Under African Skies (31 page)

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Authors: Charles Larson

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(BORN 1960) LESOTHO
Upon completing his secondary schooling in 1981, Mzamane Nhlapo left Lesotho and worked in the South African mines for two years. He continued his education, earning a Secondary Teaching Certificate in 1988, but instead of teaching he went to work for the Highlands Water Project in the mountains of Lesotho as a site administrator. A year later, he went back to school, matriculating at the National University of Lesotho. Nhlapo completed his B.A. in education in 1993. Since that time, he has served as the headmaster of a secondary school in the Mafeteng District, while working on his writing in his free time.
According to the editors of
The Kalahari Review
, where “Give Me a Chance” was originally published, Nhlapo “wishes to engage in ‘the emancipation of women in the world'” in his writing. Based on an actual incident in his mother's life, the story begs the question of what is true storytelling: fact or fiction?
About “Give Me a Chance,” Nhlapo says: “First, I wrote the story to show how bold my mother was in trying to break away from the cultural bondage in which a woman is a helpless minor who should seek permission from her husband to get—among other things—employment, even when her husband was failing to provide for the family. My mother refused to be passive and let herself and her children die of hunger. She is the voice of many women who should boldly stand up and demand their chance to determine their destiny.
“Second, in our culture boys must look after animals and do other ‘manly' chores at a young age. This denies them a chance to be closer to their mothers. Writing the story brought me closer to my mother for the first time, since I had to talk to her to ask for details and reasons for her actions. For the first time, I felt the warmth of motherhood. I could laugh and cry with her. Like their mothers, young boys in our culture should stand up and demand their chance for a balanced and healthy growth to adulthood.”
In addition to
The Kalahari Review,
the author's stories have appeared in
Basali! Stories by and about Women in Lesotho
(1995) and in
'Na Le Uena
—
Anthology of Creative Writing in Lesotho
(1995)
.
Mama KaZili woke up early with her eyes red and watery as though she had been crying the whole night. I suspected that something was going to happen. At the age of nine I could see and observe well. Life at home demanded as much.
That was the day when she decided never to let us die of hunger. My father had not been sending her money from the South African mines for more than a year. It was said that he had another wife in the mines. His parents refused to listen to Mama KaZili's complaints about that. They wanted her to accept that for a husband to have numerous wives was the norm, something a “good” wife did not have to complain about. They did not seem to understand the economic realities facing her and her children.
But in a way it was understandable why my grandparents didn't care. Now of late, if my father had to send money at all, he sent it to his mother, who was to decide whether to pass it on to Mama KaZili. And in most cases Mama KaZili never received a cent. My father knew this, but he, too, could not afford a complaining wife.
“Today we are going to Makhoakhoeng, to some relatives of your father,” my mother announced that morning after we had eaten
pap mpothe
(mealie pap alone, a mixture of cornmeal and water).
“Why, Mother?” I asked. She took time to answer my question. I saw her swallow something hard first.
“Because if we stay here you won't have something to eat,” she said eventually.
Makhoakhoeng is forty kilometers from Habelo, my home village. To go there we took an old bus from Botha-Bothe, my hometown. After traveling for thirty kilometers, there was no road for the bus to go farther. The Maluti Mountains began to get rugged—steep, rocky, rough. Worse still, it was snowing that day. The air was chilly and freezing to the bone marrow, more so when we were wrapped in tattered blankets and had no shoes on our feet. A sympathetic woman must have lent my mother some money at home so that we could take the bus to those mountains. They were so white and so huge!
Slowly we began to climb those cold, slippery, and uncompromising mountains. My younger sister, Nopaseka, fell down time and again, getting more damp from the snow each time. Once I decided to carry her on my back because my mother had the youngest baby, Mkhathini, on hers. Nopaseka was too heavy for me, and we fell down together. My mother fell also, only twice or thrice. Mothers are tough; they don't fall easily. But the last time she fell, it was heavily, and I heard her mention my father's name in disgust: “Moshe!” She also mentioned the names of my older brother and sister, who were left at home, as if to say, “What will they do tonight?” When I walked close enough to her, her eyes were still a little red and looked like they had water in them.
We struggled up the mountains in a numbing temperature. I could not feel my toes. Our cheeks were stung by the chilling winter winds. A vicious icy snow pelted us in the face. Our bodies were bruised, hungry, and exhausted. But we were determined to reach the place of our father's relatives, where we would eat
papa
before we went to sleep. The determination of Mama KaZili rekindled ours.
