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“We are the ‘most beautiful’ of all”.

Sunday, 1 August 2021 8:00

The cult of physical beauty is most important. The rules of aesthetics are followed by the entire group.

Gently but firmly, the mothers try to shape the physiognomy of the new-born child in the hope of affecting the collective appearance of the group. From birth, the head of the child is delicately squeezed between the hands and the nostrils are compressed.
The Bororo believe they are the most beautiful people in the world.

The man is tall and slender with a straight nose, large eyes, white teeth and a high forehead. These are the rules of beauty for the male nomad. The woman also has soft and gentle lines and wants to have a concave spine and lengthened breasts. She wears her hair in the form of a bun plaited on her forehead. The scars on her face and the sides of her mouth denote the clan she belongs to and protect her from evil spirits. Her jewels and ornaments make her even more good looking. For her, beauty represents the joy of life.
The social position enjoyed by the woman within the family renders her tranquil. She has the same status as the husband: she may share her man with three other wives but she may easily abandon him.

The young Bororo spend much of their time taking care of their bodies. They adorn themselves with earrings and multi-coloured necklaces and cover their eyes with a blue veil. They live as young people up to the age of sixteen. When a man asks for a young woman as his wife, he must accompany his request with a gourd full of milk: if he is accepted by the family of the girl, the future spouse must offer his in-laws three Zebu cattle for the great marriage feast. Every palio, a word denoting a single Bororo, gives the greatest attention to respecting the norms of behaviour handed down from father to son: strength, courage, pride, honesty. When he goes against them he becomes a pulaku (meaning ‘you are outside’, you have gone beyond the norms of the fathers and you must therefore leave). Another serious offence is that of the septundum, lacking respect for the wife or not satisfying her desires, including her loving advances.
“If her heart is already far from you, a mother may say to her son, you must not keep her because her sorrow will also become yours. Her beauty will fade. It is better that others should see her while she is beautiful rather than have her become unhappy staying with you”.

According to the Bororo, man and woman are like two poles that naturally attract each other. When she is ‘ready’, when she is neither pregnant nor breast-feeding her child and finds someone who attracts her, she must immediately halt, even if her herd is moving with the entire group. She stops in order to be with her young man who will never call her by name since this is prohibited by tradition. ‘The one you love, you must respect’, they say. One form of respect is not to show love openly. This is really a matter of avoiding the semteende, ‘the shame’, that strikes whoever breaks the taboo.
The Bororo woman is, however, free and independent. She has no regard for virginity and may reject the man her mother and father offer as her future husband. If her husband is unfaithful, the demands of culture determine that she is in no way faithful since this would be unjust. (F.M.)

South Africa at the crossroads.

Sunday, 1 August 2021 8:00

Now is a critical time for South Africa, a major test of its institutions and leaders. Former President Jacob Zuma (79) is finally behind bars.

The Constitutional Court, the country’s Supreme Court, will hear his appeal against a sentence of 15 months imprisonment for contempt of court. By refusing to testify Zuma, the very stereotype of leaders in Africa, defied a Judicial Commission of Inquiry into Allegations of State Capture (systemic corruption in which private interests significantly influence a state’s decision-making processes for financial gain).

South Africa’s constitution includes important institutions intended as protections for democracy and guarantor of citizens’ rights. The office of Public Protector, reporting to Parliament, is an independent body designed to monitor government maladministration and corruption.

In March 2016, the Public Protector, Thuli Madonsela, set in motion an investigation into allegations against Zuma. It was widely believed that three businessmen brothers, the Gupta family, in cahoots with Zuma had been selling top ministerial appointments in exchange for highly favourable business deals and contracts.

The investigation itself was the result of a civil complaints procedure initiated by Father Stanislaus Muyebe, the vicar-general of the Dominican Order in southern Africa, and a second complaint by the main Opposition Party, the Democratic Alliance. The final lengthy report of the investigation was worrying enough for the Constitutional Court to implement Madonsela’s recommendation to set up a Judicial Commission of Inquiry. Zuma was finally forced to resign in 2018 after nine years in office.

I only met Zuma once some forty years go. He suddenly appeared from behind a bush in the then Salisbury capital of Rhodesia/ Zimbabwe. I was with Rev. Frank Chikane, the future secretary-general of the South African Council of Churches (SACC), then and now a prominent and courageous advocate of human rights and democracy. Frank was meeting his brother, an active member of the external ANC.

At the time, the ANC camps in Angola and Zambia had been infiltrated by apartheid agents and in an atmosphere of paranoia scores of alleged ‘sell-outs’ had been executed. Zuma was head of ANC Intelligence. Even in that fleeting encounter he struck me as a frightening
and dangerous man.

In 1994, not long after he stepped down as President of Zambia I accompanied the late Kenneth Kaunda (KK) monitoring South Africa’s first fully free elections. His recent death reminded me of so many unanswered questions about the leaders of the African liberation movements. How had they managed the transition from political activist or guerrilla fighter to holder of high office in an independent State?

Why in the case of Kaunda, a pious Christian and a thoroughly decent man, was the one-party State a natural default position? In the case of Zimbabwe, did its first President, Robert Mugabe, impart a sense of entitlement to wealth through power the result of suffering, persecution and prolonged imprisonment under collapsing colonial or settler rule?
A kind of reward?

The heady atmosphere of optimism and idealism, the euphoric crowds voting during the 1994 elections, are long gone. Even then there were serious threats. Kauda was assigned to KwaZulu-Natal where Inkatha, the Zulu tribal movement, was shaping up for a war with the ANC. Violence that could derail the process of the elections. Kaunda had a retinue of two: a Zambian bodyguard impeccably turned out in military uniform and myself as bag-carrier and general factotum. We were lucky.

The Zulu leader Gatsha Buthelezi backed off after intensive lobbying . Instead of carrying machetes and guns the young men we met in our first small town were having a wonderful time talking into walkie-talkies and acting as if they were a Presidential protection unit. Sadly intercommunal violence was to pick up after the elections.

Kaunda stopped at Pietermaritzburg for a night-time vigil in an Anglican church. We had a row of pews to ourselves with the bodyguard seated two places away on the left of Kaunda and myself on his right. Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Denis Hurley, the Catholic Archbishop of Durban, were to give short homilies. During a silent period for prayer out of the corner of my eye I saw a stocky white man barreling down the left aisle. He stopped at the end of our row. He looked disturbed. It didn’t look good. As he pushed along the row towards us it looked bad.

To my amazement the bodyguard let him pass, sit down next to Kaunda and start sobbing. Kaunda handed over his signature handkerchief and held the weeping man’s hand. The man blurted out that he had come to ask forgiveness. He had been on a South African commando raid into Zambia which had killed several people. Kaunda said a few gentle words. Somehow both the bodyguard and Kaunda had known this white intruder was intent on confession, truth and reconciliation, not assassination. It was a mysterious moment but in retrospect caught something significant both about South Africa in 1994 and Kaunda’s personality and leadership.

