by Zakes Mda
There was no doubt in his mind that the elephant was about to hurl him against a tree which would have broken his body into two. Rendi was happy that for a change he was the one who had played a heroic role. His only sorrow was that he could not announce this to his father because he would be punished for taunting the elephants. Zwanga would know at once that the bull had been provoked and would have warmed their bums with a switch. He had been known to do that on occasion when he received reports that the boys had been naughty. Or when they failed to perform the chores that he gave them around the compound. If only Zwanga knew of his bravery he would have gained more respect from him.
That’s what Rendi yearned for. His father’s respect. The same respect that he seemed to give in abundance to Chata. Rendi’s observation was accurate, even though Zwanga was trying to hide his favouritism and pretended to be even-handed. It was clear that the old man was more impressed with Chata and wished his son could be more like him. But Rendi could not live up to that expectation; Chata was simply too good at everything that they did together. Even when he, Rendi, was better, such as in moulding animals that looked like they did in real life, his father seemed to favour Chata’s monstrous animals solely because they were made by Chata. Rendi’s resentment of the low-born boy was gradually mounting. He didn’t understand how he could not be better than him; after all, he had the advantage of birth. He came from a long line of craftsmen and artists who gained their patrician position because they were smithies to the kings of Mapungubwe and of the old town from which most Mapungubweans had emigrated. How could he know that Chata had the advantage of the trance that he inherited from his mother’s people?
Chata was smart enough to realise that Zwanga’s recognition and even admiration of his skills was causing some strain in his relations with Rendi. He tried very hard not to excel in the tasks that they were given, which caused even more resentment in Rendi because he could see that Chata was slacking purposely for him. He hated to be patronised in this manner. Chata even stopped moulding the fantasy animals lest Zwanga went all gaga over them.
The boys were age-mates, so when the time came for them to go to the initiation school Zwanga sent them both to be circumcised by a famous rain doctor and paid all the expenses, even for Chata. Together they beat the drums and recited praise poems; sounds that tickled the ears of the ancestors.
On their return after a few moons they were both surprised to find that Zwanga had reproduced Chata’s fantasy animal in bronze. The original clay one stood there next to it and next to Rendi’s bull. Unfired. Rendi glared at the bronze creature while Chata just stood there, embarrassed. Rendi, blinded by tears, bolted out of the smithy to his mother’s house. It had been drilled into his head at the initiation school that real men did not cry. But the pain was too much to bear.
Rendi let tears run freely down his cheeks as he buried his head in his mother’s ample bosom.
CHATA WAS A STORYTELLER. But unlike the fireside stories that were told by grandmothers about the eternal trickster, the jackal, known to the people as the pungubwe – after which Mapungubwe, meaning “the hill of the jackal”, was named – and other tricksters such as the hare and the tortoise that talked like humans and got into much mischief, and unlike the stories that the praise poets told about the prowess of kings both on the battlefield and in rainmaking, Chata’s stories professed to be true accounts of his travels in foreign lands.
It all began when he was attacked by the strange wanderlust disease. His feet itched and he was as restless as a guineafowl that wanted to lay an egg. The ailment became worse when Abdul wa Salim came with his caravan of mounted oxen laden with cloth, beads, ceramics and other goods that the Swahili traded for ivory and gold. In the evening the trader joined the men at Younger Father’s compound for some marula beer and told stories of his voyages across the Zanj seas to the city of Mogadishu, and then across the Arabian seas to Persia and Sidon, and then further east, a voyage of many moons, to India and China. These stories made Chata’s soles itch for the road even more. Whereas other men took these stories as relish that was merely meant to accompany beer and meat, Chata took them seriously. He wanted to see with his own eyes the wonders that wa Salim spoke about.
