Valentine Marc Nkwame
16 November 2008
column
Arusha — A mother of one has invited me out for a weekend. Scary! Scary! Run! If this was happening in Arusha, I would have surely earned myself some 30 years in one of those filthy prisons.
So what do I do? Ah that is simple. Being an Arushan I am running away as fast as possible, like a bat out of hell, with Satan on the heels. Or should it be wings?
Anyway, you may ask, it is really a crime to be given a date, on a summer weekend, by an unmarried lady who just happens to have a child at home? Well there is nothing wrong about it here, but up there in Tanzania it could be the biggest political offence after mutiny and possibly the worst religious sin second only to murder.
That is because the mother-of-one who wants to give me (or any other interested party for that matter) a 'fun' weekend outing, is not an ordinary 'Mom.' This character is a school student who, if the truth was to be said, shouldn't even be regarded as mature student but rather an underage 'Pupil' going by the standards of Arusha, the area where people eat 'Nyama Choma' for breakfast, lunch, dinner and supper.
This South African parent if she accidentally finds herself in Arusha then she will probably be whisked into Primary Class Five, notwithstanding the fact that like most South African female students of her age (possibly 15) do look like mothers, courtesy of some fattening local burgers known as 'Kote!'
In this country of many thunders, there is no crime for adult males dating young school girls then converting them into temporary wives, make them pregnant before proceeding to sow their 'royal oats' to other even younger femme candidates.
After being abandoned with pregnancies what do the girls do? Weep and run away from home because Dad and Mom are going to be angry? Well, no! In fact they go home celebrating all the way and even the moms and dads with assortments of aunts also gather to praise the fertility of their offspring.
It is like this; In South Africa when young female pupils become expectant they go to hospital for pregnancy tests and when they are confirmed 'positive' with babies in their womb they rejoice and smile all the way to the bank where the state has allocated them special 'pregnancy subsidies' for students.
Then the pupils, or students or 'mothers-to-be' return home where proud mothers proceed to make them comfortable and even fatter by cooking varieties of local servings including something called 'Ulwimi soup' which is also available in Arusha in form of 'Supu ya Ulimi!' but he broth prepared here is much richer with pumpkins, assorted vegetables and of course the 'Ulwimi' itself which happens to be the whole tongue of some large herbivore, possibly a cow.
Nine months on and a bouncy baby comes out; Haven't yet done any research to find out if there have been any miscarriages among these young deliveries not sure whether any of them ever undergoes Caesarean sections either.
Then it is back to school. Here it is okay to deliver your baby and resume class. And while the teacher is blabbering away about some topic or another the new mother is free to be smoking cigarette in class as she exchange parental notes with another pupil who is also about to get a baby or already got one a month before.
"So are you planning to get another baby?" One of the 'new mothers' would ask her mate.
"Sure," the other girl would reply, "why not, but definitely it won't be with that silly, good-for-nothing, stupid, son-of-a ****ch again, in fact if it wasn't for the State grants I would have killed its baby!" Upon which both of them, and possibly their friends who have been listening, would explode in laughter.
"May we have attention please?" A teacher, possibly a male would tell the noisy group at the back of the class, to which the girls would turn stare at him the way John Mc Cain would have stared at Barrack Obama then boo at the teacher and say; "Heey take a hike and leave us alone!"
A couple of them may even lift their middle fingers up gesturing something that could have sounded like "F .ck you!" if verbalized. In South Africa this is allowed.
Or better still, the girls would simply get up and walk out of the classroom puffing smoke in the air like those old locomotive commuters of the industrial revolution in Europe. The conversation would resume at the school Canteen as the girls munch those large 'Kotes' while some leering males nearby salivate at their exposed rounded thighs courtesy of extra micro skirts that South African girls wear to school.
Some males will offer to pay for the 'Kotes' being consumed by the girls, others would buy them drinks and it will be back to 'Parenting 101.' Either that or come next weekend, and the girls will be asking, them, you or me out . Babies working hard to make babies!
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