How feasting under the stars bonded people throughout history

There is something about having a festive meal outdoors on the lawn or in a park or garden with friends. This probably goes right back to the first uses of fire to cook some grub for family and friends. There is, after all, the evidence of burnt animal bones to be found in layers of sediment in caves or middens in front of caves or — in the case of the shells of clams and other edibles — at ancient shorelines. We almost certainly would be right in assuming the resulting meals were for more than just one nuclear family.

Similarly, there are many examples in the world’s literature with scenes where hungry warriors have gathered around a roaring camp fire, as they roast a leg of lamb, the hindquarter of a deer or an eland, carving off chunks of that pungent, roasted meat.

Long into the night, they would weave tales of the gods inspired by the stars passing overhead, or sing songs that told of past conquests, battles won, faithful animal companions, and loves won or lost. Ancient country and western-style music.

In pretty much every place where I served as an American diplomat for 30 years, some version of such camaraderie took place among friends — often outdoors, and bolstered with food and drink. Who knows, maybe it was even more useful than providing yet one more expert discussion on the big policy issues of the day.

Years ago, my wife Ruth and I lived and worked in Surabaya, Indonesia. It is the country’s second-largest city and has a history stretching back to at least the 12th century — and earlier. And it has been a crossroads of international trade since the beginning. In the days of the Netherlands’ East Indian empire, Surabaya was the region’s major entrepôt. Its firms traded in rubber, tin, copra, quinine, spices, rice, sugar, teak, and many other commodities. 

A heady mix of cultures and races

In the great novels of the 19th century, such as works by Joseph Conrad, Surabaya was the big time. It was a heady mix of cultures and races — with Javanese, Madurese, Bugis, Chinese, Arabs, Indians, all manner of Europeans, yet other Asian and Southeast Asian nationalities, plus a diverse community of people of mixed ethnic backgrounds. The Surabaya we came to know was a bit down at heel compared to its earlier glory days, but it continued to be an exotic mix of people — and for many of them, the old ways stayed relevant even as they coexisted with the new.    

Living there instead of in the country’s capital, Jakarta, we were busy dealing with newspapers, professors at several universities, managing our library and English teaching programmes, and mingling with a small but energetic community of writers, musicians and theatre makers — interpreting both western and traditional theatre and dance-drama styles. 

When my wife was expecting our first child, with the encouragement of friends we agreed to carry out one of the most important Javanese traditional rituals to ensure a safe pregnancy — a “Tingkepan” — a special ceremony to assure the safe delivery of the child. Inevitably, though, this ritual became a great outdoor party as friends and work colleagues all gathered to ensure we followed the rituals precisely. Naturally we hosted a meal in our garden for everyone involved.

My wife was draped in seven batik cloths and bathed by “senior” women with sanctified water containing the blossoms of tropical flowers. Then, in order to predict the sex of the unborn child, I was asked to cut into a ripe coconut with the kind of wicked-looking scythe used to harvest rice stalks in the rice fields. The resulting coconut would be examined by a traditional religious figure who could then predict the child’s sex properly. (He was correct in that the baby would be a daughter.) Yes, Indonesia is the world’s biggest Muslim nation but there remain significant underpinnings of the earlier layers of Buddhism, Hinduism, and an even older animist spirituality. 

A prince from a minor noble family

I wore the traditional garb associated with a prince from a minor noble family, including a wool cutaway jacket, formal shirt, a special skull-fitting hat, a sarong, and sandals that barely managed to cope with half my foot. Given the tropical heat and humidity, my ensemble was perfect for achieving one’s very own personal sauna.

Naturally, of course, there was food. First, the two parents were positioned to dispense a special non-alcoholic beverage, dawud, and a fruit-based appetiser, rujak, to every guest. Thereafter, the real feast began. All Indonesian ceremonies seemingly involve food — and lots of it. We had huge mounds of rice dishes, each with vegetables and savoury bits, opor ayam (an Indonesian dish of fried chicken in a savoury sauce), various satays being grilled over small braziers, and vast arrays of tropical fruits. And there was a big serving bowl offering a special Indonesian soup — mixing western influences and local cuisine — featuring tiny Vienna sausages cut into intricate shapes, in a spicy vegetable broth. And much more. By the end of the day, everybody took some of the festive offerings with them back to their homes, with the food wrapped in banana leaves.

Inevitably, too, people took photographs (this was long before smartphones and video clips) and some of those images ended up as cover stories in local magazines — printed in full colour. As far as we could tell, no foreign diplomat’s family had ever gone through these rituals, let alone invited everybody they knew to help them celebrate the event. That made ours newsworthy, and that, in turn, gave us some kind of special cachet in dealing with the city’s leading figures. 

In the end, the baby’s delivery was uncomplicated, although it took place in Singapore because of a blood factor issue — no Indonesians carry a Rhesus negative blood type and so to err on the side of caution, my wife went to Singapore for two months to await the birth, while I joined her a week or so before the baby’s due date. 

In recognition of where we were living and the propitiousness of the baby’s birth after having done all the right ceremonies, she was named Sinta, the Balinese version of the heroine of the Ramayana saga, a tale well known throughout South and Southeast Asia.

Having carried out the ceremony that ensured the safe delivery of our first-born child, seven months later we were introduced to — rather, instructed in — the need to carry out a second ceremony and, naturally, another big outdoor party.

