It’s Huatia Time Again

Sumac Huahacha With Her Cow Pat...

In the fall of the year here in Peru they harvest the potato crop. It is hard to believe another year has passed by since I wrote about the huatia tradition here. I just got back from a huatia where I was invited. The sun is spectacular and though you freeze in the shade, out in the sun, you get wonderfully roasted like the potatoes. They cook the huatia in dirt clod ovens with dried animal dung.

Harvest in Full Process

While there, and I have no idea why I thought to ask this, I asked about Quechua names for dung. It turns out that Ccahua (beginning with a sort of pronounced glottal stopped k, the double c, kh-awa) means cow dung, but only cow dung. Then there is Ucha for horse dung and Chaccha (chak-cha) for sheep or llama dung. I am also not clear why this fascinated me so. Then they told me that if you aren’t happy with how someone is acting you call them Ccahua uma, a dung-head or worse… It is a pretty basic culture as you will suppose.

Juana Sacking Potatoes With Santos' Family

Nevertheless, a lot of words for animal excrement. They also use the generic caca for all of it but when the little girls come to school packing their dried cow pat to cook their lunch, it is, “Ccahuata escualeman apani."

Potatoes Heaped and Ready to Spread Out For Chuño

The Decline of Western Civilization, As We Know It

I consider that the state of Art in a society is a clue to its level of accomplishment. I have seen the David and mighty works of the greats of the Italian and Dutch Renaissance. I love great poetry and other literature and thrill at the compositions of the masters. I consider, much modern music to be great but at a certain point thought we had reached our low point in the tide of musical times during the eighties with the depressing advent of, “Disco.” The advent hailed such great nasally sounds as, “Stayin’ Alive,” whined so eloquently by the likes of Barry Gibb of the Bee Gees. We got jangled by others like Donna Summer. The period saw the tragic break up of the Jackson family giving rise to such great one-time-hit performers as Jermaine and Tito. Likewise, and though I digress, Michael’s slide into plastic surgery oblivion and whatever else he was up to in Wonderland. The Disco rage also produced the overproduction of mirror balls and a world awash in slitted slinky synthetic styles and shirts with oversized collars and annoying geometric patterns not to mention the plethora of leisure suits. Now, I really thought that this was the low ebb, the bottom until yesterday, I heard a song actually called, “My Life Would Suck Without You…”

Hey There’s A Head In My Soup!

I remember when I first saw the soup they call, “Sheep's head soup,” in the Altiplano of Peru, I thought that it was too gross for words. Frankly, it disturbed me. Though never actually a candidate for a vegan lifestyle, the fact that I could see all manner of floaters: eyes, hooves, snouts, brains, freeze dried potatoes and other disgusting gobs bobbing in the grey greasy slurry that looked for all the world like dishwater with body parts, freaked me out. Indeed, a certain quality of pride infused me when I thought, “Well, at least I don’t eat guts…” Time has flown by and my standards have definitely changed (some say, “Lowered,” you can guess who with unquestionable precision).

The Preparation

The Soup

While I still complain that the soup could use an onion or some garlic nowadays, I still eat it with gusto. I have consumed cows’ udder and thought it pretty fine. Liver, kidneys and sweetbreads are delicacies to me. Beef and bison intestines, and saucy stomach slices grilled to crunchy perfection over an open flame are delightful on my tongue; mouth watering tidbits. Speaking of which, I am pretty fond of tongue too; puns plural, completely intended. I am sure that none of these things will keep me breathing for long. It seems that all of the stuff on the inside of the ribcage is bad for you on some level and so I try to bridle my passion for the fatty inner organs of beasts and fowl but, all the while it is coating my arteries, I consider it pretty tasty stuff!

Savoring...