Feb 23rd - Part 3: Musu

We hopped in the van and rushed off toward the place where the cane rat (musu) clan was getting down. Here, Omutaka Nakirembeka had said that there were a group of youth who were visiting the obutaka – precisely the folks I wanted to chat with.

We bounced through a region that seemed to have an inordinate number of drum-makers, from whose stalls the signature round, furry Ugandan drums hung in every shade of mottled white, brown, black and auburn.

A long dusty ride through the country brought us to a large clearing, where the sound of drums rang through the air – the gathering of the musu. Right after getting out of the van, we were led to a special tent where Lady Sylvia Nagginda Luswata herself, the Queen of Buganda, was seated with her coterie. Sweaty and dusty, I was led to greet her highness – one of the security guards extended his arm to keep me from getting too close, as the Omutaka told me to greet her but not touch her or extend my hand. I slightly bowed, honored to be there.

Then, it was time for more food - including another delicious luwombo. After food, Arne and I moved closer to the music and I got dragged into a dance (the video attached here). After that, the head of the Musu clan told us the wonderful origin story, that involved a ghost imitated by (of course) a cute little muskrat-like musu.

We went to the graves of the old chiefs, and briefly saw the origin place, where young people in light blue smocks were receiving traditional blessings.

After that, we went to a set of buildings that looked exactly like the descriptions I read of traditional shrines (essabo). There, all of us (including the omutaka) fed the fireplaces and asked for blessings. Here are some pictures of the different homes of the spirits - of reeds, brick, banana leaves.

Feb 23rd - Part 2: Ndiga

Shortly after Arne and I left to get pens for people to fill out the surveys, Anatoli called to say the Omutaka had arrived and was ready to go. BTW, I want to be sure to state here that Arne took basically all the pictures today (just a few of which I've clipped and put here).

We loaded into the Omutaka's van, painted with a seal identifying it as an official vehicle of the kingdom – and were off to stop #1 – the installation of the heir to the last chief of the ndiga (sheep) clan. When we rolled up, we were escorted to seats right behind the chiefs who sat in the front row of the VIP canopy on big padded chairs.

Several other canopies surrounded an open meadow, with a table set in the center, where a priest was saying Mass. Beyond the canopies were large round tent-like structures covered with tarpaulins and bark-cloth where the family of the deceased traditionally sleep before this last memorial. Today, one year after the death, is the last time they can cry about the dead – an official end to mourning and new start. Next to that were people preparing food in huge cauldrons.

Seated on bark-cloth in the meadow were the sisters and wife of the deceased. And standing at the altar, with bark-cloth togas were his heir and (I think) his cousin, who is his symbolic ‘wife’ for this occasion.

One of the strangest things about this affair was the mix of African tradition with Catholic mass. There was a full service, along with communion. – By the way, there were little plastic bags lying around that said ‘host’ and had a picture of a chalice on them that I thought were once filled with communion wafers, I stuffed one in my pocket thinking my mom would love the ketch factor – I later found out they were bags of vodka ---- Yes VODKA. I scanned it for your enjoyment – healthful, with no hangover!  

Anyhow, the priest officially recognized new heir and then said prayers over the gravesite, where people did the traditional ritual of cleaning it off. Then, people went into the obutaka, where they did several older traditions. The first was drinking from pots of water with a gourd: this is supposed to bring blessings. Much as I need the blessings, I don’t know if I had enough faith to trust (as Anatoli said) that it was ‘traditionally pure’.

Next was offering prayers by setting money at gourds filled with traditionally brewed beer and cleaning the gravesite of older chiefs. Shoes needed to be removed before entering this sacred space, and a man who didn’t was taken by spirits – which left him convulsing and wailing in the bush beyond.

George Mugera had told me the story of the origin of the Ndiga clan, and one of the main roles is played by a tree, where the body of a hero is caught and eventually falls to a barkcloth below – unfortunately, I was around the corner from this very tree, but failed to get its picture. We’ll have to wait for next time!

Now it was time for a HUGE meal from those big cauldrons. The most surprising and wonderful treat was a chicken steamed in a banana leaf (luwombo). Of course there were lots of starches, and Vianney would’ve definitely said it was “real” food.

