Life in the Ring of Fire Part 55: Malampa Day Week

This week's Tautu language word is “ewis.” It means “how much.”

Monday was constitution day. Apparently having just independence day was decided to be insufficient celebration for the establishment of Vanuatu as a country, so they also take a day off in honor of their constitution being signed. Actually, it's pretty impressive, given how slow everything moves around here, that they were able to win independence at the end of July and have a constitution together by the end of September. I would've though it'd be one of those things that everyone would just let slide for a while until it became absolutely critical. Although, now that I think about it, I guess I'm assuming (perhaps rashly) that independence and the constitution signing occurred in the same year, so maybe instead of it taking two months to get a constitution together, it actually took a year and two months, or a decade and two months. That would be more in character. At any rate, Monday was a holiday, which was good because I'd contracted a cold over the weekend and thus still wasn't feeling particularly thrilled by the idea of teaching. I (knock on wood) have been pretty lucky. Our third day in Vanuatu we were given a course by our medical staff on the plethora of bizarre diseases present in the country that can kill you or, at the very least, make your life really, really miserable, to the point of making you wish that said disease would just kill you and have done with it. So far, I've contracted exactly zero of these diseases. No malaria, no dengue fever, no giardia, no African snail induced viral meningitis, no scabies, not even a boil. My health state has been more or less exactly the same as it was for the past who-knows-how-many years in the States: fine except for some seasonal allergies and maybe a couple colds. So, really, I have no right to complain. That being said, I'm going to anyway, because there's nothing like an aliment or injury, not matter how minor, to make you really wish that you were home. The medical care in the US is stellar, of course, but this isn't really what I'm talking about, since one really doesn't rely heavily on the health care system when dealing with a cold. It's more just that being sick robs you of absolutely all patience and tolerance, so things that you long ago adjusted to dealing with start getting on your nerves again. My foam sleeping pad seemed suddenly monstrously uncomfortable, my fan a pathetic attempt to lessen the sweltering heat, doing nothing an unacceptable way to amuse myself, and the food disgusting and requiring of far too much effort. In short, I wanted a nice, comfortable sofa inside an air conditioned room with satellite TV and pizza delivery. Is that too much to ask? Although, really, the most frustrating part of being sick in Vanuatu is having to talk to Ni-Vans about it. Whenever I'm sick, I generally try my very hardest to hide in my house and avoid all contact with Ni-Vans until all obvious signs of illness have abated. Otherwise, I get involved in conversation like this:
Ni-Van: “You sick?”
Me: “Yes. I have a cold.”
Ni-Van: “ 'Cause of the wind, I think.”
Me: “Umm, no, it's a virus.”
Ni-Van: “Or the dust.”
Me: “No, dust doesn't cause colds. It's caused by a virus.”
Ni-Van: “Or maybe you ate too many coconuts.”
Me: “No. It's a virus. You catch it from other people. I probably caught it from you because you never wash your hands.”
*Long pause*
Ni-Van: “I think it's because you drink too much water.”

The truly frustrating thing about these exchanges is that, while I know viruses exist, you can SEE them, after all, with a good enough microscope, there's really absolutely no evidence that I can present to people here to back up this fact. Even if they do decide to take my word for it that tiny little organisms cause disease, this would be a belief held as irrationally as believing that the wind causes colds. They'd just be blindly believing what I tell them as opposed to blindly believing what the village witch doctor tells them (no, we don't actually have a village witch doctor, I'm just trying to make a point). In the end, I just end up being an unwilling anecdote backing up whatever they've already decided to unquestioningly believe (“Of course the wind causes colds. Remember that time when it was windy and Dan, the Peace Corp, got a cold?”). It makes me feel so used.

On a more positive note, we were in the middle of the lead up to Malampa Day, which was supposed to be on Friday. Not being satisfied with having only one holiday this particular week, it had been decided that Malampa province (where I live) really needed to have its own public holiday commemorating it. Of course, then it was decided that, since Monday and Friday were holidays anyway, it'd probably be a good idea to just take the whole week off. Thus, Malampa “Day” had started the previous Friday and was slated to run throughout the week. Malampa Day Week was celebrated, as all holidays are celebrated around here, by everyone going to the football (soccer, not that sport big men with speech impediments play in the States which is so ungainly and complicated that it actually requires more referees than players) stadium in Lakatoro to play football (soccer), drink kava and beer, and eat lap-lap. Duncan had set up a kava and food stall at the stadium and had spent the whole weekend working at it. On Tuesday, finally feeling well enough to be out and about without people asking me if I'm sick, I joined him in Lakatoro. “We're going to Bushman's Bay to kill a cow.” He told me, immediately upon my arrival “you want to come?” Well, yeah.

I piled into the back of a truck with some other guys from Tautu and we set off. Bushman's Bay is a village just a little bit south of Lakatoro where, I gathered during the truck ride, there was a cattle plantation whose French owner was currently absent, thus meaning, I guess, that the cows were up for grabs. We'd come for a couple cows for the five day feast for the dead the previous Friday. Duncan had brought his .22 rifle and two bullets, which seemed to me to be cutting it a little close because I was pretty sure a one .22 round wasn't going to be adequate to take down a cow. We crawled through the barbed wire fence surrounding the plantation and struck out across the field. The more intelligent cows quickly scattered and hid in the bush but a few of the slow learners just watched us curiously.

