Cultural Persuasion

What a day! We started at the wee hour of 5:00am. The destination, 100km into Zambia (directions: you'll be able to tell where to turn) for the Chewa Tribal Celebration, The Kulamba Traditional Ceremony. The Chewa are a huge tribe,roughly 20million, that cover parts of Malawi, Mozambique, and Zambia. This yearly celebration was for the prominent chief aka "King."

So I had no idea what to expect. On Jeannie's advice, I borrowed a long black dress so that I would be dressed appropriately for the occasion. My travel wardrobe is lacking in acceptable tribal celebration attire. Luckily, I brought a long sleeve button down shirt, my origninal plan being to use it as a sun cover, but with no sun in sight, slanted rain, and heavy winds, it became a great option for warmth. We found some seats and honkered down under an old army tent. Within minutes the tent was full beyond capacity. Personal space is something you must let go of when Africa. We experienced a little of that in Paris, but nothing like here. At least the body heat helped with the cold. I could have people watched all day. And considering, by my very educated guess, there were roughly 20,000people present, there were a lot of people to watch. A lot of people were wearing red and white dotted chitenje's to support the king. (The chitenje is a large piece of fabric that women wrap over their skirts. They are very brightly colored and sometimes political. I.E. contain the president's face or in this case the kings.) We saw headwraps, dresses, skirts, wraps, shawls, shirts, capris. It was excellent!

Between the rain and wind our tent was struggling to stay up right. It kept wanting to blow away, which caused much laughter as people kept jumping up to catch it. And the laughter and chattered continued through all the dances and processionals. The people talked through everything except a chant and the entrance of the king. It was simply amazing. The dances were great but never warranted an applause. We had 'press passes'so we were able to go in the middle of the huge arena, take pictures, wander around. The perspective from the middle was incredible. People flippin'everywhere; in trees, on top of the ambulance, packed shoulder to shoulder in every visible crevice, on top of the gas tanker, etc. And yet the amount of order was maintained and the ceremony moved right along.

Favorite part: Well, there were two...first, a lovely lady by the name of Lucy lent me a chitenje for warmth. I never expected to be shaking with cold in Africa so this offering was taken with much gratitude. Second, the Gule Wamkulu. I think they are medicine men esque, but not for sure. They wear great outfits. Not even going to try and describe them just check out the pictures. Overall, great experience but we did cut it short because of weather.

We had a little trouble at the border. Always get an entrance and exit stamp from immigration or you may be left in border limbo like me. I exited everywhere but seemed to be missing the necessary entrance stamps. Also, always keep dollars on you when traveling. Those that shake you down like them the most, the power of monetary persuasion. I am going to keep this experience on the vague side, protection of the innocent if you will, but rest assured, I am typing this from Malawi. So everything worked out in the long run (long run being roughly over an hour and a half.) And I now have all necessary stamps.

Today, doing a little cooking, having a blind wine tasting, and preparing for our departure on Tuesday. Time to challenge all the self proclaimed wine experts in this house. I am a tad nervous, but rest assured I will get my confidence in check before the competition prays on this weakness.

Happy Weekend to all! Cheers,E