March 14, 2010
Morning. A knock at my door. I open it to find one of my standard seven girls standing there alone. She is terrified and visably shaking. I invite her in and she comes to sit tenitively on my couch. I wait only a minute for her to speak when she blurts out, "Brie, I am pregnant." I try unsuccessfully to hide my shock. So I say, "What?" Maybe I am not understanding her. She says the exact same sentince again... nope not a mistake. Her big brown eyes search mine for answers, then she eyes the crayons left over from Catherine yesterday. I look at her small hands, her child's body, her ripped primary school uniform and I offer her the crayons because I have no idea what to say. Come on, Brienne. Finally, I say, "Umm... do you know how far along you are?" "I think about four months."I can't believe that she is coloring. "Do you have parents?" She lives with her mother and grandmother, her father lives in Makambako with his other wife. "Do they know?" No. "Does the head teacher know?" No. "Does anyone know?" Just the father. "Where is the father now?" When I told him, he said that I was a liar and it wasn't his. Then he ran away to another village. Of course he did, I think. I am about to ask her if she has thought about her choices when I realize that she doesn't have any choices. She is an African child. So I promise to try to help her, but explain that this does not mean that I will take her baby. I ask her what her name and age are- Loveness, about 13.
Turns out, she will be kicked out of primary school in about 2 months. Jessica does a priliminary exam, things look fine health wise. Felix is aware of who the father is and is prepared to have some sort of plan to find him. Loveness' mother and grandmother have minimal reaction. I am surprised, until I think about my village and how many young women have children with no fathers. I realize how how many female friends I have with babies on their backs, but where have all the babas gone? So in another informal "Brie-vey" I start asking that very question.
First stop is Felix and his wife, Mama Glad. They run the shop across the street from my house. Felix is my new village chairman, making him Image's Barak Obama. He is almost as cool. I love talking about issues with he and Mama Glad. Even though Felix is a 36 year old man, he is really open with me. We discuss gender roles, sex, AIDS, domestic abuse, etc. and he is honest with me, even if he know that I will not like the result. Mama Glad is tough and will say exactly what she thinks even in front of her husband. They are both incredibly good natured, even compared to other Tanzanians who are good natured as a rule. In the shop, after greeting, I say"What is up with all the single mothers here?" Felix gives me his smile that says he is going to answer my question, but that I am not going to like the answer.
Felix: Well, a lot of women are trying to find a husband and they think that if they get pregnant that the man might marry them. Or they just feel so lonely that they want to have a kid.
Me: Okay, but don't you think that they are lonely because their husband and lovers are never home, they are always at the bar with their friends?
Felix (laughing): Maybe. Sometimes, women are just foolish and they believe that a man will stay with them.
Mama Glad (in full tongue-clicking dismay): Ah! You know that is not true! Brie, they lie to us! They tell us that they love us that they will marry us if we give them a good child. But then they just run away! Or they are already married with another family- they are cowards and liars!
Felix (laughing at her outburst): She is right, but women must be tougher.
(We go on like this for awhile...)
In Tanzania, it is not rude to ask people personal questions. So I ask Mama Jonas, Mama Poli, Mama Samweli, Mama Umi, Mama Johnson, Mama Aggy.... and more... I get varying answers: he already had another family, he raped me, he told me he would marry me, he ran away... I ask some guys too (all are married and deny ever getting a woman pregnant and leaving): Os, Nicky, Fredrick, Puce, Stan, Bon, Titu, even Mzee Ngoda. Their main response is: The women lie, they want to have a lover then they get pregnant and expect the guy to stay. They all want kids and we don't have to have just one wife. Then I ask Mwalango, one of my young male primary school teachers. Shortly after I got to Image, he got one of my village ladies, Tao, pregnant. Today they are married and have a beautiful son named Ima. Mwalango tells me, "I love her. I told her I did. When she was pregnant I stayed by her. I did what I said I would do." Wow- It is just that easy.
Then there is Asha. I love Asha. She is from Songea (town to the south), we are the same age and she is my village barmaid. She is not married and has a daughter, Suze, who is five. As a rule, Tanzanian barmaids almost always double as prostitutes. The going village price is about two dollars, (it is less if the girl insists on using a condom). When Asha first came to Image, I watched how she dealt with the men- with humor, with toughness, as an equal. One day I came in to buy eggs, before she saw me, I saw one of the village guys hitting on her- then I heard her use one of my lines! She laughed and said strongly, "Ha! Why would I do anything with you? Don't you have a wife? I am too good to be part of that." That is my line! I taught the women to respond like that! I came up, glared the guy down and smiled at Asha. Since that moment, when Asha picked up my female empowerment teaching we have been close. I watch her strongly and sweetly reject money and guy after guy. Finally, I convinced Mama Max that Asha should get paid more, so that she never feels the pressure to accept. Mama Max, being as awesome as she is, sees the benefit for all women and agrees to the raise.
Once when I was teaching about AIDS testing at the bar, Asha excitedly ran to her room and came back proudly brandishing her testing card which indicated that she had been tested three times- all negative. The guys all start in with questions about her testing and she said, "There is no way that I can let myself get AIDS because who would take care of Suze?" As I mentioned, I LOVE Asha.
So I ask her: Where is Baba Suze?
Asha: He told me that he loved me, but when I got pregnant he chose another lover and ran away from me. Suze has never met him. He hurt me, I will not let Suze be hurt.
I reminded her to teach her daughter to be strong too.
It is odd, but because I am so close with Felix and Romanus (my top government people), I am sort of an honorary village government person. We were hanging out for office hours listening to peoples complaints- so and so stole some of my corn or I want to open a bar here but need some money to start off. Blah blah. Eventually thirteen people come in all fired up. X is sleeping with Y but they should be sleeping with Z but he is with A. I never could get it all straight, especially because it was always three plus people talking at once. Felix and Romanus both listen carefully in Tanzanian style- not rushing, going around and around in circles, enjoying the drama of it all. After about two hours of this, I interrupt, "Hey, I have a thought. How about we all think to ourselves for a minute: Am I married? If we are than maybe we should think about just sleeping with that person. If we aren't we should pick just one person that we want to sleep with, see if they want to sleep with us tooand go to Brie's house to pick up some condoms." Romanus and Felix smile at me. Everyone else stares like I have just turned water to Safari Lager. An hour later, all thirteen people are at my house collecting condoms. Can these little pieces of rubber solve all of Tanzania's problems?
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