Friday, August 6, 2010

Cultured out

This weekend was a busy weekend! On Friday Sam Nujoma, the founding president of Namibia, came to my school. He was in the region for the king of the Masubia tribe’s birthday celebration, which took place in Bukalo on Saturday, so he came to my school on Friday. My school is named after him, so I think he visits quite often when he’s in the area. Sam Nujoma is extremely popular with the Namibian people: he was a freedom fighter and the first president after Namibia gained independence so people , associate him with defeating the Apartheid regime. Thus, my school went crazy preparing for his arrival. School was cancelled on Thursday so the learners could clean the school grounds (so illegal – can you imagine that happening in America?), and on Friday tons of people showed up to see him speak. I got to shake his hand which was pretty cool – unfortunately I entrusted my camera to a learner to take pictures and he somehow missed that. A band played for the event, and learners performed from the school choir and culture group. Caprivian culture groups wear reed skirts and dance a really intense hip shaking dance which is actually really great. It’s crazy how people can move their bodies here: I swear all of my learners can dance. A dance group from the village also danced spell. For that the women wear big skirts with a lot of fabric underneath and kind of shake their hips while clapping.
After the dancing Sam Nujoma gave a speech. When I asked one of my cleverest learners, what he thought of Nujoma’s speech he answered “when he said he had been in SWAPO (Namibia’s main political party) for 46 years I thought he was very old. Also, he doesn’t speak English properly.” I will reserve judgment on that in case the Namibian government is checking up on this blog. Nujoma also donated N$2000 dollars to my school to build new class buildings which I didn’t know we needed but okay.
On Saturday I went to some of the event in Bukalo. Bukalo is about 10 k from my village and kind of the capital of the Masubia nation. The Masubia are the main tribe in the Eastern Caprivi, which is the side my village is on, but there are also Masubia people stretching into Botswana. In Caprivi there are two main tribes: the Masubia and the Mafwe. The two tribes don’t get along very well and there’s a lot of tension between them. The Masubia people speak Subia and the Mafwe people speak Sifwe, which is why the Caprivian language is Silozi even though the Lozi tribe comes from Zambia. It’s a bit confusing. The Khuta, or tribal court, for the Masubia people is in Bukalo and it’s where the king lives. All villages also have smaller khutas which are run by the village headmen, or indunas, and it’s where disputes are settled. The Khuta in Bukalo is extremely formal. Women must wear sitenges, and before you enter, or even if you are just walking past the entrance, you have to kneel down on the ground and clap. If you forget you have to pay the king in cattle. When you come before the chief you also have to kneel down and clap the whole time you are in his presence. Men can kneel down on their knees but women have to get even lower, so their hands and knees are on the ground.
But anyway, this weekend was the Subia king’s birthday so there was a cultural festival in Bukalo which happens this time every year. I only went to part of it because I was feeling a bit cultured out after the event on Friday and several other events that have happened at my school this term. Kaitlin, Andrew and I showed up while they were still giving the speeches. We wanted to go inside the main arena where the king was sitting so that we could see him better. From what I could see he was dressed in leopard furs, and in front of him on the table was a leopard skull. He’s actually pretty young, in his 40s, and I have heard tell that he didn’t actually want to be king, but he was somehow forced into it because there were no other heirs. We weren’t able to get into the main sitting area because it was full, and I’m not sure we were actually important enough to sit there. Everyone who entered or exited had to kneel and clap, and anyone who passed before the chief had to kneel and clap before him. Since there were no seats in the arena they let us sit with the band who were right next to the sitting area. Sam Nujoma gave a speech, and after he finished there was an entertainment break when the band we were sitting with got up to play. The band had gone to eat lunch so they were late arriving back, so while they were waiting they kind of just focused the cameras (the news was there) where they were sitting, so basically just on we three random white people. Then the band finally got back, so they got up to play, with the cameras still focused on them with us in the background. Awkward. Made more awkward by the fact that the song the band played was about “shooting the mukuwa” with two female dancers shooting at a “boer” to the sound of drum beats. The boer, or “mukuwa” since there’s no differentiation in the language between boer and white person was differentiated with a big belly made of pillows stuffed under his shirt to show that the white man was well fed and greedy. The boer was defeated and everyone cheered while meanwhile we makuwa were sitting in the background watching awkwardly while being filmed. It was a very uncomfortable experience.
After the song finished the current president of Namibia, Pohamba, spoke for about an hour. By the time he was finished we were pretty done also, so even though there were more speeches and dancing to follow we hiked back to Katima for hot showers and pizza, both of which, to be honest, are more rare in my current life than watching important people give speeches and Caprivian dancing.

1 comment:

  1. Actually when we depict the boer or mubulu we mean apartheid Goverment. there is also a difference between a mukuwa and a mubulu/boer thats why no one would refer to you as a boer or mubulu but a mukuwa which means you are acceptable.Remember we as Namibians came out of a very repressive goverment that you will never imagine but as black Namibians we will never revenge or lift a finger to harm the mubulu/boer.The song is all about history just like USA has films about Cowboys and Red Indians or the American Civil War and last but not least there is freedom of expression and you wont be in trouble.Thank you for your stay in Kabbe. Siseho at Lusese

    ReplyDelete