Teenage Circumcision Celebrations in the Bush

Dear Sue,

The second trip I made to Mbadi has been a completely different experience – for not to say adventure. It opened my eyes to new categories I might operate with in the analysis phase of my work. I managed to get close to the field in a way I never imagined. The last couple of weeks have been intense on the personal as well as the professional level. I have crossed some personal and cultural barriers which I now doubt whether I should have crossed – but enough with the introduction, here comes the story – and before you go on, if you have a weak heart it will be best to stop reading here and ask me to mail a more censored version.

Mbadi, does not look like a Maasai village. The community is indeed predominantly Maasai, but visual representations of Maasai traditions are lacking- it is unusual to see people wearing the traditional Maasai shukas and dresses and in the whole village there is not a single manyatta (traditional Maasai huts made of a mixture of mud, ashes and dung plastered on a wooden frame). Only the traditional Maasai craft of bead decorations is represented, usually by a single beaded bracelet or belt. Yet, conversations and observations have revealed to me a strong feeling of “Maasai-hood”. The tribal affiliation is voiced often in relation to local and national politics, occupational opportunities, education etc...

Last Tuesday, Robert, one of my “brothers”, told me that he was going to go to Kinuta, a Maasai village on the other side of the hills, to participate in some circumcision celebrations. Realising that here lay a chance to observe, and perhaps participate in a rite of passage that may reveal to me some configurations of power and cultural symbols which otherwise would stay hidden, I asked to join him – on the condition that there will be at least one English speaking person there to help me. Robert is a lively and chatty guy, but he speaks very poor English. I have been promised that “on that side of the hills everybody is very educated and they all speak very good English”. So the next day we left.

We arrived in Kinuta around six o’clock in the afternoon. The hilly dirt road leading to the village was long, winding and nearly impassable even for the four-wheel-drive that took us there. All around were acacia trees, giraffes, and “real” Maasai men and women - wearing shukas, numerous beaded necklaces, bracelets and earrings, which hang on ears that have been stretched and made long by years of wearing large and heavy metal earrings. Every compound (the Maasai often live several generations in one compound or “boma”) consisted of at least one manyatta, while the other structures were usually corrugated iron huts, of the sort seen in Mbadi and the slums of Nairobi. I felt like I just travelled back in time and was convinced that no one in the village would be able to speak a word of English.

Arriving at the family that was to host Robert and myself, there were three young boys sitting in the living room. They were old friends of Robert, and greeted me heartily – in perfect English. In the following days of celebrations (we stayed there from Wednesday until Monday), I have met a long line of Maasai lawyers, doctors, pharmacists, vets, university students etc...

When later during that visit people opened up to me, they told me of an American mission which came to Kinuta in the seventies and started exporting Maasai beadwork to the states. Having strengthened the sense of community and of legitimacy in the eyes of others, the parents were happy to send their children to the schools which that mission opened later.

I compared Kinuta to Mbadi. Far from being able to argue for it properly (yet), my feeling is that the lack of acceptance from “others”, as well as the relative proximity and easy access to a city have had a bad influence on the lives of the villagers, who live on stories of brave Maasai warriors, but do not become warriors themselves because they believe that the future is in the city. Yet they only use the city for pleasures –shopping, playing pool, sitting in cafes etc... Unlike the people of Kinuta, they do not see the city as a resource, as for example job opportunities. I think that the old generation is not familiar enough with the city, and the young generation needs a guiding hand in understanding the relationship between the city, education and themselves. To establish this argument, I will have to operate with terms such as mentality of poverty, urbanization and slums, for I fear that if no change will take place in Mbadi, it will become a slum.

On Thursday, the day before the circumcision, the family followed the tradition and sent George, the boy who was about to be circumcised, out with the cattle. He was instructed to come back in the afternoon, and in the meanwhile the women prepared food for the guests. I have been told that when George will come back I will see his brothers and age-mates get excited, but that it should not scare me. Slightly puzzled by that warning, I stepped outside when I saw George arriving with the cattle. Seconds after he entered the manyatta, young people started running towards it, waving their hands wildly, shouting and screaming “I love him”; “he is my brother”, “take me instead” (all that of course in Kimaasai, but had been translated for me). These young men were all stopped violently by some “guards” – other young men that have been posted outside the manyatta. The guards worked in pairs, two guards on each “attacker”. The “attackers” had an empty look in their eyes, some were foaming from the mouth, and it was indeed quite scary. Walking away from the manyatta I saw Lucas, one of George’ older brothers, looking odd and asking to enter the manyatta to see his brother. I could immediately tell that he was experiencing the same feeling as the others, what seemed like an out of body experience, and I managed to keep him away without using force, just by talking to him. I noticed quickly that his mother and some other women were looking closely at us, which made me feel terribly uncomfortable, especially as I was not completely sure what to do next. But the other “guards” nodded and signalled me to keep Lucas away at any cost. I convinced Lucas to go for a walk with me (A new born calf was missing that day and I got Lucas to help me look for it). On the way I could see in his eyes and on his body that he was becoming his old self again, but he was very weak and after we found the calf and brought it home he had to rest. That same evening all conversations seemed to be about how I managed to keep Lucas away in a gentle way. Not really having digested all the day’s events yet, I found out all of a sudden that I became “popular”, and people were complimenting me on my actions and telling me more about this phenomenon, which they call “amazement”. Even Lucas thanked me.