At first Zwanga was infuriated when Chata told him that he was thinking of satisfying his wanderlust. The old man relied on Chata at the mine, especially since Rendani had been given the position of Royal Sculptor and was therefore no longer based at the mine but had moved to the top of the hill to be with other patricians. Zwanga himself was too old to mine and melt gold. Chata did all the work with the assistance of a young man called Anopa, and then shared whatever the mine yielded equally with Zwanga. Zwanga shared his portion with Rendani while Chata shared his with Anopa. That way everyone was happy. But if Chata wanted to satisfy his wanderlust, a journey that might take forever, who was going to mine the gold?
“Anopa can look after things while I’m gone,” said Chata.
“I don’t understand this disease that is eating you, Chatambudza,” said Zwanga. “I don’t understand why you want to be a mutshimbili – a wanderer – like your mother’s people. I brought you up for better things. You seem to forget that you are no longer one of the Vhasarwa. I made you a person.”
Rendi felt betrayed when he first heard the news from Zwanga. By that time Chata had already left Mapungubwe.
“Why didn’t Chata tell me?” he asked. “Is he not my mukomana? He must not get anything from the mine while he is away.”
“Of course, he won’t get anything,” said Zwanga. “He only gets a share of what he has worked for. If he chooses to be a wanderer then he will eat his wanderings.”
Rendani knew that Chata had been hoarding his share of the gold over the years. Perhaps he had been planning to abandon their mine all along, after exploiting it and the Zwanga family for all those years.
“You shouldn’t have let him go, Father. He is ungrateful for everything we have done for him.”
“I couldn’t hold a man who had the sickness of the vhatshimbili, Rendani.”
“It is just an excuse, this wanderlust thing. I have never heard of anyone who suffered from it. When he returns he must not go back to the mine.”
“Since when do you decide who works at my mine or not? Will you go down the hill and work there yourself?”
“I am the Royal Sculptor, Father.”
“Then Chata will work at the mine when he returns.”
“If he returns.”
“Mitshimbilo does not last forever. Wanderings come to an end. The arrangement that we have with him has been very profitable for all of us, Rendani.”
“Except that we don’t know what he does with his gold.”
“It is his gold.”
Even as Zwanga said so he was wondering why Chata was hoarding all his gold. Often, when everyone else had run out of gold, they had directed Swahili traders to Chata’s house because they knew that he had a lot of it, but he always refused to sell it to them. What was the good of gold if it was not used to enrich one’s life with power and wives and the luxury items that the Swahili brought from across the seas? Chata had no wives to support. His only dependant had been his mother, but she had sneaked away one night a number of seasons ago to join the world of her ancestors. Perhaps it was this loss that infected Chata with the wanderlust disease, because it started soon after the !Kung woman was buried. He had been very close to his mother.
Rendani, on the other hand, was jealous that Chata was able to do whatever he wanted to do any time he felt like doing it. He himself could not afford the luxury of a pointless journey even if he were to be attacked by mitshimbilo, the disease of vhatshimbili – the wanderlust – because he was constrained by his responsibilities to the kingdom as the Royal Sculptor, and to the family as husband and father.
While father and son were arguing about him, Chata had crossed the Limpopo and was walking in a n
orth-easterly direction towards the Sabi River. He did not want to be encumbered by baggage so he carried only his spear and a shield. Across his shoulder was a bag made of the tanned skin of a rock rabbit in which he had a few gold ingots. He wore a kaross of tanned wildebeest hide and front and back aprons made of tanned impala skins. He walked with confidence for neither man nor beast will challenge a man who’s sure of himself. Between the Limpopo and Sabi he came across sporadic gold mines and he stopped at some of them and was welcomed quite warmly by the miners. But he never lingered because the road ahead was still long. Kindly strangers gave him dried kudu meat as provision, which he put in his rock rabbit bag. He occasionally nibbled at the meat, but when he was really hungry he ate the roots of shrubs and berries that he had learnt about from his mother when he was a little boy. He quenched his thirst at the clear streams in which he also bathed. He still loved himself even on the long road and every day or two he dipped his body into the flowing waters.
There were no mishaps on the road, and it took him two weeks to get to Sofala, a coastal town on the Zanj seas.
