so i promised to tell you all about the clan iron belly -- and now i have an opportunity

yesterday i thought i would start a seven days fast but decided not to. a good friend of mine's financee gave me a great big bag of food that was cooked saturday and i dont want to see it waste. its 'prayers food' and i have a thing about that. i dont ever waste that stuff. so i decided i will go seven days on this food only. the *special* thing about the food is it smelled a little sour last night.
no problem i put it in the freezer brought it to work and put it in the freezer there. when i took it out and heated it in the microwave things got really ugly. sing with me: peas porridge hot, peas porridge cold, peas porridge in the pot, nine days old...

wow that thing smelt yucky!!! but... i dont waste prayers food... never... ever. so i sat to it. vagrants do it, dogs do it, flies do it... i could do it. spoon after spoon the stuff went down. putrid curry dish after putrid curry dish -- there was chataigne, pumpkin, channa and aloo, bhagee, rice and another dhal thing. and then there were saheena and katchorie. i got 90% of it down but the katchorie was way gone... half of it made its way in the mouth the other half i had to just watch it in the plate and pretend like it wasn't there. today i think i earned honorable mention in the clan iron belly.

so what is clan iron belly? clan iron belly was founded by an uncle of mine who took a sour soup and washed out the provisions and made a fresh soup from it. the theory is -- heat kills bacteria and what few survive wont kill you. well i didnt die from that soup and he didnt either. i went on to recruit more into the clan. to be a part of clan iron belly you have to eat something that would have been thrown away by civilized people or create a concuction that would not be eaten by civilized people. alligator stomach or iron belly refers to that ability to stomach things that most people cant -- like eating a runny egg, split peas and peanut butter sandwich or dunking your doughnuts in callalloo.

right now i dont know if it is mind over matter but my stomach is running a fever... a very high fever. its only been 20 mins since i ate but my gut is getting really hot. i have never had my stomach pumped... there arent many stories of curry (a serious taboo) in the clan iron belly... i am going to make history... at least i hope so.

but i really must salute every vagrant out there... unrecognised members of the clan... showing where there is a will there is a way and that there is nothing more powerful than the human spirit and the will to live...

peace and love
kwesi