Feb 23rd - Part 1: Guest of the Omutaka

Well, today started bright and early. Arne and I were supposed to be at the palace by 8:30, to meet Omutaka Nakirembeka. As per his request, I'd copied off a series of surveys to distribute to young Baganda folks to see what they knew about their clans. 

We arrived right on time. As we flipped through magazines aimed at Ugandans in the UK, a few folks joined us, including Anatoli (who was acting as Luganda translator for the day) and the heads of two other clans, the dog (mbwa) and the 'rainwater that falls off the roof' (ky'ababoobi). Now, that last clan leads me to an important point with regards to my original thoughts when coming here. 

You see, at first I was thinking about helping to design a program that relates youth to conservation and the environment by focusing on animals and plants that act as traditional clan totems. Now, that's all well and good for things like leopards (ngo), wild potato vines (kkobe) and termite-mound mushrooms (butiko). But the clans also include a fair number of things that AREN'T animals or plants - ranging from lungs  (maugwe)  to cooking pots (ntamu). The picture here shows a section of a wall at Bulange palace depicting various clan totems - here we have a grasshopper (Nsenene), Monitor Lizard (Nswaswa), Snout Fish (Nsuma?) and ... excrement - yep, poop. 

So, by focusing on an organism-human connection among Baganda clans, it's narrowed by not only the tribe - but by particular clans within the tribe. This fact makes me think that a better idea might be the idea of connecting people with sacred space, regardless of their clan.

Now.. this day was sooo busy that I'm going to divide it into 3 parts: the heir installation among the Ndiga, the celebration of the Musu, and crowd madness at UB40 (you'll see when you get there - which is ironically probably before you get here).

Market Afternoon

After Lusiti, I rushed over to Rubaga hill to meet again with George Mugera. This time, he shared the stories telling the origin of the heart (mutima) and sheep (ndiga) clans. Like the ngeye story, they wove together characters, places, names and the envionment - though for these two - as you can already tell - they didn't have as powerful a connection with the conservation piece. 

Anyhow, after we finished, I said that I wanted to go to the market and get some chicken. But not just any old chicken - we're talking so fresh it's still clucking chicken. So, here, for your enjoyment are some pictures of a typical urban African market in 2008.... ah... if only there was smell-o-vision,  you could better appreciate the full sensory experience. 

So, first, are pictures of our lucky chicken before and after (yes, this is the same chicken folks) - and the fee for dispatching and cleaning this fair bird was a mere 35¢! 

 

A fish monger is captured, whisk in motion to keep those flies on their toes, and, for a snack, just ask the nice lady to break off a few pieces of this lovely dried fish-mobile. To help with the smell, the lady at the bottom can sell you some garlic, onions and ginger.

Oh... and the last picture - Easter eggs. Now I realize I actually am completely insane. I had seen food color in one of the markets, and had to buy it. I mixed it with some white vinegar and boiling water and - voila! - Easter egg dyes. It didn't stop me that the only thing available was brown eggs. I used candle wax to do resist printing on egg number one and just dipped egg number two.

To add to the sillyness of this exercise, I did it by the dim candlelight of a blackout. As part of a 'load sharing' program, the electricity periodically gets cut off around Kampala. That sounds sensible (kind of) - but somehow I have a hard time believing there's any planning involved when power just goes in and out for a couple of hours at a time, even 

seemingly critical places like the airport. Anyhow, here's evidence of my egg-straoridinary evening!

Feb 22nd: Tokiiya ŋŋonge nto

"Never Underestimate an Otter" is the rough meaning of the Luganda proverb that titles today's journal - a reminder that even small things can make a big difference.

It's an appropriate quote to describe my visit to a place outside of Lusiti, a place especially I was told is especially sacred to the people of the otter (ŋŋonge) clan. (BTW, those first two letters are nasalized 'n's, like the ng at the end of the word 'sing'.)

This journey represented the resolution of a mid-trip crisis. After being quoted an exorbitant price to visit this place (the equivalent of about 2 weeks full-time wages for a middle-class person), I felt conflicted about going -  a bit taken advantage of and foolish.

To add to my angst I got this book called 'Witchcraft Revealed' that left me uncomfortable. It was written by a devout priest who made it his mission to expose the lies and treachery of witchcraft in Uganda through a number of former witches who "spilt the beans".