For a number of days he was seen loitering at the waterfront. Every time a Swahili dhow docked he rushed to negotiate for passage with the merchants. Thanks to his association with the likes of Abdul wa Salim he had a smattering of Kiswahili. But the merchants did not have a place for him in their dhows. He was amazed to see so many of the Swahili elite in their flowing robes throughout the town. More of them had settled and set up trading posts in Sofala since Suleiman Hassan, the Sultan of Kilwa, captured the town from the Arabs about forty years before. Not even the Arabs and Persians who came through the Buzi River from the market town of Manica and were ready to sail back to their countries with loads of ivory and gold after successful missions inland wanted to waste their time talking to him. They did not think they had any use for a Zanj – which is what they called all black people who were not Swahili or Arab – in their vessels. He gave up begging the arrogant sailors, and walked further north.
After another two weeks of crossing forests, gullies, rivers and valleys, and of climbing and descending hills and hillocks, he reached the Swahili capital of Kilwa. He repaired to the docks and spent all day long gazing at the dhows, yearning to be in one of them, and begging the sailors for passage. Again, he had a problem convincing them. He was seriously considering returning to Mapungubwe and settling down to marriage and respectability when he chanced upon Hamisi wa Babu, an old merchant who used to be a regular in Mapungubwe many years before. Hamisi wa Babu did not remember him though, because Chata was still very young when the trader last visited the town with his wares. But Chata remembered him very well; there had been some scandal about which the adults whispered. Chata never got to know the details, except that it involved one of Baba-Munene’s young wives. The Royal House hushed up the whole matter, but banished Hamisi wa Babu from ever again setting his straying foot in Mapungubwe.
Hamisi wa Babu still had fond memories of the town and when he heard that Chata was from there he immediately took him under his wing. As they waited for the monsoon cycle that would assist the dhows across the Zanj seas he taught his new protégé the ways of the Swahili and the ways of the sea. With a gold ingot Chata purchased the white flowing robes of the Swahili with a matching turban. Hamisi wa Babu hoped that he was not only going to turn Chata into a sailor, but also convert him from his infidel ways into the ways of the book – the Koran, as given to the world by the great prophet Muhammad of Arabia. Chata merely went along with the teachings because he was determined to sail the seas; he did not pay any particular attention to their dictates and demands. He was a son of Mapungubwe and his God was not Allah but Mwali. Nevertheless he did not argue with his teachers.
As soon as the monsoon cycle allowed it, Hamisi wa Babu’s dhow embarked on the voyage northwards. Chata got along well with the small crew of seven, though he could detect that the more arrogant ones viewed him as an inferior since he was first and foremost an infidel and then a Zanj. But when he acquitted himself well in all his tasks and they saw that their boss, Hamisi wa Babu, treated him with respect they changed their attitude.
In Mogadishu – a city of white-washed buildings and minarets, of willowy brown men who trod lightly on the brown earth in their white robes and gigantic turbans, and of tall slender market women in colourful kaftans and head scarves – Hamisi wa Babu’s dhow docked to pay taxes and replenish food supplies and water, and then proceeded towards the Red Sea. After a few days it docked at the port of Aden. Then began the serious business of bartering the ivory, animal hides and skins, carved doors and chests and gold that they brought from Kilwa for pottery, porcelain, silk, spices, cottons, swords and daggers, glass and stone beads and kohl from the Persian, Arab and Indian merchants. Chata had not been aware that their dhow was carrying such a lot of rhino horns and that they were so much in demand among Arab traders. These traders fell over themselves bargaining for the horns and Hamisi wa Babu was all smiles at the profit he was going to make just from the horns. Chata was very uncomfortable about the rhino horn trade. Where he came from rhinos were sacred and no one would dare kill them.
“What do they do with all these horns?” he asked a fellow crew member.
“Arabs carve dagger handles from rhino horn,” explained the crew member.
“They send some of the horns to China,” added Hamisi wa Babu. “Chinamen make panaceas from ground rhino horn. They say no ailment in the world can defeat their remedies. They also mix the powder with other herbs and foods to make potent aphrodisiacs.”
