Tell us how you like your steak!

[Verity]

If you ever write a book, Neto (and here is hoping you do) I will certainly want to obtain a copy!

Now I'm hungry for some wood fired steak...

[Soloist]

For those who like steak fat (I identify) if MN Emory serves me doctors blamed President Reagan particular cancer (colon)on his eating steak fat.

Wife: Aha, but I can’t afford to eat steak as often as President Reagan, so maybe I am still safe.

[MaxPC]

Like any meat, the younger it is, the better. It might also help to let it "age" a bit first, too.... (Did I really say that?)

In that case I would be very tender indeed.

Neither I, nor the Banawa, are cannibals.

Reminds me of a story. Some background first. The Indian Agency in Brazil has one section called (when translated) "Contact Front". This is the department that manages un-contacted tribes, mostly just preventing anyone else from getting into the areas where these tribes are believed to be. This section has attracted persons of the political radical left, which in Brazil means Marxists. A Frete de Contato team came into our village once while we were there. They stayed on the other side of the airstrip, and made no effort to come over to meet me, so I went over there. I could tell that the team leader didn't want to talk to me, but I was friendly and cordial, so he was sort of forced to talk a bit.

The story, however, deals with what the Banawa told me later. A man from a related tribe (around 4 to 10 days dugout days travel away, depending on the time of year) was there in the area, at the mouth of the Banawa River. This guy is known for begging for things, and he was asking this Indian Agent for some shorts. He told him, "You shouldn't be wearing clothes at all - you should go back to your old ways." (Actually, these tribes didn't go completely naked, but these Frete de Contato people aren't anthropologists to start with, and just make their own assumptions. So someone said that they should have asked him where his mule is, because when outsiders first came into the indigenous areas, back in the rubber boom days, they always traveled with a pack mule.)

But if the Banawa ever were cannibals, they either didn't know it, or didn't want to admit it. (When describing a related tribe that they had wiped out because of cannibalism, they actually seemed confused as to whether that tribe was human or not, because the fact that they had language indicated that they were, while the fact that they ate people classified them as animals.) Anyway, I said that they should take a pinch of the flesh on the outsider's side between their fingers, and when he asked them what they were doing, to say, "Well, we used to eat people, and we were just checking to see how much fat you have." (That's the way they "grade" the quality of a game animal - the more fat there is, the more healthy it is, and the better the meat.) So we all had a good laugh on that one, thinking about how he would respond to the unspoken suggestion.

I agree, I truly would enjoy reading your book should you write one; which I do earnestly hope that you do. Yes, I now they are not cannibals, my apologies if that was mistaken. I was making a joke at my own expense. I would have dearly enjoyed watching the reactions of the Contato team if the Banawa gentleman had taken a pinch as well.

[Neto]

In that case I would be very tender indeed.

Neither I, nor the Banawa, are cannibals.

Reminds me of a story. Some background first. The Indian Agency in Brazil has one section called (when translated) "Contact Front". This is the department that manages un-contacted tribes, mostly just preventing anyone else from getting into the areas where these tribes are believed to be. This section has attracted persons of the political radical left, which in Brazil means Marxists. A Frete de Contato team came into our village once while we were there. They stayed on the other side of the airstrip, and made no effort to come over to meet me, so I went over there. I could tell that the team leader didn't want to talk to me, but I was friendly and cordial, so he was sort of forced to talk a bit.

The story, however, deals with what the Banawa told me later. A man from a related tribe (around 4 to 10 days dugout days travel away, depending on the time of year) was there in the area, at the mouth of the Banawa River. This guy is known for begging for things, and he was asking this Indian Agent for some shorts. He told him, "You shouldn't be wearing clothes at all - you should go back to your old ways." (Actually, these tribes didn't go completely naked, but these Frete de Contato people aren't anthropologists to start with, and just make their own assumptions. So someone said that they should have asked him where his mule is, because when outsiders first came into the indigenous areas, back in the rubber boom days, they always traveled with a pack mule.)

But if the Banawa ever were cannibals, they either didn't know it, or didn't want to admit it. (When describing a related tribe that they had wiped out because of cannibalism, they actually seemed confused as to whether that tribe was human or not, because the fact that they had language indicated that they were, while the fact that they ate people classified them as animals.) Anyway, I said that they should take a pinch of the flesh on the outsider's side between their fingers, and when he asked them what they were doing, to say, "Well, we used to eat people, and we were just checking to see how much fat you have." (That's the way they "grade" the quality of a game animal - the more fat there is, the more healthy it is, and the better the meat.) So we all had a good laugh on that one, thinking about how he would respond to the unspoken suggestion.

I agree, I truly would enjoy reading your book should you write one; which I do earnestly hope that you do. Yes, I now they are not cannibals, my apologies if that was mistaken. I was making a joke at my own expense. I would have dearly enjoyed watching the reactions of the Contato team if the Banawa gentleman had taken a pinch as well.

I did understand it as a joke. But they actually MAY have been cannibals - no one knows, except that the tribe they wiped out were, and they were in the same language family. The Banawa story tells that these other people (the Yima, pronounced as JEE-mah) would run after them, calling out, "I will not harm you, you are my child to be!" Well, if they 'raised them' first, they still eventually ate them. They say that these people were very tall, and had very long arms. No wonder. Only two children, a boy and a girl, were said to have survived the massacre.