The Strength of Makara
My father’s maternal grandmother (Makara) was the daughter of chief Nenguwo, which means that she was royalty. Nenguwo is also the same chieftainship from which my mother is a descendent. It means that my parents shared ancestry which also means that they shared certain DNA and traits passed down through the generations. The outward manifestation of these attributes would be realized in myself and my little sister Tapiwa Gwenlisa.
In the mid nineteen-sixties, my parents met and fell in love in what was at the time known as Salisbury (the capital of what was then Rhodesia). Salisbury was a bustling city where the village young people from all parts came to find work, start a new life, and hopefully fall in love and live happily ever after. My parents found each other in the suburbs of Highfield, and they also found all of the above.
Their union gave birth to six children, three boys and three girls, including the one albino boy (myself) and the one albino girl (my sister Tapiwa Gwenlisa). As we were the youngest of the bunch, our older siblings would come to play pivotal roles as our protectors thereby creating a much safer childhood compared to the lives of the other albino children whom we saw growing up neglected and even unloved around us.
My grandmother on my father’s side was given the name Hamundide by my great-grandmother Makara. The name Hamundide only has one meaning, and this translates to "you don't love me." As a child I remember everyone simply calling her Chimbuya, which simply means “the old woman.” As a child I always wondered why everyone called her Chimbuya. It did not sound like a normal name to give to a child at birth. What parent would look lovingly at their brand-new baby girl and lovingly declare that for all the rest of her God-given life and beyond her name shall be “the old woman”? It seemed weird, but as a child I never pressed the issue. It now seems obvious that Chimbuya was not my grandmother’s real name. This was just a way for the family to bestow on her honor love, dignity, respect, and all the adoration that she deserved. Identifying her as the oldest woman in our clan was an honor was in keeping with our traditions. When my great grandmother gave her the name Hamundide at birth, she was sending a message to her elders and the society around her. When we called her Chimbuya we were lifting her up to the highest honor that our society could bestow.
Before my grandmother was born, Makara gave birth to eight albino children who were all put to death moments after being born. I do not know exactly how Makara’s eight albino children died, but whatever method they used back then, it was inhuman and a horrible way to treat human life. As soon as the child was born, the attending midwife would see the white skin, the blond hair and the blue eyes and they would either kill the babies by strangulation, or by placing the child in a clay pot, covering the infant with sand, and then placing the pot on a burning stove, effectively suffocating the baby to death inside the clay pot. The pots were then sunk to the bottom of the river for final disposition. It really does not matter at all how they carried out these evil deeds. At the end of the day, they got away with murder.
After the eight killings, Makara declared to her husband that she was done killing her children. She would keep the next one and if she was lucky to have more than one, she would keep all the rest. When the next child was born, it was another albino child, a boy child, and she name him Gore, which literally means “a cloud”. I believe that this was her way of looking up to the heavens, and thanking God for giving her comfort from all the pain. If heaven kept on giving her these white children, then heaven must want her to have these white children. She had lost so many of her beautiful children at the hands of a cruel, ignorant, and hateful society. After Gore, Makara gave birth to an albino girl child and as before, she refused to let the midwives kill her.
My grandmother Hamundide, or Chimbuya as we all affectionately called her, was one of Makara’s black children. Her name speaks volumes. The name Hamundide was a direct rebuke to her society. This name alone told them that she felt unloved. If they had loved her, they would not have killed so many of her children just to save face. It is not easy to tell just how widespread these types of killing practices were in those old days. Since that day when Makara acted in defiance of the beliefs and traditions of her own people, countless lives have been spared, including my own. I am a descendent of a true hero.
When I was still a young boy my grandmother my father brought my grandfather to the city to live with us. As soon as she arrived at our house all the children were always excited because Chimbuya always carried some of the sweetest candy in her skirt and apron pockets and she loved to share. She wore at least two or three skirts, dresses and aprons at a time and her pockets were like candy heaven. These candies were made from one hundred percent brown sugar and molasses and they were so delicious!
My grandmother would get out of my father’s car, hand out chunks of this sugar to all the children around, rearrange the multiple dresses, skirts, and aprons on her body and then break out into a song and dance. She sang and danced right there in the front yard where all our neighbors could see and she was so happy as she sang and danced and yet I was so embarrassing that I wanted to run and hide. She sang for me a song about her brother Gore as she danced up a cloud of dust right there in the front yard while someone set the tempo on a makeshift drum. I was always horrified at her lack of shame, yet I could not get my eyes to turn away. It was a beautiful thing to see.
Over the years, my siblings would tease me endlessly by imitating the song and dance routine because they knew it would embarrass me. As a child I did not understand the meaning behind her simple songs. I know now that each time she saw me, I was a reminder of her brother Gore who was the strength and joy of her own mother. How much she must have loved and adored her brother Gore. I wonder if she had sung and danced like that for him, or if her mother had sung and danced just like that for her own son.
My ancestors had very little regard for the albino child’s life because of stigma and superstition. Makara loss is hard to imagine. It is because of her heroism that I am alive today. It is an honor to tell her story. Many families would look significantly different today if none of their albino ancestors had been sentenced to death as infants. As I grow older and am little bit wiser, I am glad for the strength of Makara. I hope I have inherited from her the strength of character to stand up for what is right even if it means that sometimes I might have to stand alone.