A Night in the Village

My Hostess
and
Her Family

I was anxious. I was scared. I kept telling myself that I had survived 30 hour fasts, having no food, no shelter, sleeping outside in freezing weather, surrounded by 30 teenagers; certainly I could certainly survive this. What was I afraid of? Well, for one -Cockroaches. I hate those things and I was afraid of one crawling on me during the night. That was definitely one fear! The other fears were much more subtle, sometimes silly thoughts. You know the way your mind can wander and play with you before you enter the unknown. “What if they grab me and try to circumcise me.” Female circumcision is real here.

Stephen and I had asked the “chairman” (the man spearheading the committee of villagers who are working with us on the development project in Sakata) if he could find two homes, one for each of us, to stay in for a weekend to try to understand a little more fully what life is like in the village. I took Janet with me as a translator. Stephen relied on the gift of tongues. Unfortunately God never granted him this gift. Fortunately, God did grant him with a host who speaks English very well.

The first night there, my first fear was realized and a second fear introduced. We arrived at the home of our host after dark. She greeted us with a paraffin lantern in hand. Few words were exchanged. The car's tail lights disappeared down the dusty road and darkness enveloped us. Lifting up the lantern, she took me by the hand and led Janet and me into the house. We wound our way between large bags of maize stored in the main room and then she stood at the threshold of another room. This was to be my bedroom for the next two nights. There was nothing in the room. Only a bamboo mat on the floor. No simple bed, no foam mattress, no blankets, nothing! We slid off our shoes and walked across the mat. We placed our small suitcases in a corner of the room and then asked if I could use the toilet before going to sleep. It was clear that everyone was already asleep and that she had no intention of visiting or chatting. Holding the lantern out in front of her, she quickly walked through the house. I stumbled and tripped as I tried to keep up with her. She led us outside the house, through a narrow corridor between darkened buildings, and opened a thin metal sheet door to exit out to the pit-latrine. I could barely see anything. She placed the lantern on the step into the out-house. I could make out a small dark hole in the ground and knew where I had to aim. The curtain blew in with a light breeze. There was no moon. The stars were in abundance.
After being escorted back to the bedroom, we laid down on the mat. Our hostess said goodnight and dropped the thin curtain dividing our room from the rest of the house. As she walked away, she said something in chichewa that I did not understand. Through the pitch black, Janet translated. “She said that if we hear noises during the night, do not be afraid. It’s just the rats.”
Nearby drums celebrated late into the night. I lay on my mat for hours listening. Finally I found sleep. Suddenly something was crawling up my leg. I quickly brushed it off with my foot and pounded the floor with my feet to scare away anything that might be down there. In the morning, I found a big brown cockroach dead, at the bottom of my bamboo matt.
But, I am happy to report that I am still intact and have not been circumcised!

In the village, you can have no agenda. Time slows to a crawl. People walk everywhere. A few have bicycles. There is no electricity. All cooking is done with firewood, pots balance on rocks over a fire. There is no running water. All water is collected by the women at the well. I was awakened before sunrise by women’s voices passing by outside. They were all going in the cool of the day to carry water home to their families. I quickly jumped out of bed. I did not want to miss anything! After using the pit-latrine, my host handed me a bucket. We carried the buckets in our hands to the bore-hole and balanced them on our heads as we walked back home. Any work I did was met with much approval. They think azungus do no work, at least not physical labor. And compared to these people, I am soft. Their bare hands lift boiling hot pots off the fire without a flinch. Small children carry neck-breaking loads on their heads. The children and teachers have a 30 minute walk to school where class sizes are over 80 children. They go with a hoe to the fields to harvest the cassava they will eat for breakfast that morning. They pound the maize in a huge mortar and pistil to make nsima (corn flour made into a pasty patty) for lunch and dinner.

Meal times are simple. We sit on the periphery of a mat outside in the shade. The food is placed in the center. We pass common bowls filled with fish, pumpkin leaf relish and nsima. There are no utensils. We eat with our fingers. They laugh at our clumsy ways. A common cup is passed for drinking as chickens peck the ground around us, hoping for a grain of dropped.

The afternoon is hot! We sit in the shade and trade stories. They want to know how far Americans have to walk to the nearest bore-hole (well). They want to know what we think about the possibility of a black president. They want to know what kind of problems we face. They laugh freely and easily make fun of us. We always have an audience of curious children who have heard that there are azungus in the village.

That night before retiring to my mat, I ask for a story. The son-in-law tells an old folk tale as the light of the lantern flickers from face to face. I sit and relish the moment. Life in the village is simple and unpredictable. the fields need to be hoes and planted yet you do not know how much you will be able to harvest this season. You know when you are going to run out of food but not how you will provide until the next harvest. Your children were plentiful and helpful but you never expected 5 of the 7 to die. Your children lived right next door to you but you never thought you would be raising 7 grandchildren at the age of “at least over 70”. Life in the village is hard!

Yet, there is a beauty and peace beyond words that these people possess. They have riches some of us have somewhere lost. Their families are strong and devoted to one another. The slow pace of life affords them time to laugh, sing and dance. The stresses of the "developed" world are not felt here. The worries they have are of life and death! Life is very fragile.
The challenge for all of us as we enter into this partnership with Sakata will be how to preserve the simplicity and harmony of living while trying to ease the pain of poverty.