 

Though one could argue the legitimate value of connecting with ancestral spirits, herbal healing, counseling etc... there were some stomach-churningly graphic  pictures in here - including a bunch of pictures of human sacrifices. How, I wonder, did they get these guys to pose with the head of a little boy in their arms? Lord knows,  but there they were, and clearly without any photoshop involved. 

This made me not only uncomfortable with the cost, but a bit with the idea of visiting this place. It didn't help that none of the Africans I'd been working with had ever been to any of these sites themselves. I made the decision that it was too costly, and (especially since the Omutaka was taking us to places on Saturday for free) decided to bow out. 

Happily, Peace turned it around. She called the original guy who was going to take us and asked how we would get there on our own.  So, Friday morning we found ourselves in a dusty bus lurching toward Lake Victoria, and the sacred place of the otter.

Now, this was really being in Africa! In the shadow of the large yellow rock towering above the lake that formed the heart of the obutaka were men sitting on bark cloth playing omweso, a more complicated version of the mancala game played throughout Africa. Nearer the stone, a medium sat on another piece of bark cloth amidst many different kinds of offerings. Toward the lake, spears surrounded smoking fire-pits, burning altars to the various gods - most importantly, the god of Lake Victoria, Mukasa.  

 

There were many different shrines - too many for me to describe here -  but the wonderful thing about this place was how positive the energy felt. Unlike some people had told me, it was not literally (or figuratively) dark. It was clearly a place that people came for healing, a bright, special, sunny sentinel on the shores of the gently lapping waters. In the end, we were asked to donate whatever we felt was appropriate in our hearts - and even being generous to our guide and the spirits of the shrine we wound up paying only about 1/5 of the cost we had been quoted earlier.

The pictures show men playing omweso, an offering of meat and raw plantains for Mukasa, and a sacred rock covered with barkcloths representing Walumbe, who heals diseases. The video is our guide playing one of the bells worn by the dogs of Ddungu, the god of the hunt.

FEB 21st: Ssezibwa Falls

Today started out with a trip to meet Omutaka Nakirembeka Alan Waliggo, the head of the heart (mutima) clan and the Bataka's appointed chief of all the clan heads. It couldn't have gone better! The Omutaka was warm, well-educated, and very interested in collaborating. 

Not only did he offer to do what he could to help shape the project - which is moving toward the conservation of sacred spaces and stories, he shared a related undertaking - a program to take young Baganda to the origin places of their clans. What was even more wonderful was that he invited us to two events on Saturday. One was the seating of the heir of the deceased leader of the sheep (ndiga) clan, the other was to accompany youth visiting the obutaka of the cane rat (musu) clan. We agreed to be at the palace in Bulange at 8:30 Saturday  morning, and then headed off to Ssezibwa falls.

Ssezibwa is on the way to Jinja (the source of the Blue Nile), where two springs come out of the earth. In traditional Baganda culture, this fact is especially significant because twins are traditionally considered a special honor. 

So, 2 hours of a crowded matatu and a short boda ride brought us to the humble entrance station, where we were joined by a wonderful guide who led us up the falls. The plunging water is not associated with a particular clan, but is a sacred space for all the Baganda, kept by a woman who advises people and maintains a set of altars. 

Here, a common way to honor the gods is to throw an animal (usually a sheep or goat) off the top of the falls. If the animal survives the ordeal, the gods have given their blessings. If not, some further work or another sacrifice needs to be made. According to our guide, sheep lovers need not fear - too much - supposedly 7 out of 10 survive the plunge. In fact, he said that many of these creatures take a the dive a few times before being 'retired'. But, humans, it seems are not so lucky. The force of the water, he said, is so strong that it generally holds a man down for 4-5 days before the lifeless body comes floating to the surface.

The top picture is Vianney posing at the livestock drop-off point, as if he's just sent a goat on a cliff dive. To the left are offerings at the mouth of a cave where a sacred python is given eggs to ask or give thanks for blessings (the twin-spouted pots are associated with the birth of twins). Below is a dish showing the usual offering at local sacred places - cowrie shell money, coffee beans, and modern cash.

FEB 20th: City Scenes

Today was pretty much a wash - hours of waiting to change tickets at Kenyan Airways, a long time perusing the biggest bookstore in town - cutting my life by years with each hour spent breathing the fumes of Kampala. So, I decided to post a selection of city scenes for you to appreciate the chaos of this big city, now pushing almost 1.5 million. BTW, the big pink sign is announcing a music and drumming competition held between the different Baganda clans.

