I prepared an eclectic but simple beef recipe to celebrate the retirement of Dr. Charles Sydnor, a great farmer, eye surgeon, brain surgeon and a colleague in sustainable agriculture. Dr. Sydnor ran a 500 acre farm in Snow Camp, NC. It was a magical place to visit and observe healthy grass fed beef operation where the cows were moved three times a day to ensure that the didn’t overgraze, feed on top of their feces as well as discourage the spread of ticks. Each paddock was fitted with a watering self-feeding system that required the cows to press on a ball at the bottom of a small bucket. The water would keep filling the bucket as long as the cow was pressing on the ball. Once the cow had enough water and raised its head, the ball would automatically lock in place to ensure no more water filled the bucket. That meant that the cows didn’t have to drink pond water which might cause the cows to have worms. The whole farm had 20,000 feet of pipes running through all the paddocks.
Dr. Sydnor would take my children and I on cart ride to see how the cows were doing from time to time. In other words, going to buy meat was a treat that my children will probably come to treasure just as much or even better than vacation trips. Now that there are no more chances of a golf cart rides around a 500 acre farm before buying some high quality Red Devon beef and bones for stock, even my children are recognizing the importance of having visited the local treasure.
That’s why I made some sumptuous simple but flavorful beef recipe to appreciate the transitions that are happening all around us. I am especially mindful of the importance of Elder Ngugi Wa Thiong’o’s passing. I am grateful for the many intelligent people I have met in my life.
I named this recipe Kĩmandi, a term I first heard in my village after a neighbor’s cow died from an accidental fall into a deep ditch, breaking its leg. The cow was quickly slaughtered to save it from excruciating pain. Since the cow is too much for the family to eat alone, the owner sells the meat to the neighbors at special prices and soft terms. There is no scale to measure the exact weight and no set price, it’s a price of the heart.
The interesting bit is that this is the one transaction that huckens to our traditional economy. During the transaction I witnessed, little money changed hands as the neighbors probably didn’t have the money at hand. There was no recording of how much meat each person got as everything was based on trust. Just to be sure, the owner of the cow would mention the price loud enoungh for those assembled to hear. The very act of both parties knowing that there were witnesses discouraged default. I never heard of a case where any of those who received some meat failed to pay.
But there is a less obvious point that has to do with the spiritual sensibility of my community. In that regard , my ancestors believed that you can’t lie to the land as it has always been there and will always be here. We all came from the soil and will eventually return there. So once a word is uttered from your mouth and in the presence of the soil/land, the record is permanent. By dying a liar or a cheat, you equally affect the soil/land. The value of the soil/land is more than the fertility of the soil but also the justice degree it holds from all the accumulated credit worthiness of all those it has created, nurtured and received back. It is for that same reason that libation is poured into the same soil/land.
That is how my indigenous community avoided institutions such as DOGE, characters such as ELON and disgrace such EPSTIN and epidemics such TRUMP. Like the story of soil/land, the problem is not these characters but the soil/land they come from. That soil/land is our creation and we are responsible as witnesses who have heard. We can’t hear, not act and think that we are innocent. Our very souls are depreciated by tolerating injustices.
We need more such heart quenching stories to eat by, live by and ultimately to die by. That is ecological balance through indigenous economy.