María Lusa

- That was a hell of a tough drive back! I shouted as I stepped down from my old Taunus
- Lot of mud in the road, eh? asked Negrita
- Yeah, and with such a small rain! I kept complaining

- Take a break and have a mate. You seem to need it.
- Ok, I´m still shaking, I told the cow while turning on the stove. By the way, I passed your friend María Lusa while coming here but I couldn´t stop the car without the chance of getting stuck. I just waived at her. She seemed to be heading into town.

- I know. She greeted us good bye this morning because she´s on her way to find her roots.
- What do you mean?
- Actually, she always had that urge but was postponing the trip until she read a recent article on genetic hoof-prints. She wants a mitochondrial DNA exam.

- Why? What for?, I asked very intrigued
- When she was brought from the North as a very young calf she looked like any of the kids around but as months passed she grew differently. Her head was shorter and broader and she began to show horns.
- Go ahead, Negrita.
- Well, those horns drove her crazy. None of us here have them.
- So what? It´s natural that you don´t have horns, you´re an Aberdeen Angus. I still don´t get it.
- That´s the point. It´s easy to feel comfortable when you know like I do where you´re coming from. Just because of my lack of horns I can trace my ancestors all the way up to the first founder cow, Black Meg, crossed in Scotland between Angusshire and Aberdeenshire in the 19th century.
- Sorry Negrita, I think that´s a very self-limiting belief. Are you going to tell me that you see the pastures greener because you know you´re an Angus?
- No, that´s not the po..., tried Negrita
- If she had shared that feeling with me, I interrupted her, I would have told her the name of her town of origin, the truck that brought her here, the name of her parents, anything I know! Or I could have helped her investigate more... Anyway, why should anybody feel more or less happy just because of their race?

- Moooo! Stop and listen to me 99! She knows where she came from and all those things you mention. She knows she came from Brazil. Her problem are those horns. One large horn growing outward and bending down and the other short, going forward and then pointing upward... That´s very confusing. She wants to know at least if she´s a Bo Taurus or a Bo Indicus.
- Brazilian cattle came from Portugal. Isn´t that enough? We all have short family trees in South America... no more than a couple of generations. What´s the difference?
- I know. But you can´t blame her for wanting to know how her own offspring are going to be able to deal with heat, cold, hunger, thirst, diseases, how deep is her genetic reservoir. If she comes from the 16th century "pé-duro" that the Conquistadores brought at first is one thing. A very different thing is if she´s an Alentejana, Barrosã, Mirandesa, Alistana, Tudanca, Mertolenga, etc. any 19th century breed migration.

- Ok. I´m sorry. I´m so used to people using racist comments that I thought you guys were into that too.
- Oh no! We don´t care about that. We care about life, 99
- ... you scared me... I thought you had identity problems... Chau Negrita, my water is boiling...
- Chau 99, and please calm down.