Friday we had a break from all of the classes and instead traveled to the Bahurutshe Cultural Village outside of town. On the drive there, I saw more of what I thought Africa would look like, in Gaborone there were definitely very poor neighborhoods, then once we got out of the city there were wide stretches of low lying trees and you could see for a long way to hills in the distance. It was really stunning to see.
The cultural village was like a living museum, where they demonstrate culture that doesn't really exist except for in really remote areas of Botswana. Driving up we were greeted by these 5 elderly women who began chanting and dancing when they saw our bus pull up. They were dressed in very traditional clothing and wore bones on their legs that rattled when they danced.
We were led into the village and the woman claiming to be the wife of the chief welcomed us. We were then told that we would get to see a wedding ceremony and needed a volunteer bride and groom and of course, trying to be proactive, I volunteered for the part of the groom. The ceremony began first with the tossing of the bones, a tradition done by the elder with the gift, depending on how the bones fall determines how the marriage will go.
Luckily for me I got a good toss and then drank the ceremonial beer, which was essentially fermented sorghum and was very bitter. Then we were paraded to the honeymoon hut to "consummate our marriage" (not really, don't worry Jamie). From that point on our married life together consisted of her grinding grains and cleaning and putting cow dung on the floors of our new home to keep snakes away, while I herded goat and played games all day long. It was pretty awesome being a male in this tribe.
At the conclusion of our wedding ceremony the chief's wife noticed my star of david and said "shalom" to me. It was just a strange amalgamation of two very different cultures and I was caught off guard, but later at lunch she came over and explained that she had studied in Haifa and had married a Jewish man in Israel (originally from Manchester). It was amazing to hear this because at this point I had lost hope of meeting any Jews in Botswana because there are only 100 reported in the entire country. It was empowering to know that even in the face of antisemitism Jews have manged to spread and prosper to even the most remote areas of the world.Here's our new hut (still under construction):
The people here are very superstitious and believe that witches walk among people in the villages. Later on, when they demonstrated dances they showed dances that correspond to each of the wives of the husband. The first and oldest wife dances first to show that it is she who has the right to sleep in with the husband. Following this dance, the younger wife, believed to be a witch, does a dance where she turns into a frog to hop into the husband's bedroom.
The people here are very superstitious and believe that witches walk among people in the villages. Later on, when they demonstrated dances they showed dances that correspond to each of the wives of the husband. The first and oldest wife dances first to show that it is she who has the right to sleep in with the husband. Following this dance, the younger wife, believed to be a witch, does a dance where she turns into a frog to hop into the husband's bedroom.
Following the dancing we went on a short walk where we ate wild grapes right off of the bush and saw the totem of the tribe (the baboon). Similar to Native American culture tribe here each have a totem, an animal, that they believe to be sacred and eating it is perhaps one of the worst sins you can do. Then we had lunch where I got to eat setswa, a ceremonial dish which is just pulled beef, and we learned that the people who run the cultural villages also have renovated huts with cable and air conditioning so you could stay there for the weekend and work with the women and have a really romantic get away or an intense cultural experience. It sounded really like a really cool opportunity and I took down the number on the off-chance I'm ever backpacking through Africa.When we got back from the village we ate dinner and then proceeded to go to "The Bull and Bush" a bar in Gaborone for a night out. When we got there we realized that most of the people there were ex-patriots or volunteers so we ran into people from Iowa and even DC. Since coming here I've been amazed at how many white volunteers are working here and how you can manage to see the same people over and over again. On one hand it's been comforting for me, but on the other hand I came here to actually feel like a minority and experience how unsettling that is and it just hasn't happened to me yet on the same scale it has happened to other people in the group. I'm sure though as I begin work my experiences will change.
Ke a go rata thata!
I miss all of you!
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