Chicken hell, and why I'm going to strengthen my vegetarian convictions

Today I found out where the bad chickens go. Half of me was screaming, oh, the poor chickens! and the other half was on red alert, klaxons blaring, "Bird flu! Bird flu! Bird flu!" Just another day in the market...a bored Chinese man in filthy clothes with a cigarette hanging between his lips grabbed my host mom's choice of poultry by the wings, hauled it out of a miniscule cage where it and its unhappy compadres wallowed in excrement, tossed it onto the scale, and without a single qualm slit its throat and tossed it behind a wall to flop itself to death. When the sounds of the hen's last death struggles died away, with ruthless efficiency, he and his gory partner defeathered and gutted it. I turned away for a sec to see my six year old host sister playing with equally miserable carp in the next stall, only to have my attention redirected to the chicken scene by my host mom saying, Oh look, Xiao Dan, there's still an egg inside! Sure enough, in the de-gutting process, a fresh egg had surfaced.

I also saw the cabbage seller woman wash her hands in the fish tank. Bon apetite!

On the way home I asked if she was worried about bird flu. "Oh no, in China we don't have that. Don't worry, relax. This chicken is very fresh. Last year there was bird flu, this year no problem."

I have a riddle for you. What do sketchy butchered chickens, tap water, and carrots have in common?

Yin-yang.