Started as a Boring Friday Evening @bloggingabroad
I have been at my site for 9 months and I love my
little village. It’s a small rural villa and it reveals traditions. Many
nights I sit in my apartment and I hear drums beating and people chanting close
by. I am told that it comes from a curandero’s house and they are performing a
ritual. A curandero is a traditional Mozambican
Spiritual/Medical Healer, similar to the Witch Doctor in the American Indian culture. I
always said to myself that someday I will be invited to watch. I haven't yet.
So it’s Friday and the sun is setting and honestly
I was trying to think of something to do, and then I hear the drums. My boredom gave me the nerve to think of a way
to visit. I walk to my friend’s house, who
very discreetly mentioned that she is a curandeiro, and asked if we could walk
and visit the commotion. Before I knew
it, we were wrapped in a red, white, and black symbolic wrap and walking down
this dark road close by.
A small group of woman, men, and children sat in a
group, like they were camping around a fire.
The adults were all wrapped in the same colors, and the beaded women were
beating on the drums. I couldn’t tell
their reaction to my visit at first, but my friend immediately had them
chuckling and a space was cleared for us to sit.
The drums were beating, as women were chanting in a
different tongue. I didn’t know what was happening but, I was fascinated. All of a sudden, my friend grabs my hand and
pulls me to dance- no one else was dancing- but the “special guests” were
invited with the woman who were chanting.
I just copied the beat, everyone was giggling
at my attempts to dance.
It was a brief visit and now tomorrow morning at
8:00 a.m and again 2:00 p.m we are invited back to the anointment of a new curandeiro.
8:00 am Saturday
Equip with my Ipad, by myself, I visited the
continuation of the ceremony. Since words cannot depict the intensity of this
ritual, the pictures will give you a glimpse of a traditional custom
here in Mozambique.
It was fascinating to say the least.
The woman in the middle is being ordained, she is being cleaned after she drank and threw up the goat's blood.
Dancing and singing are a big portion of the ceremony.
Beautiful drums made locally
This black goat donated it's blood and later its bile organ and skin to the ceremony
Red, white , and black are the colors of this tribe's tradition, animal symbols represent as well
The dances are quick moving and strong stomping - dust
Here the another part is starting: she is looking to get hints to where the hidden treasure was put. She needs to find parts of the goat that will lead to her being ordained.
Running into the field to find her items.
Each trinket and item of clothes is a rep of this curandero's history
She sits in from of the alter of herbs and puts on the goats skin pieces to be slept in and then tomorrow she will be washed off in the river.
The baton is made from the tail hair of an animal that looks like a Yak.
The goats bile is tied to hair in the back.
She is layered with different symbolic wraps
Singing and dancing
Speedy
I believe here the spirits are speaking out through th voice of a curandero and being translated from another (Zulu) language by one of the elders.
May 1st
2016, is my one year mark that my feet have touched Mozambique. I am emotionally
mixed about this; I am looking forward to returning home yet, I value being
here. Time goes by much slower here; I feel more like I’ve been here 365 days, rather than one year. So this day mixes
my feelings between celebrations and relief.
The year has
been mixed with intrigue and adjustments, nuances and challenges. I have loved meeting new people and making
friends; sharing interests and commonality. I have been intrigued with the
culture; funerals, weddings, the
traditional healer’s drums at night, the chicken feet in the beans, the
pounding of peanuts, the potage snack at school, the dusty roads, the swollen bellies,
the acute dermatitis, the buildings in rubble from colonial times, the weekly
market, the vendor boys that work all day in the heat for fifty cents. These
impressions are carved into my mind.
Emotionally
this adventure has also been
topsy-turvy, I have never felt so popular than when I hear my name called so many times walking to
the center as my heart often squeezes when looking at the kids and wondering what their future will be
like. They also make me think of my own children,
Christian and Alycia, and appreciate where they are even though I miss them.
I swerve
between counting down the months I will be home and hoping I have enough time
to see some results from my projects. The Peace Corps’ phrase; “The toughest job
you’ll ever love”, is accurate.
All in all, this year has definitely enriched my journey,
thank you for sharing it with me.
xo @bloggingabroad
