Born to Born

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Born to Born

Paris, Sunday July 9th

Most probably you would not have called this a house or a home.

What would it look like for you? Mud walls set up by children in some kind of undecipherable children game?

Four mud walls, a door hanging on uncertain hinges, a roof made of the summer grass, rood sagging here and there, it had not been renewed for some years.

Mud wall, red and grey, in some place reaching the beautiful ocher color of Italian landscapes. The red color of the earth, the tired and exhausted earth where everything had gone, where all fertility was long gone, dead, futureless clay remained, embedded in sterile iron and aluminum poisons that bound the clay into red clumps.

It was a home.

It was giving protection to Washa and her children. Obog had been gone for so long that none bothered to remember him.

Washa and Obog had built the house themselves, during the dry season.

The elderly had told them where they could set up their house and marked the land that would be theirs. It was not very good land, they were far away from the well and so far away from the river that it would take the women more than one day to get water, and not even enough water for a week, only water for three days.

They were too near to the house of the dead family. The family had died in sickness four years ago, the house had remained empty and was slowly going back to the earth, but still the house of the dead family could be seen and they were too near to it.

The family had worked more than a month during the dry season making the House. It had taken four men more than two weeks to gather the grass that would make the roof.

The women had mixed the red earth that would be used to make the walls.

One day the walls had been strong enough to carry the roof, all the men had assembled and lifted the roof on top of the walls.

That week they had slaughtered three goats and the beer did not last more than three days.

It was a house for a family that did not have cattle, that did not have grain, that did not have poultry, that did not hide money in the roof grass; Maybe this is why the soldiers did not even bother to burn it down, they just took away Obog and the children, leaving the younger one, not bothering to enjoy themselves torturing him, or because they spent so much time raping Washa..

Washa had been left in the house with the younger children. Two died of sickness or hunger, who cares whether it is sickness or hunger, they died, they were buried, none attended the funeral, they were not humans, they were children who had died as children do.

Washa was left in the house with little Obog. She called him Obog, the same name as her husband, even if he was not the son of Obog, he was the son of nobody, a passerby who had enough money to pay or the son of the soldiers as so many other children.

The villagers died, they died of the thin death, many died, the cattle was not cared for, it belonged to nobody; Washa grabbed five cows, and little Obog built a cow pen with sticks taken from the forest and thorn grass.

Little Obog wanted to be near the cattle, there were so many thieves, so many desperate hungry lost shadows who would kill anything just to drink the blood.

Little Obog built himself a very tiny hut near the cattle, all the night he would be sitting there, sometimes he would sit on the main branch of the dead tree, he would be watching for thieves, whenever he saw a shadow he would send arrows and kill them and seek them for anything that could be used, and them put them out in the hyena's path.

The fence was reinforced and a gate was built.

In a corner of the yard they started pilling up grass and maize cobs, and then they made a water trough even if they did not quite know how they would fill it.

With the cows they were able to plow they could manage a little more land and they were able to carry more water from the river. They even carried water for other families who could pay by working in their fields. They also lent the cows to other families for plowing their land if they promised that they would give one bag of maize for every work day of two cows, they lent the cows, knowing that if they did not do it the cows would die.

Granaries were built.

One day they felt that the House was too small for them. They built a new room, they did not know if this was a new House or a new room.

The mud walls were nice, keeping the heat out, keeping the cold out, it was nice to live in a mud house, but they wanted to feel safer, to have strong walls like the house they had seen when they traveled to the Town to sell their maize.

One boy tried to amuse the other boys about the name Little Obog. His died slowly, even when his mother cried that he be put to death, this was not given. There was so little to bury, and nobody wanted to do that so he was left and the hyenas came.

They hired a man to make bricks at the river. They wanted strong bricks, bricks that would not melt at the first rain. Those were good bricks, when the rain came, the Houses stood, even when the river water was streaking at the Houses, the bricks stood and the brick maker was not killed and could go on making bricks?

