BUKRA & BUKRI

Getting to the Goat Market

I knew that I wanted to get a couple of goats when I came to Pakistan, as it is a huge part of the culture. I was just unsure how I would possibly go about it. However, after talking to people and getting to know the staff at the hospital I found out that the Pharmacist, Saleem, had a goat. He had bought the goat for his father who had shepherded his whole life in a village, but now was to old to keep working in the village. So Saleem brought his father to live with him and to keep him busy he bought him a Bukri (female). The Bukri has two very cute baby goats (bukryown). So while having chia with Saleem and his father I found that every Saturday there is a goat market close to town and Saleem would be willing to go and help me find a few goats. So I asked if the coming Saturday would be a good day to go and Saleem said it would be. So Saleem and Asif (my language teacher/translator) came, and Bo who drives a pickup truck said he would drive us. Denise our French Canadian neighbour decided to come as well just for the adventure (women can not leave by themselves and have a harder time getting out of the compound). However when we got to the market we found out through Saleem that Denise could not come into the market because there were no other women present. So Bo also stayed behind because it is also not good for women to be left by themselves either. Denise was not at all happy with this, but she reluctantly stayed.

Two things I learnt from this experience. One Pakistan is still very much a patriarchal society and just like in restaurants here there are cultural norms that dictate that women do not go in certain places. The other thing is that just by being present, westerners can cause problems. It was good that Denise and Bo stayed behind because we would have drawn a crowd and probably would have affected the price of the goats as well.

The Goat Market

Getting the goats was a lot more work then I expected. Good thing Saleem came along and that I gave him the money in advance. This way it looked like the goats were for him and thus the price of the goats were not affected as much. There was a lot of bartering going on in the market. One Bukri that Saleem almost bought turned out to be sick. We found this out just before we were going to seal the deal. The deal is sealed when you give the owner of the goat a deposit. We had just given the deposit when we noticed that the Bukri was deficient. Thankfully we got our deposit back. After this Saleem called his father who must have come by rickshaw as he did not come with us. After Saleem’s father came there was a lot more confidence and we were able to get a healthy brown Bukri (They call the goats with the long ears Sindhi goats after the province that we are in). The Bukra (male goat) was harder to get, as the price of a good bukra was too much.   We finally found one Bukra that seemed good, but the owner would not go down enough in his price. Finally we just decided to leave and Saleem said that he and his father could get us a Bukra another time. So we went back to where the Bukri was being held and went to pay for her. As we were leaving though the owner of the bukra came and he reluctantly took a cheaper price. So we paid for him there, but when we drove away the people at the gate stopped us and asked why we did not have a receipt for the Bukra. They were going to send us back to do the proper registration, but the proctor who was helping us get the goats came and told him it was not necessary. After a bit of arguing back and forth we were able to leave. We had gotten the Buckryown.

            I asked about what had happened when we tried to leave. Apparently at the goat market you have to pay a buyers fee. When we had bought the bukra just outside the market we just paid directly for it instead of going to the cashier. However, because our proctor liked us, he made sure that we did not have to go back and pay the fee. In Pakistan its about who you know and relationship when it comes to getting things done.

WHAT'S THE PLAN?

I wanted to get a Bukra (male) and a Bukri (female) as I thought it would be fun to have kids running around. Unfortunately, I found out after that it would probably take the entire time we are here before baby goats will come. This is okay though, as the goats will help bless the national families that work in the hospital when I leave. The baby goats can be sold here for a very good price around Eid Al-Adha, the Muslim holiday where goats are sacrificed. The demand for the goats drives the price up a lot.

When I brought my goats home the first question I got was, “where are they going to live??” Yes, I did ask for permission first, and the consensus was I could have a few goats, but they were unsure what I was going to do with them. Interesting enough the hospital compound is a 7-acre lot. It is a very big compound with lots of grass and trees. It’s actually quite nice. So putting my goats somewhere was not my major concern as I knew there was plenty of space, but I did have to figure out a permanent home for them where they would not bother anyone. So I started a beautification project of one area of the grounds that did not look so nice, which I will talk about at a later time.

The idea behind getting the goats, besides having a few pets around that Abigail can ride and pet, is to be more immersed in the culture. It gives me something in common with a lot of the nationals here. Pakistan is very relational, and making friendships is very important. Already I have made quite a few friends, and have been able to learn more Urdu because of my goat project. As well it is helping me become more familiar with construction and how things are done within Pakistan when it comes to building projects (which is very different then in a Canadian context). Finally it adds a little bit of joy to my coworkers lives as they get to pet and feed goats whenever they want to (including me as I do get to fulfil my life long dream of being a shepard of ruminants. One co-worker was even talking about getting a lamb to add to the heard ;).