The following contains some details which might be hard to read. They may not be crucial for my project, yet only by telling you about the actual act that took place I can explain the way I acted during the rest of my stay.

The next day four goats were slaughtered. Having promised myself that I will not just stand and look, but will participate in all the day’s events, I crossed some personal lines and helped with the slaughter. It is customary to strangle the goat and then skin one side of its throat. The next step is to puncture a hole in the throat while holding the skin up, creating a kind of pocket, to collect all the blood that gushes out of the wound in the skin. As soon as the blood start coming out of the wound, one of the men kneels by the dead animal and starts drinking the blood, literally straight from the animal’s throat. I knew I was about to experience this, and have been contemplating the night before whether I should participate or just watch. Thinking this is a unique, once in a lifetime experience, I made an impulsive decision to participate, and was the second person to dip his face in the warm blood that was still coming out of the wound.

That one single act of no more than a few seconds had changed everything. People clapped me on the shoulder, saying “you are really one of us”, “we have never seen a Mzunugu (Caucasian) do that before”, “you are special”, etc... For the next three days complete strangers were seeking my company, offering to tell me their life stories (in these very words – “let’s go for a walk, I will tell you about my life”), telling me about the history of their community. I have been showered with knowledge and information without any possibility of keeping a record of any of it, due to conditions in the field. I could not start jotting down notes in front of people who trusted me so much. Most of them did not even know the purpose of my stay. In the evening, sitting with my diary, I found that I could only organise a fraction of the information, my thoughts and feelings on paper.

On Saturday I spent some time with George and his friends. After the circumcision George is not allowed to be seen by a woman – excluding his mother – for three weeks. He is therefore not allowed to leave his manyatta for that period of time, with the exception of going to the toilet. He sits in his room all day surrounded by friends. At one point he pulled up his blanket to show his mates the fresh wound from the circumcision. I felt uncomfortable and looked away in the most natural way I could, acting on a feeling of discomfort, yet trying to hide it at the same time. Later on that day, we were six in the room – George, Robert, me and three of George’s friends. Another friend walked in with a bowl of water and soap. Sensing what was going to happen I asked George if he would feel more comfortable if I left the room, but he put a hand on my lap and asked me to stay seated. He then walked over to a stool, completely naked, and sat in front of Robert, who was washing his hands. For the next few minutes I felt forced to watch together with some others how Robert cleaned and treated the unhealed wound. It all took place in the most natural atmosphere.

Later on that day I started feeling that I am loosing foothold in reality and in myself. The visit to Kinuta has been a great success, no doubt about it. But I felt that I went too far. Even though I did not experience anything I could condemn as morally wrong, those experiences stood in contradiction to what I have been brought up on – the act of drinking blood (and especially in that manner!) which is considered primitive or a “savage” act; The sense of shame, which “we” in the west think of as natural, or as moral, played no role there. I did not have a problem with the acts themselves. And that was exactly my problem. I enjoyed drinking the blood. I thought it tasted nice, and two days later I actually did it again. I thought the atmosphere of brotherhood and comradeship around George was touching and beautiful. I am happy and proud that I have experienced it, but I could not stay there and stay myself. I felt I was (somewhat willingly) being sucked into a world where all that had made sense to me so far lost its validity. I did not know who I was any more. That evening I used my mobile for the first time to make a phone call – I called Catherine, my girlfriend, to get reassurance that the old world I remembered still existed and was waiting for me to return.

I returned from Kinuta to Mbadi last Monday, but have been quite shaken since. In the meanwhile I also contracted some viral skin disease, most likely from something I ate (or drank...) On Friday I went back to Kinuta to attend a wedding, hoping to observe more meaningful cultural expressions of identity. But I just snapped. I felt I could not stay in Kinuta, or in Mbadi anymore. I left yesterday and came back to Nairobi. This is where my fieldwork comes to an end. I will now concentrate on my diary, field notes and interviews, of which I believe I have enough. I am aware that for a project like this, no time in the field can ever be enough. Yet I have to admit that I have reached my limits.

As much as I wanted to come back to the “real world”, it is now I start having difficulties with my recent experiences. Now, where I can sit in comfort and reflect, I realise where I have been, what I have seen and no less, what I have done, and I see it all from the “normal” point of view. I feel some sort of unjustified and unexplained shame. Even though I never saw, and still do not see, any wrong in any of the things I have been through as a more or less active participant, I still feel I cannot talk about it openly. I find it amazing how the social code is embodied in us (or maybe just in me..) to such a degree that even in the wilderness it ends up influencing our thoughts, behaviour and feelings more than our own, personal code.

Dear Sue, I already apologise for this very long mail – I have shortened it as much as I could. But this act of writing to you is also an outlet for some of the things that trouble me at the moment.

Hope to hear your comments soon, all the best,

Oren.