Kaunda and my friend, the SACC’s Rev. Frank Chikane, owed much to a Christian humanism that allowed them to move seamlessly between the political and the religious. Chikane survived neurotoxin poisoning by the apartheid security police and became in 1999 Director-General in Thabo Mbeki’s presidential office. In July 2010, Frank courageously publicised his insider blow-by-blow account of the de facto coup by which Zuma forced Mbeki’s resignation and came to power as President. Chikane now has a leading role in the nationwide Defend Our Democracy Movement, a coalition of NGOs, religious bodies and lawyers.

Chikane is both consistent and persistent. His position is simple. South Africa’s future had fallen into the hands of politicians who looted the country and enriched themselves at the expense of the people. Now is the time for the people to mobilize ‘as the last line of defense’, Chikane’s words, to protect South Africa’s democracy. Against this background of a popular movement, and Zuma in prison despite support in the ANC, the role of the judiciary takes on a particular significance. Meanwhile Mandela’s spirit of reconciliation and enormous self-sacrifice for his country remains a political ideal.

Younger readers may think of distant South Africa and the 1990s themselves as ‘another country’. But there are lessons for Britain’s contemporary political problems. We need some of that early post-apartheid political creativity, the infectious hope that things can change. We need a concerted movement that draws different parts of society together to support our institutions and defend our democracy. And we need Church leaders with the courage and confidence to recognize our problems as both ethical and political who will speak truth to power and act accordingly.

Ian Linden
a visiting Professor at St Mary’s University,
London.

South Africa has been rocked by the worst violence since the nation achieved democracy in 1994.The unrest began on July 8 when former President Jacob Zuma started serving a 15-month prison sentence for contempt of court. Supporters in his home province of KwaZulu-Natal set up roadblocks on major highways and burned about 20 trucks. The protests closed the N3 and N2 highways, which link the Indian Ocean ports of Durban and Richard’s Bay to the industrial hub of Johannesburg and to Cape Town.

The unrest spread within KwaZulu-Natal, where shopping malls and centers were ransacked by mobs that took food, electronics, clothes and liquor. Attacks on retail centers also spread inland to Gauteng province, to Johannesburg, the country’s largest city, and to Pretoria, the capital. In Durban and Pietermaritzburg, crowds attacked warehouses for major retailers and factories, which were set alight. Several burned until their roofs collapsed. The unrest lasted for a week until 25,000 army troops were deployed.

At least 215 people died in the unrest, and more than 2,500 were arrested on charges including theft and vandalism, according to government figures.
Extensive damage was done to 161 malls and shopping centres, 11 warehouses, eight factories and 161 liquor stores and distributors, according to the government. An estimated $680 million was lost in stolen goods, burned trucks and destroyed property. (c.c.)

Israel. Nevé Shalom – Wahat al-Salam. An Oasis of Peace.

Sunday, 1 August 2021 8:00

On a hill between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem stands a village that is an oasis of peace. Its dual name Nevé Shalom – Wahat al-Salam respects the two communities that live there, one Hebrew and one Arabic, in a land where peace has been wanting for more than seventy years.

The name Nevé Shalom– Wahat al-Sa-lam is a bilingual expression meaning ‘Oasis of Peace’ and signifies a dream that has existed since 1974. It is a village founded by the Dominican priest Father Bruno Hussar, a Catholic convert from Judaism and an Israeli citizen. His idea was to ask Jewish and Arabic families to live together in the same place and so create a single community. For 47 years, the village of Nevé Shalom– Wahat al-Salam shows the whole world that Jews and Arabs can live together respecting and understanding each other and seeing others as an enrichment and not as a danger – and to do this in a society where Israeli-Palestinian conflict has lasted for more than seventy years and where hatred has caused people to question deeply the idea of a village where different people live together on a daily basis.
This is demonstrated by the various acts of vandalism perpetrated each year against Nevé Shalom – Wahat al-Salam. Despite all this,
the experience goes on.

The aims of Nevé Shalom– Wahat al-Salam are to face up to the complexity of the different situations, to break down divisions and stereotypes, to focus upon the relationship between power and prejudices, to become aware that each person has a role in the construction of a more just society and fraternity, where each person has their place and their role. There are tens of thousands of young people who have been involved in the School for Peace as well as the adults who have learned in this place how to manage situations of conflict and are now active in organisations involved in resolving the conflict.
Nevé Shalom– Wahat al-Salam wishes to be an experience of resilience where people are continually starting over again in the face of difficulties. Its strength derives from the relevance of a message that has its roots in the founder, Father Bruno Hussar, who used to say he had four identities since he was a Catholic priest, a Jew, an Israeli citizen who was born in Egypt and lived there until he was eighteen. Furthermore, Fr. Hussar held four citizenships during his lifetime: Hungarian, Italian, French and Israeli, as well as having been born in Cairo into a Jewish family that was well integrated into the Arabic world.
While in France studying engineering at university, Hussar met the figure of Jesus and in 1935 was baptised after a troubled journey. He would have like to embrace the priesthood but decided to postpone matters since he had to look after his mother and siblings. In 1945, he joined the Dominican Order, changing his name from André to Bruno.

He was sent to Israel charged with founding a Catholic centre for Hebrew studies. Once he had arrived in Israel, Fr. Hussar began to understand more and more the importance of his Jewish roots and his feeling of belonging to the Jewish people. He studied the Hebrew language and history including the attitude of the Church towards the Jews. He became increasingly convinced of the need to bring about a change in the teaching of the Church and the position and attitude of Christians towards Jews. In his early years, Father Hussar met other formerly Jewish Christians and some Christians who agreed with his views. In 1955, the Work of Saint James was founded for the purpose of deepening the encounter with the Jews. But Fr. Hussar felt it was not enough. He says: “There is the main conflict between Jews and Arabs…then there are countless other conflicts between Jews and Christians, Muslim Arabs and Christian Arabs, between Jews and Jews […]. They never see the faces of the others and they are not interested in seeing them”. Since it would have been impossible to deal with all conflicts, Fr. Hussar confined his attention to the two peoples that within the state of Israel confronted each other as enemies, and started to dream of a village called ‘Nevé Shalom – Wahat as-Salam (Oasis of Peace)’ where Jews and Palestinian Arabs can live together in equality, peace, collaboration and friendship. And so it was that, in 1974, the experience of the village of Nevé Shalom– Wahat al-Salam came into being.

