Nc-wala

  Hello friends and family! Blog entry three.  I think that means I am officially a blogger. I am already imagining my growing cadre of fans.

I had meant to elaborate on my experience in the field in this entry, but amazing events have made me push it back a bit. Last weekend I undertook an epic journey to the Nc–wala festival in Chipata, a town about  7 hours north of Lusaka. I say epic because the entire thing involved little sleep, no showers, and a terrifying bus ride. However, it was one of the most rewarding spontaneous trips in my life.

My roommate Casey getting wild

I was accompanied on this journey by my equally crazy and adventurous roommate Casey and my work mate and friend from Boston, Alla. We each packed a small back pack Friday and departed for a party at our friend’s house, which somehow ended up looking more like a masquerade than a chilled out dinner party. Our bus departed at 4:00 am, so at that point it is really not worth going to bed.  We proceeded to board a seven hour bus to Chipata 3:00 am.  Seeing as we had wet hair from a dip in the pool, were covered in glittery things, and were perhaps a bit too giggly, I would rate that particular moment as a Triple Muzungu Effect moment. 

This was my first bus ride in Africa, I learned a couple rules governing the operation of these vehicles.  If it is dark, that obviously means that you have to drive in the middle of the road. Since you are in a top-heavy bus,  that clearly indicates that you should actually speed up when going around turns.  And, last but not least, if is pouring rain at 4:30 in the morning and you can’t see the road ahead of you, that means accelerate.  God and I re-united in the early hours of that bus ride. I also learned the reason the seats under the vents were empty were because the rest of the bus knew that in the pouring rain, vents leak. A lot.  Thus you have Alla and I (Casey having done the wise thing of putting herself out of her misery by going to sleep) with a rain coat and chitenge over our heads, hiding from the rain on the bus, and praying for our lives. Damn muzungus.  Despite all of our preparations to sleep on the bus (namely, alcohol) there was no sleeping for the first three hours.

I woke up to be dropped in the middle of a field with thousands of people and tents. We drag our poor selves to find a bathroom, and are led to a port-o- potty. Now, I have dealt with port-o-potties before.  In fact, the difference between an African festival port-o-potty and a port-o-potty found at a Phish show is merely the color. Alas, shit is shit. However, this being Africa, the birthplace of the majority of microscopic beasties, we decided to take our chances in the bush.  We confidently wandered into a weird, overgrown cemetery. Of course, it turned out to served the same purpose as the port-o-potties.  It’s amazing how acclimated I have become to the smell of poop.  Family germophobes, I can almost see you cringing.

Anyways, after changing, deodorizing, and waking up a bit in this weird overgrown cemetery/potty in the bush, we walk into the festival.  We are clearly in the drinking section, which inspires me to say a little word about a thing called Shake Shake. Shake Shake is the local, cheap alcohol. It comes in a milk carton. It is made by essentially putting mealie meal and water in a hollowed out gourd and letting it sit for a couple of days.  Apparently mealie meal is considered a staple for more than just its nutritional value. It somehow ferments and turns alcoholic.  It unfortunately also starts to smell like puke. Strongly. And it is thick and white.  I am literally nauseous just thinking about it. So when you see someone totally drunk with white stuff spilled down their front, you really don't know what it is. Everyone was drinking Shake Shake.

I don't think these would make it past customs.

Now a little more context about Nc-wala (pronounced Nich- wala.) Nc-wala is a harvest festival of the Ngoni people in the Eastern Province of Zambia. I essentially went because they sacrifice a cow by stabbing it and the paramount chief drinks its blood.  How could I miss it? And to think I was once a vegetarian…The Ngoni do these tribal dances and dress in traditional tribal dress.  They wear headdresses and skirts made of pelts.  The pelts they use were often of cheetah, zebra, and other animals that were clearly illegal and poached. You can see some in the pictures.  So the attendees at the festival were all wearing these pelt head dresses in celebration of Nc-wala.

Being three Muzungu girls, we were stopped about 2 minutes after entering the festival by a couple of young Zambian men, and being the nice ladies that we are, we started talking with them.  Before you know it the cameras are out and we are taking pictures with absolutely everyone and wearing their headdresses.  We make friends in particular with these two guys that seem at least half sober and not as obnoxiously hitting on us.

Just at this moment it starts to pour.  Of course none of us actually brought our rain jackets to the middle of the African countryside during the rainy season, so we dash for cover. The problem was that so did everyone else. After nearly getting knocked down in the shoving that occurred to get under a roof, our new friends guided us to the police tent and spoke with the police.  Muzungu Effect: We are allowed to stand under the police tent while everyone else gets wet. Did I feel a little bad?  Yes. Was Casey wearing a white silk shirt that really would have looked rather thin when wet? Yes. So we stayed in the police tent with the “prisoners” from the festival and some guy bleeding from the head that walked in. This seemed completely normal.

