My education has always been one of the most important things to me. A way to learn more about the world and to discover how I could contribute to it. Something I had near complete control over that I could use to determine my future. So in high school, when I saw peers seemingly brushing off school, I would be frustrated and write them off as hoodlums. I didn’t make an effort to seek an explanation as to why they didn’t have the same values as me. I just made their apparent apathy their single story.
(This post is part of Blogging Abroad’s 2017 New Years Blog Challenge, week two: The Danger of a Single Story. It is based on one of my favorite TED talks by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. Give it a listen here.)
Thanks for another thoughtful prompt, Blogging Abroad!
Now, many years later, in Mozambique, one of the women I look up to the most never got past the fourth grade. But if I used that single factoid to determine my perceptions of her, I would be missing out. Because she is so, so much more than her lack of primary school diploma. She is one of the most welcoming, energetic, and hardworking women I know. Meet Mama Egeneta.
All dressed up for Christmas dinner. Look at her face – she knows she looks good!
Our Relationship
Our pre-service training (PST) had three phases. Back in October we left Namaacha for two weeks for phase 2: a quick visit and introduction to our communities and future homes. During that time I lived with a host family and Mama Egeneta became my second host mãe here in Mozambique. Now that I’m back in my community for good, I have my own place to live. But I still visit the family nearly every day and eat dinner with them at least once a week. More if I’m too lazy to cook…
(A Sliver of) Her Story
Like most residents of Sitila, Mama was born here and never left. I’m not sure how old she is, but she was still fairly young when Mozambique’s civil war started in 1977. She said that explains why the recent New Years fireworks scared her so badly: the booming noise reminded her of the fighting.
Mama is the oldest of eight children. Here in Mozambique, being the eldest gives you a lot of responsibilities, particularly around the house if you’re a female. So Mama didn’t really have a choice to continue school after age 10. To complicate the matter even more, Mama’s father had five wives, her mother being the youngest. With each woman having her own family, Mama’s father couldn’t provide sufficiently for each one. The kids really had to step in and help.
So when Mama wasn’t helping around in the house, she was out working on the machamba (garden/farm). To this day, she is a farmer, as are 95% of the residents of Sitila. I am so amazed that after all these years, she can still wake up at 3AM to ride her bike to the machamba that’s apparently so far away they won’t let me walk to it. And then after a grueling day (heck, I’m a sweaty mess after 30 minutes of picking weeds), she’ll come home to do hours of chores, whether it’s peeling cashews or hand-washing clothes. One of my host sisters, Mana Alice, just got married in December. Now that she’s moved out of the house, Mama has had to take on more work at home.
Her Hopes
Mama is happy that Mana Alice left to move to the city with her husband. Mama thinks her daughter will find more work opportunities, earn money, and send some home. With the serious drought lately, the farm hasn’t been producing any surplus to sell, so the family has no source of income. Mama has two older sons who have already left Sitila and been working for a while. She’s not comfortable asking them for money, but she says it’s different asking a daughter.
With three of her kids already flying the coop, only one daughter, Mana Yara, remains. Although my older host brothers left their kids to be raised by their grandparents. So Mama and Papa have four extra bellies to feed. But that also means eight extra hands to help. And boy, are these kids great about doing so without being asked! Mama is really raising them well. She hopes Yara and her four grandkids can all finish schooling in Sitila (up to the 10th grade) before going on to bigger and better things. I’m confident they all have bright futures ahead!
Mama’s pride and joy
Why I Love Mama
One of my favorite things about Mama is her welcoming spirit. I can still be 50 yards away when she spots me in the distance and enthusiastically yells “Mana Lizia” (I get called many names here and very rarely is it “Liz” – kinda fun to have so many aliases though). By the time I approach the yard, one of the kids has already fetched me a chair from the kitchen. I go sit by Mama and we talk about our days. She tells me I should’ve come over earlier so I don’t ficar sozinho (stay alone). I convince her I was busy with work colleagues or chores. She asks me if it’ll rain the next day. She is absolutely fascinated that my phone has accurately predicted the weather several times! If I try to leave anytime between 6 and 7:30PM, she’ll ask why I’m not eating with them. Even if I already have food prepared at home, sometimes I stay anyway because it’s just too hard to say no.
This hospitality she shows me isn’t circumstantial. It’s constant. For this, everyone in town not only knows, but loves Mama Egeneta. Whenever she gets a call (side note: her ringtone is a cat meowing and it makes me smile every time), she answers so exuberantly. Her smile transfers through the phone. I might understand only three words of the conversation since it’s in the local language, but the eavesdropping still leaves me grinning because of her contagious energy.
Moral of the Story
I don’t know if we should feel guilty about subconsciously using stereotypes to make first judgments about people. I think it’s part of human nature. But I do know that we’ll become guilty if we let those stereotypes alone dictate our perceptions.
“The problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete. They make one story become the only story.”
– from Adichie’s TED talk
So I challenge you (and myself): take the time to learn people’s stories. It can be a daunting and never-ending task, but it’s worth it. I’m just now beginning to realize that all those hours I spent during phase 2, sitting on the esteira (straw mat) under the mango tree, seemingly doing nothing productive, were actually so important to learning Mama’s stories. Even if we sat in silence for much of the time, or Mama was speaking to the kids in Xitswa, I gained important insights into her life. And the stories we shared to break the silences, however small, truly built up.
When she’s not running around working, Mama loves to relax on the esteira.
It’s in these small moments that I was able to get a fuller, albeit far from complete, picture of Mama’s life. And that I realized she’s far from the hoodlum I might have characterized her as, had I used the fact that she never finished primary school as her single story. I’m so grateful to have her as my mãe and am excited to see my collection of Mama Egeneta stories grow over these next 23 months!
Lizambique 