sunday which is when I did my big offering.  More below.

Tabaski here is the daytime equivalent of first-footing, going from house to house, eating a bit here and a bit there once morning prayers are done.  Traditionally, a ram is offered and killed in the large family courtyards and there is much mutton to be had.  Rice, salads, chicken braisé, and delicious ginger and baobab drinks. 

My celebrations started on Sunday when I sent the young off to the livestock market to buy my chickens for me.  No point in going myself – the prices were already on the ‘You cannot be serious’ side of normal.  They brought them back to my courtyard and we fed them rice and oats and water.  Yes, folks, they were still alive.  I named them.  An uncle/neighbour had been co-opted for the bit I couldn’t face, but I plucked and drew all five. ….. the birds were immersed in boiling water to make the plucking easier, and then had their down singed off by Farida using my little charcoal burner.    Quite a lot of hard work and I moaned constantly about the ease of buying supermarket chickens.  Once the birds were all on some sort of cookable state, I prepared supper for my intended guests and headed out to the orphans’ ceremony for the afternoon.

Henri

The orphans’ ceremony was predictably dull; on behalf of VARENA I presented some of the 31 school ‘kits’ of a backpack, pens, pencils, crayons, exercise books and most importantly the school fees.  I stumbled through some version of ‘I am really happy to be here today and to see so many young faces …’ and tried not to wince each time the compère described the children as the future of tomorrow.  It took me back to Gayhurst School and ‘I believe the children are our future’…..

Riotous supper of chicken – Michel and Gustave, (Henri was a little reluctant and was sent back to the oven to reflect a bit on his future) – saffron rice (thanks, Tante Claire) with aubergine sauce and as a starter my thrice-cooked chips which were a great success.  The guests spent rather too much time telling great cross-West-Africa bus journey stories which involved paying 1,000 CFA here and there in order to keep the bus on the road – customs, police, border guards and passport controls – and not enough time in wonderment at my chicken-plucking stories….

 

 

Today the remaining chickens (Emile and Albert) were cooked with pasta and sauce for the neighbours, most of whom popped in for anticipatory smelling and assurances about how hungry they were.  I sent off the platters and went elsewhere, myself…. to join the chums for rice, fish and stories about weddings in Senegal and Burkina Faso and Côte d’Ivoire – believe me, we just don’t know how to have a good wedding the Europe – only lasts one or two days?  Amateurs, we are!  No bartering over bride money?  Where’s the challenge?  No rushing about town in a minibus honking the horns for 12 hours?  No killer local spirits followed by dolo followed by wine and beer and ……. You get the picture.  Much fun is had.

Then off to M and Mme Barry – yes, the bank manager and his wife – for another drop-in and some more chicken and salad and sugary drinks and I am now collapsed on my sofa typing this with an enormously full tummy feeling sluggish and slightly overdone myself. And I still have two visits to pay before bedtime….



 

Madame Barry and me