The rain let up and we try to go over the actual ceremony, which takes place within a walled yard. We go to the first doorway and are denied entrance by members of the Zambian military.  We go to the second entrance, and our new guides get in through the guards to find one of his friends working in the press. He gets us in! Yes! At this point, the cameras are out. We work the camera thing and are soon ushered up front to take pictures.  Alla has a big digital camera, and before you know it she had gone right up to the press only area and was ten feet away from President Rupiah Banda taking pictures! She made friends with a press agent, and suddenly we were ushered front and center. Muzungu Effect. We were treated like press, and we didn’t dissuade anybody. We must have been in front of thousands of people, taking premium pictures. 

Awesome. 

Ngoni in traditional dress

 But it just gets better. On both sides of the stage are hundreds of Ngoni in full tribal dress. They see us taking pictures, and they want theirs’ taken. The ability to see their pictures on the screen is just too much fun.  Soon we are taking pictures among the crowd of people actually taking part in the ceremony.  We were there for about 45 minutes snapping pictures and joking across the language barrier. It was by far the most amazing experience I have had in Zambia to date. You can see from the pictures that the women are topless. Only older women are allowed to expose their breasts. If a woman can still produce milk, it is inappropriate to show them. It is only after one is done having children that this becomes acceptable. 

 

Digital camera = lots of friends

                              

After we get tired of pictures, we get back to our press spots in time to catch the final dance. Again, as close as we can be. I was self-conscious because we are being watched by so many people. I have amazing video footage, but I do not have the patience to upload them.

After all of this, the bull had yet to be killed. We were front and center but couldn’t see much as we had to sit down so that others could see. I saw the first spear go in, but didn’t get to see anyone drink blood. At that point though, it was inconsequential. We had such an amazing time, I would have been happy to leave right then. We left the ceremony and ate some nshima, and then our new friend took us out of the festival and into the actually village that hosted the festival. On the way, we ran into one of the women we had taken pictures of.  Her family camp was making a huge pot of nshima over the fire. There is a very a particular way to stir it with the cooking stick, as you can see from the video, and they let us try it! I may have burnt their nshima. 

I never was good at cooking.

We continued on and had a nice rest in a field, as at this point we were exhausted. We were on our way back when our friend ran into two of the chiefs, who gave us a ride back to town (Muzungu Effect). Essentially, we arrived dirty and hung over on a bus, and got a ride back with not one, but two chiefs. Not bad for one day, in my opinion.

Now, after I have recounted the most amazing day I’ve had here thus far, allow me to of expound some of the darker aspects of Nc-wala and some cultural practices that I learned about during my visit.  Every Ngoni village has a chief.  As many of you know, tribal lines in Africa supercede national lines. Thus, when I say Ngoni, I am referring to Ngoni tribes in Malawi, Tanzania, Zimbabwe, etc. So, ruling all of those chiefs is a paramount chief. He is the one that drinks the cow’s blood, and he is believed to have connections to the spirits. He is treated like a king of sorts, with body guards, multiple houses etc. He has been chief for around 40 years.

Every year at Nc-wala, the chief is allowed to pick one virgin girl from the village. This girl is required to ‘entertain’ the chief that night. Although there is no legal repercussions for refusal, the elder women in the village will ensure that this young girl complies. There is no marriage or any kind of compensation, just this one night. After this night, the girl is ruined. Her prospects for marriage are dashed. You may think that this is because she is no longer a virgin. Not the case. The reason is heart breaking and an example of the struggles that Africa faces. The paramount chief is HIV positive. He has been sick for years, and everyone knows it. However, tradition is tradition, and so the practice continues.  No one will marry the girl for fear of getting sick. I think this is such a telling example of how hard it is to combat the virus in Africa in the face of so many conducive cultural practices.

There are also some other interesting cultural practices that surprised me. I had assumed that girls being virgins at marriage was important here, as it often is in cultures where women are repressed. Not so. In fact, there is a practice I was told about that ensures that women are NOT virgins. Apparently, there is a man in the village called a “hyena” that is responsible or determining when a girl is ready for marriage. He does this by sleeping with her when she is around 12-13 years old. He will then make the decision.  Can anybody think of a better way to spread an STD?  Frankly, I was horrified.  These practices are only in the very rural areas, and also seem to be fading out, but still shocking.

Our trip ended rather uneventfully. We stayed in a self-contained room that we couldn’t leave without the assistance of the attendant because of the guard dog outside (exactly who was he guarding, anyways?) We then got to wait until about 12:30 for 10:00 bus to depart, but that’s the way it goes. All in all, it was an absolutely amazing weekend!

Thus concludes entry 3. Love to all!

She's saying "its a weapon, not a magic wand."

These boys were posing for us.

Believe it or not, they asked us to take a picture with them

Amazing