We wrestled endlessly with the treacherous mountains to cover the ten kilometers. I could not calculate the passage of time. My mother kept swallowing something hard. She also spoke alone, uttering words like, “I'll go back to work hard for them … Tonight you will eat …”
When we were close to the village we were going to, we stopped. Mama KaZili wanted to breast-feed the baby. The baby did not suck her breasts as usual. He was very stiff and looked very pale. And he was not breathing. For the first time in my life, I heard my mother cry.
The death of Mkhathini reduced our number to six in the home.
It is difficult to tell in detail exactly what went on in that snowy weather.
But I do remember that we were taken to the village on horseback. Observant villagers had seen that we had stopped at one spot for a long time in the snow, and they must have wondered why. Then horsemen came to fetch us. People in the mountains are more concerned about others than people in the lowlands or towns.
When we arrived at my father's relatives', there was a mixture of happiness and grief. They were happy to see us, children of their brother. But the sight of Mama KaZili carrying the dead child was a great shock.
They might have been struck by the sight of death, but by this time Mama KaZili was sober, clear, and determined. She was in her best poised manner. She was no longer a cold, crying woman trapped in the snow with small kids falling down numerous times behind her. I saw a mixture of anger, grit, and willpower in her. That was my mother at her best.
She was expecting the accusation: “If you respected your husband and his parents, the child wouldn't have died.”
She knew that they, too, would be more concerned about the cultural norms and respect for the Nhlapo family than the circumstances that compelled her to come to them. One step wrong, she knew, and she would be told she was not married from Swaziland to kill children but to “make” them for the family to grow.
After the initial shock of Mkhathini's death was absorbed and discussion about burying him had finished, Mama KaZili had to answer a few questions, just as she had expected. The house was full of curious relatives, each one of them listening very attentively. The atmosphere was that of a serious village court case.
“You mean you didn't ask permission to come here from your husband or from your parents?” Matweba, my father's oldest brother, asked with serenity.
“Yes, after all, I know they would have refused,” answered Mama KaZili coolly.
“And what lesson do you think you are teaching other wives in this big Nhlapo family?”
Mama KaZili kept silent.
“Talk!” scolded Matweba, with muttered support from the group of men.
“Talk!” repeated Matweba, shouting at the top of his voice.
Mama KaZili looked at him straight in the eye and said, “I'm teaching them that when husbands don't fulfill their duties as heads and breadwinners
of families, to an extent that children die of hunger, they should not sit there and do nothing, waiting for manna from heaven. I have brought my children to you for a month or two to have something to eat while I look for employment.”
“And again without permission?”
“Yes,” Mama KaZili answered with firmness.
Once again, there were rumbling voices from the men, this time louder and more threatening. I remembered one case two years ago in Habelo when one woman had told her husband outright that he was lazy. Every corner of the village had groups of men cursing,
“What an insult! A woman tell her husband he is lazy!” By the end of the week, the woman had disappeared. Her husband had beaten her severely. Nobody knew whether she had been admitted to the hospital or had run back to her parents,
a ngalile
(a wife who runs away from her husband back to her parents), or had joined other runaway wives, who were eventually called prostitutes. (Because separation and divorce are more common nowadays, that has changed.) There were rumors and speculations, until a few days later, when dogs dug up the decaying body of the woman in her garden.
“Order!” Matweba demanded silence.
In addition to the rumblings, there was an uncomfortable chaotic movement in the house. Men felt insulted by Mama KaZili, and obviously some of them wanted to “touch” or “lay hands” on her. Others gaped at her with utter scorn.
“She must go back to Swaziland!” a voice shot to the roof.
“O-o-o-o-order!” Matweba shouted vehemently in a roar that could have frightened a lion. There was a smell of onion from the other room. My stomach groaned. My mouth watered. If only we would eat in a few minutes! At least by now we were warmed by the yellowish-blue flames of burning dung. But we were still starving. Would we ever eat, amid these heated quarrels of grownups? I wondered.
A band of birds passed next to the window, singing their old melodious song happily, as though it was not snowing outside. In the house, a deafening silence fell once more for Mama KaZili to speak.
“May I remind you that I'm a legal citizen of Lesotho through marriage? I don't intend to go back to Swaziland. And no one can force me to go, not even my husband.”
