From the Hammock: The tale of the sheep

According to Josh, a friend and a man of the bible, “Jesus considers himself a shepherd to human beings whom he refers to as sheep. God created us and loves us therefore we are his sheep. Jesus was sent by God to save and keep us (the thieves and robbers are not just Satan, but the consequences of our own fallen situations and bad choices) we recognize the voice of Jesus and follow it to find life. Not just the afterlife, but a better life here, sustenance, and abundance, also unity. One flock, one shepherd.” I am not very informed in matters of the bible but I know for sure that using sheep to describe human beings is common in God speak. Maybe after-all sheep are cool animals. Don’t tell that to my tribesmen. WE’RE NOT THE SHEEPThey treated the thing with disdain and intrigue and myth. Eating sheep was in fact forbidden; it was said that the people who ate mutton developed a permanent running nose; that irritating mucus dripping from one’s nose. The cattle keepers maintained that sheep was helpful in protecting herds of cattle from being hit by lightening and so each family had some sheep that occasionally provided entertainment with their awkward bullfights. But as children we never knew what happened to the sheep finally; it was unheard of eating their meat and we never had the equivalent of lamb too. As such it was considered an insult to call a person a sheep. Sheep was amongst the highest marks of stupidity. The Baganda our neighbouring tribesmen in central Uganda treated the sheep with even more disregard.In this culture for a person to address another as a sheep or to say anything insinuating that the person addressed was like a sheep; it was held as highly offensive. Nobody wanted to be called a sheep; it looked down all the time and even had a very terrible sound. One could imitate the sound of a cow, a cat, a goat and even a dog but imitating a sheep had something irritating about it. Personally I did not consider sheep as worth representation of human beings, there are cooler animals; say dogs, ironically, referring to somebody as a dog is also considered offensive in most cultures yet humans associate with dogs universally more than they do with cows; cows are certainly cooler than sheep they give us milk, cheese and meat. God could therefore have called us cows but not sheep maybe chimpanzees. But they look weird, it is said those chimpanzees and gorillas are our cousins after-all but who wants to a cousin of that thing which is not cute? How about rabbits; Mr. Hare is a cool guy. Somebody said the other day that owls are even cooler.They have eyes at the back and front of their heads.Cleary I did not hold sheep in high esteem till recently when I changed my mind on sheep while I was walking in the wilderness next to my neighbourhood. I was out riding a bicycle in the village where houses are so awesome they have “Buwani” or sun glasses as the English call them. The driveways to the entrances of the chateaus in this village tease the observer. Like looking at a person with cool shades and you imagine how their face looks like without the shades. When I saw the houses they seemed to be chilling behind the shades; grand, artfully designed and highly reserved. Nothing looked misplaced in this village other than me or so I thought of myself. Then I saw them animals in the backyard of one home. They were the mothers of all sheep. They were big and tall and they gave the impression they smiled when something unusual happened nearby. Now that is some sheep.These four elegant sheep are quite something, their teeth curve at the front to form a V shape looking backwards inwards the mouth and watching their open mouth gives you the impression that they are smiling at you or something below because their eyes are facing down and since they are so tall and I need to tilt upwards my head to be able to see their chin they seem to leave the impression that they are laughing at me. They are like giraffes only they have wool on their bellies and shoulders. Nobody was watching these sheep-and the owner having appreciated that his animals are indeed not your regular sheep, leaves the four things in close but safe vicinity and clearly visible to passers-by. No human being was in sight other than a dog, which stood guard of the sheep, and it barked the closer I came to the sheep. As I walked closer I was still wandering whether they were giraffe or sheep. I was thinking when I watched them that perhaps they are the sheep that they speak of in the bible; and they are the sheep I wannabe. (Ed’s note: The photos show Llamas and not sheep. Although early writers compared llamas to sheep, their similarity to the camel was later recognized. The llama (Lama glama) is a South American camelid, widely used as a pack and meat animal by Andean cultures since pre-hispanic times. Thank you) donuwagiwabo@gmail.com