I bought a lovely cow tail attached to a stick for 60 cents from a peddler on the street in Kitale…thought it would be good for displays at events back home….unfortunately, it stinks so badly, even wrapped in TWO plastic bags with duct tape, so very reluctantly I was forced to ditch it at our last stop. Thankfully, my fortune changed.
In Kisumu my beloved Roger gave into spending a whole 45 minutes with me in a little side-street alley where native (and some not so native) crafts are sold. Each vendor grabs your arm, saying in clear English, “Hi, I’ve been waiting for you! Come and see my shop!” and then anxiously describes each article and how much either you need it or your friends back home do.
One of the vendors, a tall, lanky guy actually did have many things that I thought were interesting: huge drums stretched with cow hides as well as other fascinating musical instruments, even a huge long metal spear, complete with some kind of tail hanging off the end and leather strips with colorful beads. I stopped to look and that’s when our fifteen-minute conversation took over. He had several of the cow tails on a stick like the one I had bought before and thought I really needed one…for $8.00!! He told me they were perfect for swatting flies or for dusting my “beautiful furniture” at home?! I was explaining how I had already bought one in Kitale and how very nasty the thing was and how extremely disgusting the smell was, so much so that I had had to throw it away. He was horrified! He explained carefully how you have to wash it, scrub it with your hands with the wash tub and soap and water. Then, he continued to explain IN DETAIL that it was because of where the tail is on the cow. Geeshhhhh, how gross!!! And, here it is traveling around in my suitcase. Literally, when I took the two bags and all the duct tape off (reluctantly shared by Roger as it’s typically saved for mosquito nets we encounter with holes in them), I seriously thought I was going to throw up the smell was so bad. So, yes, I gave it another go. I bought ANOTHER cow tail on a stick promising to go home and follow his directions. So, now it’s been sitting in a wash bucket for two days with a ½ cup of laundry soap. Tomorrow, I plan to hang it in the sun for at least a few days hoping to bleach out any last odors or living things.
Fortunately, for me, I was able to find someone to help me scrounge through the trash out back and retrieve the old cow tail on a stick, so now I have two soaking away! Some people just pay the big bucks in the souvenir shops for the ones already washed, I guess, with the pretty carved elephants for a handle or beautiful beadwork (check out the photo). Mine? A wooden stick!!!!! Price??? $1.20!!!! He said, “Madam, you are a very good bargainer, not like the others!” YAHOOO for me! Do you think it’s worth it? Mmmm, I’ll let you know! Hey, and if you happen to know any other suggestions, please send them along! Yes, ditching them both is still on the table as a viable (and perhaps the only) option.
I’m sorry, but did you pay to have the “Got Milk” ad put on this post. Seriously?? I read all about rotten cow tails, and then ended it with a picture of a happy cow on a bottle of milk. Wondering if that happy cow has a tail
You might get searched on the way home just because of the stench. Here’s hoping the soap soak works!
LOL! Well, at least the version of your page that I’m reading at the moment doesn’t say “Got Milk?”
I made some rawhide once from an antelope skin. This is where my concept of the “smell of death” comes from, and I think you are now also familiar with that smell. It is the absolute worst smell ever! Imagine having to take up that skin, smelling like that, and scrape off the flesh and hair — not a quick job by any means!
The stench has to do with decomposition, not cow poop, and soaking the cowtail duster in soapy water isn’t going to help. This is what Martha meant when she said, “by this time he stinketh.” Alum, perhaps, might be of some small assistance, but it’s bound to ruin the embellishments — at least the fur — if that’s even been cured. It sounds like they just cut off the cow tail and duct taped it to a stick, decorated it, and worked hard to sell it while it was still reasonably fresh. I suppose it may have been necessary to remove the bone, and they may have attempted to scrape out what muscle there was. Hopefully the second one was properly cured. If I were going to make one of these, I’d leave the whole thing out to dry, well salted (with NaCl) for at least a couple of weeks. Once it’s already assembled, it’s probably too late.
You’d know more about customs than I would, but I wouldn’t expect to be able to bring something of this sort successfully through a customs check, though it is pretty.