It's a woman's prerogative to change my mind. I promised to write about the inspiring efforts the people of this district are making to improve their ability to provide a stable living for their families, but I changed my mind. They don't have the ability to receive any financial help until the government recognizes their "co-op," so I decided to write about them when that is in place. My readers will be eager to help, and I want to capture that outpouring of compassion when they are ready to receive it. SOOO... A little Rwandan history is in order. What better place to start than with the king.
The eight senior missionaries in the Rwanda Kigali mission posing in front of the palace. Left to right, Birds, Ensigns, Stephensons and Cravens.
It's cool inside the palace and smells sweet from the grass structure and mats woven of reeds or grasses that carpet the floor. Other than the door, there are no windows or other ventilation. The climate here is so temperate, that perhaps the door opening would have been sufficient. Note the two little spikes just behind the entrance roof. Those spikes signify the kings house. A double spiked headdress also indicated the king. The little wooden spike at the peak of the roof was believed to prevent lightening from catching the straw house on fire.
The last king of Rwanda died in 1955, though the country had been at least partly in control of first the Germans, (since the late 1800's ) and then the Belgians, (beginning between the World Wars.) But before that, the king of Rwanda had his royal compounds in several locations around his kingdom, his many wives, (but only one queen) and many centuries of tradition.
As palaces go, I think the Rwandans were on to something. The royal bed had room to comfortably sleep two dozen people.
This shows only a portion of the bed. The baskets that surround it contained the Kings wardrobe. The brown covering on the bed is a felted type fabric made from beating the bark of a ficus tree. It feels light and soft, similar to a tightly woven cotton blanket. The bed is elevated off the floor, and tradition holds that a bevy of young women either lay under the bed while the king was enjoying himself with a wife and clapped to encourage him, OR stood outside the door and sang to cover the intimate sounds so they would have privacy. I don't know about anyone else, but I sure hope it was the latter.
This one gallon gourd has a straw. It was for the king's banana beer. There was a virgin boy with no scars who served as taster of all the king's beer. When deemed safe and delicious, he delivered it to the king's palace.
The outer compound was well guarded, but when someone wanted to petition the king, they were examined before being allowed to enter. They approached, keeping their hands in view. They removed their shoes at the white ledge and when invited, knelt with faces to the floor, clapped three times and then addressed the king. Once dismissed, they had to back away, all the way outside the compound.
Inside the chamber is another room with a similar hour-glass shaped stool. There the king judged the people according to legal accusations.
If someone was condemned to die, they were allowed to try to fight their way past the king's guards and touch the pole in the entrance of the palace, called the pole of forgiveness. If they made it, they were pardoned. Legend says only one man ever succeeded.
See the stool in the entryway? That's the throne. The pole of forgiveness holds up the arch of the palace door. The vertical wall inside is a divider for the king's room of judgement, and his bedroom is behind that.
These workers are rebuilding the milkmaid's house. Only the milkmaid was allowed to milk the royal cows and only the king could drink the milk from his cows. The milkmaid was to be a virgin with no scars on her body. She served until the death of the king. Some were known to live out their lives as virgins, but their families received benefits for their sacrifices. I think I would have "accidentally" fallen down and cut my knee. . .sufficient to make a nice scar.
Many native Kinyarwanda speakers can't pronounce their 'R's and replace them with 'L's. So our guide kept referring to the king's "loyal" cows. I'm sure they were loyal, since their keeper sings poems to them, calls them by name, swats off the flies, and feeds them very carefully.
I'm not sure but I think his poem went something like this.
Molly, oh Molly, you beautiful beast,
These tourists are paying for your daily feast.
So let them fondle your astounding horn
If you give them a grin, I'll give you some corn.
Who knows. Molly was certainly friendly. The keeper told us her real name and I couldn't begin to repeat it back. The cows (including the bull) were completely gentle and obviously enjoyed the petting and scratching offered by the tourists. What was MOST surprising was that the feed for all the cows was already in the hayricks. The cows were all watching their keeper, waiting patiently for him to release them to lunch. Only when he returned the cow to the herd and led them by walking in front of them, did they approach their food.
Here's my cute missionary companion, giving the old girl a pat. The other cows all look on a little jealously.
The Belgians built the king of Rwanda a nice 1920's ranch style palace. The tour took us there but there were no photos allowed and most of the furnishings were looted during the civil war and genocide of the 1990s anyway. It's mostly photographic displays. It is a very comfortable and gracious home with modern-for-the-time accoutrements.
Even in ancient times, Rwandan kings didn't live in a used palace. When you're building them of straw, that's not such a big deal. (No three little pigs jokes, PLEASE!) But when the last king took the throne, he began building a beautiful two story palace-by-anybody's-standards on the hilltop facing the Belgian palace. It was nearly finished when the king died. leaving no natural heir.
Interesting fact. The story goes that the king received the Yellow Fever Vaccine and was dead five minutes later. . . I suspect he should have had his beer boy take the vaccine from the same syringe and the same bottle first! Our guide did tell us that the last king was unpopular.
Some of you might be frowning at the fact that this excursion has nothing to do with missionary work. But the truth is that we senior missionaries have a lot of freedom in scheduling our time. We pay for our own gas anyway and there's something to be said for having good relationships with the others on our team.
But rest assured, we are now teaching weekly English classes, temple preparation classes, and a music conducting class starts Saturday. That will lead into a keyboarding class and that will hopefully lead to the graduates playing in Sacrament meeting and receiving their own keyboards to practice on through a Harmon Grant.
We're studying up and experimenting on ways to help and how to best facilitate and support the heroic efforts of some of our brothers and sisters here. The underlying theme of many, if not most of the problems we see here is poverty. But the members are almost all new and haven't often seen the effects of paying tithing, and trusting God.
I'll get to it all. . .all in good time.
TEASER: Next time I'll tell the story of a woman whose children had left to live on the street and was reunited with them.
Comments