The Boda-Boda

Here's an overview of urban Uganda's transportation of choice, the boda-boda.

These little mopeds / motorcycles ride where vehicular traffic would not dare to tread, weaving amongst angry rush-hour commuters, sidewalks filled with pedestrians, and dirt roads carved with mini Rift-Valleys. For less than a dollar, you can sit back, feel the wind in your hair, and feel your adrenalin rush as your life is put in the hands of fate and teenage speed demon.

When Peace and Arne met me at the airport, they had picked up a brochure that said: "Be aware, be VERY aware", complete with a bunch of gruesomely graphic pictures of mangled bodies post-bodaboda accident. It advised against ever taking a bodaboda, or if you must, insisting that the driver provide helmets and not being afraid to ask him to slow down. OK - that is a terrific idea.

But... let's do a reality check: for most Ugandans, the bodaboda is the only way to go. A taxi that would cost about 15,000 Ugandan Shillings (~$9) or a communal van, or 'matatu', which would take you along limited routes for about 800 shillings (45¢) would crawl along slower than you could, well, crawl yourself. For a mere 3000 USh (about $2.15), not only do you get a ride on a faster vehicle, you also have the benefit of bouncing off road - pedestrians and chickens notwithstanding.

So, here's a video that will help you to appreciate both the danger and the exhilaration of riding on a boda through the city. The pic of Peace and me on the boda is courtesy of Arne. See if you can identify anyone in the video wearing a helmet. Bonus points if you can see me in the rearview mirror, or if you can find Peace or Arne!

FEB 19th: Entebbe and UWEC

Today Peace and I crammed into a refurbished minivan and headed to UWEC (the Uganda Wildlife Education Centre) in Entebbe - where about 3 1/2 years ago I had come for a whirlwind four-day workshop. It was such a wonderful relief to get out of the choking haze of Kampala.

Entebbe is on a beautiful green peninsula in Lake Victoria, and it's no wonder that this is the place the colonial government chose to put their offices. It was a pity that I really had no time to look around. Peace and I spent a fair amount of time in the office. I had a great talk with the gardener, Richard, about medicinal plants and witchcraft and shrines and traditional religion - balancing on all kinds of fuzzy lines that I realize make this project that much more difficult. He took a list of the plants associated with clans so that I could get their scientific names. Most intriguing to me is the Nvuma, the spiky-looking seed of a supposedly aquatic plant that nobody has actually seen. Hmmmm....

I worked a little with Peace on a set of activities she's writing up for Ugandan teachers to submit to WCS, as well as typing a survey for students and teachers asking them about their knowledge of the natural history of the organisms represented by their clans.

One question which (too late) I realized would raise some dander was "Have you ever been to an essabo (traditional shrine)". Later, I would learn that these things are closely associated with witchcraft, which in general seems to be associated not with healing, but exploitation, grifting, and fear. I guess essabos are constructions, like a church, but with altars to native gods. The irony is, most of the people who seem opposed to the idea of them have never gone to them, so I wonder.

Later, when we dropped off our first batch of surveys at the local Catholic school, we changed this to a less-touchy and more relevant term: obutaka - which means a clan's place of origin. - I can't help wonder if Mutaka, Butaka, Omutaka, Obutaka etc. are all related in their meanings - anyhow, this is generally a natural place where the ancestors are believed to be buried. Unlike essabos, which are more off-limits for good Christians, it still seems to be OK to visit the obutaka. It's also more related to the idea of relating nature, place and people through the clan system.

I didn't even have time to walk around the wildlife centre, just a brief look at Lake Victoria and some time watching the ever-present vervets before heading into Kampala yet again.

FEB 18th: Office of The Obutaka and Makerere University

Today, the need to learn Luganda became deeply apparent, when I visited the headquarters of the king of Buganda (the Bataka) at a palatial building called Bulange. A wonderful old man greeted me at the door (the parliament was in session) and we told him we were there to seek an audience with the Omutaka (the chief of clan heads).

I choked out a few phrases, but mostly bowed and nodded and said lots of ‘thank yous’. Though he was very kind, I felt silly to be on this involved cultural experience without really knowing the language. After Vianney briefed him on the project, he asked in English “And what is your clan?"

