American Childhood, African Manhood

 William has become somewhat of a celebrity around Mbabane, and certainly in our neighborhood.  Swazis tell me that it's not uncommon to see white babies around town (although I haven't seen them), but I've gathered that it's extremely rare to see a young child with the father.  It did not take long for him to acquire a Swazi name, so William is known everywhere around Mbabane as "Mandla," which means "strength."  Although the "j" sound does not exist in some African languages, that's not the case with siSwati.  My name translates very well as "Joweli," and that is how I am known.  Swazis often leave off the last syllable of a word, so usually my name sounds exactly like it does in the States, only with two syllables.  [Technically speaking, that's the correct English pronunciation as well, but I like it just fine the way Americans say it!]

Back to the point.  Not only is it unusual to see a young child hanging out with his dad, but the backpack in which I usually carry William is an extreme novelty to people here.  Even in South Africa, I have been asked multiple times where I got it.  I guess they just don't see them here in southern Africa.  Anyhow, one of the things that we noticed right away after moving to Swaziland was how total strangers, even on the street, will absolutely fawn over William.  And when I'm carrying him in the backpack, women will wave and cheer, people will sometimes take photos on their phone, even the men will engage with him and be very friendly [in a good way!].

I had never thought before about how much Americans (in general society) tend not to interact with babies.  Mostly, my social circle has primarily revolved around church my whole life, and church people are generally very friendly and welcoming of babies and children.  But even in America, Allison and I noticed how much having a baby around brightened up a room and, to borrow Allison's phrase, were an over-all "happy pill."  But here in Swaziland, that effect is multiplied about ten times.  And other young children will want to play with William and include them in their games, too.  The family who lives in the flat adjoining ours is a single mom with two daughters plus the mom's sister who lives with them.  I don't know the exact age of the youngest daughter (it's hard to guess the age of Africans, they always look younger than Americans because their skin is so resilient to the sun), but she's somewhere between 6 and 8.  Her name is Nozi [sounds just like how it looks], and she absolutely loves it when William plays with her outside in our courtyard.  She doesn't speak much English, and William doesn't speak at all of course, but they really have a good time.

Going back to my original point again, the sad face of this coin is that many fathers in this culture are at least somewhat, if not totally, removed from their children.  For example, the gardener at the first house we lived in was from a village a couple hours drive away from the city, and would only go home to his family every month or two.  He stayed somewhere in the city during the week because it was too far to commute from his homestead every day, and I'm guessing that it was too expensive for him to travel home every weekend.  I think this is also true of other cultures around Africa as well, but it seems that here in Swaziland there is stigma against marrying a woman unless she has proven that she is fertile (and preferably, has already given birth to a son).  There are other cultural factors as well, including the tradition of lobola, or the "bride-price."  It seems that many men don't marry for the simple reason that they simply can't afford to pay it.  The net result is that it appears to have become traditional in Swazi culture for women and children to be together, generally separated from the men.

To illustrate this point, as a family we went to a traditional Swazi festival to celebrate the new year, just to see what it was all about.  This festival is called Ingcwala.  [This word is virtually unpronouncable to the standard English speaker, because the "c" is a click sound.  If you take out the "c" and just pronounce it how it looks, that's close enough.]  At Ingcwala, basically everyone wears traditional Swazi dress and dances in celebration of the coming harvest season.  In fact, Allison was required to buy a piece of cloth to wrap around her as a skirt over her pants, because inside the Royal Kraal (i.e. traditional homestead) women are not allowed to wear pants.  Inside, the men dance on one side, and the women and children dance on the other side.  When we arrived, I was carrying William in his backpack as usual, and I was strictly warned that we wanted to partcipate in the dance, I could not take him with me.  We decided not to join in the dancing, so this wasn't any big deal.  We enjoyed mingling in with the crowd and observing what was happening.  But again, the point of all of this is to demonstrate how ingrained this is in Swazi culture, this gap between father and children.

But lest you get the idea that all families in Swaziland are like this, let me assure you that they aren't.  I have seen families at our church where the men primarily take care of the kids during the service.  One of the teachers at ZBC is a married Swazi man who has one son of his own and, along with his wife, has adopted four others either orphaned or vulnerable.  Our parish priest lives with his wife and five children.  Another of our Swazi friends has a family, including caring for a child he fathered before getting married, and he and his wife have been married 14 years.  And all of these men have two common denominators -- maybe others as well, but at least two -- they are Christians, and they are employed in well-paying jobs.

Allison was reading an article this past week which explained a saying that they have in Nigeria: "Being a man is more than a full-time job."  It means that there are too many cultural and social obligations than what a man can fulfill by working one full-time job.  It seems as though this applies to Swaziland as well.  More than anything, I feel saddened by these cold realities.  Sometimes I feel guilty to have such a good relationship with my son when so many other sons around me don't have a good (or any!) relationship with their father.  Yet, I suppose that the very best thing I can do both for Africans and Americans, is to be the best father to my children that I can be.

And to pray...

Almighty God, our heavenly Father, who sets the solitary in families: We commend to your continual care the homes in which your people dwell. ... Turn the hearts of the parents to the children, and the hearts of the children to the parents; and so enkindle fervent charity among us all, that we may evermore be kindly affectioned one to another; through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.
 -Collect for Families, Book of Common Prayer, p.828-9