Matters of Life and Death

Banji ni lumbu, kuilu ni ku mundi  (This world is a cattle camp, the homestead is in heaven.)

This old Lozi proverb emphasises the transience of life and demonstrates that is a universal theme. The ephemeral nature of human life on Earth with our short entry into and exit from this world is a matter all cultures seem to try to come to terms with.

A cattle camp is a group of temporary wooden and grass shelters built on seasonal pastures. The herdsmen live there while they are looking after the cattle. The closest Scottish rural equivalent from yesteryear would be the ‘bothy’. At the moment there are many of these camps at the riverside around Mwandi as the cattle graze on the islands and floodplains. With the onset of the rains these ‘bothies’ will shortly be abandoned and the herds and herdmen will return to the village or homestead -the permanent settlement. It is this transhumance that is being compared to dying person leaving this world for an eternity in heaven.

On Wednesday evening we received news that Rev Manyando’s father had passed away in Mongu. Rev Manyando is one of our Livingstone Ministers. His father, Mr Green Sitali Manyando, was a former teacher, a former Council Chairman for the District and Village Headman. He was 80 years of age and had been ill for the last 8 months.  So on Thursday lunch-time we set off for the Manyando homestead in rural Bulozi, at Litoya, about half-way between Mongu and Senanga. Rev Manda, Getrude Kambole, the Consistory Secretary, Ida, Keith and Mubita  were the Mwandi Representatives. We picked up Rev and Mrs Nyambe in Sesheke and drove up the back road, reaching the pontoon in good time and then visiting the manse in Senanga. We finally arrived at Litoya at around 2200h.

We were welcomed into a dim and crowded lapa. (courtyard surrounded by reeds). As is the Zambian custom, a substantial marquee, made from a large tarpaulin, had been erected in the yard, and in front of it, the usual three-logged campfire was burning. The sofas and armchairs and any other extra seats from the home or borrowed from neighbours were placed outside for the use of visitors, mourners and those coming to pay condolences.

The lapa, at this time, is traditionally split into male and female areas. The men generally sit on the seats under the tent and the ladies in chitenges, legs straight and out-stretched on reed floor-mats. On arrival at the mourning-house (Zambian-English: the dead person’s home) you are expected to shake hands with all present, then enter the main house where the widow and her entourage of female relatives and neighbours are again sitting on mats. There you shake hands and express your sorrow and this is the time for tears. If the bereaved are Christian, you may be asked to offer a prayer of consolation here. You then return outside and sit with the other visitors who have also come to express solidarity with the family in their time of grief. You may now chat and discuss lighter matters with the people around you.

We were offered some of those ubiquitous white plastic garden chairs in front of the main house and a wooden coffee table was placed in our midst. A daughter of the house brought water, soap and a towel to wash our hands before eating. Then we were offered chunks of stewed beef and liver cooked in gravy and buhobe ( thick mealie-meal porridge). Eaten with your fingers, this was most welcome after our day’s journey. Cool drinking water is always served after eating. It is a breach of etiquette to drink with your meal as Europeans would tend to do.   

It was exceptionally atmospheric after eating to sit and look up at a clear night sky with its tiny electric blue spangles of glittering stars in their constellations, smell the whiffs of woodsmoke and listen to singing of hymns and choruses accompanied too by the rhythmic cadences of the drumming of youngsters from the Church choir.

Most people wrapped themselves in blankets or chitenges and settled down to sleep after midnight, others kept watch and dozed on and off throughout the night. The night-time temperature at this time of year does not fall below the mid-20s Centigrade. We three were very kindly given the privacy of an igloo-tent pitched in the lapa; inside too was the luxury of a mattress. Our middle-aged bones are no longer as good as they once were for sleeping directly on the ground! Incidentally we used our bath-towels as bedding and were perfectly comfortable.

By 0530h next morning most people were up and about. And the choir had started to sing again. Hot water was being prepared and lugged to the ablutions for visitors to wash themselves. Again kind neighbours put their toilets and bathrooms at the disposal of visitors at the mourning-house. We bathed en famille at the neighbour’s bathing area, a  reed-screened rectangle with a plank to keep your feet off the sand and an old maize sack served as the bathmat. Buckets of hot and cold water, an empty basin and jug were  available to make a simple shower.

After washing and dressing, a breakfast of bread, marge and cocoa was served in the main house. In the corner stood a magnificent polished wood coffin with two pictures of Mr Manyando, one as a young man and the other just before he died. After breakfast we were presented with a printed burial programme, as other members of the family and dignitories kept arriving. There were representatives from the Government including the Lady Mayor of Mongu and the Barotse Royal Establishment. During this time the choir and the congregation gathered in the lapa and sang hymns and choruses.