The key to the experience of Nevé Shalom– Wahat al-Salam is dialogue. It is lived out daily between neighbours whether Jews or Arabs and also in the primary school attended by children who do not live in the village but in the surrounding areas: the educational system there is the only one in Israel where teaching is done in both Hebrew and Arabic. It is marked by the continual and spontaneous encounter between the children of the two peoples and guarantees reciprocal knowledge and respect as well as respect for the culture and traditions of the others. But dialogue also involves religious identity since the Arabs living in the village are partly Christian and partly Muslim.

On the hill the village is built on, there are no buildings for worship: the families practise their faith outside the village. However, a House of Silence (Bet Dumiain in Hebrew and Bet as-Sakina in Arabic): it is an architecturally very simple structure dedicated to reflection, meditation and prayer. It is neither a mosque nor a synagogue nor a church but a large, white-painted sphere with a simple entrance. Within it there are no religious symbols denoting one creed more than another: there is just a rock in the middle with an olive branch – a universal sign of peace – a lighted candle and some mats and stools. The House of Silence is dedicated to all faiths, a sign that unites in a land where religions divide people. Despite everything, the dream goes on.

Chiara Pellicci/PM

Africa. The Giraffe. ‘Higher than the trees’.

Sunday, 1 August 2021 8:00

Giraffe, in the Sindebele and Zulu languages, is Ndlulamiti, meaning literally ‘higher than the trees’, is one of the most iconic animals of the African continent. The tallest animal in the world, it can reach a height of six metres. The characteristics of this mild herbivore have enabled it to survive by blending in with its surroundings. However, the giraffe is in serious danger of becoming extinct due to the continual reduction of its habitat.

The giraffe is an artiodactyl of exceptional dimensions with the female weighing as much as a ton and the male 1200 kg. It is the only one of its kind, not only because it belongs to an almost unique family (that of the Giraffidae, which includes giraffes and the rare okapi), but also because its physical characteristics distinguish it unequivocally from any other mammal. While its height represents its more evident characteristic, its outer covering and irregular-shaped blotches make it no less unique among herbivores. The giraffe’s long neck, which may exceed a weight of 200 kg, enables it to reach the highest branches of trees beyond the reach of most other herbivores, with the exception of the elephant, and to carve out a specific alimentary niche for itself where it finds few competitors. Nevertheless, the bone structure of its exceptional neck is composed of only seven vertebrae, just like any other mammal, including humans. The exceptionally long, slender legs enable the animal to take long strides and to reach remarkable running speeds, even though the giraffe’s movements may appear elegantly slow.

The scientific name of the giraffe, Giraffa camelopardalis, reflects an ancient myth that describes this animal as a cross between a camel (its mouth is like that of a camel and it also chews like a camel) and a leopard (due to the blotches on its skin). Its numerous sub-species are similar, though different, as regards the appearance of their hides.
From the dark brown blotches with irregular outlines of the southern African giraffe and those of its cousin the Thornicroft (endemic to South Luangwa, in Zambia), to the network markings of the Kenyan reticulated Giraffe, each sub-species has a characteristic skin but the pattern of the markings is a characteristic that is unique to each individual within
any given sub-species.

These dark markings are a most effective camouflage that fragments the outline of the animal and, at the same time, makes it blend in with its environment, often making a motionless giraffe in the bush become invisible, even from a few metres away.
Giraffes have at least one pair of horns composed of bony protuberances covered in hide and skin (unlike the keratin covering that antelopes have), but the males also have a third horn in the occipital zone that is less noticeable than the other two. The two main horns are, from birth, separate from the cranium – to facilitate calving – and become attached to it only after a few weeks.
The tongue of the giraffe also has unique characteristics: it has a bluish colour, more than a metre long and capable of freely grasping and manipulating even the branches of the karoo and white acacias covered in long, sharp thorns.

The ‘problem’ of height
The height and dimensions of the giraffe, together with its ability to launch deadly kicks in all directions, render the individual practically invulnerable to predators; only a large and experienced pride of lions can successfully hunt – and not without danger – an adult giraffe. However, the giraffe’s height also creates a problem that it had to face and resolve during its evolution. Sending blood to a height of six metres requires a good pump and the giraffe’s 12 kg heart fulfils this task efficiently; nevertheless, such a pump means pressure is high and this, in certain conditions, may cause dangerous on the ‘pipes’.
When a giraffe lowers its head to drink, it experiences the added pressure of gravity which would possibly cause the blood vessels in the head to burst. To counteract this pressure, evolution provides a remedy by means of a complex network of capillaries located in the neck of the giraffe: the wonderful network. This organ instantly balances the pressure of the blood, avoiding excessive pressure when the animal lowers its head and any drop in pressure if it suddenly raises it.

The legs, too, may suffer the negative consequences of high blood pressure: this is why the hide of the giraffe is so elastic in these areas and functions as a containing measure to avoid damaging blood vessels close to the skin. Being so well equipped, the giraffe may sleep soundly; but how and where does a giraffe sleep?
Giraffes spend from 16 to 20 hours feeding every day and so there is not much time for sleep. When they can, they crouch down with their legs folded under their breasts (the typical position of ruminants). Alternatively, they may rest their heads in the fork of a tree and enjoy forty winks. They never lie down completely because, as ruminants, they would be choked by the liquids in the reticulorumen, and they never really sleep. Like all ruminants, giraffes never sleep in the ordinary meaning of the word but enter a sort of ‘energy-saving mode’ during which the brain waves assume characteristics that are very similar to those produced by a non-ruminant during sleep.

The social system of giraffes
Despite their fame as formidable adversaries even for the most powerful predators, giraffes are essentially meek animals. They are very quiet (they make but a few sounds and these are not easily heard by the human ear), they live gregariously without, however, forming stable herds or groups. The social system of giraffes is, in fact, based upon temporary associations; they associate for short periods in groups without fixed ties from which, at any time, one or more individuals may separate to join another group or live a temporarily solitary life.

Consequently, they do not defend territory but during the mating season, the dominant males clearly vaunt their status by means of an ostentatious pose which they show off in all their majesty, threateningly approaching any potential male rival. If the latter does not show subordination, they may engage in violent blows of their horns driven home by their long muscular necks, while rivals maintain parallel positions. This is but a small break, essential for procreation: an interval of time after which the giraffes again become meek and peaceful. Unfortunately, however, despite their meek character, fate has not rewarded them: today the giraffe is in grave danger, caused by the continual reduction of its habitat by human expansion and its population decline has reached alarming levels, bringing it to local extinction in many areas of the continent.
The grassy savannahs punctuated by acacia trees or the open forests and riverbanks of Africa would not be the same without the long sinuous figures of these herbivores that, from time immemorial, traverse the continent. Like many of their similars, they have not managed to resist the implacable pressure of human expansion.

Gianni Bauce/Africa

Niger. The Bororo-Wodaabe. The Beauty of Liberty.

