You're vegetarian? It's okay, you can eat tripe.

After getting up and walking away from the seat I was in for fear of the Ox kicking it’s hoof through my raised forearm and digging it into my chest, it’s time to take him down. Two ropes and about eleven men (word has it that can take up to as little as two to get the job done) the beast doesn’t even struggle. From the moment his hind legs are pulled he doesn’t even fight fate. As if he knew his purpose for being there. The bellow he issues before the elder even pierces his skin is the final nail in the coffin that the ancestral blessing has been given. From there, the knife enters his throat and Wezile barely stirs, his mortal acceptance transcends the pain I can only imagine. Peacefully and quickly done, his last kicks are easily handled by those of us still holding on to rope. Done, now the work begins.

You know how big an ox is right? It’s like a cow, with a penis it can’t use, well it’s a pretty large animal, can you imagine having to skin and gut it? Yeah it’s a process. One that a fellow we dubbed as Rambo made a lot simpler and faster for us. The swing of his axed snapped through ribs. His knife removed flesh from skin and fur, without leaving a trace of flesh on skin? That sounds confusing but makes sense in my head somehow. “Inyama ayihlali efeleni.” (Flesh doesn’t stick to the fur) Says an elder aiding the process to youths around him, but he keeps quiet and admires Rambo at work, exclaiming that it obviously isn’t his first time skinning a beast. He even goes further to remark that it looks like it could be his fourth or fifth. Rambo pays no attention to the compliments dead set on completing the task at hand. While on our cigarette escape we all admit that if we had been lions Rambo would have no doubt been the Alpha having a pride of females while the rest of us roamed the African plains looking for a weaker adversary to topple.

There’s something about knowing where your meat comes from that makes it that much better to chew through. Maybe it’s about being able to say you aided the slaughter of animal, but leave out the part of not being entirely willing. Between ego and testosterone there’s a battle there somewhere. Nothing is wasted. Everything is eaten, I had my first taste of brain and had to suppress my gag reflex by not concentrating on its texture. My brother says salty marshmallow, I say Bone marrow. Have you ever eaten bone marrow?

My kid cousin who is one of the most pensive beings in the world says to me on another cigarette getaway “Kodwa thina maXhosa singcolile! Phofu wonke umntu usalenza elisiko loku xhela, siya fana.” (But as Xhosa people we're ruthless! In fact all of us who still conduct the practice of slaughter are, we're all the same I suppose.) I agree.