The main Church Service started at 0930h after the arrival of the Presbytery Bishop, Rev Sipalo from Mongu. The Funeral Service followed the Lozi Liturgy with Hymns, Scripture Readings, a short Sermon, Prayers and a Blessing. I was asked to read Job 1:17-22 and Philippians 4:12-13 in Silozi. This is what brought me to ruminate about the transient nature of life and think about the Lozi perspective on this.

At the end of the service is the body-viewing. This is when all present take leave and say farewell to the deceased. It is the Lozi custom that one should be self-controlled in the Church during the funeral service with no noisy outbursts of emotion but it is permitted to grieve freely at the body-viewing. If you cannot contain yourself in Church, you go outside till you have composed yourself then return. Once everyone had filed passed the body the coffin was closed and the bearers carried it to the burial site. Normally this would be the local cemetery.

However, as the founder of the village Mr Manyando was buried next to the special tree in the middle of his village. The Headman’s house is usually about a dozen paces to the east of that tree. This tree symbolizes the existence of that particular village and its people. The area “under the tree” as it is called, serves as a meeting place to resolve disputes. Traditionally too the tree serves as the village shrine and the founder is buried in an unmarked grave at its foot. The dead body next to the living tree is a symbol of the continuing interaction between life and death and the area where the living commune with ancestral spirits when necessary. The village headman is the go-between. It was interesting to witness, to our eyes, this example of animism and syncretism.

Talking about graves I recently learned a new idiom. When Mr Kapui from Kandiana died a few months ago, I asked Julius if he could arrange for some young men ‘kuyepa libita’ literally ‘to dig the grave’. Now to the Lozi ear that sounds incredibly direct, harsh and callous, they use the euphemism ‘kulukisa ndu ya mutu’ literally ‘to prepare the person’s house’.

The congregation gathered round the grave and again the choir sang. The coffin was lowered into the grave and some sticks as tradition dictates were thrown in as well. Mourners may also come at this stage with a handful of earth and throw it in the grave.

If you are unable to go to the grave a young man will circulate with a shovelful of earth that you may touch instead. The young males of the family continue to shovel in the earth, often spelling each other and taking turns on the shovels, until there is a rather untidy heap on top. However, the four corners of the grave are marked with sticks.

The female relatives then come out and ‘pat the grave’. They use their hands to make a truncated rectangular pyramid. When that is done people present at the graveside; family, colleagues and visiting dignitories are called out in order of precedence to place flowers on the grave. These are provided by the family. You take the flower, go to the grave, kneel, stick in the flower and then say a prayer of thanksgiving. There appears little concern here regarding “Prayers for the Dead” that seemed to exercise many of the reformed persuasion in the past!

Then came the eulogies. There were speeches from the Local Authority and the Barotse Royal Establishment then a male family member gave a short biographical life-history of Mr Manyando and thanked all who attended for their care and support. The Minister closed the proceedings with The Grace and Benediction. Visitors then proceeded back to the home to say farewell to the family and set off on their way home.

Visiting a Lozi cemetery comes as a bit of a shock to Europeans who are used to carefully manicured and tended graves with lawns, flowers, shrubs and individual stone gravestones. These you will find in the urban areas of Zambia but not in the rural areas. Mwandi is a typical rural example. Wild, natural and unkempt rural cemeteries tend to be found to the west of the village roughly a mile away from the village centre. Traditionally the bush starts here and the graveyard is found right on the border between the village and the bush and so those who die are buried near to their living relatives. That is why so many bodies are brought home to Mwandi at great expense from all over Zambia to be buried here.

A Lozi village is a shelter for both the living and the dead and animistic belief says they should be able to communicate with each other. The graves are a clear demarcation of where the village begins and where it ends. To some extent you could say the living are placed between the dead at the shrine and the dead at the cemetery.  The fact that you have the dead so close to the living perhaps makes death something less to be feared by the living and more recognizably a process on the journey to heaven as the Lozi have traditionally seen life as a metaphorical journey to a heavenly paradise called Litooma .

Mabizo-Names

I think it is easier to answer each of the most recent enquiries in a special posting. (I have tried to reply using the comment box but my replies to Kalumiana and Etambuyu, I see, have still not arrived.)

Firstly, the meaning of Kalumianna it means a small, slightly-built man. It is Siluyana.

It is made up of the diminutive prefix Ka-, the root is –lume (ie mulume - man) and –ana the Sisotho diminiutive suffix.