OK.. I should have seen this coming, but I was unprepared. I stammered out that my mom’s county in England is represented by a red rose, and that some animals I identify with are the buck and butterfly… but it wasn’t very convincing. No matter, he sent us up to the Omutaka’s office. We went up a regal set of stairs, then a few flights of not-so-regal ones, to a small office where a young secretary was reading the paper at her computer. Vianney explained our mission and she gave us the personal number of Omutaka Nakirembeka, who told him to call back Wednesday to make an appointment on Thursday morning. Unsatisfying as that sounded, it was all we could do, and we headed back downstairs.

On our way out, the old man who greeted us asked me to choose a clan and said he would give me a name. That time, I said an antelope "Ngabi".... but he had a hard time coming up with a name - so he said maybe he would give me a name next time. This was not the first time I would be asked to answer this question.

We hopped on a boda-boda that we had hired for the whole day and began the trek up to Makerere University, where the mission was to check out their bookstore for relevant titles. The campus has been the site of a series of recent riots (seems par for the course in the developing world) - but luckily, it was nice and quiet, except for the nesting maribou storks making a riot in the large trees scattered on campus.

We had a nice, traditional lunch - these include LOTS of starch (sweet potatoes, matoke (mashed raw plantains steamed in banana leaves), rice, taro root and sweet potato. Funny, one afternoon, we stopped in town to get some pizzas and Vianney said it wasn't "REAL food" - which I discovered meant that it didn't contain at least half a plateful of starch. Anyhow, I bought a number of great books and headed home, passing the market.

Funny, though I was in Africa a limited time, much of it was spent both shopping and cooking. But there's a much better day to talk about that experience, so I'll leave it for another posting.

FEB 17th: Church and George Mugera.

It was up early the next morning for Mass at Rubaga cathedral. I tried recording the girls – but the space swallowed their voices. The church was a strange brick island on a hill, with lollypop-bright stained glass windows and statues of European saints and missionaries. The only architectural hint of Africa was the small memorial to the Uganda martyrs – local Catholics killed as the Buganda kingdom convulsed between Islam, Christianity and the native religion – Kiganda.

It seemed a strange place to start my exploration of the ancient stories and natural sanctuaries of Buganda. From Mass, I walked down the hill for the topical languor of waiting in the sun - inevitable despite the humming cell phones and bustle of apparent constant activity.

George Mugera, an old man from Kizigo, was supposed to come at around noon. Last week, Vianney had met him at the royal palace, where he was looking for someone to record stories he wants to share before he dies. As the doors of bureaucrats shut behind him, this project opened a small window.

So, at around 3pm, he was standing in front of me. The school was a hive of activity, with new students registering at the beginning of the term. Trying to get away from the bang of the construction, we were led to a back corner of the school and climbed up on a rickety box to enter a small cement storeroom, just George and me. So, fondling his rosary, George smiled and I tried to say a couple of phrases from my ‘Luganda Phrasebook for Tourists’ while he gazed at me with clouded eyes.

Sister Claire, the principal headmistress of the school, surprised us with a couple of VIPs (I’m sure we were the last thing she ever expected to find in a back store-room) – before Vianney came with his colleague Anatoli, who was there to help us translate. Strangely, it seems that few people have much formal training in Luganda, which has lost some of its original subtleties and become increasingly peppered with foreign words. Even Anatoli (whose father insisted he learn the ‘proper’ language) needed explanations for many words George was using.

Now, since I’m talking about language, I realize that a little explaining would help regarding a few of the terms I’m using. In Luganda, like many Bantu languages, the prefixes add meaning to groups of related words. For example:

LUganda – the language of the Ganda.
BUganda – the land of the Ganda
KIganda – the beliefs of the Ganda
MUganda – a single Ganda person
BAganda – 2 or more Ganda people

Before we got to the stories, we began with the most obvious questions I had yet to answer: 1. What was I doing and why? And 2.What kind of payment or support am I able to offer?

The answer to the first question shaped itself a bit over the course of the week: to gather information about the Baganda’s connection with the natural environment including the origins of traditional names, totems and taboos, and sacred places special to the clans and Baganda in general.

