Humour : The Villager: What goes round, comes round

We villagers are a breed of people with many beliefs and superstitions. We tend to hang on to things that our ancestors told us once they were not done in the right way, we would be destined to terrible fates. This was a matter of belief and superstition. A belief is an inner personal conviction, deeply embedded in any one human being whether a villager or not; it is the inner personality of a being with the feeling that something exists or is true. Superstition on the other hand is a belief in a myth held by a group of people or one person. I’m not trying to impute anything to do with the category of people who go to shrines vis-à-vis those who do not. I’m only building up a simple, logical justification of why we sometimes perform certain tasks and do not do what we ought to have done in preference to what we do! I hope we are still together and you are not losing track of my argument. Sounding philosophical is the only way I can make you (the so called ‘Abanyamujyi’), realise that there are some brains in the village too! We think many things happen because they are meant to be so, to this regard, they are neither accidents nor plots, but all about destiny. I sometimes take these “things” to be true. That’s why I believed that getting married to my chain keeper was not an accident but an act of “the gods”; otherwise, who would have tamed me? I write this column because I am a villager, how else would I have known who a villager is and what village life is all about? I am fighting tooth and nail to get the village in me diminish but the odds are against me. It is like climbing a tree, upside down! I’m very optimistic (if that verb exists), that later than sooner, the village in me will be a thing of the past. As you have realised, I have started living the life-style of city dwellers. The other day, I was taken aback, when one of the “Abanyamujyi” called me to inquire about my latest “invention,” the sauna. The poor chap, despite having been born and groomed in the city environs, had never come to terms with the “sauna” phenomenon. While talking about this, I’m a typical villager (311), beating him to the draw! The same poor chap made us laugh a few years ago, when we had gone to attend the burial of a friend’s mother somewhere in Kiziguro in the then Commune Rukara. Just near the home where the funeral was to take place, there was a homestead with “manyatas” (grass thatched huts). The poor chap went closer to see what the “funny” structures were. He could not believe that, the “manyatas” were actually houses for people. This fellow even asked us whether the guy who lived in the “manyata” had a wife and children! Very naïve indeed! Nearly five years down the road, the same guy is again caught “open mouthed” by the sauna concept. I do not blame him but the system that denied him the virtue of being a villager. Now that I am beginning to outsmart the very “abanyamujyi,” I suspect that I am nearly there! Talking about the sauna reminds me of one or two peculiar things about the same. I’ve always heard that in Europe, it is an offence to go to a sauna with any attire except a towel for sitting or lying on. In Kigali, we go in with the likes of “bitenge” or “kanga” wrapped around our naked bodies. The other day, a certain man was in the sauna, he decided to lie on one of the benches. Not aware of what he was wearing, the piece of cloth on his huge body slipped off and we were treated to his ugly “behind”!! Still on the same note, one “mzungu” (most probably from Eastern Europe), walked into the dressing room and suddenly walked out stark naked to the sauna; the revellers all burst into a loud laugher. The nakedness of the “mzungu” wouldn’t have been anything worth laughing about, what “killed” us with laughter was his tinny reddish gadget. Worse still, there was a habitual “kanyama” (muscular man), who frequented the sauna; rumour has it that, he visited the place on a daily basis. This guy always offered free “massaging” services to who ever wanted. One fateful evening, the “kanyama” massaged a client so well that they ended up in one of the rooms to share a “shower” (I wasn’t around, don’t ask me questions). Word has it that one of the revellers heard a terrible signal coming from the showers. When he heard some one stating that she had died (ndapfuye), he though the person had suffered from a heart attack or something like that! He dashed to the cooling lounge and informed fellow revellers that someone was “busy dying” in the showers. Fortunate enough, there was a doctor among the revellers who rushed to rescue the “dying” lady. To their horror, they found the “kanyama” coming out after “killing” the lady. As we talk now, the “kanyama” has been banned for life, never to set his feet in the sauna and its environs. Little did he know that, what goes round comes round! Mfashumwana@fastmail.fm