Etambuyu: I am sorry I can’t be of more help here. I happened to find by chance a copy in Bookworld at Manda Hill about a year ago. It was the only one there at the time and although it had some pages missing I, nevertheless, hastened to purchase it. Amuzume hande!

Thirdly, Grace: Musa is the direct Biblical translation. Nasishemo is another Siluyana equivalent close in meaning to Grace.

Several variants are available for “listener”. The first set of names is derived from Itwi, the Siluyana for ears; therefore, a good listener. Other possibilities are Kamatwi or simply Matwi.

Another related name is Muleteetwi (Muleta-itwi) literally ‘ear-bringer’ so a good listener.

Humble: Noocana (*c is pronounced ‘ch’ and oo is a long o) or Noobu

(Na-ubu) both mean associated with small things so born of a humble family.

Another variation is Ikaacana

Matwi is found in the Siluyana proverb: Matwi a mwelwa luyupela kuule. The ears of pauper hear from afar.

Nasishemo: Lya sishemo ku mutala, lya ng’ole ku moyo. A kind one at home but a cruel one in government.

Another useful little book is Silozi Se Lu Bulela by YW Mupatu first published by NECZAM in 1978. It gives a simple Siluyana conversation and explains other more difficult idioms and proverbs.

I hope this is all of help - Keith

Butoya retreat

After four days and five nights of melting in Mongu, we set off on Thursday for the 5-day Presbytery Retreat; this is an open air event now held every four years. The first retreat was held here in 1941. Butoya is about 15km SW of Mongu on the Barotse Plain. It takes almost an hour in a 4x4, through matapa and mishanjo (Lozi gardens cultivated at the edge of the flood plain), across fords with Monet-type water-lily pools, over mounds with palm trees, crossing rough burnt pasture and through banks of loose silver sand, We were fortunately guided well through all these obstacles by the Induna Mungambata who is the Headman in charge of the area and a Church member.

Rev Sipalo and  Rev Lubasi

The name Butoya is derived from the Mutoya tree, a type of willow. These trees form a long thicket along the river bank and the lagoons there. It is the natural beauty of the site that makes it such as special place in God’s creation for retreat and fellowship, another ‘thin place’ as George MacLeod once described Iona. It is an ideal spot for both individual or solitary prayer as well as providing under its rich thick canopy a shaded cathedral for communal gatherings to hear the Word of God preached or to praise and worship God in Church services.

The place is also of local historical interest as the first aeroplane (fulai in Silozi) landed in the area in 1928 during the reign of Litunga Yeta III. Out of the 1998 Retreat attended by over 4000 people came a much needed and prayed for revival in the United Church in Western Province.

The theme for the Conference was “Living the Salt Life as a Witness for Christ” based on Matthew 5:13 and was made up of eight topics. You, the salt, witnessing as salt, saltless salt, a salt life in our stewardship, social responsibility, salt for healing, characteristics of empowerment by the Holy Spirit, living the life of prayer and maintaining our Christian integrity. These topics were dealt with by Ministers from various Churches inside and outwith the Presbytery. The day was interspersed with early morning devotions, praise and worship, Choirs and Praise Teams as well as the topics. In the evenings after devotions were more social occasions for singing, testimonies and sketches followed by prayers at the close of the day.

Each consistory looked after its delegates another 8 joined the 8 members from Mwandi who had attended Presbytery. On Thursday we bought all our perishable goods and set out for the site. There was no ice to be had in Mongu, so this meant that another trip would need to go into Mongu on Saturday to pick up more frozen fish and meat to see us through to Monday. On arrival we were conducted to our site with a sipapela (an open shelter with walls framed by branches and covered by grass mats); this was to sleep in. We had brought our tent so it made an ideal store and larder for our provisions. A latrine had also been dug for our convenience - so to speak. We were fed well over this time spiritually and physically.

Breakfast was bread and tea or coffee. Rice pudding was also served once, Mongu rice is a well-loved staple in Zambia. Lunch and supper was buhobe (thick maize-meal porridge) or rice with fish meat or chicken and as vegetables either cabbage or kail. We did enjoy Irish potatoes as a treat on Sunday.(In Zambia potatoes are given the sobriquet Irish to differentiate them from sweet potatoes.) We are very much appreciative of the efforts of six of the ladies who undertook to cook for us all at each mealtime.

Both Ida and I learned how to bathe like a Lozi. There were no bathing facilities at the camp site, other than the river, so we joined others to bathe in the late afternoon. The rules for bathing for both sexes are apparently the same. Keith took Mubita with him to the mens area. First mistake, bathing children is womens’ work!