When Little Obog became of age he took Manna as companion; many where those telling him that this was a bad choice, Manna was far too old, she was born the same year as the red heifer, the red heifer had calved eleven times and had now been dead for two seasons. By this age any girl would already be carrying children, so what was wrong with Manna?

Little Obog did not listen and Manna carried him five children and four girls.

The House was looking prosperous and attracted many of these poor stray soldiers whose only food was a gun in a doubtful shape. The soldiers were always permitted to enter the House and given the acacia root beer, this beer which is so bitter that none can felt the other root. Their bodies were always left at the same place. Their guns were buried, but not tee deep. Now the village was surrounded by many hyenas, yet the hyenas never attacked the villagers, nor the children. When the seasons was too bad, the House villagers would leave and old goat for the hyenas.

When Manna had born her third child, she selected the young girl, because she thought that when she came of age, she would be strong and a good worker. It was not the custom to select to girls, but she also selected the one legged girl in spite of the mockeries. The one legged girl knew things nobody in the House could understand.

The House was now so large that nobody could say where the first House had been, if ever something remained of it.

The House was made of many houses, some larger, some smaller, some cool, some warm, some for one family, some for many families.

Nobody called Little Obog by this name anymore, he was known as Batembo. This was his sun name. His moon name was known only to himself and Manna.

All was as it was said to be.

By that time the villagers near the river started complaining about the amount of water taken and saying that so much water was taken that their own cattle had not enough to drink.

They dug out the arms; they kept the women and the children.

They did not want this to happen again, so a river House was made, and the one legged woman asked to be authorized to live there.

Batembo did not oppose her wish, he never opposed any wish from the one legged woman.

Batembo did not know why he was not with the one legged woman as he was with the other women.

The one legged woman should have been dead, she never carried any children, not even girls. The one legged woman always seemed to know what was going to happen, who would die during the no food season, she always knew about the rains, nobody was afraid of her, nobody wanted to walk with her, nobody wanted to share the meal with her, so the one legged woman would be seen, sitting at her house door, surrounded by the hyenas.

When the one legged woman moved to the river, they all thought she would die soon, who would protect her against the soldiers, the animals?

That season that the one legged woman moved to the river, a fire destroyed Batemba's largest house. Two children died in it, and also many cows and goats and also two women.

Sometimes the river woman would be seen coming into the Houses village and she would point at villagers with her stick and they would follow her. None had ever thought what would happen if they did not follow her.

She would bring them to a place and direct them with her stick and they would not understand what they were doing, but they did it.

It is so that is became that the women never again had to pound the grain; a mill had been built at the river.

It was so that the sticks were no longer used, the river woman has shown them the earth to be dug out, the cone into which to put it, the way and length he fire was to burn, now they all had strong sticks that they could make into any shape they needed.

The moon season she told villagers to scrap that dust, collect this root, dry this bark, let very young girls dry and mix the mud into jars, that moon season everything changed in the House village. The river woman told a girl to take a jar and put it in the circle. Then she told the girl to take a burning branch and put it into the jar. They all fled the village, they had never seen or heard something as terrifying, even worse than the rain season's thunder and lightening. When they came back, the river woman was still standing there and she taught them how to make small jars to be filled with the black powder.

The House village was no stronger than the rocks, stronger than the river, stronger than the soldiers, the World was theirs.

When Batembo felt that that the great weakness would soon be larger than Batembo, he ordered all villagers to leave the Houses, keeping only one cow, one goat, ten chicken, and five old women. He waited and she was there, the River Woman. Manna had been for long deaf and blind and unable to move, the River woman went to her House, lifted her in her arms and brought her next to them.

When the villagers came back, there was little to seen.

The hyenas where surrounding what once had been the Houses, sitting, doing nothing.

The villagers scavenged for remains, they were so few of them, then it was loaded on the back of the woman and they went in search for the next place where the Houses would be built.