This One Time in Cameroon edition 1: Hey good lookin', whatchu got cooking?

So one hot afternoon in the beautiful city of Bafang, I stopped by my favorite palm wine bar to greet the palm wine mama and sip on some of the good stuff. This lady is super nice – really amazingly so. So I’m sitting there and drinking this palm wine and I look over to my left and see a big pot on the fire. “What’s cooking?” I asked, half-hoping she would offer us some (as she is known to do). “Oh that?” she replied, “that’s just a sacrifice for the ancestors.” She went on to explain that she was cooking goat meat as an offering to her dead ancestors. You have to do this from time to time.  How often? I asked. Maybe around once a year, but it depends on when they ask.  I expressed my confusion. Now how, exactly, do they ask? Apparently by causing trouble in your life. Maybe you have money trouble or maybe you get sick, and this can be the ancestors’ way of letting you know that it’s time to pour them out another goat stew sacrifice.

Ancestor worship: it’s what’s for dinner.