Dustin Hoffman: Stupid ass camel! He’d rather sit there and die. Warren Beatty: You know, I kind of admire that.
-Ishtar, Hollywood’s biggest critical and box office flop, lost $40 million on a $71 million budget
We didn’t let the lame camel in our dabouka just sit there and die. We slaughtered it before its last breath so we could butcher and eat it halal style. I knew about the gauchos on the pampa, that for lunch they would kill a beef and cut out its heart for an anticucho a la parrilla and leave the rest for the vultures. On the trail we were hungry for the meat we were driving and riding, but in a dabouka of 100 head, each camel was worth one percent of a life’s fortune, not quite $71 million but near the Sudanese equivalent, and you don’t eat a meal worth a fortune just because you’re hungry. So first it had to be near death, and when it was we ate it raw.
Photo ©David Melody