Sunday, 1 August 2021 8:00

The Bororo belong to the large ethnic family of the Peul, better known as the Fulani, Fulbe, Poular, Fula, and Fellata.

The origins of the Peul are still a mystery though there is no shortage of theories, some rather imaginative, in this regard. One theory, for example, says they came from Mesopotamia, having crossed the Red Sea. Others say they are descendants of a Hebrew-Egyptian group, forced to move south during the Roman conquest. Their language, Fulfulde, is in many ways similar to other idioms of the Dravidian branch and they have even been compared to the nomads of Iran.
However, the more credible version still is that the Peul originated in Ethiopia. About 5,000 years ago, these nomadic pastoralists seem to have expanded from the regions of the Horn of Africa, into North Africa, or more precisely, the Tassili Plateau in Algeria, and then emigrated towards the south west, moved especially by pressure from the Berber peoples (around 3000 AD).

Henri Lothe, the French explorer and ethnographer, in his account of the archaeological expedition undertaken in the fifties into the Tassili desert, examined hundreds of rock graffiti of inestimable historical and paleo-ethnographical value, discovered in the area, and noticed that many of these drawings showed surprising similarities with the somatic and clothing characteristics of the present-day Peul. Others who subsequently studied this rock art speculated on the presence of proto-Peul cultural elements in the region as long ago as the fourth millennium BC. The famous Mali author Hampate Ba, had no doubt about the presence, in some painted scenes, rituals and practices still to be found among the present-day Peul. In one of them, from the Bovidian Period, around, 4,000 BC, he recognised the lotori ceremony, a celebration of the aquatic origins of the ox, once practised by the Peul of the Diafarabe region in Mali, but which fell into disuse due to Islamisation. Another motif depicting fingers, convinced him that he had found a representation of the myth of the hand of the first Peul pastor Kikala. Finally, in a rock inscription found at Tin Felki, Hampate Ba was sure he could recognise a hexagonal jewel, very similar to the ‘Cross of Agadez’, a fertility talisman still used by the Peul women.

It seems certain, therefore, that the proto-Peul experienced a golden age on the Tallili Plateau in Algeria. Pastor artists like the Peul, in fact, must have been the authors of the many Saharan rock paintings showing water-loving animals (giraffes, hippopotami and buffalos) and very slender human figures. As the meadows dried up and the desert advanced, those nomadic pastoralists must have moved south with their herds and reached the region that extends from southern Mauritania and Senegal as far as Lake Chad.
The expansion of the present-day Peul peoples originated in the region of Futa Toro, which is roughly the territory of the valley of the Senegal River and includes the areas in the north of Senegal and the south of Mauritania. There, from the mixture of Berber pastoralists, Caucasians and sedentary blacks, the Peul ethnic group was born.

The black Peul gradually abandoned the nomadic life and became herdsmen and farmers. They live a sedentary life in large villages and mostly converted to Islam and mixed with other ethnic groups. Since the XV century, their warrior and conquering elite gave rise to numerous kingdoms and empires, from Senegal to Cameroon. They are the recognised founders of the great Sokoto emirate in Nigeria, after waging a long jihad, or holy war, led by Usman Dan Fodio. Where they did not form the royal family (as in the Hausa sultanates), the Peul held the posts of counsellors, lawyers and court officials. The Berber-Caucasian Peul, physically tall with a straight nose, smooth hair, narrow lips and reddish skin, have always avoided the mixing of blood or any sort of cross-breeding. They have remained pastoralists, very close, both in spirit and in habits, to the great Sahara and Sahel nomads.

A small minority of this group has kept intact the ancient traditions, moving with their herds among the sunny plains of the Sahel, seeking water and pasture. They are called Bororo, a name which, on the lips of other Peul, means ‘those who do not wash themselves and live in the bush’. They themselves are proud to call themselves Wodaabe (sing. Bodaado), which means ‘the people of the taboo’.
Islam has scarcely touched them. After a somewhat superficial conversion, they returned to their traditional religion (cult of the ancestors, belief in spirit or ‘djiins’). This caused the great Islamic warrior Dan Fodio to be ‘banished’ from the Islamic community; even today, in some Hausa emirates, they are believed to be infidels and are therefore ‘banished’. In turn, the Bororo Wodaabe consider the sedentary populations as their inferiors. They especially despise the black groups of the south which they call by such names as ‘hyenas’, ‘monkeys’, or ‘donkeys’. Mixed marriages with blacks are deplored and described as ‘eating the fruit of the bitter prune’. (F.M.)

Being Together and Sharing.

Sunday, 1 August 2021 8:00

Two Comboni missionary sisters from DR Congo share their experience. Compassion, commitment, and hope are the ways they share their life with people.

My name is Sr. Bernadette Idey, my missionary vocation brought me to live in the Middle East, Zambia, Kenya, and the Democratic Republic of Congo, my native country, where I have been for five years now. I live in Mungbere, a town situated 138 km from Isiro, the capital of the new province of Haut-Uélé, in the north of the country.
Mungbere stands at a crossroads between important cities such as Isiro, Wamba, Mambasa, Watsa and Dungu. It has more than 20,000 inhabitants belonging to different ethnic groups: Mvu, Budu, Logo, Zande, Mangbetu, Yogo, Lokele, Luba, Boa, Mbuza and Hema. There is also a considerable number of pygmies who here are called bambote. Many other people have been coming here to work in the fields or cattle rearing, to engage in commerce, to have better access to health care and education or to escape from places where security was not guaranteed. With so many languages being spoken, French is still the official language, though Lingala is the medium in daily use.
Most of the people are Catholics though there are some who belong to other Christian denominations and there is also a Muslim minority.

The parish of Our Lady Consoler of the Afflicted, is part of the diocese of Wamba and administered by the Comboni Missionaries. The parish has a number of primary schools – including one just for pygmies – three secondary schools, a hospital which is also run by the Comboni Missionaries, and social structures for the promotion of women.
I am the headmistress and a teacher at the Mavuno Institute, one of the Catholic High Schools. My job is to plan and coordinate the curriculum and extra-curricular activities. My responsibilities also include supervising all the teachers and the students who aspire to taking up teaching in primary schools. Teaching provides me with an opportunity to keep in contact with young people. They sometimes need someone to listen to them, and the fact that I am an African and Congolese Sister helps them to trust me. They feel at ease with me and they sometimes share their anxieties, sorrows and joys. I am here to instil in them human, moral, Christian, and professional values and I endeavour to create a favourable environment for their development.
Compassion for children coming from areas of violence encourages me to welcome them and enrol them in school, sometimes contrary to school regulations. I see them as ‘lost sheep’ who have a right to education. This educational pastoral is a vocation that requires much patience, flexibility, availability, sacrifice, faith, and love but also firmness in facing up to certain situations. The best thing of all is being surrounded by young people who give me the joy of living.

