Ivory Coast: An Alligator’s Tale
By Blair Kaiser

"Gravel in their intestines?"

"Yes, each piece of gravel represents a year of age, so if you find 5 pieces of gravel, the alligator is 5 years old."

"And how is this proven?"

"I not sure," the lanky bare-chested man mused quizzically.

Here in the Cote d’Ivoire its seems as if every time I turn around, someone is killing or has already killed some species that I would rather not encounter alone.

Jogging down a dirt and sand road flanked by dense jungle and palm trees, I am startled when two men emerged from the bush. One was carrying a very long snake in one hand, its head biting a stick in the other hand.

"What’s that?"

"Cobra."

The word Cobra required no translation from French to English.

"Are there many here?"

"Oh, perhaps. Not too many," he replied nonchalantly.

"Are you going to eat that?"

The men donned guilty grins and nodded their heads.

"Bon appetit," I said and continued on my run.

Not thirty minutes later, when I had turned around and was heading back to the village, I ran into another man. He was carrying a small alligator in one hand, a machete in the other. I had to interrogate him.

"Eiiiieee! What’s that?"

The man laughed because he knew I knew what it was. Still, I was puzzled. I started my usual series of questions.

"Are there many?"

"Yes."

"Are there bigger ones?"

"Yes, but you need a gun to catch them."

"Are you going to eat that?"

"Yes," he said, clearly amused by my bewilderment.

I started back towards the village with a head full of thoughts and ideas on what other dangerous animals I could possibly encounter. What if an elephant tramples across the road or an army of scorpions attacks my ankles? I couldn’t help but think back to the snake I found crawling across my leg in bed in the middle of the night months earlier. I never did figure out what kind of snake it was, but I laugh to myself imagining if it was a cobra or black mamba. My mosquito net is tucked in extra tight these days, and any unfamiliar noise or movement is automatically overwhelmed by my floodlight.

Back in the village, after an afternoon of paperwork and reading, I walked across my yard to the latrine. I came across four men slaughtering a cow in my backyard. They couldn’t have been more than 15 or 20 paces from my door, and they were gutting and hacking away on this huge animal. I recognized a couple of the men as the men who sit under a makeshift shack along the road, selling chunks of beef and other parts to passersby. The USDA would have a field day inspecting the conditions in this "slaughterhouse".

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