February 24, 2007
Sarakosti – the festival of cadis
The basic story of this vaudeville: The cadis [a minor judge in a Muslim community where Islamic law is followed] and his assistants catch any passer by (also extracting them from their houses on occasion) and induce them through all manner of verbal sexual abuse and accusation to give a donation/pay a fine.
If they don’t, and most times even if they do, the caught person is hoisted off his feet by the assistants and symbolically ‘fucked’ by one of the many phallic objects that are at hand for the ceremony, such as a carved broomstick handle that dangles off the cadis’ waistband or the dried gourds displayed on his table. Towards the end the Cadis himself is caught and pelted with flour then forced to ride through the village on a donkey facing backwards and all the villagers throw vegetables and the such at him. The festival lasts the whole day and this year’s cadis was truly remarkable. The symbolism of the scenario was rebellion against Ottoman rule and levy, the sexual symbolism is an older thing entirely, I imagine.
The final act is a dance beneath a hung effigy of the Cadis.
There is some controversy associated with this festival in as much as the local priest was forbidden by the patriarch to conduct a church service when it was discovered that this would take place in the village.
Sarakosti is the 40 days of fasting before Easter. This marks the beginning of it and the end of a series of celebrations in the run up to lent.