We were accompanied by our local MCF Convenor. After undressing myself and Mubita we slipped in the river and sat down with the soap to work up a good lather for soaping us both, Second mistake. My companion was loudly told by an old man to tell the mukuwa (white-man) to stop sitting in the sand and either to kneel or squat like everybody else! You then may soap a part of your body after that you cup your hands and pour the water you gather in them over the soaped part. When I asked why this was required behaviour, I was told it was so that you were less vulnerable in case of a crocodile attack! It was all very reminiscent of Gideon, who separated those who lapped the water with those who got down on their knees to drink!

African tribal life is quite egalitarian in many respects but it also demands a much greater degree of conformity to cultural norms than we with our more individusalistic outlook would tend to find acceptable.

During our time at Butoya we also took time to visit Sefula Mission where a kinsman of Keith’s, William Thomson Waddell worked as an artisan carpenter for Rev Francois Coillard. After building a house for Rev Jeanmairet and his new wife Elise (nee Coillard) Coillard’s niece, at Mwandi, then called Sesheke, the group of Basuto and Europeans set out for Sefula where Waddell built Coillard’s house and the Church there. We visited the graveyard where Coillard was buried. ,Waddell became engaged to Louise Keck, the teacher at Sesheke (Mwandi) before he returned home to Scotland to die of the leprosy he contracted here. We also saw the Boarding House that is named in memory of him.

The bridge and Church he built at Lwatile and Lealui await another visit on another occasion.

On our last day Mubita contracted a high temperature and diarrhoa, so we took him to Sefula Clinic where he was seen and given medicine to treat his problem. The Clinic is drawing water from the river by drum and bucket at the moment as the pump for the borehole has died and there is no money to buy the spare part.

We set off on Monday morning, after packing up at Butoya and buying provisions for the journey home and fuel in Mongu we set off via Senanga and crossed the Zambezi again on the pontoon at Kalongela. Nine hours and a puncture later we arrived back in Mwandi tired and thankful.

It was good for us all, taking time out from our busy everyday lives and devoting it to God and listening to him. It was a time of challenge, growth, exchange and blessing.

Lozi Names, Part 2

It is always good to read at the beginning of the year the list that Register House publishes of the most common children’s names in use in Scotland for the previous year. I thought, as a follow up to the original article on Lozi nomenclature from last year - (What's in a Name), it might be useful and interesting to list some of the more common Lozi names to be found in the Mwandi area with their meanings. As a class teacher marking the daily register I have come to recognise Mwandi family names.

Lozi names, the Siluyana ones, fall into two main categories, nouns and verbal constructions. Notulu and Amwalana, from the previous article, are two good examples. Most noun-type names consist of a prefix and a stem. If we split up the name “Mu-bita”. Mu (means a person) and ‘bita’ means to pass or wrestle, hence the meaning the passer-by or the wrestler, think of Jacob/Israel..

So all Lozi names have a meaning. Mukelabai (one born at a bad time), Muyunda( the peeper) and Sitali (one who came on a bad day) are good Mwandi examples.

Below is a list of some other more common names in Mwandi with their meanings.

Akabana (one who doesn’t rise ie. bedridden)

Akalemwa (one who can’t be seized)

Akeende (one who won’t go)

Alisinda (the reliable one)

Imataa (bad-tempered)

Inambao (lion)

Indala (famine)

Ingutu (well-wisher)

Kufekisa (to resemble)

Liboma (the smasher)

Likando/Manyando (sufferings)

Lisulo(royal hunting party)

Lubinda (stubborn)

Lutangu (a tale)

Masiye (orphan)

Mubiana (one who misses someone or something)

Mundia (one who deserts me)

Munjita (one who calls me)

Mukatimui (bad woman)

Mutafela (one who is finished)

Musowe (throw away)

Monde (born in the 1st quarter of the moon)

Mwangala (joy)

Naluca (f) (the wee one)

Nalukui (f) Ilukui (m) (fierce one)

Namakau (many hoes)

Namatama (big cheeks)

Namukolo (born in a canoe)

Nawa (good company)

Ngonda(peace)

Nyambe (God)

Mutondo (tree, medicine)

Sanana(pertaining to children)

Sianga (euphemism for crocodile)

Silishebo (one born during famine)

Simasiku (m) ,Namasiku & Nosiku (f) born at night

It is difficult to categorise Lozi names definitively but they can be arranged broadly and somewhat thematically. We can see many are concerned with the transience of life, its sufferings and the surrounding circumstances at the time of birth.

As all writers tend to say, by way of a cop out, this is not a comprehensive list, but is merely indicative and somewhat subjective, I know that I am bound to have caused local offence by some grave omissions but thankfully on this occasion the blog readership in Mwandi is mercifully small in number!