we taste like pig

Because I am feeling kinda chicken shit and don't want to say something too contentious on another person's blog I just thought I would make a comment about cannabalism. Now, I have just been living among people who are the second third and fourth generation descendents of cannabals, never thought I'd write a sentence like that! In fact the last recorded case was in the early 1970s on the island. My village father showed me where the human earth oven was in his garden... you were not permitted to cook people in the village or in the same fire as other food... there were bones scattered everywhere. Contemporary culture on the island does not condone cannabalism but at the same time are not ashamed of the actions of their forebears, these things were habits of the night i.e, the premissionary period. They now have adopted and adapted christianity and the moral codes that entails, but they have not moralised on the actions produced by the radically different social system of their ancestors. Elsewhere in the Pacific for example this same were we or weren't we debate goes on. Fijians for example dispute the cannabalistic tendencies of precontact time inhabitants of those islands. What troubles me about the report on Carib cannabalism is that the chief is supressing the views of other Caribs and implying they are in it for the money. While I know nothing about Carib/Arawak history I know enough about post-contact Pacific to know that many peoples have reconfigured their history of before and after the encounter for various ends. Equally important is the realisation that power in small societies is still power, and elites in small societies present history in a way that advantages them and secures their hold on power. Sound familiar? I am not saying this is the case with this Carib chief, but we don't know for sure, because very little information about other Carib views are being circulated. I also know that this is only part of the problem of the Pirates of the ... 2 premise ...

On a completely different note, you know how in movies people often find themselves locked out of their hotel rooms? This morning I acted that out in real life for a whole bunch of school children visiting our capital city. What really annoyed me though was that I had put a shoe in the door but forgot the power of the wind in that city so both me and the shoe were in the wrong side of the door.... As I was going down the lift in my towel and singlet, a woman said to me 'locked out eh? 'yep' I said. And won't the buggers let you back in?
Hang on, if there were others in the room, doncha think I would bang on the door sream bloody murder till they let me in?