Independence Day

On October 24 Zambia celebrates its freedom from the white people who controlled the former Northern Rodesia which happened in 1964.  For the people of Mboole they were very happy to include me, the only white person in the village, in their celebrations.  The celebration for me took on two parts, the soccer games and the school’s Independence Day celebration.

The soccer games are a day long event where everyone goes and watches soccer games all day long.  I practice with one soccer team but they weren’t able to register me in time so I can only play friendly games.  So I just tagged along to watch.  Because it was day long event our team made some gela for lunch which is just ground corn meal cooked and mixed with milk.  Four guys just squat around a dish and eat away, it was interesting taste experience.  Because I had been in town the day before I told my team I would buy them a treat for after the game.  So I got them some bread and peanut butter.  Now please allow me to defend this choice of mine.  The people who live out in the villages maybe have bread once a year, for Christmas or Easter maybe and bread is without a doubt a real luxury item here.  So they all eagerly downed their one slice of bread.  After all was said and done I packed up the little bit of remaining peanut butter and went home.  At home my host mother said that a few of the other guys on our team had walked by earlier. They were talking excitedly about how the white guy had got them some bread.  The one said “Yeah and there was this brown stuff to put on top”.  Which I found strange because everyone in the village grows their own peanuts and they eat peanuts all the time but peanut butter is only found (but found abundantly) in the towns and the cities.

The school’s Independence Day celebration was very interesting but very stressful.  In the days before Independence Day the school collects about 50 cents from as many students as can afford it (this was my job to collect money and write down the crazy Tonga names like Chilileko Chuulabantu).  Then on the Independence Day there is traditional singing and dancing then for those that paid the school cooks a full course meal (consisting of Nshima, cooked cabbage and goat or chicken meat).  My grade 8 class insisted tat I join in the traditional dance, so they dragged me out there and the whole school roared with laughter from the from the moment I busted my first dance move.  Also may I say that cooking for 300 people on wooden fires is very stressful but very satisfying when finished.

Grade 8 Girls Preform on Independence Day

a more melo preformace 

May I just put in one request to all the physicists.  If they find the Higgs Boson this year someone let me know please.