“Does this woman ever read the Bible? Will she ever learn to respect us?” one man asked loudly near the door. Other voices joined in.
“Yes, the Bible. And respect to us?” The question was directed to Mama KaZili via Matweba.
“Yes, I know the Bible,” she answered. “It says women should keep silent. ‘They are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law.' Customary laws also treat women as children who are expected to be under the man's guidance and protection. Women are considered weak and naive. They have to seek permission even for little things like visiting friends and parents, looking for employment, seeking to attend school, or asking for a scholarship or loan or applying for a site … . Name them all,” Mama KaZili told them in a clear, firm tone. Her voice had a ring to it, like a medium-sized school bell. It reflected self-confidence, industriousness, fairness, and humbleness, just a touch of hunger, loneliness, and tiredness. The way everybody listened quietly in the house, you would have thought they were hypnotized.
Mama KaZili continued undisturbed. “All these forms of injustice take place in a government [Basutoland National Party] that repeatedly points out with pride that it has been elected by women because men, who are predominantly away in the South African mines, are mostly pro-BCP [Basutoland Congress Party]. Society and government don't want to give women a chance. Women have to seek permission for everything that can improve their lives. Before I pass away in this world, I want to have had a chance to improve my life and the lives of my children.”
Everybody in the house was looking at her in disbelief, openmouthed, eyebrows raised. Mama KaZili must have given them more than enough to chew at a go. Men sighed without a word. One after the other they started going out of the house silently.
The last to go was Matweba, who said in a declarative tone: “Men solve family problems best at the kraal. We shall be back soon to give our final word on the matter.” He closed the door behind him with what I thought was a bang.
Fortunately for them, it had stopped snowing, although it was still freezing outside. I heard a cow moo at the kraal, obviously mistaking the men for herdboys.
As soon as the men had gone, plates of food were brought in for us to eat. That was what Mama KaZili had brought us to Makhoakhoeng for: to have something to eat before we went to sleep. The food was delicious:
papa, popasane
(a wild vegetable which is resistant to winter cold), and mutton. It was two years since I had eaten meat. The smell of onion was there.
I had always been told that my nickname, Richman, was derived from
one old Nhlapo whom I was named after who lived at Makhoakhoeng sometime in the late 1890s and owned a lot of sheep. That day, with mutton on my plate, the nickname made a lot of sense.
There were mixed feelings about what Mama KaZili had said to the men. Elderly wives thought she shouldn't have spoken like that to the heads of families, and that she should offer an apology when they came back from the kraal. Younger wives thought the truth had finally been told. It was high time they stood up on their feet to do something about their lives, they said. Even if men did not admit it, economic pressures in the families appeared too heavy for them to lift alone. It was time they swallowed their pride and accepted reality. Mama KaZili nodded her head with satisfaction, agreeing with the younger women. Her preaching was developing roots.
One by one, in single file, the men came in. They were silent and frightening. Dusk made them look like tall black shades moving in silhouette. One by one, they sat down in their chairs, while the women remained seated on the floor. Once again, Matweba took the chairmanship.
Soon there was a frightening silence in the house. Those who hadn't finished eating had to stop abruptly. The atmosphere became electric. Everybody knew that decisions made from the kraal could not be questioned. In a way, the decisions were regarded as holy because men were made heads of families by the Almighty God.
The last man came in from the other house, carrying a bundle in his hands, wrapped in a white sheet. He put the bundle next to my mother. It was the corpse of Mkhathini, the deceased child. The audience remained breathless.
With a thundering note of finality in his voice, Matweba broke the silence: “I, Matweba, the brother of your husband, together with his other close relatives, have decided that you, Mama KaZili, are bringing disrespectful and misleading lessons to our wives here at Makhoakhoeng. If they allow you to do that at Habelo, we cannot allow it here. We have therefore decided that, because of snow, the children will remain here for a week or so. As soon as the snow is over, they will be sent back to Habelo, back to you. We cannot allow you to humiliate Moshe, your husband, our brother, by scattering his children all around in the name of looking for employment without anybody's permission. If we can allow you to humiliate him, our wives can also go out of hand and humiliate us. We cannot allow the breakup of the Nhlapo family. Those of us who have not been fortunate enough to get employment in the mines have the duty of keeping the Nhlapo family intact.

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