Hi everyone,
After two incredible months, countless adventures and new challenges, a tediously long plane ride, and a brief bout with gastric E-coli (from which I am now fully recovered), I am back in the US. I got back on Tuesday, July 5th and am starting to settle back into life at home. I am sorry I did not post very many updates during my last few weeks in South Africa. The end of our stay in Manguzi was a whirlwind, and for most of our final week of travel with the rest of the Robertson group, I did not have internet access or time to write. But fear not, I still have lots more to share about my experiences in South Africa. I will continue to post creative writing pieces, pictures, stories, and reflections, so feel free to keep reading J
Ngiyabonga umgani! (Thank you friend in isiZulu)
Tori
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Shared Songs and Understanding
Thursday, June 16, 2011
The lights flickered and went out. I sighed and kept stirring the mashed potatoes. Lauren and I were at the stove, putting the finishing touches on the meal we were preparing for our host family.
The lights blinked on, starting the sounds of water boiling and the house humming with electric energy. Elizabeth started to cheer, “Yaa-ay..,” but before she could finish the power quickly went out again, throwing the house into darkness. The process continued several times before we decided the power really wasn’t coming back on.
“Ohh well. At least we finished cooking,” I said as I turned off the stove and took the potatoes off the hot burner. Elizabeth laughed, “Too bad we are missing Scandal! though.” We were all a little disappointed about that. Every night we tried to finish cooking by 7:30pm, so we could watch this South African soap opera together. It is our host family’s favorite show, and Elizabeth, Lauren, and I had grown quite fond of it. Soap operas here air Monday to Thursday in the evenings. The immensely popular shows are an interesting reflection of the diversity of South Africa. The shows have a variety of different story lines and characters who speak in English, isiZulu, and Afrikaans, catering to different South African ethnic groups. Luckily, the English subtitles throughout the show make it possible for me to understand everything.
“Phila,” Lauren called to our nine-year-old host brother. “Come here, boo. Bring the phone, and we can go find flash lights.” The two of them disappeared down the hall, followed by the glowing light of the cell phone. Armed with flash lights we began serving dinner. We had made chicken with chakalaka (a tasty South African sauce with spices and lots of vegetables), garlic mashed potatoes, and sautéed onions, peppers, carrots, and tomatoes. Our host sister Fanele had dug up a few candles, which cast a soft glow over the room. Nqobile and Lauren were seated on couches facing each other across the room, a candle on the table between them.
“Nqo,” she looked up as Lauren got her attention. “Its almost like we are on a date.” Everyone in the room laughed.
Nqobile’s name starts with one of the many Zulu clicks, which felt so foreign when I first arrived here. My tongue was unaccustomed to making noises like that. After considerable practice, I mastered Nqobile’s name, which was definitely one clicking word I needed to learn. It was a particularly good word to learn because Nqobile is the South African version my name, meaning victory in isiZulu. In Zulu culture, names are beautiful and full of meaning, having direct translations that many English names lack. The children in our house, Phila and Fanele, have names that mean “we have to live and be many” and “you have to thank God” respectively.
We lounged in the kitchen with Phila and Fanele. The meal was finished and dishes were cleared away in the kitchen. We didn’t have running water and used buckets of rainwater to wash the dishes by hand in the sink. The sink was divided in half, one dirty sink where dishes were sudzed up scrubbed and another clean sink where dishes were rinsed and put in the drying rack. We didn’t need power to do the dishes but had decided to wait to do them until the power came back on, and we could see better.
Phila had his face buried in the couch, muffling the sounds of the song he was humming. You could call Phila shy, but a man of few words would probably be a more appropriate description. The quick-footed soccer star rarely answered our questions with more than a word, if he answered them at all. It wasn’t until Fanele suggested it that we realized that his quietness with us was because he is not very comfortable speaking English, particularly in comparison with the talkative Fanele. Earlier in the evening during dinner Phila had made a comment that had everyone laughing.
Our host Mama turned to us. “Do you know what Phila said?” We shook our heads. “He said it is hard to eat your dinner with a fork.” Phila looked at her before turning his gaze back to his plate, giggling but a little self-conscious none the less.
“I’m sorry, Phila! Of course you can use a spoon. I’m sorry we did not think to get you one.” I looked at him apologetically, hoping he wasn’t too embarrassed.
“Here boo,” Lauren cooed. She walked purposefully out of the kitchen and handed Phila a spoon, which he happily accepted. The spoon was one of many examples of the countless cultural differences small and large we encountered every day. It was impossible to recognize and learn about all of them. That wasn’t the point anyway. Instead we needed to be willing to admit our cultural blunders and rectify them when we could. Luckily our utensil choice was an easy problem to fix.
After dinner was finished and the dishes cleared away, Elizabeth, Lauren, and I sat around the living room with Fanele, Phila, and Zodwa. Mama and Nqobile had gone outside, probably to check on the power and their mother who we affectionately called Ma Agnes. Ma Agnes was a tough, dignified older woman with wrinkled skin and thoughtful eyes. She was thin but by no means frail. On several occasions I had been shocked to see her walking home with a giant jug of water balanced nonchalantly on her head. It took me considerable effort to carry these jugs to the house, so sixty something year old Ma Agnes’s ability to carry these heavy jugs on her head baffled me. She certainly was a remarkable woman. She spent most of her days cooking and sitting on a straw mat outside of her house. She sat draped in mix matched cloth, chatting with the peg-legged Mr. Cross and her other friends while drinking beer or shucking peanuts for samp (a delicious Zulu dish with peanuts cooked to a soft consistency). Ma Agnes was a woman who had seen her country transformed. Born black under the strict, legislated inequality and injustice of apartheid, Ma Agnes had been barred from many opportunities. She had undoubtedly suffered considerably as a result of apartheid, a system designed and orchestrated by white people. Yet despite the tumultuous past she had endured, Ma Agnes welcomed Elizabeth and I, white Americans, into her home. Each day we walked by her on our way to and from the hospital. Neither of us spoke more than a few words of the other’s language, but we communicated none the less, smiling, giving each other hugs, searching our brains hopefully for words the other might know. Ma Agnes was the proud matriarch of a large and successful family. I respected her greatly and only wished we could have talked about her great multitude of life experiences.
“Hmm, hmmmm, hmm” Phila hummed into the couch, his face buried in a cushion.
“What are you singing, Phila?” Elizabeth asked. “That sounds familiar.” Phila did not answer, choosing instead to flash his usual bashful smile. I looked at Fanele. “Do you know the song he is singing?”
“Yes.”
“Can you sing it with him?” Fanele looked at me, her eyes gleaming with a bit of false modesty. Fanele was shy about it but was a great singer. Often when the house was quite or while she was chopping vegetables she would sing top American or South African hits or some of the gospel songs her Mama was so found of. When Lauren, Elizabeth, and I had come from work earlier that day, Fanele had organized a singing game for all of us. She made a numbered list of popular singers. Lauren, Zodwa, Phila, Elizabeth, and I had to pick numbers and then sing songs by those artists. Elizabeth and I quickly discovered that we didn’t actually know the words to many of the songs, but Lauren, who has a beautiful voice, helped us out. Fanele judged and scored the whole competition. My rendition of the Michael Jackson song “Billy Jean” earned me second place, behind Lauren.
“Tsamina mina eh eh” Fanele had overcome her hesitation and started singing. “Waka waka eh eh.” We all joined in. This Shakira song was one of the anthems of the 2010 FIFA World Cup and had been nearly as popular in the US as it was here in the cup’s host country South Africa. Armed with words that had traveled around the world, our voices joined together. “Tsamina mina zangalewa. This time for Africa!”
