A few times
this last weekend, I had to freeze and smile. We had such a village
weekend….let me try and make you see it.
After a hot
and busy week, I left home on my regular Friday afternoon trip to town. The car
was full: I dropped two men at the hospital- one had fallen out of a tree
cutting firewood (probably cutting the branch he was standing on, again) and needed
stitches, the other man was accompanying him. I call this one the Deaf Man,
because he is always screaming at me as if he thinks I’m deaf or he is trying
to make me deaf. I dropped another to get her hair platted for the upcoming
wedding, and took the third to the local shopping centre to get the baker to
correctly spell the names of the brides and grooms in pink on two shop cakes.
After my chores, I collect them all again. As far as we drove, with the wedding
cakes in the dust and chicken droppings under the seat, the mother of the groom
keeps shouting out the window to her family and friends coming from all over
the country. We had no space for them, but we picked up all their belongings,
and crammed them with the precious cakes. I disposed them all and their bags
and chickens on the site of the upcoming wedding, with loud shouting in our
honour. The six cakes came home with me, and into the fridge, not to arrive at
the wedding in a heap of melted cream.
Middle of
the night, Carl’s phone rings. At least, it felt like middle of the night
because it was still dark. It was a call to arouse the ambulance driver, a lady
is in labour. A loud groan from Carl’s side of the bed, after a really hard
week, makes me offer to do this drive to the hospital. He appreciatively
accepted, and off I went in tomorrow’s work clothes. Outside Deaf Man waits for
me, to take me to his hopelessly under aged wife. Halfway to the patient I turn around, to get
money for diesel, realising I won’t make it back again with the tank
dangerously low. When we finally arrived, there was lots of excited chatter. I
finally figured out, the baby popped out before I made it to their home, which
is just about 600m from our house. I sighed a sigh of relief, always thankful
if I avoided having to deliver a baby in the car.
Whenever
there is a sick person, I arrive at the hut to find a whole crowd. This is no
exception, and two ladies were trying to get the cord tied off with pieces of
wool, torn out of a blanket. Firstly I wrapped the little baby, smiling at the
newborn smell. Then I tried to tie the threads, but they kept snapping. I sent Deaf
Man flying away on his bicycle, while phoning Carl to give him two umbilical
clamps (from my favourite pharmacy where you can buy ANYTHING without a
prescription). When he came back, I tied off the cord and hand mommy her little
girl. Outside I stood still and I appreciated the break of a new day in Africa-
no dust can be seen yet, nor the barren land waiting for the rains, only the
silhouette of the trees with the guinea fowls flying down noisily and the last
stars holding out against the sun. I breathed deeply, and smiled- life is good.
Every child, is a blessing from God. The ladies gathered around me, and promise
me that this little one would be named after me- ulna;) This is only the second
time the ladies around here have attempted to call me by my own name- I am known
as vena Rashelle (mother of Rashelle) or mrs Carlos (wife of Carlos).
They
celebrated all of Saturday night- we could still hear the doom-doom at 3:30.
Surprised that anyone could still be awake to celebrate the actual wedding
ceremony on Sunday afternoon. We came back from church, got dressed for a
wedding, took our 6 cakes, suncream, camping chairs, umbrella, and drove the
600m there. (I promise we would have walked if we didn’t have the cakes.) We
made sure we were at least one and a half hours late. As we arrived we were
watched by every pair of eyes, and shown our place next to the lounge seats
where the couples will sit, once they arrive from town. So, here we are: on two
camping chairs, under an old Unicef tent, with a little umbrella against the
38degree sun (of course, everyone else is sitting in the full blazing sun),
watching people dance. There is still something so primal about the dancing
that I feel I need to avert my eyes, even when the children are dancing. Carl
and I have tried to shake our hips like they do, but have been completely
unsuccessful, of cause not where anyone could actually see us. The same mechanical
beat keeps ringing out, and every time a different group stirred up the dust.
At least someone had the sense to sputter water over everything to settle the
dust.
Finally
three men with whips started driving the curious children back to allow the
wedding party to come through. They got out of some town taxi’s (I couldn’t
see, there were just so many people) and took their place behind the line of
teenage dancers in purple silk dresses and shirts. From this moment everything
and everyone that wanted to pass the dusty courtyard in front of the bridal
tent, would have to do so dancing. Even the bride on the arm of a female
handler came down the ‘aisle’ with a repeating four step move.
This was the weirdest part of the whole day
for me: not even once in the next two hours were the brides allowed to lift
their heads. They kept staring fixedly at their toe tips, with an expression of
total doom. Carl and I kept expecting them to left their heads with some
special ceremony, but they never did.
The whole
afternoon happened in Tonga, so we were stringing together our few words: boy,
girls, Jesus, prayer. At least we knew when to close our eyes. The preacher
preached up a storm for a few minutes, and all we could understand was Jesus,
Jesus, Jesus. Then another man talking in an auctioning voice, got them to feed
one another a bit of the shop cake with their lace gloves, and then kiss one
another. (Actually, now that I think of it, here the brides must have lifted
their heads, but their faces still looked like they saw something really bad.)
After the kiss they sat down with heads down again.
The hardest
to look at was when the knives were brought in to cut the cake. Two knives,
each being brought forward with about 10minutes of extremely sensual dancing,
each. Most bizarre.
Now the
announcement was made that everyone without a gift, needed to leave. So, out
came the whipped men to chase the most of the probably 500 peering guests away.
Two sheets are spread out and all of the remaining guests brought out new
dishes to place on the sheets and lined up for a mouth full of cake. Two cakes
were cut up into literally a couple of hundred pieces. And then suddenly, it was
all over.
We took our
fold up chairs and quietly slipped away. Mother of the house where the wedding was, spotted us,
and followed us to the car with a big plastic bag, Inside was our thanks for
our help- the rib cage of a goat. I will have to google to see what to do with
this one.
We drove
home the full 600m, and slipped into a bath, leaving it completely brown. And
we smile- life is good.
As we were
sitting there, looking at those hundreds of curious faces, it struck me. God
knows every single one of these nameless faces. He planned their days, and
loves them, exactly as much as me. He died for their sins too. How can we tell
them?
Ps. Two
pictures of our visit to a blind school- Malaikha. Was a very interesting
morning, and Simon left with a friend he wants to go back to see.
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