In the rural and multicultural context of our school, I try to promote unity in diversity, religious tolerance, mutual respect, and the family spirit. We pay particular attention to the education of the girls, and especially that of the Pygmy minority since they are quite vulnerable and easily tend to abandon the school.
I encourage them to persevere in their studies as it is not easy for them to integrate into a structured educational system.
Despite everything, there are some reasons for optimism. Last year, for the first time in the history of the Institute, we had a Pygmy candidate for the state exams, which he passed. It was a cause of great joy for all of us and I hope it may serve as an example and inspiration for the other Pygmy students still attending the school.
One of my joys is to see how an increasing number of girls succeed in finishing secondary school, with good results in the state exams at the end. Those fortunate enough to go on to university are doing well and this is very encouraging. Only a few years ago, the girls would study much less than the boys and often gave up their lessons while still very young.Finally, I believe the Mission is everywhere. I am happy with my work in the field of education since it provides me with a vast field of apostolate and the opportunity to spend time with people of different social levels, sharing their sorrows and their joys.

Living with the people.
From Africa to Latin America. Continuing my studies in Mexico and now living in Texas. I am Sr. Isabelle Kahambu Valinande, a Congolese sister. After my religious profession, I was assigned to Mexico where I lived for nine years in three different places. I spent a year in Guadalajara working with the sick and elderly as well as in the parish. In Costa Chica, in the state of Oaxaca, I devoted two years to African-Mexican youth ministry. That was a beautiful experience during which I felt the joy of missionary life. It taught me to allow myself to be guided and I learned much from the young people. It also allowed me to really get inside the reality of the country and to open myself up to what was new and different while sharing what was mine.

The diocese of Puerto Escondido did not have sufficient pastoral agents, too few priests and, as a result, many young people were not being sufficiently assisted. Our parish in Huaxolotitlán had about 32 communities and just one priest who could not visit all the places during the year. The communities, therefore, organised the celebration of their faith themselves. I was one of four Sisters and we shared the territory of the parish among ourselves. While accompanying the people, I was deeply moved by their testimony of faith.
I must admit that this situation surprised me, knowing that Mexico is a country with more than 500 years of evangelisation. In my diocese of Butembo-Beni there are many priests and religious congregations. Even though it is not long since the coming of the Gospel, there are pastoral agents trained to accompany the Christian communities and the celebrations are very impressive.
In Costa Chica I had to turn my hand to all sorts of work. On Sundays, I would go to different communities for the celebration of the Word of God. I was also deeply moved by the celebration of funerals.

Traditionally, the dead are not buried without a blessing so the people go in search of a priest, a sister or a catechist. They say these people are ‘closer to God’ and that the prayers and blessings bring the deceased person close to God. They have one ritual which is a mixture of African and indigenous traditions. As soon as a person dies, while the body is still warm, they place it on the ground in contact with Mother Earth. “From the earth they come and to the Earth they return”, they say. When the body is cold, they believe that Mother Earth has received it. They then adorn the place with marigold flowers and lime, placing the dead person on a bed in preparation for the vigil after which they go to the chapel, something sacred for Catholics, and carry out the burial. The community then gathers to share food. The communities where I worked also have the custom of having a novena of prayers for the happy repose of the deceased. I appreciated very much this way of celebrating the life and death of people.

Lastly, I lived in Mexico City for six years. There, while studying Religious Sciences, I dedicated myself to missionary animation and ministering to migrants. At the Casa Mambre, I helped them with their administrative formalities and to study the language, especially those coming from Africa. At the Cafemir Centre, I collaborated in the psycho-spiritual accompaniment and manual therapy for migrants to facilitate their social integration. I am now in the United States where we are going to open a community in Texas to continue our work with the youth and migrants. (C.C.)

South Sudan. Mission towards Reconciliation.

Sunday, 1 August 2021 8:00

After ten years of the declaration of independence, South Sudan continue to suffer the drama of civil war. Reconciliation between various ethnic groups has become an important task for the churches in South Sudan. The commitment of Comboni Missionaries among the Nuer ethnic group.

The Comboni Missionaries were invited in 1998 by the Bishop of the Diocese of Malakal to accompany Catholics who lived scattered in the villages of the Fangak region in the South, the wetlands and marshes of the Nile. We missionaries visit people regularly in their villages. We walk on foot to distant chapels – up to four days away from the parish centre since there are no roads. The parish territory is huge, about five times the size of the Greater London area. Paths that are not used disappear within a few weeks in the constantly growing vegetation.

During half of the year, the waters of the Nile and the rains flood the region, becoming flat as a disk. There are no hills except termite hills. On our hikes, we cross waters that reach up to our necks. Tropical diseases are part of everyday life and safe drinking water is rare.
The basic food of the Nuer consists of sorghum (millet) with milk or fish. They plant and harvest with hand tools, as the ox plough has not yet been introduced in this region. Furthermore, there is no telephone/mobile phone network, no postal service, no power grid – we depend on solar power – and no local radio station; only shortwave radio works to receive BBC and Vox of America.

Training catechists
The main task of the missionaries is to train catechists in their chapels. Our parishioners have a strong, sincere faith but little Christian education. We offer the catechumenate for adults who ask to become Christians. About half of Fangak County’s population is now baptized. There are many followers of traditional religion who are attracted to being a Christian. We offer education programmes in Nuer and English since more than 95% of the population in this part of South Sudan are illiterate due to their isolation (nationally, the illiteracy rate is at 75%).

We have been operating a primary school at the parish centre since 2014. So far, around 250 grade eight students have graduated with a certificate. It is a tiny seed, but significant, considering that less than 1% of the county’s population have obtained a primary school certificate, a document as prestigious as a doctorate title in developed countries.
Due to the recent civil war, reconciliation between various ethnic groups has become an important task, not only for us, but for all the churches in South Sudan.

Work of reconciliation
The South Sudanese Catholic Bishops’ Conference has been having difficulty in reaching and gaining influence among warring parties since many bishoprics have been vacant. In addition, ethnic belonging is still a strong aspect of the identity of Catholics and of Christians in general, as is among church leaders. In this difficult tension between cultural and faith identity, the ecumenical South Sudan Council of Churches, of which the Catholic Church is a founding member, prepared a path towards national reconciliation.
In our parish, the war reached only the fringes of Fangak County, with the exception of its capital, New Fangak. Other areas have not been directly affected by battles or displacement. This has been the case, due to the isolation of the area, created by the Nile swamps, and thus lacking road connections. In our diocese, in whose territory much of the fighting and destruction took place, our parish is the only one that has not had to be closed in all these years.

