Thought Picnic: Eating flesh twice forbidden

Harking back in time

This is a story that seems to draw many laughs, yet it is the narration of one of my many experiences of racial abuse countered with the good fortune of a quick wit. I am sure I have relayed this on one of my previous blogs, but it finds some interesting resonance today.

I was in a bookshop on the concourse of Amsterdam Central Station when a brief encounter looking like a disagreement of sorts ensued. I have no idea how it started, but this man was soon spewing out expletives at me that my only response to him was to say, I do not speak like that.

In retort, he said, he would speak anyway he wants to, which was his prerogative, not that I cared much for it until he said, “A hundred years ago, I would have shot you.” Strangely, I was not shocked because we were not in that time of the past that he desired. However, my response just as he finished, “Two hundred years ago, I would have eaten you.” He did not have a reaction to that.

The natives as creatives

Indeed, the white man did bound around Africa and some uncharted regions of the world where some encounters revealed the magic of gunfire and for others who never returned, cannibalism did not have the strangeness it has today. A large cauldron, some excited drumming, and the natives were chewing the delicacy of rare meat not deemed untouchable as to be deified.

I cannot vouch for what my ancestors would have done long before my time. Still, as far back as we can trace the history, a good few were progressive and this fed the inclination of my near ancestors to seek knowledge, education, emancipation, and much more. I am a product of their tenacity and survival against all odds.

Heads are not that sweet

You may then wonder why I started this blog with the story told earlier. In the last few days, I have had conversations where I have been deemed blunt, frank, cruel, unforgiving, or even grumpy. Usually, someone would suggest I got off on the wrong side of my bed and when I suggested I only had one side to get off on, they implied I was climbing up the wall first.

In another situation, it would be me biting off their heads, as if I had travelled back in time for a stint in substituting brains for cauliflower cheese. Even I started wondering what could be in their heads that could be tastier than what I normally cook?

It speaks to my strong constitution that I have not reached to retch in a sickbag already. I could almost regret my riposte because people might well believe I have been picking my teeth with the finely honed bones of an Englishman and well, my crockery is of the finest bone without having to get to China.

For all my civilised mien, I was only trying to stop one heinous act with the benevolent sharing a catch, is that not what community is all about?