A Fassika ailment

I was hoping that the annual Easter cattle drive thru the streets of Addis Ababa would add the usual color to the gloomy rainy days of April. I have yet to witness cattle heading for Kerra with the occasional panicked bull rampaging thru the streets scattering pedestrians in all directions as Fassika approaches. But then I have not been out much lately and things could have changed.
This is the only time the Addis driver actually yields to anything, if for no other reason than to avoid the angry animal from putting a couple of holes in the body of his shiny car.
More often though, the cattle travel at a leisurely trot down the street on their way to the slaughter house guided by a cattle-driver who continually administers corporal punishment to steer the animals or twist the animal’s tail in one direction or another just like you would to your steering wheel.
Even more sheep are crossing the streets this time of the year, making their way to impromptu markets at the nearest street corner. They huddle like football players as though they know what is coming occasionally mounting one another in a futile attempt to copulate or assert dominance. I am thinking there must be a pressing need to procreate when you are on the way to becoming lamb chop.
The corner drive-in sheep market is where driver meets sheep. From the seat of his car, the true connoisseur sizes up the merchandise in pursuit of the seasonal bargaining ritual to buy a holiday sheep for slaughter. Sheep are dragged over to the car for closer examination of the fatty tail. Your choice will have its legs tied and unceremoniously joins the spare tire in the trunk of the car or on top of a blue and white FIAT.
Flooding the street as well are chickens by the tens of thousands. In fact the whole city turns into one large animal farm. And not a single beep is heard from the usually intolerant Addis driver as Sunday’s tibbs is crossing the road.
You would think that you are in New Zealand or someplace where sheep outnumber people. Of course come Easter morning they will all be dead sheep and there will be more people than you’d care to count with mutton stuffed in the gut.
The one animal that is sure not to end up on anyone’s platter this holiday season is the donkey, the most reliable mode of transportation…a savvy navigator of the chaotic traffic, if I have ever seen one. Unlike the Addis driver this animal almost always knows when to yield.
On Easter eve the spicy aroma of burning butter mixes with the cool damp and smoky air, as the sheep seem to be begging for mercy all night long. Doomsday is approaching and they seem to know it. It is enough to turn you into a vegetarian.
The bbaaa…aa..aaa!…of the sheep is replaced with the early morning call of yebeg kodda yalew! …as skin dealers roam the neighborhood in search of what is not edible and instant sheep skin exchanges popup at your neighborhood street corner.
Street dogs fight over the discarded insides of the slaughtered sheep as the gorging spreads to the bottom of the food chain. An old driving hazard makes a comeback and you will soon be dogging horny sheep heads staring at you from the middle of the korekonch as you drive by.
At Kerra, fresh bones will be added for the scavenger birds to pick on from the thousands of slaughtered cattle ushering in a new season of carnivorous feasting. Attracted by the replenished aroma, huge birds migrate from far away palaces to gently circle the sky as if waiting for landing instructions on the stinky mound behind the slaughterhouse.
So, if for the last two months, of your own free will and being of sound mind, you deprived yourself of all worldly animal products and abstained from meat, milk, eggs, butter and other cardinal sins, including the sacred act of procreation, it is time to let go and enjoy life a little. But as you say goodbye to any semblance of sensible eating remember to be kind to your digestive system in the coming weeks.
Easter morning will see very few cars on the road with the carnivores sound asleep with bulging stomachs from a night of feasting to break the lent. It is probably the safest day of the year on the road…fewer taxis, fewer buses, fewer toxic fumes, fewer near misses, fewer everything. If you are an early riser, here is your chance to drive thru the streets of Addis with little or no impediment.
Enjoy it while you can because the next day will usher in another wedding season with Sunday caravans and the noisy Beep, Beeep, Beeeepp !!

yonaskab@hotmail.com