Year: 2008

Books, Rants, The Sky is Falling

In May I read Derrick Jensen’s A Language Older Than Words…

“Every morning when I wake up I ask myself whether I should write or blow up a dam.”

Although I know the feeling, I have no interest in being a writer and I don’t know the first thing about bombs; I’m not sure where that leaves me.

Jensen’s definitely an environmental activist but the book isn’t really an “environmental” book. I gave the book away so I can’t verify, but I think the book is even categorized as “Spiritual/Philosophy” on the back cover. What stands out in my mind from the book is Jensen’s use of historical references to explore the complete disappearance of once-flourishing animal populations like salmon, bison, and passenger pigeons. He quotes North American explorers who, in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, remarked on flocks of passenger pigeons one mile wide and three hundred miles long, containing up to one billion birds. Holy crap, right?
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Food, Kenya, Pictures

A month or so ago I a colleague and I bought a chicken at the local market. We took it back to his house and proceeded to slaughter and eat it. African style. I never got around to posting pictures, so here you go!

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Although I was good at holding the chicken, the killing part is another story entirely. I figured if I saw it once or twice I might be able to do it myself. I am proud to say that I cannot even imagine what kind of instincts I would have to muster up (not to mention stifling a gag reflex) in order to actually kill one myself. I do believe that humans evolved as meat eaters (and of course, killers!), but wow… no thanks! I guess I just don’t like meat THAT much! In fact, a whole week will go by and I will have not eaten any meat!

By the way, in Swahili “kuku” means chicken. :)