In all other parishes of Malakal Diocese, the work was stopped for several years. Still, every Nuer family of our parish has lost relatives in the war. Because the enemy breathes down their necks, but is still reassuringly far away, our work of reconciliation looks different from a parish with mixed hostile groups.
Our Nuer Catholics pray at Mass in the language of the Dinka as a sign for national reconciliation. At the local level of clan conflict, traditional reconciliation goes hand in hand with Christian prayer. Our active parishioners are noticeably less violent than the average Nuer. The ecclesial life is like a shelter where a new, peaceful lifestyle is maintained. The Catholic Church is known and loved for the fact that differences of opinion are settled without violence.
In contrast to traditional festivals and gatherings, weapons and alcohol are not allowed on church grounds. Anyone interested in this ‘alternative lifestyle’ can join us. A traditional feast often runs the risk of ending in bloodshed because youth (men) injure or kill each other. Either a previous attack needs to be revenged or a new dispute is started under the influence of alcohol.
Furthermore, in our sermons and conversations, we shape the idea of inviolable human dignity because every person is an image of God. The word dignity cannot be adequately translated into Nuer. As an illustration, we explain that everyone must respect other persons deeply, even if they are women or strangers of another tribe. The stories of Jesus in the Gospels help to underline that message. In South Sudan, there is no secular society.

Therefore, international peace programmes, which always appeal to reason and emphasize human rights, have little effect on the ground because they do not understand the dynamics of people’s ethnic and religious identities, or they negate them.
As missionaries, we make the Gospel known to our listeners. A disciple of Jesus is called to imitate the Father and love the neighbour, even the enemy. It is about a change of mentality so that it is no longer the ethnicity or the clan which defines whom one can or cannot trust. The Gospel and the Bible clearly show what constitutes a just, honest person. This should be the benchmark for building a just and peaceful society.
A peaceful and conciliatory attitude is the strength of the Church and the missionaries. We live with ‘our’ people and suffer with them. Jesus Christ changed and converted people by loving concretely and making Himself the servant of all. We missionaries strive to learn language and culture, and walk their paths both literally and figuratively.
People honour this, and they are ready to open themselves to the perspective of the Gospel because we have opened ourselves to their perspective. Patience is needed. Jesus explains that the Kingdom of God grows like a tree, slowly but steadily.

Gregor Schmidt

Why cattle can’t speak.

Sunday, 1 August 2021 8:00

A long time ago it is believed that the Pokot people were very similar to cattle. They could all speak the same language face to face and loved keeping the other company. They would also share duties among themselves and whenever there was an issue to discuss, they would do this during the night hours.

Food was never a problem among them, as it simply flowed down from the mountains and came to them by the rivers. They often had celebrations and on these occasions the cattle were always the ones to lead the dancing around a big fire at night. Life was good among them, and there was peace in the land.

One day it happened that a man’s child got sick. Because they were all friends, cow came to see how the child was. He was in a very bad state, and the next day a prophet was consulted.

The prophet then told them that the only cure for the boy’s illness would be if a calf was to be slaughtered to break the curse that was on the boy. Man thus went to cow and told him what the prophet had said. Because they were such good friends and because a blood sacrifice was part of their culture, cow agreed and gave her calf to man.

The only thing that cow asked of man was that he should slaughter the calf with a sharp stone, never break any of its bones and lastly that the tongue and liver of the calf should be given back to the cow so that she could bury it. Man promised this to cow but went on his way home and disregarded everything that cow asked of him. He killed the calf with a spear instead of a stone, he broke many of its bones and finally he threw away its tongue and liver.

The following day cow arrived at man’s house to see how it all had gone and to collect the tongue and liver of its calf. When he arrived, he instantly saw all the horrible things that man had done. At this cow got very annoyed and their friendship broke down completely.

After a while man started to miss his friend dearly and at long last, he went to say to cow that he was sorry. He even took some honey with him to put on cows’ tongue for her to enjoy, but cow would have none of it. She was so angry at man that she refused to accept the honey or open her mouth, for it all reminded her about the tongue of her calf being thrown away so carelessly.

That is the reason why cattle do not eat honey like men. And because cow refused to speak or open her mouth for such a long time, all cattle lost their ability to speak. Since that day, men and cattle do not share a special friendship any more.

Folktale from Pokot people – Kenya. Elijah Deba

Governments and TNCs: Shared Responsibility for Human Rights and the Environment.

Sunday, 1 August 2021 8:00

The role of Transnational Corporations (TNCs) in Africa continues to be of vital importance for the economic development of the continent in terms of generating wealth, developing technologies, and creating jobs for new generations.

But TNCs have a contradictory role because, on the one hand, TNCs carry out an economic transformation through different spheres of action (whether in finance, infrastructure, services, natural resources, or agriculture), on the other hand, TNCs cause one of the greatest difficulties for the integral development of peoples, causing
inequalities and injustices.

At present, the States have the exclusive jurisdiction to enforce respect for human rights and to monitor the care of the environment within their territories. There are no international mechanisms to prosecute violations and abuses of these rights or the destruction of the environment by TNCs and their subsidiaries or suppliers throughout the value chain. In addition, the business lobby develops all its capacities to nullify or reduce the punitive force of legislative initiatives, both at the national and international levels that attempt to control its power.

In the face of any initiative to control TNCs by the States, companies position themselves by asking to maintain the current legal status of international legislation through voluntary mechanisms. However, these mechanisms have proven ineffective over the last decade since the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights were approved. The OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises have been shown to be equally ineffective, which are government recommendations directed at TNCs that operate in countries other than where these companies
have their headquarters.

In other cases of international legislative initiatives, such as in the current negotiation for a UN legally binding treaty on TNCs and human rights or the mandatory Due Diligence law of the EU on companies and human rights and the environment, TNCs companies show a false attitude of collaboration. The business strategy makes requests that create confusion in the scope of application of the new legislation with the intention of lengthening the legislative processes and weakening the content of the norms that seek to regulate the behaviour of TNCs (a toothless regulation).

Thus, the responsibility to respect human rights and the environment should correspond to both the States and the TNCs through a shared responsibility and direct obligations that prioritize the protection of human rights over the economic benefit of companies. In other words, legislation is necessary that contains clear and direct obligations for companies so that States can control the behaviour of TNCs.

The EU has publicly recognized that voluntary TNC control systems are ineffective, and yet there is no explicit will on the part of the European Commission to limit impunity for large corporations.
Respect for human rights and the environment is at the mercy of large corporations that take advantage of the democratic weakness (corruption, lack of adequate legislation or inability to implement the necessary control measures) of the developing countries in which they lead to carry out the activity. In this sense, the direct obligations of the Companies and the rendering of accounts to the States are the best guarantee of respect for the economic, labour, social, health and environmental rights of the peoples.