None of the horns could have come from Mapungubwe, Chata concluded. Unless, of course, they were poached. Other peoples from the lands he had traversed did not have as much regard for the rhino.
“I would make much more wealth if I took these horns to China myself instead of selling them to Arab middlemen,” lamented wa Babu. “But what can I do with a small dhow like this?”
Indeed Chata was amazed to see large vessels – baggalas with crews of more than a hundred each – that dwarfed their small sambuk.
Though he marvelled at all he saw, especially at the merchants’ life of luxury, he did not envy them. He had no ambition to be one of them one day. He would rather have his life of freedom where he did what he wanted when he wanted to do it, a life that was not controlled by the cycles of the monsoon or the price of gold. Back in Mapungubwe he was in control of every aspect of his life, especially after Zwanga retired from active mining and handed the mine over to him and Rendani became the Royal Sculptor and lost all interest in mining. He was a free man in Mapungubwe; even the seasons had no power over him since he did not farm. The merchants, however, in all their finery of silk and gold jewellery, had to sail towards India and China in the summer and towards the Swahili coast in the winter. Their lives were planned for them by the seasons, by the winds and the waves and the stars. They deceived themselves into thinking they were free men, yet they were in truth in bondage.
It was a successful trade mission for Hamisi wa Babu and his crew. It was a successful mission for Chata too for he had seen the world and satisfied his wanderlust. He had sailed in the vast ocean where his eyes could not see the end of the water and had become seasick. But only in the beginning. Soon his body had got used to the rough motion of the vessel as the monsoon tossed it around and to the fare of salted meat, millet that had been roasted and then ground, and rationed water. On the way back he was like a seasoned sailor and his loss of weight and weather-beaten face attested to that fact.
Once more the dhow docked in Mogadishu to be taxed and to take on fresh supplies. Chata and two of his mates walked to the market in the centre of the city. It was there that he bought his famous Yunjin cloud brocade. But it was also there that he was captured on suspicion that he was an escaped slave. The ruler of Kish – he may have been a sheik or a sultan; in Mogadishu they simply knew him as the King of Kish – had recently raided the east coast of the contine
nt and ventured inland into the lands of such Zanj peoples as the Makonde further south, the Chagga, and the Gikuyu, and also of the Habash, to buy slaves from unscrupulous rulers and patricians and to capture some as they worked in their fields. When the slave baggala docked in Mogadishu to be taxed some slaves broke loose and escaped into the town. The slavers of Kish were searching Mogadishu for their escaped property and they believed they had found one of them in the form of Chata. The two crew members from Hamisi wa Babu’s dhow tried to explain that he was not one of the slaves but a fellow sailor from Kilwa. They made the mistake of claiming he was Swahili like them.
“If he is truly a Swahili then he will know something about Islam,” said the leader of the slavers. “I’ll ask him a simple question that even a child will know. What was the name of Prophet Muhammad’s first wife?”
Chata looked at his colleagues hoping for some help. But the leader of the Kish guards shook his head and indicated that there would be no help for him. He obviously did not know the answer. The men of Kish were enjoying themselves and they broke into laughter at Chata’s perplexed face. The leader of the slavers smiled. “Come on,” he said, “I’ll help you. She was the daughter of Khuwaylid, son of Sad, son of Abdul Uzza, son of Qusayy. Surely you’d know that.”
But of course Chata was even more confused by the list of those strange Arab names.
“We are not fools,” said the guard. “This man is no Swahili. He is a Zanj infidel. He is one of our slaves.”
“He is one of us,” cried Chata’s mates. “Otherwise why do you think he’s dressed in the white robes of the Swahili?”
It was obvious to all that the slavers were aware that Chata could not have been one of their escaped slaves. But what did it matter? He was a Zanj. They might as well capture him to replace at least one of the escapees.
“Anyone can wear any robe,” said the leader of the slavers. “That doesn’t mean anything. You can take a Zanj out of his leopard skins and dress him in the finest of silk but he’s still a Zanj.”
