Cockfighting in Cartagena

Our second to last night in Cartagena, I took Alden with me to a cockfight out in the new town area. On a side street, down a dirt tract lined with motorcycles, through a gate. USD$4 each got us entrance with numbered bracelets. Inside, men bustled about with a cool, casual "afternoon picnic" air that belied the fierce poultry violence to come. Out of a few hundred people, there were only three or four women, looking bored on the arms of boyfriends. We stood out, of course. Alden as a girl, both of us as the only foreigners in the place.

 

The whole event begs boxing analogies. Most people come only to watch and gamble, but those who want to compete bring their roosters with them. The chickens are already plucked/waxed/shaved from legs to butt, have a strip of shortened feathers along the back, and have had their neck feathers trimmed so that when their feathers stand on end, in a fight, the remaining head-feathers will flare out dramatically like a lion`s mane. Inside, each chicken is weighed in a little chicken-sling suspended from the ceiling, complete with chicken-leg-holes so they`re stable. Chickens who`re already checked in are put on display in cages under the roster board and men crowd around using some sort of chicken divination to decide which chicken, as they amble about, pecking at the floor, will be ready for a bit of the old ultra violence come match time.

 

How this chicken divination works is unclear and I found myself wondering, as I watched the crowd shift and shuffle for a better look at the contenders. Some, I imagine, is passed down through the generations, a men-only family secret of chicken pickin`. Others, I like to think, might be more scientific and have a secret, passworded spreadsheet of all chicken types, weights, pre-fight behavior, color, whatever. Maybe they feel the heads for bumps. "That chicken there," one man thinks, "looks kind of wise... like an Oriental master... that will deftly maneuver and use the other chicken`s momentum against it! Yeah, that chicken will be like water, my friend..." Like most gambling, it`s probably simple "feeling." Like most gambling, people`s "systems" are probably a crock of shit, a case of human tendency toward apophenia.

 

After display, and when the chickens are "waiting in the wings" (guffaw), their rear spurs are cut off and the legs wrapped with athletic tape. This is a careful, highly ritualistic process that involves at least a few men in focused concentration, surrounding the taper, watching every solemn wrap. With a good base of tape, a sharp spur is attached by first having its base dipped in hot wax, to make sure the fit and angle are absolutely prefect, and then having more tape wrapped around the top so it is secure. The artificial spurs are about an inch long, sharpened to a fine point, and made of... something. Coconut shell? Some kind of nut? Whatever it is appears organic.

 

In the ring, the two birds, bred from birth for this purpose, have their naked legs and hiney bits rubbed with what I think is wood alcohol, to make them furious. Their spurs are then coated in lime juice and the chickens are held out toward each other by their handlers, excitedly pecking at each other and getting appropriately riled up before being let loose on the arena floor.

 

What follows is a flurry of spikes and feathers, then blood, then bloody feathers and dripping, spraying blood, which culminates, many minutes later, with one bloody, battered chicken giving up and trying to run away from the other. The aggressor gives chase and cinches the win by knocking the now defenseless loser down, biting at its neck, killing it. The winner is held up proudly by its owner, the loser is carefully tossed out of the ring by an aide, blood dripping in a graceful arc, destined to become McNuggets. (Or, here, un plato de pollo con arroz.)

 

I took photos and video footage for anyone interested. Alden and I had ringside seats. Being the only whities, being ringside, the camera`s flash... it was no surprise that the next day, while looking at hats in a shop across town, one of the other customers exclaimed, "Oh! Hey! I saw you at the chicken fight! Last night! Yeah!"