Feet and Heads

Scott here, putting in my 2 cents. Two cents at a time over the course of our 3 year blogging history I may have put in a whole 20 cents. For actually writing blogs and communicating, I am grateful for my wonderful, patient, well-spoken, and beautiful wife, Katie.

The prime thing that keeps me busy here is building deep friendships. It’s my heartbeat, my passion. This means spending time with local people telling jokes, stories, and sharing our lives. It also means doing lots of new and interesting things. Recently I got to go with a friend to eat a local delicacy called serupe, literally “head and foot.” (wasn’t that a disease in sheep a few years ago???)

Serupe is traditionally prepared very late at night and the shops open around 2am until 6am. It’s mainly construction workers who come and eat this very filling meal. Because of the heat they usually work from 4 or 5am until 12pm; serupe supposedly gives them all the energy and brainpower they need to work all morning without a snack break.

One of our interns and I arrived in the otherwise deserted market area around 2:30am with our friend. Not knowing what to exactly to expect, we soon found professionally prepared serupe consists of a goat or sheep stomach filled with rice (you don’t eat the stomach lining, but the rice is cooked inside it), boiled goat or sheep tongue, some kind of yummy broth, and, best of all, fried goat or sheep brains. It isn’t that bad if you don’t think about what you’re eating. The tongue was good, a bit like liver. For dessert you get to gnaw the fat off a boiled goat or sheep hoof. Mmmm!