My 9 week stay in Kakamega has ever so quickly come to an end. I’m in the Nairobi airport now waiting for the long flights ahead to Amsterdam then Chicago. Unfortunately, the past 12 days or so I’ve I found myself so busy at work and wanting to spend as much time as possible with my host family. So it’s been a bit of a blog drought from this end. But don’t worry! I won’t leave my blog stranded without a few more stories, pictures, and a proper ending. So starting with a post about my last weekend in Kakamega, at a rural Kenyan funeral:
It was my host sister’s husband. He was 48 years old when he passed on July 2nd. He was either an alcohol abuser or a diabetic (or maybe a combination); I got contradicting explanations from family members. Either way, his unfortunate passing left a family of a widow and three teenage daughters. The mother and one of the daughters spent the following week and a half living with my host family. The dynamics of home life changed for the duration with extra help around the house and a lot of visitors stopping by with well wishes and prayers for the family.
On Thursday afternoon, the body of the man was transported from a holding room in the hospital to the place of the burial: his hometown, Isulu (one of the many rural sub-communities of Kakamega). In big cities the deceased of wealthy families are buried in cemeteries, but in rural or poor communities they are buried in their hometown. Momma Mary stayed in Isulu for the following several days to help prepare for the burial of her son-in-law while meanwhile I stayed back in Lurambi (the village I live in) with my big-city host sister Joanna.
Joanna and I joined the rest of the family on Saturday after a 40 minute drive through Kakamega. (Although it’s not very developed, Kakamega is a big town!) When we arrived around noon, there were already 200 people sitting in plastic chairs-borrowed from the church- or on the ground, all positioned strategically out of the hot African sun. I was shocked at the high turnout, considering we were in a genuine rural community; mud and stick homes were few and far between, each separated by large fields of crops. Joanna and I brought two more chairs with us and somehow squeezed into the limited space of shade. Once we were sitting, I got a glimpse of a very basic program outline: The funeral was set to begin at 9 AM, but in typical Kenyan fashion it started about two hours late. Most of the program outlined who was to be speaking at the funeral, everyone from the mother-in-law and daughters to the neighbors and the landlord. I felt beads of sweat forming on my neck as I listened to speaker after speaker rant in Swahili. The microphone system screeched and malfunctioned with every transfer of hands. Most speakers who came to share their well wishes and stories were well composed, but the occasional drunkard made quite a scene.
When the last speaker (and by speaker, I mean any member from the crowd who wanted to say a few words) finished, the priest lead mass for the Catholic family. At this point Joanna and I went back to a neighbor’s house to get some lunch. Momma Mary was cooking in a two-room, non-furnished mud and stick house with a few other neighborhood women. There was what had to be the biggest pot of ugali I had ever seen! Ugali, pilau (spiced rice) with beef, and cabbage were almost ready to serve the growing crowd of about 300. The small house was so hot from all the cooking; smoke and steam filled the room and made the inside a good 10 degrees hotter than the already smoldering outside air. The vats of food were brought outside while I was instructed to sit inside, so I’m not very sure how all of the guests were fed (I didn’t see a single plate or utensil other than what they handed me to use). After I had finished eating, the mass was just finishing and it was time for the burial. The guests moved from the site of the speeches to where the body would be buried. A tiny mud house had been built as a temporary home for my widowed host sister just 200 yards away from the gathering. They had built the house only three days before and the mud was still wet. It’s the belief that the immediate family should live next to the grave of the deceased, and this simple house served as a temporary home before a proper, permanent house could be built.
Finally after a very long hot day in the sun, it was time for the burial. The priest blessed the coffin and body with holy water before it was lowered into a deep hole. (It’s customary to bury, not cremate, the dead.) While two neighborhood boys worked to fill in the hole with dirt, a choir of 20 wearing all white sang joyous songs, celebrating a life and praising God. The only sad song they sang through the entirety of the funeral was when the body had been completely buried and each family member placed a small flower on the grave. Once the sad song was finished, the family and priest filed into the temporary mud house to give blessings. When they came out of the house, they were singing, dancing, and clapping their hands to the music of the choir. About 100 of the guests followed the choir and family as they trotted up and down the dirt path through the rural neighborhood. The song they were dancing to was a final, joyous goodbye to the deceased husband.
Finally, around 6 in the evening, it was time to go back home to Lurambi. My widowed host sister stayed in Isulu wile I went home with some other relatives. After another day with extended family, everyone said their goodbyes and went back to their hometowns around Kenya. The house was strangely quiet when it was once again just me, my host parents, and the 2 year old. After that it was just 5 short days left for me in Kenya, which I will post about a little bit later!
