The Long Journey Home

We are flying over Iceland at the moment (the Iranians did not find us!) We expect to land in 8 hours. I have listened to an audiobook on leadership, watched a documentary about Pavarotti and another on Hank Williams, and ate about a pound of brownies. Gigi finally fell asleep... (she couldn’t walk in a straight line at the Doha airport and was alternating between sobbing that she missed Africa and crying that her legs were too tired to carry her through the airport… Not that this stopped her from leap frogging concrete statues as we went.) It’s really dark in the plane. Every time Dominic opens the window, I am blinded and half the plane lights up in the shaft of light which is rather embarrassing.... so we haven’t seen anything really.

We left the house at noon yesterday and it is now 7pm Swazi time. We’ve been on this particular flight from Qatar for about 11 hours now....My knees hurt but Noemie’s asleep on my lap. But my heart’s starting to hurt now too. I am so conflicted. I am ready for the staff ministry position that awaits me at our old church in Florida and all the adventures that being on staff will bring but I am also torn about our departure from Swaziland. It was beautiful to me because Swaziland was beautiful and the people are beautiful and our friendships were fruitful and just beginning to blossom... and in the promise of a bud beginning to open, we were ripped out prematurely. We knew it had to happen. We believe it was and is God's time. But I am still grieving.

 I only made it once to the Mantenga Village dance. Once to see the shuffle and the stomp and the hit-your-forehead-with-your-shin-bone rapid-fire stomp. And the way those stomps lift red dirt puffs in clouds…If you wear sandals it gets in your toes. Red dirt of unpaved roads... unpaved if you can still find them. The craft mart. The soapstone carvings, the carved wood boxes, the beaded collars and earrings and keychains. The laughter as Gigi made friends with all of the craft market sellers and promised all of them her business. She was always mortified to find I had ran out of money before she could fulfill her promises. Sometimes they gave a trinket anyway if I had been a worthy patron. They have been burned and disappointed so many times, they don’t trust when I tell them I will come back. I tell them they can trust me.... I “stay” here, I tell them. I stay here in Ezulwini. My name is Nomsa. And I know the secret handshake. And I carry myself with the boldness of the Swazi- I look them in the eye and regard them as Sisi- I am sis. I am sister. I hand them a Gospel tract and an invitation to church but they don’t really look at it. They only ask me questions about it. I suspect that they can’t read. After 5 months, I can usually repeat a name back on my first try (the phonemes are so distinct from those of the English tongue.) My children see Africans as family. We are all family, those who are of the household of God. My family includes Sanhele, a carpenter. Maybe he will make me a desk or an Adirondack chair before Danny leaves. My family includes farmer Bandile. I don’t know what Bandile farms. Perhaps mango, “pawpaw” papaya or corn or pineapple that grow everywhere. Perhaps spinach or butternut squash, staples so common in restaurant dishes as French fry “chips.” Perhaps he farms “baby marrow-” weenie zucchini. Perhaps I should have asked. I should have bought the Bulembu honey while it was in stock- that’s for sure. Linda was the first one to see us in, making sure to stock my pantry with essentials including rooibos and ceylon teas. She was the last one to visit, coming to see us hours before our departure as I tried to untangle a web of necklace chains. She looked at me with a half smile and waited in her way. Waiting. And making me nervous. Mm. Her daughter Tanya were Noemie and Gigi’s first friends. Her son Taro has the longest name I’ve ever seen. I take a picture of his name written on his school book when we go to his house. The Mirira’s have an ice cream freezer in their house. When we come over for lunch, they choose 4 brand new tubs from the collection to offer us with our lunch.

On the morning of our departure, we made one last visit to Sugar Snap Cafe where we would eat every Friday and Coozie would spend the weekdays in between looking for a piano teacher for me. The day she came proudly bearing a name was the day we told her we were leaving. 

 

Coozie let Gigi put on a hairnet and she was permitted to work in the restaurant kitchen. What a delightful gift. Gigi was loved wherever we went. Her boldness and lack of inhibition fit right in to Swazi culture.

 

 And the Sugar Snap ladies hugged her and cried as we said goodbye. And they sent us off with a cake box stuffed top to bottom with crumbly but delicious brownies. It was more than we could take with us. 

 

Noemie has already baked a 9x13 pan of banana chocolate chip bread which I cut up and stuffed into numerous ziplocks. I gave one of the zip locked baggies to Sakhile, the best Buffalo soldier guard of the lot. We took a picture with him too- He who feared every snake indiscriminately for its potential to be a boomslang or a black mamba. He who showed my kids where there was a birds nest in a tree. He who laughed riotously to see the children whooping and tearing after the vervet monkeys with a fury. And who always, always, had the remote controlled gate open before we reached the driveway. 

Our first night back and I have woken before the Florida sunrise and I imagine the sun already risen in the African horizon. It’s a different type of sunrise there- the rays creep over a land yet untamed by humans, a land where wilderness is not yet contained nor beaten into submission. The mountains still rise unconquered by settlement, dirt is still more prevalent than pavement, the night is still dark, largely untainted by the street lights of progress. The day has begun on the first of continents. It smells of rain and dust and trees and ash. The last movie I watched on the plane was Black Panther. It was a perfect end to a trip that lasted four and a half months. The main hero is gentle and thoughtful but strong and convicted. His supporting characters, mostly females, are submitted to his quiet authority but they are fierce and dignified, and include a general that looks like Ms Linda. The culture is a mash up of many and my kids recognized many nuances like the handshake, the shields, the beaded jewelry. The face paint was not familiar, neither was the language (Xhosa) though it had the clicks. And the ultimate message is that revenge and force is not the way to lead a people resonates with Biblical directives, as well as the spirit of the Swazi people who are never defensive but trust and sense the commonness of the human experience.

Swaziland is changing though. Even if I should come back, the country I left won’t be the same.