To the field with Sayaba
As Ibrihim and Muntari head off in the morning to the market to buy the goats, I trek to the field with Sayaba, Ibrihim's wife of 12 years. She is a fiesty young woman who speaks her mind and enjoys joking around, often at my expense. I love her and find a familiarity in the rare connection she shares with her husband. She is, and has been, his only wife which is not common in this Muslim culture.
Ibrihim and Sayaba got married just 2 weeks after I arrived in Garin Maigari as a Peace Corps Volunteer. I distinctly remember not liking her in the beginning. As I struggled to learn Hausa, her loud brash comments often landed heavily upon me. But over the years, I have learned much about Sayaba, and the Hausa women as a whole. Although they are suppressed and clearly expected to live subordinate to their husbands, they carry pride in their children and their ability to be the women of the house. They joke with each other, laugh loudly at their shortcomings, and quietly support each other in times of need. Most clearly stated, they tell it how it is.
I have learned a lot from these women; learned to laugh at myself and much to their delight, have learned to laugh with them. Sayaba has taken to calling me "Jagwara" which means "divorced woman". And I, in turn, call her "Uwargida" or "first wife", insinuating that I will marry Ibrihim and live as her co-wife. Traditionally, the first wife rules over the second wife and has the ability to delegate household duties to her. In this concept lies the joke as we list off the facts that I can't pound millet, prepare hura (millet porridge)or tuwo (millet pate), and of course, I've voiced my opinion that 2 kids would be plenty.
As we pull up peanut plants and lay them out to dry, we laugh together and move on to discuss serious issues including birth control, domestic abuse, and girl's education. Over the last 12 years, Sayaba has become a wife, a mother of three, and has grown up and figured out a lot about being a woman. And as I listen to her talk, ask her questions and discuss possible solutions to these issues, I realize that so have I.
Zoulleha
(Written 10/10/2008 from the village of Garin Maigari)
Ibrihim and Sayaba got married just 2 weeks after I arrived in Garin Maigari as a Peace Corps Volunteer. I distinctly remember not liking her in the beginning. As I struggled to learn Hausa, her loud brash comments often landed heavily upon me. But over the years, I have learned much about Sayaba, and the Hausa women as a whole. Although they are suppressed and clearly expected to live subordinate to their husbands, they carry pride in their children and their ability to be the women of the house. They joke with each other, laugh loudly at their shortcomings, and quietly support each other in times of need. Most clearly stated, they tell it how it is.
I have learned a lot from these women; learned to laugh at myself and much to their delight, have learned to laugh with them. Sayaba has taken to calling me "Jagwara" which means "divorced woman". And I, in turn, call her "Uwargida" or "first wife", insinuating that I will marry Ibrihim and live as her co-wife. Traditionally, the first wife rules over the second wife and has the ability to delegate household duties to her. In this concept lies the joke as we list off the facts that I can't pound millet, prepare hura (millet porridge)or tuwo (millet pate), and of course, I've voiced my opinion that 2 kids would be plenty.
As we pull up peanut plants and lay them out to dry, we laugh together and move on to discuss serious issues including birth control, domestic abuse, and girl's education. Over the last 12 years, Sayaba has become a wife, a mother of three, and has grown up and figured out a lot about being a woman. And as I listen to her talk, ask her questions and discuss possible solutions to these issues, I realize that so have I.
Zoulleha
(Written 10/10/2008 from the village of Garin Maigari)
posted by Seeds of Hope Africa at
Sunday, November 02, 2008
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