African Laughter - Doris May Lessing [175]
But sadza is no longer a ‘black’ food. The son of a privileged white family, asked what he wanted for his birthday meal, said nothing would do but sadza and stew. Sadza is served in every restaurant, every hotel, at every barbecue. In the courtyards of the country hotels, along with the barbecues, are the great pots for sadza. Nothing is more satisfying to the ironies-of-history nerve than to watch those whites who stay in Zimbabwe but preserve their feelings of superiority, filling their plates with sadza. Then–in the old days–sadza was kaffir food and no white would dream of eating it.
The meal in the hall that night–and all the other meals–was noisy and exuberant, with an atmosphere of holiday. To most of the people here taking courses, this training college in the bush represented a time of affluence. Few people can afford to eat meat at every meal, or even every week, and certainly not great slabs of it. And when we went off to the bedrooms, the shower block was full of women showering. Like a party it was, a water festival. There they stood under the streams of hot water and called out to each other their pleasure and their surprise at the lavishness of it all. No one in the villages has unlimited streams of hot clean water. Some women had showers several times a day, just as they ate as much as they could.
Chris was sleeping on the men’s side of the building. Talent and Cathie were in one room, Sylvia and I in another. The four of us crowded on to Talent’s bed, for discussion on next day’s strategies. It was an atmosphere pleasantly reminiscent of after lights-out at school.
‘We must take things slowly,’ said Cathie. ‘We forget, we’ve done this so often, but for nearly everyone on this course it’s new. It’s worth taking the trouble to explain and explain. This is the first time ever people have been asked to choose their own themes, and then write their own articles and poems and stories and then comment on it all. We mustn’t let them be shy. We must watch out for the ones who don’t speak and encourage them.’
Talent has had her experience in the army and then at the collective farm. ‘We must split them into smaller groups to discuss the material, between every session. Then they will support each other, and it’ll be easier for them to criticize us.’ She is always the first to translate theory into practice.
Talent and Cathie began a close, expert, detailed discussion on the right sizes of groups for different purposes. Sylvia was tired, she wasn’t sleeping: she wanted to go to bed. The room was divided by a partition for privacy but it was easy to talk. We talked until late, just as Cathie and Talent were doing in their room. From every room in this women’s wing, until late, came voices, laughter and, once or twice, singing. Sylvia was not laughing. She was telling me about a close friend whose marriage had broken up, and in a way she often uses: she does not want me to make quick judgements about manners and mores she is sure are hard for me to understand. They often are.
There are several children, the oldest nearly twenty, the youngest still a baby. The husband is a civil servant. The marriage was always difficult: he was for some time an alcoholic, she saw him through it, protected him, interceded with superiors. Then there was another woman and a baby: she took him back. Only a few weeks ago she discovered that he now not only has another woman but a new baby: she knew nothing about this until someone told her the baby was being christened. She accused her husband: he said he wanted her to accept a polygamous marriage. She said, ‘When we married you had the choice of a Christian monogamous marriage, and a marriage according to our customs. You chose a Christian marriage.’ ‘I have changed my mind,’ said he. She refused to accept a polygamous marriage. He is spending all his time with the new wife and baby, and if he does come home it is only to shout at her. Meanwhile she is supporting the children, almost entirely, because his money is going on the new wife, the baby, a new