The second was more tricky. Sometimes, I feel a bit insane for coming here for a week of hard work paid for with my own limited money and time, especially when I don’t even know if anyone is interested in this project. How can I explain to a poor guy from a little village in the middle of nowhere that I’ve flown half way around the world and already spent more money than he’ll see in years just so I can start the process of gathering information so that maybe, someday, people in the future can know the places once special to their history. Even harder to explain is the fact that not only am I not funded for this project – I’m just barely struggling to get by in a tiny apartment in ridiculously expensive Manhattan.

So – how did we answer?

That this is just a beginning, that we are hoping to create proposals from what we find, and create a resource that will be recording this information for future generations. And, that in the meantime, to thank him for one of his many stories, we can give him ‘bus fare’ for taking the time to come all the way out and visit with us.

With the negotiations finished, he launched into a story I’ve not found in any of the resources I’ve found thus far – the origin of one of the first clans of the Baganda, the Ngeye (the black-and-white Colobus monkey).

I’m going to wait to share it with you until I see where this project goes – but I do want to say that it was amazing. Even in translation, it wove together people and the natural landscape with beauty and fluidity. It connected family names like “Nakitto” (the chilly morning when the main character catches a baby colobus”) to the landscape, to the spirits of the ancestors, to respect for the animal itself.

Anatoli and Vianney were even more blown away than I was. George had them at one moment quietly enraptured, in another howling with laughter. What was amazing to me was that the words he used for the family names needed to be explained to them – maybe like someone named John Smith might need an explanation that ‘Smith’ refers to someone who makes a living as an metalworker.

Even if nothing comes of this, I know that at least the 3 Ugandans who helped me during this week (Vianney, Anatoli and Peace) - have – through this journey, found out things about their own heritage they never knew.

FEB 16th: Song and Games

For as slow as the pace sometimes seems in Africa – I have felt like I have been running all week. So, I’ve decided to write these when I get moments, then post them the next time I manage to have access to the internet – which might be very well when I’m back in New York (or if I’m lucky, Europe).

Other than the brief safari I went on in Botswana, I have never felt a tourist in Africa. True to my tradition, here I was – just hours off the plane walking through the cement corridors of the Rubaga Girls’ Secondary School to meet the chorus as they get ready for the new term, having my name chalked onto the board and finding myself spontaneously called upon to talk about music, life and Catholicism in the United States.

The singing was amazing. I never knew a room of high school girls could blend such rich and deep harmonies. Especially wonderful were the songs in Luganda – full with round, sonorant vowels. I brought a digital recorder with me – I’ll try uploading a bit so you can hear them for yourself.

Equally wonderful was watching Vianney in action. His finely tuned ear identified the girls who were off-key, his explanations of phrasing immediately smoothed and refined pieces, and his versatile voice was able to demonstrate exactly what he was looking for.

After choir practice, Vianney, Peace, Arne and I headed into the center of Kampala to the ‘Cheese Bar’ where Arne was determined to see a soccer match: Arsenal (London) vs. Man U (Manchester). The place is run by a Dutchman who wears wooden shoes around town and makes cheese so good that it gets exported to Holland! We sampled it on the cheeseburgers.

Jet-lagged though I was, I still managed to stay up and dance to some great Kenyan dance hall after the game with an old pal, Sharon – we boogied down like we did 4 years ago, when I was last in Uganda. It was so great it eclipsed the largely terrifying ride there (but I’ll write more about the general mode of transport later).

The Pearl of Africa

Strange that I would be writing my first blog posting ever from a computer in the corner of an office at 'Our Lady, Queen of Africa', a Catholic girl's school in Kampala, Uganda.

I'm here with Vianny, the school librarian, choir director and music instructor - and the man that will be my Luganda translator and guide as we seek to record and share information about the traditional clans of Buganda and their relationship to conservation.

The Baganda are one of the 43 or so tribes that live within the borders of the country of Uganda, - the one from whom the country takes its name. There is lots of information on the clan system, but I've found that most of it focuses on geneology - we are going to see what connection they have had to the nature of this beautiful, green country.

Now, I'm off to meet the girl's chorus, with whom I understand I'll be performing at the National Catholic Cathedral (a surprise that came out of the blue this afternoon). One of them just came in to say they're ready. Before I go, I want to post a couple of pictures. One is my friend Nakitto Peace and her boyfriend, Arne. The other is Daphine, one of the neighbors at the collection of homes where I'm staying.