**OK, I'm going to take a moment here and warn any particularly squeamish readers that you might want to skip over the next paragraph. Things get a little messy**

Duncan purposely walked up to one such cow and shot it in the head. As I predicted, this did not kill the cow, but it did fall over and lie on the ground, mooing unhappily and flailing its legs. However, it did not seem all that inclined to get up and run away, which was good. At this point it was noticed that no one had bothered to bring a machete with which to cut the cow's throat or, for that matter, butcher it once it was successfully killed. Between the eight or so of us assembled, the only cutting implement we had was a small knife about the size and sharpness of a steak knife. One of our team was sent off in search of someone to borrow a machete from while the rest of us tried to make do with this tool. The bravest of our group went in in an attempt to cut the cow's throat with the steak knife, while at the same time avoid the violently kicking hooves. He tried restraining the cow's front legs with one hand while cutting with the other, which is kind of like a mosquito deciding it's going to try and hold you down with its antennae while sucking your blood. The restraining strategy was quickly abandoned in favor of crouching as far away from the cow's hooves as possible while still being able to reach the throat. Surprisingly, he was actually able to make a small incision, and a stream of blood fountained from the throat onto the ground. This didn't really seem to do much to hasten the dying process however, as the only discernible difference was that the cow's frantic mooing now had a sort of rasping quality to it. A few more guys took a turn at sawing at the cow's throat with the steak knife and after a bit of work blood was pouring from the wound at an appreciable rate and the cow's kicks grew weaker and weaker. After a few minutes, it was dead. Then it was time for the gross part. Myself and three others each grabbed a leg and pulled it away from the cow, spread eagling it, stomach up, on the ground. Two others worked with the knife to make a cut all the way from the throat to the rump, thus exposing the cow's gut. Then, one of them grabbed the tough and rubbery (despite what you see in movies, cutting something's, or someone's, throat isn't all that easy. Throats are built to last) esophagus and pulled really hard. You see, conveniently enough, the entire digestive tract, the throat, stomach, and intestines (ie. all the parts of the cow that no one really wants to eat) is connected together so, in theory, you can rip the whole thing out all at once. Of course, at the moment, the rib cage was getting in the way, and it didn't seem to me that we were going to have very much luck cutting through a cow's sternum with a steak knife. Fortunately, it was about then that one of the guys showed up with a machete, which we were able to use to split the rib cage. Now, it was just a matter of muscling the cow's insides out. This ended up being quite a chore however, because the insides were 1) really heavy, 2) slippery, 3) covered in blood. It took all six of us heaving and hawing for a good twenty minutes to lift and push everything out. During the process, we ruptured the abdominal wall and got to watch the gray, slimy small intestines worm their way out into the open. That was pretty cool. Afterwards we all looked like we'd taken part in a particularly grizzly murder (perhaps certain animal rights activist would argue that we HAD taken part in a particularly grizzly murder. However, I've adopted the ethical stance of not having any qualms about inflicting harm/death on any species of animal that has attacked me. So far in Vanuatu I've been attacked by chickens, cows, goats, pigs, crabs, a variety of fish, and dogs, so I've got most of the basic meat groups covered). A truck had pulled up to us while we were working, and, after laying down a bed of coconut leaves, we hoisted the gutted cow into the bed. We also recovered the heart and liver from the discarded guts and tossed those in as well. Just as we were finishing, Duncan (who'd gone off to shoot and help butcher the second cow) walked up to me holding a cow heart, which he thrust at me. “Here,” he said “hold this and give it to your mom [Linda] when we get back.” Thus it was that I rolled into our food and kava stall in Lakatoro, covered in blood, clutching a dripping, bloody cow's heart by the aorta. I think that's probably the most badass I've ever felt in my life.

Thursday, a boxing match had been arranged in honor of Malampa Day. The match was supposed to actually be on Friday, Malampa Day, but the SDA Church complained that since they begin observing the sabbath Friday at sundown, their members would be unable to attend the event because it was taking place in the evening. McKenzie, Laura (who'd come down for the occasion), and I all agreed that if you get that worked up about the practice of your faith preventing you from seeing a boxing match, it's perhaps time to re-examine the principles underlying your faith. This is Vanuatu, however, so the provincial government politely obliged and moved the day of the match. The headlining fight was between a boxer from Southwest Bay, Malekula, Kali, who was apparently accomplished enough to have taken part in a number of matches in Australia and New Zealand, and a Fijian. To warm up the crowd, however, a number of amateurs from all over the island boxed each other first. The MC kicked off the event by asking the crowd to give a big hand to the volunteers because, and I quote, “It's difficult to get up in front of so many people.” Only in Vanuatu would you sign up for boxing (a sport which involves getting the living daylights beaten out of you by someone determined to give you a concussion) and your biggest fear be stage fright. The fight right before the headliner was between two volunteers from New Zealand, who'd decided that they wanted to be part of the event and had been allowed to do so on the basis of being white. This caused quite a lot of excitement in the crowd. Given how much Ni-Vans love to watch white people when they're just sitting around, getting to watch TWO white people fight each other was no doubt the most exciting thing most people could possibly conceive of. I have to admit, it was pretty entertaining. In the end, however, the headlining fight was somewhat disappointing as Kali knocked out the Fijian in the second round of what was supposed to be a twelve round fight. Fortunately, I'm not all that into boxing anyway, so I just had a good time hanging out with everyone. All in all, I approved of Malampa Day Week.