We aren't just any old animal farm with pigs and hens and goat. We are THE animal farm. 

Old Roger has said that for as long as there are humans who eat meat, the farm would always be in business. The highlight of the farm depends on what season it is. During Christmas and Thankgiving -turkey and pigs, during the Eid celebrations chicken and ram. The farmer caters to all sorts. 

Now we who are grown and fattened for the season love it. We are fed well, not used for manual labour on the farm and groomed too. This we know is a requirement by the people who buy us as per their religious rules. So we are treated very well. 

Then we see the world. From our little farm out in the hicksville we are transported to all parts of the country. From busy market places to  makeshift trading posts - we are sold or bartered to the family that will take us home. 

But we are not all so lucky. Every once in a while, a few of us don't get sold or bartered and will have to be returned to the farm. For us, there is no greater tragedy than being a "Reject". According to the whispers, Old Roger was a reject from last year. He has rope injuries on his hind legs and wobbles when we walks. He always has his head down and only really looks alive when he is telling of the tales of his journey around the county. But the inevitable usually happens. One of the young sheep in their innocence asks: "It sounds so wonderful... Why did you ever return?” And then Old Roger would return to his default deadpan self. Our mothers would tell us to be good when we were young or end up a Reject. That, for us, was the boogeyman under the bed. 

The big day came. A week to the Eid festival, we were all shipped to our trade posts. I was taken to a market in a place called Kaduna. The road had been a wonder to behold. All those lands and open spaces- with no fences or barriers. When we went into the bigger towns and cities making drop-offs, i smelled the strangest smells and saw the most colourful of places. We all looked out the gaps of the trailer and marvelled at the things we saw and heard. 

Eventually I was dropped off myself. But life wasn't as easy as we had thought. The flock from our farm were kept in paddocks next to flocks from other farms and there was a lot of rivalry and competition as our human owners tried to woo the customers by offering the best prices and claiming that their animals had the best look. It wasn't looking good for our farm because up until a day to the Eid festival, only 9 of us had been sold. We were all starting to worry and young Albert was downright mopey because his chances were even slimmer being as small of stature as he was. But remarkably, he was the next of us to be sold. I overheard the humans say that the economy has been terrible and the currency of the nation had been greatly devalued therefore most customers couldn't afford the high prices of goods anymore. This didn't bode well for us. 

On the morning of the Eid festival I saw a little human girl looking through the paddock holes at us - as we lay sad and dejected. The farmer had said the night before that we would have to all go back to the farm. We were all to be Rejects. But the little girl.. she looked what the humans would call “cute”. When our eyes locked she smiled at me so I let her try to touch my ears. Then she pulled away and ran off only to return with an adult human male. She pointed to me and said "Daddy let's take this one." 

So they were last minute buyers then? But the way the older man looked me over, I knew he wouldn't want me so I didn't even bother getting up to preen for his attention. But the little girl was relentless. She stamped down her foot and declared that they would take me or no other. The farmer, seeing a possible sale, came over and started negotiating prices with the human man. The farmer is a professional haggler and finally a price was agreed upon. It was much higher than the price the farmer had hoped to get for any one of us this late in the day. I know because I had heard him and this foreman talking before. The farmer would have accepted up to half the price the human man paid. Maybe now he will finally be able to afford to send his youngest daughter to school. This has always been a bone of contention between the farmer and his wife, who has always insisted that their daughter be sent to school even with the farmer arguing that he couldn't afford the extra expense. My mother used to say that it was unnatural for me to listen to the humans talk but they have always fascinated me. Especially their love and devotion to money. I still do not get it. I have seen money before, it doesn't even look all that delicious to me but I guess to each his own. 

The foreman collared me and I was loaded into the delivery vehicle they aptly called a 'pickup' that would take me to the home of the humans who had bought me. As the little girl walked by me, she smiled her victory as if we were in cahoots. I had to appreciate her gusto. 

I see that the butcher is there already sharpening his knives and preparing his equipment. When I am brought to him, he looks me over with a critical eye and gives out instructions for how I should be held down. They needn’t bother, today I won't be going anywhere. The human man is given the knife to make the first cut and I hear him telling someone to take his daughter away. But my little defender would not have that so instead she ran forward to stand in my line of vision and stomped her foot again. Her father grudgingly subsides and she smiled that smile of hers again. 

I didn't hear her father respond and I don't even know if he did. My last thought was that she had named me after a damn goat.