SWAMPY TALES

ABA- UNGA NEVER DIE! Yes, you read right. Ungas never die! They only transform. To know what I mean, read on. I lived in a village at the northern end of Bwalya Mponda chiefdom. The next, known as Maishike was north-east. There was my grandfather’s desolate village of Matolongo , otherwise known up to now as Chibolya, somewhere in between. Most of the evenings, we could see some huge bright torch light further down Chibolya and occasionally some sound of gunfire.   One day, I asked my mother where the bright torch- light was coming from: “It’s Musanika (Torchbearer). He’s a dead person walking by the shores of Chibolya.” “You mean a ghost? What about the gunfire?” “Oh, I never told you,” she said, with a gentle love tap on my shoulder. “The gunfire is real and it’s coming from another dead man called Sande Puwa.” “Who is Sande Puwa and why does he fire guns and at what?” I asked out of typical child curiosity. “Sande Puwa was a skillful hunter. Durin...

UKULEYAPO: BU- UNGA WAY OF SHARING Any Unga who has ever lived in the vicinity of our swamps is familiar with these unwritten Unga statutes : Ukuleyapo and Ukuleshako . In Cibemba language, Ukulesha means stopping or preventing someone from doing something. But in our Lunga, the same word means voluntary giving a portion of what you have whenever you meet someone, known or stranger; specially to do with fish or meat. Ukuleyapo means unrestricted way of taking your pick out of someone’s catch. In ukuleshako, the fisherman or the hunter chooses what to give you. You don’t choose for yourself. There are parts of the animal, known as “ Ifilewa ” that you can pick freely without the owner frowning at all.   Some of these are liver, heart, intestines, abdomen, spleen, kidneys, etc. Other parts of the meat can only be given to you by the hunter. With fish, it will depend on your relationship with the fisherman. You can choose any size if you know each other. Otherwise, ...

THE LUNGA WE WANT Two years ago, I grew a breed of small groundnuts we locally call Solontoni. So the yield could have been better that we had difficulties with what to do with them apart from pounding and using them in vegetables, kusashila . They were in a small sack, less than twenty-five kilos of shelled nuts. My wife hesitated to use all that fo r kusashila and asked me what else we could do with them. “As a salesman, where do you think we can sell this to realize what we spent, even if it’s just to break even?” she asked. It got me thinking. As a salesperson, she expected me to find a market. Who would buy them at a price that would give us some return on our investment? “What if we roasted them, packaged them in small plastics, drop them at taverns so patrons can get them for some snacks?” I said. My partner was thinking of doing the same but selling by the roadside. My idea was that if we sold them by the roadside, we would price our product less, ...

MY STORY AS A STORY-SELLER I had just been ejected from my step-brother’s one-bed-roomed-house in a small suburban compound by his mother. He is away on duty. Step-mother never wanted me to live with my step-brother anymore; for her own trivial reasons. With nowhere to go, no money to help me get anywhere at all, I wandered around Mansa town with my Olympic bag containing a small blanket and a few clothes. No food for at least forty-eight hours. This was sometime in October 1986.Out of desperation for survival, I agreed to take a position of waiter at Mansa Inn, advertised through the department of Labour. Visiting Bangweulu Wetlands -Chiunda Ponde Little did I realize that I was kick-starting a long and enjoyable sales career. I had just struggled to complete my Grade twelve a year ago with no hope for any sponsorship to enter college. I trekked all the way from Muwele Village in Chief Chiunda Ponde in Lavushi Manda district to come and join my step-brother, a United...

A WET DISTRESS CALL FROM LUNGA! This long year, you will not find anything as wet as this call in Lunga wetlands!   Picture a family of eleven hungry boys and girls aged between one and nine surrounding a small pot. In it, is but little nshima . A piece of leftover bony-meat submerged in unseasoned gravy in a plastic bowl is placed beside the pot, in the center of the eleven-man team eagerly waiting for a signal to start munching. Parental refereeing is evidently missing.   They have gone searching for possible donor-pledged food packs from overwhelmed local government officials. You watch scantily dressed kids dipping a few fingers in a bow of water as a mere mandatory ritual; certainly not for health reasons! All eyes on the ball.   Ready- to- attack positions taken! But one necessary act is yet to be done. The meat has to be shared by Chakanya (sharer), the eldest person around. While Chakanya is struggling with the bone, siblings can’t wait fo...

An excessive sentimental yearning of some past period or irrecoverable condition, termed nostalgia, is exactly what I felt when I traveled to Ncheta Island, my place of origin. Thinking about Lunga  As our boat approached the flooded villages, instead of feeling sympathetic, my memories took me back to the time when conditions like that provided cherished opportunities to us, boys, to search and find small fishes that we slew for pleasure . Wading through ponds going fishing without a canoe (kufushila) was a prized pastime. That day reminded me of times men brought in tasty, gigantic tiger fish or bream which, when cooked, tasted more like steak; and needed no artificial spices.   Back then, came mid-days when men gathered in one place, nsaka, where it rained nshima, our main dish. If you were an obedient boy, you feasted with the village elite and you were encouraged at the end, to take away the leftovers of chunks of fish, which was a great honor! Ho...

UNGA TRIBE STORY – AS IT SHOULD BE Reading excerpts of a book about Unga tribe written by our colonial District Commissioner many years before I was born, aroused my interest. The parts I read were heavy on the Ungas’ fishing occupation and had scanty information about our whole way of living.  I searched the internet, libraries and other sources of information to find out if there was anyone, dead or living, from my tribe, that is; who has ever tried to tell our own story. I found nothing. The closest I came was some research work students did in their theses (about our fishing activities), for their degree examinations . It made me think. Where are all the educated men and women from Lunga? Why would I fail to tell our own story? I have lived the life others are writing about. I understand better why certain things are done in a way and religiously support our belief system. Why would I let someone else empathize my feelings and pen them down when I can do so mysel...