Tuesday, May 10, 2005
Sunday, May 8th
Clearly the bloom is off the rose. I realized that this morning when I choose to ride my bike to town on the macadam road instead of taking the scenic back way with its unimpeded view of the valley leading down to the lake, big rocks, goats and cows, and the dukas with the women selling papayas, oranges, bananas, limes, cabbage, spinach, tomatoes, avocados, mangos, pineapples, yams, cassava, onions, fish...
It was a beautiful morning. Cool. Bright blue sky behind broken clouds shielding the morning sun. I had plenty of time. I didn’t want to work up a sweat on the way to the Gurdwara. It was just... well... the beauty of it and the african-ness of it wasn’t enough of an attraction this morning. And yeah, going the back way I know I will have a lot more kids shouting MAZUNGU MAZUNGU at me, and it still does bother me. A lot. You are never allowed to forget that you are an alien, here.
Still, it was a nice ride and I arrived early at the Gurdwara, the first person to take a place, crosslegged, on the mat to listen to the Guru singing songs of praise in a minor key accompanied by the harmonium and tambor. I decided that a big reason why I like this music so much is that in addition to being so different, it is intelligent, adult music and that seems so rare here.
In the afternoon I walked over to the compound of the White Fathers to talk with Father Martin. Five days a week he drives over to the Bujora Museum where he works on collecting, preserving and presenting Sukuma culture and oversees the Museum. He was very glad to hear that my family will be visiting overnight on August 9th, and we talked about the activities. I forgot to mention a campfire, but that should be part of it for sure. We did talk about native dancing, and apparently the dance troupe typically ends with a snake dance. Father Martin described in quite some detail how they handle the pythons, which are up to 5 meters long and quite strong. They are fed a chicken a week, and it must be a live chicken. It gets completely crushed before being swallowed whole, and you can follow its progress through the snake. Cluck, cluck.
There were a bunch of noisy monkeys outside while we talked. Cute little things, white with black faces. The same ones I see now and then when I climb the hill to watch the sunset. Fa. Martin first came to this area in 1961, the year Tanzania got its independence. He says at that time there were lots of baboons in the area then too, and many hyenas. The hyenas were killed off with the poison used in the cotton fields, but some are now coming back – I’ve heard sounds at night that people tell me are hyena calls. Fa. Martin says farmers are glad to see a few hyenas return, because they control the wild pigs that otherwise tear up their crops. I’ve never seen a wild pig around here. But then, I’ve never seen a snake around here either, and they say there are a lot of them.
Clearly the bloom is off the rose. I realized that this morning when I choose to ride my bike to town on the macadam road instead of taking the scenic back way with its unimpeded view of the valley leading down to the lake, big rocks, goats and cows, and the dukas with the women selling papayas, oranges, bananas, limes, cabbage, spinach, tomatoes, avocados, mangos, pineapples, yams, cassava, onions, fish...
It was a beautiful morning. Cool. Bright blue sky behind broken clouds shielding the morning sun. I had plenty of time. I didn’t want to work up a sweat on the way to the Gurdwara. It was just... well... the beauty of it and the african-ness of it wasn’t enough of an attraction this morning. And yeah, going the back way I know I will have a lot more kids shouting MAZUNGU MAZUNGU at me, and it still does bother me. A lot. You are never allowed to forget that you are an alien, here.
Still, it was a nice ride and I arrived early at the Gurdwara, the first person to take a place, crosslegged, on the mat to listen to the Guru singing songs of praise in a minor key accompanied by the harmonium and tambor. I decided that a big reason why I like this music so much is that in addition to being so different, it is intelligent, adult music and that seems so rare here.
In the afternoon I walked over to the compound of the White Fathers to talk with Father Martin. Five days a week he drives over to the Bujora Museum where he works on collecting, preserving and presenting Sukuma culture and oversees the Museum. He was very glad to hear that my family will be visiting overnight on August 9th, and we talked about the activities. I forgot to mention a campfire, but that should be part of it for sure. We did talk about native dancing, and apparently the dance troupe typically ends with a snake dance. Father Martin described in quite some detail how they handle the pythons, which are up to 5 meters long and quite strong. They are fed a chicken a week, and it must be a live chicken. It gets completely crushed before being swallowed whole, and you can follow its progress through the snake. Cluck, cluck.
There were a bunch of noisy monkeys outside while we talked. Cute little things, white with black faces. The same ones I see now and then when I climb the hill to watch the sunset. Fa. Martin first came to this area in 1961, the year Tanzania got its independence. He says at that time there were lots of baboons in the area then too, and many hyenas. The hyenas were killed off with the poison used in the cotton fields, but some are now coming back – I’ve heard sounds at night that people tell me are hyena calls. Fa. Martin says farmers are glad to see a few hyenas return, because they control the wild pigs that otherwise tear up their crops. I’ve never seen a wild pig around here. But then, I’ve never seen a snake around here either, and they say there are a lot of them.
