Village Visit

Im tired, aching all over and sweating as I stare at the screen for literary inspiration. No Im not sick. Im smiling inside and out as I listen to a recording of the singing I heard today. The sounds of the womens harmonies and exuberant...beatboxing?! is reminding my poor muscles of the dancing and hours of sitting bolt upright-both legs outstretched (hello stomach muscles!) -which in turn is pushing all words from my mind.

My day started at 4.55am when I woke from restless sleep in anticipation of our 6am departure to visit the villages. I was going out to the villages!!! So exciting!! I had been allowed to tag along as the 'driver', so I had packed a lunch of bananas, a boiled egg and a cob of maize for each of my passengers (my language helper included) and was ready to go, armed with hat, sunscreen, umbrella, chitenje, camera, voice recorder, tp, money, phone, panadol, hand wipes, bottle of water...no wonder the locals look at us with amusement!

The roads are usually much clearer of the pedestrian, animalian and assortment of 2-6 wheel moving devices early in the mornings, but even since my last trip to Blantyre, the grass has grown tall and dense with the wet wheather and now stands 6-10ft tall - obscuring all view of oncoming traffic and forcing the pedestrian minority who don't normally walk on the road- to walk on the road. It had also been raining most of the night, so we came across a few places where whole villages had moved to the road as their villages were turned to swirling rivers. Nearby the bridge wasn't down- but a policeman waved me to slow down and there were branches indicating no driving on the right half and a huge crowd enthralled by what was happening under the bridge- so i said a prayer, held my breath- and chose to never know how little of the foundations/bank was actually left.

Turning off the main road we picked up another 2 passangers and proceeded to our first village (1 of 6). We pulled up and waited under a mango tree while someone went off and came back sometime later with several women. A lot of talking went on and it was communicated to me that there was a funeral, so we could come back next week.

Arriving early at the next village(2 of 6) everyone was still in their gardens so we walked and slipped our way along muddy tracks to find them and let them know we had arrived. The women laid out mats under a shady mango tree (it had stopped raining) and commenced singing. I can't explain the harmony, the gutteral rythms, the myriad of colours of their chitenjes and loose blouses, their weather beaten faces and huge, welcoming smiles. (At this point I stopped to try and figure out how to download a recorded file of their singing on to my computer, so i could upload it for you...but I managed to push the unproteced 're-format device' button, thus deleting all music files, 3 weeks of language lessons and the women singing in about...2 seconds. So I went to bed and slept like a log).

Back to the story...the women seem to have a selection of songs with lyrics that can be amended for the situation, so the first verse was about waiting for everyone to join the meeting that would be starting soon, the second was about how happy they were to have an unexpected visitor and they wanted to welcome the lady (me), the third verse was about how the visitors lived in Mangochi, but their hearts were here with the people, the fourth verse was about how they hoped the visitors would help them with thier hunger and contribute to their many needs, the fifth verse was about how one of the ladies was upset because her friends had gone to Mangochi without telling her, so now she was attending the meeting here instead of with her other friends because she was angry at them.... and so on, with one or two women taking turns to sing the new verse and others coming in over the top with harmonies and intricate breath-rythms. The fast beat is maintained through the whole song/selection of songs by the dancing (upperbody)- even if no-one is keeping it vocally. The rythm is in their blood and they all know when to put their heads down and ...grunt/growl in unison between each verse. Now you can see why uploading a sound file would have been a whole lot easier! At one stage we stood up and did a shuffle dance in a circle facing each other, shoulders rubbing, swinging our bent arms in time. It was so cool.

Oh dear- Im only up to village 2- speed version: At village 3 of 6 we were sat on plastic chairs and served 'utobwa' while the women sang and the meeting progressed. Utobwa looks and tastes rather a lot like a cross between vomit and yoghurt, but luckily for me its dairy free! Its a drink made from boiled millet and maize, fermented for a 2 days with sugar added to make a thick, creamy pink coloured liquid that smells...like it tastes. I was entertained for the rest of the day following the path of the utobwa through my digestive system.

Village 4 of 6, the women were waiting for us and formed a singing welcoming committee to walk us from the road into the village. I ahd an elderly lady take one hand, another woman take the other- then they disagreed about where I should sit and I was stuck! :) this village had a lot of younger mothers and babies everywhere- suckling and sleeping tied to their mothers backs-or dragged around by the younger children. The theme at every village was 'we are hungry', but at this village, one of the women asked Swa- to translate and aimed the request directly at me- please help. we have run out of food. The harvest is still months away. Perhaps Allah has provided you to help us. Will you help us? Baba Mo- explained that this was the case in every village and I personally couldn't help everyone, but we would take the message back to Mangochi and see what could be done. its hard.

Village 5 of 6 was inaccessible due to flood damage, and there seemed to be a disgreement of some sort at village 6 of 6 which the whole village turned out to see and add their bit. We left at 5.30 and made it back to Mangochi almost on 7pm- tired, happy and mentally preparing myself to do it all again next Thursday.