Let me start by saying I don’t eat dog meat, I have never eaten it (I hope so), and do not imagine any instance of my eating it in the future, except of course a terrible war breaks out and man must survive. Fair enough. But the more probing question will be if I support the consumption of this highly controversial delicacy, which by the way, the Chinese consume far more than Nigerians, if we were to go by numbers. The very mention of dog meat as a delicacy produces “yuk!” as a response, or a feverishly face rumpling grin that is typical of drinking Epson Salt. But dog meat is an increasingly popular delicacy in many parts of Nigeria and indeed the world, therefore no disdaining approach will change anything.
I grew up in Calabar with my brother, and we both knew that one thing will never grace our cuisine-polished tongues; dog meat. Down an adjoining street to ours was Mr. Friday, who operated a joint notorious for a large sign posted outside the shack with the tag “404 vs Palm Wine – Come One Come All.” We detested the people who went in there and kind of saw them as vile men, lacking control of their bellies. What made it worse for us was that every Fridays, a pickup truck would pass by loaded with a huge cage containing over twenty frail looking dogs that were probably aware of their approaching demise. Then a few hours later the whole street will be stinking of dog blood, and most people probably do not know that it has a foul odor. These all made it absolutely impossible to sit at table with a hot serving of barbecued dog meat.
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I met Scoppy for the first time after Secondary school, when I came to take care of my grandmother in Lagos Island. I was still a sporting freshman in Lagos life and was always bewildered at how things functioned in the highly disordered Island life. Scoppy (a tweak of the area boy name Scorpion) is one person that embodied the perfect description of a local guy that lives in the area, and carried out any act possible as survival tactic. He could be a gateman on one hand, and a manned gate (thug) on the other. He could be a petrol station attendant as well as an oil entrepreneur selling petrol in jerry cans. Interestingly, he could also function as a local government tax collector, while also working as a bus conductor. In his varying roles in Island society, it is his night life that gives me the wonder about how such guys survive in Lagos Island. Scoppy wanted nothing out of life, but to sleep, make money, eat, drink, smoke, and womanize. Whatever could afford him these ‘luxuries’, he would fully engage. He once landed in some sweet deal that got him a foreign currency. I was happy for him, even though I had no idea where he got his big break from. I was courteously hoping he would change is mind and change his life. But no! Scoppy went to Federal Palace Hotel and blew away his riches in less than a month and was back on the streets buying rice and stew from Mama Bunmi.
Thoughts of a Calabarboy. 