This ceremony, the “Tedak Siti” or “Touching the Earth”, symbolises a seven-month-old child’s first moments of putting his or her feet on the ground after being carried around in a cloth sling as an infant. It also provides a symbolic expression of a child’s future occupation. A small two- or three-rung ladder is constructed out of bamboo and a collection of small items, emblematic of future occupations such as a tiny book for a teacher, a spoon for a chef, a tiny farm implement for, naturally, a farmer, and a bell for a future musician, are placed in one of those woven baskets used to transport a live chicken. In our case we used an ornate bronze basin since we had no chickens. 

A predictor of their future occupation

The basket is turned upside down and after the child has been unbundled from the sling and helped to climb those bamboo steps, they are encouraged to reach into the basket. The first item the child touches or picks up is a predictor of their future occupation. There was, of course, no file of papers for a future bureaucrat or a hand tool for a mechanic or engineer. But that is tradition for you. 

Personally, I don’t believe in magic, clairvoyance, or ouija boards, but our little seven-month-old daughter, fresh from her bamboo ladder, went right for the bell, the musical instrument indicative of her future as a musician and multimedia artist. True destiny. Then it was on to the ritual prayers for a safe and happy life. Thereafter, inevitably, the next item of business was the food — those huge mounds of rice and vegetables, chicken, satay sticks straight from a charcoal brazier, fruits, and that weird vienna sausage soup again. What kind of cross-cultural artefact that is, we continue to wonder, decades later.

Soon enough, in the manner of a foreign service career, we would move on to Sapporo, Japan. There we were very lucky to have a house with a garden that was perfect for entertaining guests. By virtue of the latitude of that city, we could have summer evening, outdoor parties that lasted well into the evening. Fortuitously, our Japanese neighbours enjoyed helping out with the arrangements and co-hosting. We cut one of those big oil drums in half, longitudinally, had a grill made for the top, punched a few vent holes in the curved sides and it became perfect for a low-tech, wood and charcoal-fired grill suitable for fish, squid, lamb, corn on the cob, and potatoes wrapped in foil placed in the coals.

We used this for hosting groups of visiting scholars, at least over the summer and autumn, although after September the first snows would begin and we would have to move indoors. Alternatively, we could repair to our nearest restaurant for a lamb grill using one of those cooking apparatuses shaped like a Moroccan tagine grill, but in Japan called a Jingis Khan, reportedly named after a Mongol warrior’s helmet. Or, we could go to our favourite downtown izakaya, or farm-style eatery, on Badger Alley where we and our guests could enjoy all manner of raw, roasted, steamed, or grilled fish and shellfish — as well as a bountiful platter of some very thinly sliced frozen deer meat carpaccio, the speciality of the inn.

Sometimes we would find ourselves in a community festival in a nearby park, with lots of that Jingis Khan on the go, and the women all wearing yukata, those summery cotton kimonos.      

Years later we were living in Tokyo and we found ourselves invited to the Emperor’s Birthday garden party in the grounds of the Imperial Palace. The official female Japanese hostesses all wore magnificent silk kimonos, while the men were in their best navy blue business suits, not surprisingly. The food was passed along by waiters moving soundlessly among the hundreds of guests, but it did seem that such a grand event lacked the warm, personal touch of similar events in Sapporo, a much smaller city than Tokyo. Of course, when the cherry blossoms were in season, everyone repaired to a good spot to have a party under the cherry trees, packed lunches and sake poured into little square wooden boxes for cups.

Several braais in quick succession

Along the way, of course, we also spent many years in southern Africa and South Africa. Four different assignments, in fact. Early on, while we were living in Pretoria, we were invited to several braais, all in quick succession. They were for different communities in and around Johannesburg. The first was with a group of young African businessmen and entrepreneurs. The second was a gathering of my wife’s relatives and friends from her old neighbourhood. And the third was at the home of an Afrikaner businesswoman with many connections in the old regime and who was building efforts to create relationships with the soon-to-be new leadership of the country. 

There were, of course, differences in the gatherings, but, from an anthropological perspective, it was the similarities among them that were compelling — pointing towards the commonalities in South Africa’s culture and society. The foods were almost the same — everywhere the required salads, side dishes and grilled meats, and the drinks were almost the same as well, although the wines were more expensive at one of the three events than the other two. 

Female guests at all three events were largely in charge of the food coming out of the kitchen, while the men clustered around the grills to compare notes on how best to cook the meat and whether beer or some other liquid was the right thing to be spreading over the cooking steaks, boerewors, chicken cuts, lamb chops and other things being grilled. With each of the three events, one could sense a link back to those earliest times when men clustered around a campfire, probably whispering secrets about how best to roast that haunch of wildebeest on offer.

One other braai comes to mind and that was one that took place just after the releases of the country’s political prisoners had begun in earnest in 1990. This took place at the home of a successful black professional family. Although it wasn’t immediately obvious, it eventually became clear this writer was the only white person in attendance. 

Someone handed me the tongs

As men always do, we clustered around a very full braai grill and then someone handed me the tongs and grilling fork and asked me to watch the meat, reminding me to be careful to turn all the meat to ensure everything was cooked properly. After dutifully beginning to carry out my assignment, after a few minutes I looked up from my labours to realise I was alone at the grill, cooking for the masses. 

No problem, I’d worked in restaurants and been a unit cook in the infantry. Then it dawned on me that as the sole white guy at the party, I was now doing all the cooking for a very hungry gathering, enjoying the sunshine of a lovely garden. Ah, the new South Africa comes to suburban Johannesburg — over a braai grill — I thought.

And so, what can we conclude from all these experiences — beyond the obvious fact that we all have to eat and love our food? It seems to me that eating together in gatherings, often out of doors, fulfils a deeply elemental need of building community and bonding with others of our kind — preferably while discussing how best to prepare that food and comparing notes about how we do it. Man was not meant to dine alone. DM