au revoir

Being relatively young, the Monkolé churches are still trying to work out how to do things as Christians within their culture. A good example of this is a question which arises whenever one of the Christians dies: “Pastor, how do we deal with this?”

The tradition here is to bury someone the same day they die. The Christians usually have a short ceremony at the graveside (which may be in the cemetery or may be within the family property in the village) with prayers and a brief message. Then traditionally people come and visit the family to support them in their grief. Far-flung members of the family must be lodged and fed, and all visitors are fed too.

Recently an old man from the church died, and Marc attended the burial and visited the family during the week following their bereavement. A week after the death, there was a notice in church saying that on the Monday (8 days after the death) there would be a service in open air in the village to mark the end of the time of mourning.

We wanted to be present for this, and went down at 9.30, since we had been told 9.15 … and even so we were still far too early! The service got started at about 11, and lasted a little over an hour. There was a lot of singing from the choir – deliberately chosen songs about the joy of knowing Jesus – some readings from the Bible, and a sermon from a visiting pastor. During this time and throughout the whole morning tens of women were hard at work preparing a meal for everyone around (our boys got a foretaste to keep them quiet when they got restless during the service!).

After the service there were instructions about who would eat where. Being missionaries, we got sent off to eat in the local government representative's house with the pastors. Pounded yams (the “best” food here, reserved for parties), chicken and spicy sauce were served to us, and we could have had rice too, if we'd had any room left!

We didn't remember the pastor having told us about such a service after the week of mourning, so we asked him about it. He told us that it can be difficult for a bereaved family because no one knows how long the time of mourning should go on for, and sometimes members of the extended family hang around for ages afterwards (requiring food and lodging). The Christians here asked their leaders how long the mourning period should last, and they asked a more established church among a neighbouring people group what they do. They said that it lasts for about a week, and then they have a big service to mark the end. Not only does this give a signal to family to leave (!) but it is also an opportunity to witness to the Christian hope that death is not the end, and that within the sadness of losing someone is the joy of knowing that they have gone to be with Jesus.

Speaking of which, Simon has learned the lesson well. Here is a recent conversation we had:

Simon: Why we can't eat the mushrooms in the compound but we can eat the mushrooms on the pizza?
Mummy: Well, the mushrooms in the compound might be poisonous.
Simon: And they can make us ill?
Mummy: Yes.
Simon: And they can kill us?
Mummy: Maybe.
Simon (looking happy and excited): And then we can see Jesus!
Mummy: ?!?

Sometimes applied theology gives unexpected results!

harmattan

We are now well into harmattan season - windy, white and dusty! Even with our windows closed, all surfaces are covered with a thin layer of white dust within a few hours of being wiped. Temperatures are much more pleasant though, in fact we've even been feeling cold!

Our New Year's Day family walk:


Benjy got a bit tired at the end...

Confusing Christmas

Our Christmas weekend was another good example of cross-cultural living! This was partly because we wanted to keep some of our own traditions while discovering how things were done here. What also happened was that the way the church did things didn't seem to be the way we'd been told it would be done. We didn't know whether that was because a) we hadn't understood in the first place, b) plans had changed and we hadn't heard/understood why, or c) things were exactly as we had understood but looked different from the way we expected!

We didn't go to the Christmas Eve meeting as it was at 8pm (ie. 8.30 or 9pm!) and so past the boys' bedtimes. And Marc and I felt that we wanted to spend our Christmas Eve together.

Our boys opened their stocking presents on Christmas morning and then we all went to church. The Christmas morning service seemed joyful but not particularly Christmassy, which we put down to the Christmas Eve meeting being the more Christmas-themed of the meetings. We went home afterwards to our Christmas dinner of guinea fowl, opened more presents and then spent the afternoon as a family.

Sunday's service was followed by a long discussion which I understood was something to do with “the youth”, “preparation”, “Saturday or Sunday” but the details were beyond me (however I was definitely missing the context, which I only learnt on Tuesday when we had a good long chat – in Monkolé – with the pastor).

On Christmas Day the pastor told us we were invited to eat with a lot of people from church on Sunday. But he said, “Go home after the service, and we'll call you when it's ready, because the ladies can't start preparing food early because they'll be in church.” We figured this would be a midday meal but certainly not before 1pm and probably not until 3 or 4pm. We just snacked, and put the boys down for their usual nap at 2pm. But by 5pm we were starting to wonder whether we'd got it wrong. Finally at 5.30pm the pastor rang to say that … the meal still wasn't ready! But at least that reassured us that we had understood … just hadn't understood the likely timing! At 6 he rang again to tell us to come down to the village, and by 6.30-ish we were tucking into a delicious meal of pounded yams, chicken and spicy sauce.

It just brought back to us the frustration of living somewhere where you don't know the unwritten rules of social interaction! And reminded us how as Westerners we really don't like to just be hanging around waiting for someone else! Part of me also felt it was a shame we hadn't gone down to the village earlier, but we had been told to wait at home because they didn't want to keep us waiting around. So I was afraid that if we went down earlier they'd feel under pressure to get the meal served earlier.

More became clear on Tuesday during the aforementioned chat with the pastor. First of all, they hadn't celebrated Christmas with as much gusto as usual because someone linked to the church had died, and so they felt that out of respect to his family they couldn't have a party. The discussion after church had been about the youth not having done the preparation they were supposed to for the party, and others saying that it wasn't appropriate to be having a party anyway. Secondly, usually the big meal we'd been invited to would have been earlier (at 3 or 4ish) but that's because usually Boxing Day isn't a Sunday so the ladies can get cooking much earlier. So we'd kind of got it right but not made allowances for it being a Sunday!

I do feel sad to be so far from our families at Christmas, so I am very thankful that the church here is so welcoming and supportive of us! It would make it even harder if we weren't feeling at home here.

The choir at church all dressed up in their Christmas finery:


Our family (in the Christmas material chosen by the church women):


Me showing off my new outfit: