Oct. 11, 2012 DAKAR,
Senegal (AP) — The street level of Ousmane Ndiaye's building features a
fabric shop. He and his family live in a posh apartment on the second
floor. Their upstairs neighbors? His beloved ram Billal and 10 other
sheep.
Here his animals prance on a sunny outdoor terrace well
above the commotion of buses and vendors below, and only rarely use the
building's winding staircase.
Billal is fed the family's dinner
leftovers, and Ndiaye jokes that his wife is jealous of his sheep. The
family even foregoes potential rental income by leaving the upper level
of their building unfinished.
"I could rent this place out for
250,000 francs ($500) a month, but I prefer to keep Billal and my sheep
here," says Ndiaye, 60, sporting a royal blue boubou as he strokes the
head of the sheep he hopes will become a reality television star.
In
a nation where sheep are given names and kept inside homes as companion
animals, the most popular television show is "Khar Bii," or literally,
"This Sheep," in the local Wolof language.
It's an American
Idol-style nationwide search for Senegal's most perfect specimen. Now in
its fourth season, the show airs several times a week in the months
leading up to Eid al-Adha, or Tabaski, as it's known here.
The feast of sacrifice is when Muslims around the world slaughter animals in remembrance of Abraham's near-sacrifice of his son.
In
Senegal, the sheep's ties to the important religious holiday have made
them a part of many urban families in this predominantly Muslim country
of 12.8 million people. Still, every family that can sacrifices a ram at
Tabaski, when an estimated 712,000 sheep will be purchased for
slaughter. Some 240,000 of those are in the Dakar region alone, where
supermarkets are already offering scratch tickets for a chance to win a
free Tabaski sheep.
"The Senegalese are really into their sheep,"
says Fadilou Keita, 28, who lives with six of them by night at his Dakar
home. The financial analyst carries his iPad in one hand and sticks his
other in the mouth of Aziz to drag him toward the weigh-in scale. "This
is my passion."
The finalists from each region of the country now
face off later this month for a chance to win 2,000,000 francs ($4,000)
and the extra prestige to their future breeding credentials, said
veterinarian Dr. Mamadou Ba, a consultant for one of the program's
sponsors.
The TV show's Facebook page has nearly 9,000 fans. The
sheer volume of entries and its loyal viewership are testaments to just
how much the Senegalese love their sheep.
As the country has
urbanized, many have kept alive the tradition of sheep raising. It's not
unusual to see them grazing in an urban traffic circle or seeking shade
near cars at a taxi rank.
The TV show "Khar Bii" follows a team
of judges as they make housecalls to scope out potential candidates for
regional finals. Trekking down sandy side streets and up on to rooftops,
the crews set off in search of an animal with both size and composure.
In
one Dakar neighborhood, the "Khar Bii" team ducks under lines of
clothes drying in a courtyard reeking of urine until the ram named
Cherif is brought out of his pen.
A staffer with a face mask uses a
rectal thermometer to be sure the animal is healthy enough for the
competition. It takes a total of four people to keep Cherif still while
they measure him in length.
The finalists from home visits then
square off at regional finals, where one doting owner even brought a
special umbrella to protect his sheep Dogo from the blazing sun
overhead.
"Some people love cats, some people love dogs. Here we
have sheep," says Abou Aziz Mare, 27, who says he spends three to four
hours a day on his terrace with his animals. "I live with him like a
close friend," he says of Dogo.
Samba Fall, 44, keeps seven sheep
at his home in Dakar's Medina neighborhood though his clear favorite is
blue-eyed Papis General Fall.
"He is like my little son," Fall
says, stroking Papis between his horns. "I prefer being with my sheep to
being with people. Sheep don't talk about insignificant things."
Some
sheep in Senegal's capital are fed cardboard cartons to line their
bellies or are forced to scrounge for trash. Fall says he spoils his
sheep by mixing up a medley of corn, millet, beans and sorghum.
"Across the house he hears the pieces dropping into the bowl and comes to find me," he says with a proud smile.
Papis
General Fall is among the nine finalists in one Dakar neighborhood when
he is led out of his pen on a rope and brought past the judges before
being given a bag of food to keep him busy while the other finalists are
trotted out one by one to the loud beats of a drum circle.
An
audience in white plastic lawn chairs waves fans in the heat as the
announcer calls out each animal's measurements and owner's name.
Each
ram competing on "Khar Bii" is graded on a series of physical criteria —
including up to five points awarded for the symmetry of its testicles
and another 5 points possible for the quality of its coat. How well the
sheep marches with his owner is another 10 points.
And overall
size is key: Papis General Fall at 225 pounds (102 kilograms) failed to
advance, and the neighborhood prize went to Alassane — a ram weighing in
at 280 pounds (127 kilograms).
The victor had a snow-white coat
and red collar with his name embroidered in green and yellow letters —
the colors of the Senegalese flag.
Even for the sheep who don't
win cash prizes, there is still plenty of love. Lamine Diop, a
33-year-old post office worker, keeps a photo of Eto'o on his cell
phone.
"I treat him like a brother," Diop says of the animal named
for Cameroonian soccer player Samuel Eto'o. "A sheep is a part of the
family. When the sheep is sick, it's like a member of the family is
sick."
