A Strange Series of Events

The last week here has been an unusual one because of how well events fell into place.

Last week, Araceli and I went and picked up a girl from school who we are sponsoring.  Upon returning to her home her mother was so gracious for what we were doing she gave us a goat.

Wow....cool, a goat.  I was pumped.  I couldn't wait to have a pet goat running around Kasese.

So we made our way back to Kasese and tied up the goat, with a long enough leash to go around grazing and such.

Days passed and the goat continued grazing.  We told people in the compound about how we were going to have a celebration on Friday for our country's independence.  We would have food and drinks and fun.

So everyone was getting ready for that.

On Monday I decided to go with one of the guys we were with here to pick up some river sand to till into our garden.  Along the way he was telling me about someone he knew who had banana trees.  Oh....really? 

 

Unloading the sand and banana trees

 

When we returned from getting the river sand we ended up unloading 4 banana trees.  We had to move fast and plant them in the garden.  It was quite an off-the-cuff situation but I could not find myself passing up some banana trees.

As the days passed we continued to work at Kasese, and as the week was drawing to a close we were becoming excited for the party.

Thursday morning rolled around and I had an idea.  I remember a recipe which my dad sent me a year or so ago called, "Goat in the Ground".  What an idea it would be.  We have a goat....we have ground.....lets put the goat in the ground.

 

Planting the new banana leaves

 

So I was convinced.  We prepared the goat to be put in the ground but there was a problem.  The foil which we were going to use to wrap the goat in was quite expensive so we had to find another solution....but what were we going to do?

As we sat around pondering this in the garden I looked up at my banana trees and it hit me.  I grabbed my friend and we ran back into the bush and pulled out about 25 banana leaves.

 

Wrapping the goat up in banana leaves

 

We marinated the goat and stuffed it full of vegetables.  We then proceeded to wrap it in multiple layers of banana leaves.  The recipe called for cooking the goat for about 12 hours in the ground so I waited until about 9:30 Thursday night to stick it in. 

I lit up the coals and let them burn red hot and then put the goat in and covered it up.

I have to say I did not sleep to well that night as I was worried if the goat was going to work out or not.

So Friday came and we all got to work.  As I was doing things in the compound I always kept my eye on the ground where the goat was, wondering how it was doing.

 

The goat/banana leaves right after being pulled from the fire

Finally 5:00 rolled around and it was time to pull the goat out.  And it was hot.  I picked up the banana leaves and they were smoking.

 

Pulling the goat apart

I ran to the house carrying the parcel in my hands and threw it onto the porch.

When I cut the ropes and pulled the leaves off I found the most tender goat I have seen.

We proceeded to cook the rest of the food and then cut up the goat.

We invited everyone over to Timeyo's house and then just had a good ole celebration.  We cooked some hamburgers and French fries along with the food and most of it got devoured.

As we ended the night I looked back on the previous 2 weeks and was quite happy with how things worked out.

So happy Independence Day to everybody.

 

Enjoying the feast

 

And a quick note, last week Louis Zamperini died.  There is a book out about him called Unbroken.  I would recommend to go pick up a copy and read it.