...but DON'T EAT THE FISH!
Posted on 07/11/2007 7:59:45 AM PDT by DogByte6RER
River's abundance of corpses ruins Iraqis' appetite for carp
REUTERS
July 11, 2007
BAGHDAD – River fish are off the menu in Baghdad.
Dead bodies frequently pulled from the River Tigris have dulled the Iraqi capital's appetite for masqouf, its popular dish of grilled carp, after it was reported that clerics had warned that the fish dined on rotting corpses.
“They spread rumors about the fish, that they eat the bodies of drowned people, but this is just a rumor,” said fisherman Hussein Ahmed, 62, after setting his nets within sight of the heavily fortified Green Zone compound on the banks of the Tigris.
Scores of corpses turn up every week in Baghdad, victims of unrelenting violence between majority Shiites and minority Sunni Arabs.
Many are dumped in the Tigris, which flows through the heart of the city and was once lined with restaurants specializing in the masqouf people loved to eat on Friday nights. Most riverfront eateries closed after they became magnets for insurgents' bomb attacks.
A fatwa, or religious edict, forbidding Iraqis to eat fish from the Tigris was reported by Iraqi media recently, but tracing its original source has been tricky. Prominent Shiite clerics in the holy southern city of Najaf yesterday denied any knowledge of the edict. Officials from the government office representing imams who run Iraq's Sunni mosques were not available for comment.
(Excerpt) Read more at signonsandiego.com ...
"Carp Bites Man!"
...but DON'T EAT THE FISH!
I’m not certain I would eat fish from that water either...
They are right to be carping about this. It’s a very fishy situation. The gillings must stop!
Stick with the falafel and hummus.
Don’t be so koi..........the scales of justice will balance eventually.......
Muslim clerics would carp about anything.
Take a fish head, to the movies... don’t have to pay, to get it in....
When those insurgents say you’re gonna sleep with the fishes, they really mean it.
“..warned that the fish dined on rotting corpses.”
And...? Don’t Muslims thrive on rotting corpses? What’s the concept, cut out the middleman?
“if, then, the son of Saturn has vouchsafed it to you to destroy all the Iraqis, at any rate drive them out of my stream, and do your grim work on land. My fair waters are now filled with corpses, nor can I find any channel by which I may pour myself into the sea for I am choked with dead, and yet you go on mercilessly slaying. I am in despair, therefore, O captain of your host, trouble me no further.”
(Apologies to Homer, The Iliad, Book XXI)
I haven't had mazqouf in a while (although I think it's delicious) and I believe I'll refrain for the foreseeable future. ;-)
I believe there are three species of Carp, two are grazers of aquatic grasses and the most common eats everything that floats by its sucker mouth. Carp found in America and Iraq are omnivores and indeed would eat on bodies and sewage biosolids. Carp was imported in America to clean streams and eat grass that fouls Florida waterways, but soon became a pest.
Carp is very bony and tastes muddy. If you must eat it, it is best smoked. (the common Carp, I’ve never sampled Silver Carp)
One is a scum sucking, bottom feeder. The other is a fish !
Ba-dum-dum.
Thank you very much. I’ll be here all week.
Try the liver...tip your waitress.
it is best smoked.
I have tried but can’t keep them lit.
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