The shared responsibility between the States and the TNCs must encompass the entire activity process of the companies (and their subsidiaries) as well as a proactive attitude to prevent risks that may cause human rights violations, mitigate the negative impacts caused by TNCs and with the obligation to restore the damages caused both to the people and communities. In this sense, the main political parties with representation in the European parliament (except for the far right parties Identity and Democracy, and European Conservatives and Reformists Group) have spoken in their letter to the European Commission in which they demand a liability regime in place under which undertakings can be held liable for any harm arising adverse impacts on human rights, the environmental or good governance.

However, this responsibility would not be complete if it is limited to preventive means of human rights violations or environmental destruction. The responsibility of TNCs must also include the harm caused by their activity even if they have carried out the preventive actions established by law. TNCs must be held liable for damages their business may cause even if they have done everything possible to prevent it. In other words, until now, companies justify their impunity for the preventive actions they carry out: environmental impact studies, compliance with national laws or prevention of occupational hazards. Companies consider that taking certain precautions exempts them from the result caused by potential damages that they may cause indirectly.
Africa Europe Faith and Justice Network (AEFJN) denounces this preventive limitation of civil liability and requires the EU to include civil and criminal liability for the result caused despite the precautions
carried out by the TNCs.

The responsibility of governments also requires facilitating everything necessary so that people and communities affected by human rights violations or environmental degradation can access justice. Often, victims are unprotected or helpless in the face of abuses of power without finding an answer to their complaints. It is the responsibility of TNCs to listen to victims and not litigate against them.

The EU is in the process of creating a Due Diligence law on Business and Human Rights and Environment that gives hope to a new model of civil and criminal liability for TNCs. The European Parliament has shown its desire for the proposed legislation to respond to the current injustices of impunity created by the behaviour of TNCs. Africa Europe Faith and Justice Network (AEFJN), together with civil society, asks the European Commission not to allow itself to be manipulated by the TNCs lobby and to be consistent with its development and economic partnership policies, giving priority to human rights and creating solidarity mechanisms. The economic and sustainable growth of Europe cannot be based, once again, on the colonialist abuse of TNCs but on respect for human dignity and justice.

José Luis Gutiérrez Aranda,
Trade Policy Officer,
Africa Europe Faith and Justice Network (AEFJN)

From South Sudan. Adeng’s letter.

Thursday, 1 July 2021 8:00

Advocacy is concerned with values, awareness and knowledge of problems to promote actions, policies and changes in the issues that interest people.

Advocacy does not always aim, right from the start, at concrete results. Sometimes the right or desire of a person or a group involves too many values and too many instances to offer a clear path of action.

Advocacy can then limit itself to making public a problem that escapes or that is not present in public opinion or in bodies that should be concerned of. The aim of advocacy then is that the desire a person or a group perceive as a right can enter the agenda of the public debate. This is the case of Adeng.

Dear Father
My name is Adeng. I am 37 years old and mother of ten children, eight on earth and two already in Heaven. I went to the nuns’ elementary school and, thanks to them, my parents allowed me to start high school.
I was in my second year, I had just turned seventeen when, under pressure from my brother and an uncle, my parents gave me in marriage to a man twenty years older than I. He paid 200 cows – a substantial dowry in our culture -, which my brother mostly used for his wedding.

I was not consulted at all: in our culture, women, and especially girls, have no right to express their opinion. So, I only met my husband on my wedding day and found myself living as a second wife, with the first who was ten years older than I.

I can’t complain about my husband; he rarely beats me and, at least in the early years, he took care of me and of our children, not just financially. Then, the third and fourth wives arrived and his attentions began to move elsewhere. From then, practically, I had to raise our children alone. However, I am much luckier than many of my friends, who are often beaten and humiliated.

Of course, my marriage is a long way from the Christian marriage the nuns enthusiastically used depicting for us at school and catechism: a man and a woman welcoming each other, guided by the hand of God, joining their lives and their projects and promising respect, fidelity and eternal love, forming a family open to life and to others. A vision that used to make us all dreaming, knowing that our future would be very different.

Before getting married, I was assiduous to church, I attended catechism, I confessed and, every Sunday together with my friends, I received Communion: it was a joy to share the Eucharistic table as we did with our community meals!

When I entered high school, I began lending a hand to the young people who took care of the members of Missionary Childhood, a movement well rooted in our parish. To those children, I tried to transmit the first rudiments of our faith, as far as a little girl of my age was able to assimilate.

After the wedding, I continued for four years to teach catechism to the little ones; then I had to give up for family commitments but I continued to be part of the Legion of Mary.
I have always taken all my children to Mass, even when they were very little, as is our custom. All attend catechism regularly and the three oldest have already received First Communion and Confirmation. I have not been able to receive communion since my wedding. At school and at catechism, they told me that a woman in my situation lives in sin and is excluded from Communion. Forever?

I know well that sincere repentance and the commitment not to fall back into error make it possible to wash away the guilt and obtain forgiveness. But, I am and will always be the second of my husband’s four wives. I have no power to change my condition. In my culture, women cannot choose. I didn’t choose to marry him, nor could I object. I didn’t choose to become a second wife, humiliating the first even though I was suffering for her. I did not choose to approach him to have children nor did I have the power to refuse him. I won’t be able to do it in the future either.

How to get out of this situation? By running away? What would become of the children? By divorcing? Where to find all the cows to pay the ransom? Getting my husband to marry me, and me alone, in church? If I were to succeed, what about the other three wives and their children? If my husband dies, God forbid, we would all become wives of one of his brothers called to conceive in his name other children with us.

So I have to look down when my children ask me: “Why did you not go with us to take Communion today, Mom?” I ask myself, Will I never be able to take Communion again? For the rest of my life? Even if I want it with all my heart knowing how important it is for a Christian?

Adeng

Ecuador. The Shuar. The people of the sacred waterfalls.

Thursday, 1 July 2021 8:00

The Shuar are an Amazonian indigenous people whose culture, life, and spirituality are based on water.

The Shuar people live in the foothills of the Andes, Cutucú and Condor mountain ranges in the Amazonian provinces of Morona Santiago and Zamora Chinchipe in Ecuador. This is an area characterized by abundant rivers that form wonderful waterfalls, which is why the Shuar are called ‘people of the sacred waterfalls’.
According to estimates by the Shuar, their population numbers 110,000 inhabitants, settled in approximately 668 communities.
The Shuar’s wisdom and culture are strictly connected with water. They were born in water, live in water and return to water. Water is the basis of their life and spirituality. The river to the Shuar people is God’s path through the jungle.

Nature offers the Shuar people abundance of rains from February to July and a minor quantity from August to January. This indigenous group never experienced any survival crisis in this generous land. They are a proud, optimistic, and self-confident people.
They are not worried about tomorrow, but they focus on what is urgent and necessary to live in the present.
The Shuar people live in extended families located at a reasonable distance from each other along the large rivers or along the slopes. They do not usually live in urbanized plots but in their farms, where they enjoy freedom and the gifts of nature, especially water.
Water is the main factor to take into consideration when choosing the place for their house or the centre of their community. Sometimes, they have to change place to ensure abundance of land and a better distribution of water.

