Table etiquette

In an American textbook of an African language, there was a sentence for translation: “If you finish your beef steak, I will give you a candy”. When reading this, Africans burst into laughter. Firstly, for any African, even for a child, meat is the most wanted delicacy, that no sweets can compare with. Secondly, an African cannot imagine that somebody must be begged to eat.

Of course, the two thousand ethnic groups inhabiting Africa have different rules of table etiquette. For example, in Mali and in the neighboring countries, people eat with their hands from a common pan. Usually there is one pan for men and another for women. It is thought that food is tastier and contains more vital energy if one eats it with one’s hands, so spoons are only used to pass food from one vessel to another. That is why the hands of Africans are more used to high temperatures than that of Europeans, and the mouth, the other way round: while one is molding together a handful of hot cereal and takes it to one’s mouth, it cools down.

Before the meal, a calabash with water is served, and people wash their hands in it in turns: first an honorable guest or the head of the family, then everyone else in the order of seniority, so by the time it gets to the children, the water is quite dirty. Children eat together with adults, and their responsibility is to hold the calabash or a basin with their left hand so that it does not spin or shake. An adult will not scrape the food out from the bottom of a pan, as then the children who cannot eat quickly and are not as agile, will be left hungry. That is why, even if the adults are still not full, they are the first to stop eating, and the rest is left to the children and clumsy strangers. After the meal everyone thanks the elders for the treat, and their reply is: “All the thanks should go to God!”

The peoples of Côte d'Ivoire will serve the meal to a guest in a separate calabash: the more honorable a guest is, the more food he is offered. But a polite guest will not finish his meal, and will leave something to the host’s children. The Kirfi people in Nigeria give food to their children in separate calabashes or pans, and the children boast in front of each other that the one who got the biggest portion is loved by his mother more than the others.

A polite Fulbe man is not supposed to admit that he is hungry. That is why, Fulbe refuse politely if they are invited to eat, even if they are on the verge of fainting of starvation. To serve a Fulbe man correctly, food must be placed in front of him without saying anything, then he has no choice and can enjoy the food without risking to lose his reputation.

The working team “Drop the lie!” is happy: before the work   begins, the owner of the farm treats the workers to rice.  Cote d'Ivoire. The Kla-Dan. V. F. Vydrin. 2002.		King’s bowl for meat. Uganda. Kenya. Inter lake area, mid-to-late 19th c.