SWAMPY TALES

LUNGA’S BURIAL SITE FOR THE BLAMELESS! "The secret behind the respect accorded to sacred areas and their environs lie in the taboos that are associated with them," so they say. In Lunga, Njelele is one such place!  It is a tiny Island that looks desolate but with a strong cultural attachment to the beliefs of the Unga people. In 1974 when my mother died at Mukanga village in Chief Bwalya Mponda of Ncheta Island, one of my uncles firmly suggested that she be buried at Njelele, 40 kilometers away in Nsamba chiefdom. Uncle Chalwe was convinced that if his sister’s death was caused by someone within the village, she would come to haunt the killer’s family until they were identified.  Secondly, if the killer tried to stop her by going to her grave and frustrate her vengeance strategies, s/he will be harmed by all the innocent souls buried at Njelele. It was undoubtedly believed that only guiltless people who never practiced witchcraft and other vic...

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...

WHAT A DARK-BLACK SEASON FOR LUNGA!   Tuesday October 1, 2019. I woke up to a myriad of missed calls. One by one, I called back. All of them tried to deliver a single solemn message: “Uncle Chisala is no more!” A single, sixty-something old, handsome and controversial man who had been sick for a while had died. I last visited him several months earlier. I was filled with shame and that disturbing sense of guilt. Maybe, I should have done more for him. But my hands were already full with other pressing responsibilities. Many issues needed my urgent attention. I had just returned home from nursing an equally very sick sister.   I had to camp in Mansa to keep checking on her in Samfya while trying to keep my small business afloat. Sustaining my boys’ stay in boarding, rent and other bills were all calling. That was the start of one disastrous rainy season of 2019/2020.   Just as I arrived in Kitwe to mourn uncle, another persistent phone call from the village kep...