Shuar man. C. C. A/ Kleverenrique

The two-door Shuar house is strategically located in a dry location within walking distance of a water source. The door which is used exclusively by women gives onto the path that leads to the source of water for family consumption. The Shuar women use water profusely for the preparation of food and the preparation of chicha-nijiamanch, Shuar’s favourite drink, which is offered to visitors or guests as a sign of welcome and friendship.
Their oval houses, built according to the warm-humid environment of the Amazon, have a high ceiling so that the rainwater runs off easily from a roof made of masterfully woven straw.
Women on their way home after collecting fruits, cassava, papachina, pelma, sweet potato, and banana, wash and peel them at a water source in the way that Nunkui taught in mythical times.

Shuar Child in El Pangui. C.C.A/ Elpangui

The daily bath for adults and children, in the afternoon or after work, is a healthy practice to have a happy rest. Children spend hours playing in the river, like in the best playground.
The Shuar people are not particularly skilled in building bridges so, in case of a swollen river or a difficult path, they look for the narrowest passage and knock down a tree, then with admirable balance they walk across it.
They are instead skilful builders of cedar canoes, their main form of transportation. The Shuar people are great navigators, including children who demonstrate great ability and familiarity with rivers. Their experience with clouds and rains allows them to predict the exact time and intensity of the approaching storm. In the case that they are surprised by a downpour they immediately protect themselves under a makeshift roof or cover themselves with wide leaves so as not to get too wet.
They do not need wells or any irrigation system, the rain is sufficient for their crops. There is no custom of boiling water, because it is enough to mix it with the fermented cassava dough to take it safely.

Shuar-kids. C. C. A/Kintianua

The Shuar people are unaware of the alarming reality of drought. Their mythology does not mention it and therefore this population does not know how to act in this kind of situation. They do not relate drought to deforestation, but simply to the absence of rains, and they have a blind confidence that rains will arrive again on the new moon. One of the causes of deforestation is the intensification of cattle ranching that requires converting a good part of arable land to grassland. When the torrential downpour falls on the top of the leafy trees, the water arrives gradually on the soil, fertilizing it. Lacking the protection of trees, the water falls to the soil directly and drags the weak layer of humus away, impoverishing the soil. Today the national and transnational extractive plans in the Ecuadorian Amazon are a direct threat to the life of the Shuar people. Extractive activities, in fact, directly affect water through the contamination of oil exploitation, mining activity, and prolonged water stagnation due to hydroelectric dams.

The Elephant and Hare.

Thursday, 1 July 2021 8:00

There was once a herd of elephants who went to gather honey to take to their in-laws. As they were walking along, they came upon Hare who was just about to cross the river. She said to one of them: “Father, please help me get across the river.” The elephant agreed to this request and said to Hare: “You may jump on to my back.”

As Hare sat on the elephant’s back, she was quick to notice the two bags full of honey that the elephant was carrying. She started eating honey from one of the bags, and when she had eaten it all, she called out to Elephant saying: “Father, please hand me a stone to play with.” When she was given the stone, she put it in the now empty bag of honey, and started eating the honey from the second bag.

When she had eaten it all, she again requested another stone saying: “Father, please hand me another stone for the one you gave me has dropped, and I want to throw it at the birds.” Elephant handed her another stone, and then another, as she kept asking for stones on the pretext that she was throwing them at the birds, until she had filled both bags with stones.

When Hare realised that the elephants were about to arrive at their destination, she said to the elephant which was carrying her: “Father, I have now arrived, please let me down.” So, Hare went on her way.

Soon afterwards, the elephant looked at his bags, only to realise that they were full of stones! He exclaimed to the others: “Oh my goodness! The hare has finished all my honey!” They lifted up their eyes and saw Hare leaping away at a distance; they set off after her. They caught up with Hare within no time, but as the elephants were about to grab her, she disappeared into a hole. But the elephant managed to catch hold of her tail, at which time the skin from the tail got peeled off. Elephant next grabbed her by the leg.

Hare laughed at this loudly, saying: “Oh! You have held a root mistaking it for me!” Thereupon Elephant let go of Hare’s leg and instead got hold of a root. Hare shrieked from within and said: “Oh father, you have broken my leg!”

As Elephant was struggling with the root, Hare manoeuvred her way out and ran as fast as her legs could carry her. Elephant had by this time managed to pull out the root only to realise that it was not Hare’s leg. Once more he lifted up his eyes and saw Hare leaping and jumping over bushes in a bid to escape. Elephant ran in pursuit of her once more.

As Hare continued running, she came across some herdsmen and said to them: “Hey you, herdsmen, do you see that elephant from yonder, you had better run away, for he is coming after you.” The herdsmen scampered and went their separate ways.
When Elephant saw the herdsmen running, he thought they were running after Hare; so, he too ran after them.

When he caught up with them, he said: “Hey you, herdsmen, have you seen a hare with a skinned tail passing along here?” The herdsmen answered: “You have passed her along the way as she was going in the opposite direction.” While Elephant had been chasing the herdsmen, Hare had gained some time to run in the opposite direction.

Next, Hare came upon some women who were sewing outside the homestead and said to them: “Hey you, mothers who are sewing, do you see that elephant from yonder, you had better run away for he is coming after you.” On hearing this, the women scampered for the safety of their houses immediately. But soon the elephant caught up with them and asked: “Hey you, honourable ladies, might you have seen a hare with a skinned tail going toward this direction?” The women answered: “There she goes over there.”

Hare kept running and this time she came upon antelopes grazing and she said to them: “Hey you, antelopes, you had better run away for that elephant is coming after you.” The antelopes were startled and they ran away as fast as their legs could carry them. But soon the elephant was upon them, and he asked them: “Hey you, antelopes, have you seen a hare with a skinned tail going in this direction?” They pointed out to him the direction that Hare had followed.

Still on the run, Hare next came upon a group of other hares, to whom she said: “Hey you, hares, do you see that elephant coming from yonder? You should all skin your tails for he is after those hares with unskinned tails.” Thereupon all the hares quickly skinned their tails.

At the same moment the elephant arrived and asked them: “Hey you, hares, have you seen a hare with a skinned tail going towards this direction?” The hares replied: “Don’t you see that all our tails are skinned?” As the hares said this, they were displaying their tails confident it would please Elephant. On noticing that all the hares’ tails were skinned, Elephant realised that Hare had played a trick on him. Elephant could not find the culprit, for all the hares were alike. And there ends the story.

Folktale from Maasai people. Kenya

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