Dear Family and Friends,
11:45 pm Christmas 2004. Let’s just say it wasn’t my best Christmas ever — although it was certainly the most unusual.
Yesterday, Christmas Eve, got off to a messy start. There was a huge storm during the night whose powerful winds drove rain and mud through the opening around the door of my hut and flooded the entire structure as I soundly slept. I awakened to find two inches of muddy water everywhere. Many of my books, which lay in neat stacks around the perimeter of this place, were ruined, as were most lots of the things stored in cardboard boxes under my cot. Oh well, its just stuff. Fortunately, I’d stored all of the Christmas gifts and goodies in the main house.
What was very nice was the quick mobilization of friends to help me out. A group of folks came over (and mind you this was 5:30 am) as soon as they heard and emptied my hut of every single thing and helped me clean it all up. I felt very taken care of. By noon I was cooking and preparing for the holiday celebration. In the late afternoon one of the Sangomas came over and we packed my saddlebags with food, candy and toys which we delivered to families with children who were too sick to come to my Christmas party. I wished I’d had a pair of reindeer antlers to put on my horse but no one here would have gotten the joke. It was a nice way to end the day.
Christmas morning started out so much like home. Excited young ones were definitely the first up. Just before 5:00 at the very first light, I could hear voices of children outside my hut. I had spent the late evening blowing up balloons and decking my halls as best I could with holiday cheer. It really did look a bit like Santa’s workshop in here. The children were adorable. They formed a very polite long line outside my door. I brought them in a few at a time and let them choose their gift. Everybody got candy and cookies and some small gift. It was really fun. I asked them if they had been good and elicited promises of good study habits and perfect obedience to their parents for the year to come. I felt gently possessed by the spirit of our families favorite Santa, my beloved departed brother- in-law Bill Barnes.
By 8 am there was a pretty big crowd here. Ntate Nena, the father of this house, who was home from his job as a South African mine worker for the holiday asked me to take a photo of this beautiful sheep (ram actually) that was being led around the courtyard. I took several. It was a magnificent animal with graceful curling horns and a gentle face. Then there was a bit of a ceremony as the patriarch of this family said this sheep was for me to formally welcome me to their home and the village. It was a huge gift and I was overwhelmed. I thought, ‘gee, this is great. I’ve got a horse and now this beautiful sheep. I wonder what I should feed it.” There were two Sangomas there (formerly known as witch doctors) both of whom did a sort of a chant and prayer. Then they asked me to say a prayer. I know very few. I recited the Christian Science Statement of Being followed by the Lord’s Prayer. I was feeling very grateful.
Then four big guys took my sheep, pulled it up by it’s legs threw it upon the ground and stuck a dull old knife into it’s neck. It was horrible. It made dreadful sounds as they sawed away at its throat. It took a long time to die. My tendency towards vegetarianism strengthened. I told myself that non-judgmental was the place to be and took photos. They are grisly.
The slaughtering process went on as I watched. Nothing is wasted. This was a very big celebration for this family. Nobody here gets to eat a lot of meat. With solemnity, they handed me, handed me!, the still warm liver. My ever-present tutor and cultural advisor M’e Matjeeka said it was now my honor to cook this for the assembled group. I took the bloody thing into my hut, set aside the mountain of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches I’d made and sliced and fried up these bits of my sheep. It really doesn’t do to get too attached to animals here.
From that point on it just didn’t seem like Christmas anymore. So much here is so strange. There was no recognizable music – just the incessant drumming. It was hot – almost stifling. Few words were spoken in English – I understand so little of what is going on around me. I longed for a real conversation, a Christmas carol, a twinkling light, a flake of snow, another white face.
Many wonderful friends and students from my classes and the project brought their entire families to visit. Some did traditional Basotho Christmas activities mostly centered on chanting prayers and singing. So many came, I really can’t say how many. It seemed like hundreds. I got so tired of it all. My hut was so crowded with sweating bodies – the body odor mixed with frying sheep got to be overwhelming. The children began to seem greedy as they snuck back into line for more presents. Some of them even changed their clothes to be in disguise. People I’d never met came to my house pretty much demanding gifts and food. Some were drunk; they asked for money; they didn’t get it. I did give away tons of stuff. I replenished my PB&J sandwich mountain several times. I cooked various disgusting parts of my sheep. I wished I were home. Twice during this long day I closed up my hut and headed for the mountain where I could get a phone signal but the connections were bad. I’m so happy today is behind me. By the end of the day I could feel myself morphing from the Christmas fairy to the Grinch.
I know I’ll never forget this Christmas but I’m trying to figure out what I’ve learned from it. Maybe nothing. Or perhaps something about how comfortable it is to be within our own culture and how easy it is to dislike that which is foreign to us. I really didn’t like some of these people today. These same Africans who have been so kind and warm and accepting of me today seemed strange and barbaric and seriously lacking in manners. But, being honest, they didn’t do anything that we don’t do. I’ve been to lots of crowded noisy parties that I loved –of course I could understand the language at those and most of the guests had recently bathed. Our kids are sometimes greedy, especially at this time of year. And who doesn’t enjoy a good rack of lamb now and again.
What was basically wrong with today was that it just wasn’t the way it is at home. So it would seem that viewpoint does indeed define our reality and is ultimately useless. It produces our prejudices. Without it we are all the same. So in the universal scheme of things maybe today wasn’t that bad.
I guess that’s just the Zen of it. Forgive this rambling. Tomorrow is another day. I’m hoping it will be a more enlightened one.
Love,
Peggi
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