Tasty Reptiles, as well as The Great Air France Booking Debacle, part 2

The Sunday after Ascension, we got news that Canon Fragelli was in a medically-induced coma and that there were plans to fly him to Florence. It must have been around this time that I realized I was very unlikely to see him again before I left, as I had five weeks left at the mission. 

Anyway, on that Sunday morning, May 16th, I was minding my own business, walking up to the kitchen, when I saw Gerard, Gabriel and Dieu-Vivant with a couple of plastic basins. My first reaction was that they had gone fishing (they had done that not long before). Then I saw the lizard. 

They called it "iguane", but it was far larger than what we would consider an iguana. Gerard held it out to me and I felt the scales, but what they really wanted was a picture of me holding it by the tail.

Lunch, anyone?

While I was working in the kitchen, Dieu-Vivant came in with a basin holding the liver and 18 eggs from the lizard (I have a picture but I'll spare you). The shells were very soft and gave in completely to the touch. 

After Mass we had lunch, which did, in fact, turn out to be lizard. There was cassoulet for those who didn't prefer delicious, chewy, freshly-butchered lizard meat with tomato sauce and onions. I was seated next to one of the Nigerians who was not interested in tasting the lizard; when I said to him, "You're the African!" Canon Sigros responded, "I'm not so sure..."

That evening, Dieu-Vivant and Steeguen (my journal says, "of all people"; I guess I didn't expect a teenage guy to know how to do this) prepared the cobra that had been killed the prior Monday (and kept in the freezer). They boiled the meat and prepared a sauce with "epinards" (it means spinach, but this was more like chard), okra, tomatoes and I think zucchini. 

Dieu-Vivant also boiled the eggs. Canon Sigros was very hesitant about letting us eat them, but Dieu-Vivant was the only one who tasted any. It was all yolk, encased in the membrane-like shell. He said it tasted like egg.

Boiled cobra. I know it looks creepy but trust me, it was good.

Steeguen

Lizard (pictures don't do this stuff justice, I promise)

We had the cobra and leftover lizard with rice and boiled plantains -- and leftover meatballs for those who passed up the good stuff. 

That Wednesday, I discovered that my Air France booking had been botched -- again. I think they emailed me about changes that were made to my booking, I don't remember. Anyway, some of my U.S. flights had gotten cancelled, so I had been rebooked: Libreville to Paris, Paris to Atlanta, Atlanta to Detroit (why??), Detroit to Nashville. Whatever. The issue was that the last leg (Detroit to Nashville) was on June 22nd, while my flight out of Paris left on June 23rd. I talked to Canon Sigros and he said we would call the Air France office in Libreville the next day. 

Between my own phone not working without wifi/data connection which I had only occasionally, keeping track of international flights, Canon asking me to call the U.S. embassy to make sure I wasn't missing any documents, and trying to reactivate my U.S. phone service, thinking that maybe part of my problem was that I hadn't paid for it since it had run out in February -- I don't remember how I managed all this. I think reading about it two-and-a-half years later and trying to get the details in order is more confusing than living it was.

I had written out a big long story here, detailing my attempt to call the embassy and Air France. It's not worth it. You get the idea: things were confusing, not easy, took some perseverance. I think I used up Victor's phone data in the process. But in the end, the flight was fixed and I was able to confirm that I didn't need any additional documents to leave the country beyond a covid test. 

Let me correct that: the flight was fixed for now. But I still had another month at the mission ahead of me to enjoy!