12 January 2014

Another school year will begin tomorrow.  The students have been arriving since Friday evening and so hopefully when 8.00 a.m. arrives tomorrow morning they will be ready to begin their school year.  I don’t know how many of those in the first year who attended the English orientation course in November will be back but I suspect that most, if not all, will appear.  The government selection of students for their secondary schools only happened last month but I’d be surprised if those students who applied for and were chosen for our school would elect to go to another school.  Although fees would be lower in a government school, the quality of education as well as the care for students would be a factor tipping the scales toward choosing a religious school.  We shall see.

I spent some time during this past week waiting in lines for various services.  And during those times I often chatted with people near me in those lines, and, not unusually, I was addressed as “Mama yangu” a couple of times.  That means “my mother” and is used often by younger people as they converse with older women, like me.  I mention that because in the last line I was waiting in, a middle-aged man struck up a conversation with me.  As is often the case, people are curious about what I’m doing here, etc.  When he asked me about my children, and I replied that I didn’t have any, his face showed utter disbelief and pity.  He just couldn’t imagine how I could be even remotely happy without having children.  He is probably an evangelical Christian because he kept reminding me that the Bible says to go and fill the earth, and that I could be a Christian, a religious person even, and not follow that mandate was  beyond his comprehension.  He said he himself has a “nation” of children.  How many?  16.  Fortunately I was called to get my business done at that point because if he had that many children with one wife we may have gotten into a discussion on how his wife’s health has been affected by bearing all those children as well as questioning his ability to care for that many children and provide them with education and everything else that they need.

Anyway, I am to be pitied because I don’t have any children; however, I don’t feel very pitiful, and very much enjoy the times I’m called Mama, Mama  yangu, Shangazi (auntie), Bibi (grandmother), and by many  many more than 16 people!