{"id":778,"date":"2014-07-30T08:45:45","date_gmt":"2014-07-30T14:45:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/bj-sanders\/?p=778"},"modified":"2014-08-01T06:32:52","modified_gmt":"2014-08-01T12:32:52","slug":"day-15-of-21-killing-a-pig","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/bj-sanders\/2014\/07\/30\/day-15-of-21-killing-a-pig\/","title":{"rendered":"Day 15 of 21: Killing a pig"},"content":{"rendered":"

FYI: There will be pictures at the end of this post that will show a pig being killed!!<\/p>\n

Today was our first PIG mumu!\u00a0 Remember a mumu is when they bury food in the ground and cook it over very hot stones?!\u00a0 People usually do mumu celebrations because someone got married, someone died, the mourning of the dead is over, someone built a house, or people want to make money!\u00a0 In this case, my friend Julie wanted to make money.\u00a0 She has been raising this pig for a while and he was \u201cof size\u201d.<\/p>\n

The last mumu we went to was just a vegetable mumu (they are part of a religion that doesn\u2019t eat pig) and we just observed (except peeling potatoes).\u00a0 This mumu was for my friend, so I got to be a part of it!<\/p>\n

We got there right in time to see them kill the pig!\u00a0 BJ was excited!\u00a0 My friend held on to the sweet pig, when a man bonked it in the head several times with an axe!\u00a0 BJ asked what would have happened if the pig bit her\u2026she didn\u2019t answer! \ud83d\ude42 After this, the men threw it on the fire, and then took it off the fire to scrape off his skin.\u00a0 Next, they cut him up into several pieces.\u00a0 Don\u2019t you love my details!??!<\/p>\n

So they piled everything on the pile in this order: banana leaves, sweet potatoes, taro, more leaves, kumu (those lovely greens everyone brings me! Yuck.), then hot stones, then the pig meat, then more leaves, and then dirt.<\/p>\n

My job was to help uncover the mumu (after it cooked 3 hours).\u00a0 First of all, I wear shoes every day\u2026and they never do.\u00a0 So while we are standing on this very hot ground, I wonder how they are standing there without shoes?!\u00a0 And while we are moving the dirt and leaves, it is literally burning my hand!\u00a0 Of course, they are so careful to let the \u201cwhite woman\u201d help, because they don\u2019t want us to get hurt.\u00a0 We are trying to show them that we are the same as them!\u00a0 But I will admit that their skin is a little tougher than mine!<\/p>\n

We had a great time supporting our friends at the mumu.\u00a0 And guess what we got out of it\u2026KAUKAU (pronounced: cowcow- sweet potatoes) mmmm!\u00a0 Everyone who helps get to chow down on the vegetables and greens and then you only eat pig meat if you buy it.\u00a0 We bought some and gave it away\u2026it\u2019s the toughest meat you will ever eat!\u00a0 They make equivalent to about $150.\u00a0 So this is well worth it for them!<\/p>\n