Xa wulu, Xa faxa: Entering and leaving the world

"Ritual is necessary for us to know anything." -Ken Kesey

Rituals give meaning to life.  For me, observing and participating in rituals have been a great window into Malinke culture, times when old traditions come to light in this modern world.  In the past few months, I have felt closer to the rituals associated with birth and death because of their proximity to Sira Diaby, my neighbor, Peace Corps designated community counterpart and closest Malinke friend.

Sira gave birth to her second baby boy on May 3.  I spent quite a bit of time in the maternity ward of the hospital with her after the birth, and was several times struck anew by the harshness that life can bring sometimes.  She shared a room with several other women, had to bring her own sheets, and bathed standing on a patch of dirt behind the administrative office building, with only a wrap skirt I held up for her for privacy.  I felt so uncomfortable watching such a dignified woman recover from giving birth in such an undignified set of circumstances, but the hospital has no means to improve these conditions.

After she left the hospital, Sira spent one week in isolation with the baby in her mother in law's hut.  Even though her leg was cramping and her foot kept swelling, she refused to go to the health center to let the midwives examine her because of the belief that if she is seen by certain eyes before the baby's first seven days, the baby will die.

On May 10, the Koulio took place.  This literally means "head shaving", and is a baptism and naming ceremony.  Some people do it big and kill a goat and have music, but since Sira's older baby hadn't done that, they kept it simple and just did the ceremony and gave rice paste to the guests.  I have been to many a Koulio, but I usually show up mid-morning.  This time, I came early to help Sira get ready and was thus exposed to all of the rites that are performed before the big crowds arrive.

Sira preparing for her big day.  Her big day, you ask?  At Senegalese baptisms, the focus is much more on the mother than on the baby.  Women get very dressed up and often wear immense amounts of bright make-up and take lots of glamour shots.

A pre-baptism ritual wherein a bowl of water with traditional herbal medicine is placed next to some burning straw and sprinkled onto the straw to create an ash with medicinal powers for the protection of the mother and the baby.  Next, the piece of gourd bowl to the left is stomped on by the mother.  It is a woman in the nimakhalo group of the caste system (metal workers, story tellers, leather workers, all determined by last name) that carries all of this out I'm not exactly sure what all of this means, and when asked, people have a hard time explaining the "why" of the different elements of the rituals.

In Senegal, babies are almost always carried strapped to their mother's back.   I didn't realize until attending this part of the baptism that they don't nyoun (carry on the back), until the seventh day.  Sira held the cloth behind her, and a knife was dropped through the space three times.  After that, the other women helped to balance the baby on her back (the babies eventually become trained to balance themselves during the strapping--it's amazing to me).

After a while, more and more people began to arrive and the washing head shaving began.  Here, Sira looks on as the baby's head is shaved, with the pieces of his hair collected for yet another small ritual later on.  After the head is shaved, the baby is held up, and in a much more casual manner than you would think, the name is announced.  Karamba Danfakaha.

At baptisms, party favors are always plates or balls of deego, a kind of paste with a playdough like texture, prepared the day before by female friends of the family from pounded beans or rice.  I don't really care for it but it would be an insult not to take it...I just wish that everyone didn't offer it to me.

Depending on the family, these rituals can then turn into a big party with dancing and a feast or can be more low key like this one.  The important thing is that the baby is named.  And with my favorite Malinke name.  Ay, Karamba.

***

While I have been to more baptisms that I ever thought possible during the course of the last year, until this week I had never been to a funeral.  Neither of these events have invitations, but it feels much more comfortable going to a baptism of someone I don't know than to go to the funeral.  I have gone to greet the families of several people who have died, and I have heard the wail, the shrieking of women after a death is announced.  But I had never felt comfortable staying and observing an entire funeral rite.

When I got back from a weekend camping on the border of Guinea, I stopped by to greet my family and upon asking for my host-mom and namesake was told that she was at the "bandula".  The official word for "to die" in Malinke is "xa faxa", but "xa ban" is used more often.  It literally translates as "to end".  So I was told that my mom was at the place of the end.  It followed that the Immam, my friend Sira's father and the religious leader of the community had died the previous evening at the regional hospital in Kedougou.  This was a funeral I needed to attend.

I changed into nicer clothes and approached the Diaby compound.  A tent had been set up in the street outside the compound for the overflow, and I took a seat amongst the women there and tried to take in what was going on.  I have never been in such a somber atmosphere in my site.  A small group of women was cooking in the sun, and I was surprised to see that they were finishing the meal so early in the day (it was not even noon, and meals at big gatherings like this are usually not ready until 3 or 4, necessitating a pre-lunch during a quick break from the festivities).  I saw my host mom emerge from the compound to help with the process of dividing the rice from the. giant cooking pots into bowls for the guests to eat out of in smaller groups, and I went to greet her.  In return, she handed me a giant piece of meat (the closest thing I have seen to a steak in the region of Kedougou).  She mistook my bewilderment as a reaction to how hot the meat was, so she  gave it to another woman who had a spoon with the orders to accompany me and the meat.  The spoon woman didn't even blink at these orders, while I had no idea what was going on or where I was being accompanied to.  I followed her dumbly into a neighboring compound and then into a hut where she left me all alone with a sleeping baby.  I'm usually suspicious of meat in Saraya, but this was actually quite good, and I chuckled as I ate it with my hands, just me and the baby in this hut whose owner I had never met.  After more than a year here, I can still get caught off guard.  

Emerging from the hut, I saw groups of people crowded around bowls of rice and meat, each summoning me to join them as I passed.  It looked like people were returning home after they ate, and I joined my host sister Mballou on her walk  back to the family's compound.  I had actually never met her before--she had walked 13 km from the village where she lives with her husband's family, joining the scores of mourners who had descended upon Saraya for the funeral. 

Things got started again at afternoon prayer time.  I donned a headscarf and headed towards the mosque, but it was so full that I just stopped and sat with the crowd of women lined in the small strip of shade provided by the cement wall across the street.  After a while, crowds emerged from the mosque.  I have never really seen Malinkes cry before.  Some women were doing the wail, and some openly weeping.  I heard one woman sob, "He taught all of the people of Saraya".  The men accompanied the body from the mosque to the graveyard (the location of which I had never known before), while the women sat in and around the Diaby compound waiting, some crying softly to themselves.  The men returned, and the benedictions began.  I had imagined this part of the process to be a simple receiving line, each person saying the blessing that I had memorized before coming over: Allah mu yamfama kela aye (May God forgive him).

Instead, men from each major family in Saraya and men from other villages each took turns proclaiming blessings on behalf of the village or last name they were representing, their words echoed by a griot.  This lasted a really long time, and I had made the unfortunate choice of not bringing any water.  I waited it out, and went into the compound to try to find Sira.  I approached her, took her hand and mumbled my memorized blessing; she opened her mouth to speak but couldn't find any words.  Even when you know the official thing to say, there is no right thing to say in any culture.  But rituals help.

“This is what rituals are for. We do spiritual ceremonies as human beings in order to create a safe resting place for our most complicated feelings of joy or trauma, so that we don't have to haul those feelings around with us forever, weighing us down."

-Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love