Today is the first day of this year’s cycle of funerals in Karankasso Sambla. Music has played all night yesterday, and today in the early afternoon there is more music and various rituals are performed. I have joined the hunters who gathered to honour the mother of one of them, Karim Ouattara. Karim is the…
On nights like these I wonder why am I not just sleeping in my bed. It is cold as I drive following Norbert to the slaughterhouse of Bobo Dioulasso. At 1am we are in his minuscule office, Norbert Ido is the Adjoint of the Chef de Service Administration et Production at the Abattoir Frigorifique de…
Getting to know hunting here in Karankasso also meant developing a different sensibility toward animal death, learning to cut their throat, burn their skin, take out intestines and cut them into pieces for women to prepare. In the case of bigger animals, there is really a lot of blood coming out and sounds and smells…
I decided to drop the shotgun for a day and keep the camera in hand, going hunting with Lasso and Go-Seydou. The day was very very hot, small animals can be caught resting in the shadows. But the bush is starting to become green with new leaves, which makes following game increasingly difficult. The experience…
Once upon a time a hyena came to feed at night in Karankasso, in a hole under the tall trees I see from my house. She brought her cubs to eat the earth men dug out of the hole. One night, she was left without her offspring. According to a version, they were killed by…
So it is the day before Christmas, both my friend’s shotgun and mine are being repaired and we have no meat for tomorrow. I could buy yet another hen, but I am frankly tired of being a hunter who buys overpriced chicken. Around December they reach three or four times the normal price, and I…
On September the 9th, 2011 old Fie-Sini Traoré died. He was buried in his courtyard, lots of people were there to dig the grave and hunters shoot their shotguns in the air, to honour the deceased. Here, when an old men dies, his burial is a happy celebration. He lived a long life and left…