Grasshoppers – nsenene: eat them or smoke them? Discuss.
Grasshoppers “nsenene” – will you eat them or smoke them?
A storm had been brewing since an intensely hot morning and a few drops of rain spattered onto my new umbrella as I walked out of the Buganda Road restaurant.
Little did I know what I was heading into.
It was fun at first, stepping though the raindrops, tremendous cracks of thunder overhead but within a few steps it was ‘coming down stair rods’, a solid, vertical downpouring. I hung onto the umbrella hard but it only served to keep my head and bag dry(ish) as waves engulfed my feet and a strong wind – from nowhere – washed the sheets of hard rain against my body. Wet to the bone in seconds, continuing my walk was no longer an option. I stood beside a bright yellow vendor’s kiosk and screamed as water funnelled down the back of my T shirt.
Torrents of water gushed downhill and the previously busy streets emptied of all but the biggest 4x4s and the maddest matatu [minibus] drivers.
My shelter in the storm was one of many kiosks, this one – in the middle of Kampala – being a very modern fibreglass job where you can buy airtime and load money onto your phone. Most are a patchwork of wood, like a garden shed (only of less sound construction!)
I was wondering what to do when someone pushed open the flap at the front of the fiberglass cabin. A head poked out and shouted “Come in! Come this way!” above the din of the rain. I ran round the side of the booth and took refuge with a man and a lady in the dark metre-square box.
“Thank you for the shelter!” I screamed above the rain, and we laughed as Juma peeled off his shirt and wrung out a pint of water onto the floor.
As the rain pelted down, we spent the next twenty minutes in the dark, talking about the rainy season, Ugandan politics and the cultural differences such as food in Uganda, specifically in relation to eating grasshoppers, or nsenene in Luganda, currently in season.
I said I don’t eat grasshoppers because ‘silya enyama’ [I don’t eat meat] but apparently nsenene are not classed as meat.
“I try not to eat them any more” Juma mused, “even though I l like them.” He looked into the distance thoughtfully and spoke like someone trying to give up the fags.
In Kenya he said the same grasshoppers are collected and put on the fire, the smoke believed to keep ghosts away. An educated man, we agreed that eating dogs like the Chinese do wasn’t something we intended to try!
Do you eat Nsenene? Or do you prefer eating Enswa (white ants)?
Bon appetit Simpson! An introduction to Ugandan foods
An introduction to Ugandan foods
Simpson, our 21 year old ‘gate boy’ who lives on the compound with me has introduced me to lots of new foods, which is extremely generous considering his shockingly low wages (more about that next week). He’s shared with me:
- Cassava (like potato) and beans – served hot, mixed together, love it.
- Jack fruit – you stick your hand in a polythene bag to extract pieces of it! Has industrial type ‘glue’ (or sap) that you can’t wash off anything. Nice tho, v different to anything I’ve ever had before.
- Traditional food from his region (Banyankole tribe), which is three items:
- Kidney beans – fine.
Dark brown balls of millet flour, mixed with water and kneaded, uncooked (like thick wallpaper paste mixed with fine sawdust- yuck!)
Served with “sauce” of thin white goat’s milk cheese (smells bad), watered down (double, triple yuck!) - Eating it once was bearable but he offered it to me again the other day and I just couldn’t eat a whole plate of it. I’m not a fussy eater but God it was foul.
“Thank you Simpson, it’s very kind of you to prepare me lunch.” (I have since told him how I really felt!)
I offer him breakfast every day (normally tea and bananas) and wish him “Bon appetit Simpson!” He just loves it when I say this and we both start our day laughing.
We were trying to think of a name for his email address – he looked a bit perplexed when he saw the name Simpson had gone already so I said “why don’t we do something more personal like bonappetit.simpson?” He nearly fell off his chair with excitement!
As for life generally, I’m getting into a routine, but everything takes so long to do here. ..
- There’s no way round it, to avoid the mozzie bites you have to apply repellent at dusk every day
- Carefully check the net’s tucked in when you hop into bed
- Peel the fruit and veg (or rinse in filtered water)
- Blow the candles out because the electricity is back on
- Do the washing-up right away cos you can’t leave anything o/night [you know why! INSECTS! big ones!]
- Top up the water filter (after having boiled the water first …)
- Kill more mosquitoes or they’ll sing you to sleep …
I cooked us all lunch on Friday and it seemed to go down well. “It was a very good lunch,” Patrick said (there was lots of it I think he meant!) although I was a bit peeved to notice one uninvited visitor at the bloody table. Huh!! **
Had stupidly said “I haven’t seen a cockroach for over a week” and a small one scampered across the table – my table – not for bloody long I can tell you. It got a heavy dosing of killer spray and 63 kilos of me for good measure! Even Patrick went “ugh!”
63 kilos – just had to drop that in there, lol… am rather chuffed that even tho I feel the lack of exercise I appear to have lost weight (do bathroom scales work differently at altitude???)
The Muzungu’s photo gallery on Flickr. It’s been great fun swapping comments on my photos. So much better than the old days when I would have made you sit through a whole evening of snaps!! I think most of you are getting the hang of Flickr but please tell me if it’s still not working.
Adding photos directly to my blog is fiddly, e.g. have tried 3 times tonight and it’s failed so will have to stick with Flickr for showing more than 1 at a time…
** a cockroach darted out from a crack in the table!
