Mama forgot the spoons!

 

The members of our orientation group lived in villages scattered throughout the Taita Hills. Dave and I lived at the highest and remote location of all.

 

Our host family, Bwana and Mama Mwakodi, didn’t live in a village. Their house seemed to be the only one around and it measured about twenty feet wide and twelve feet deep.

 

Inside, they had painted their mud-plaster walls aqua blue. Over time, patches of mildew had stained the walls. And their cement floor crumbled in places. Ah, but their home was full of love and grace!

 

The main room had one small window opening—no glass—with a shutter of unpainted planks. The Mwakodis kept it closed so the house remained dark except for sunlight that came in the wood-plank front door.

 

That room reminded me of the Dorobo church we visited in an earlier segment of our orientation: The Mwakodis had strung wires from corner to corner under a corrugated tin roof, where a ceiling might have been, and from the wires they had hung papers and greeting cards.

 

Mama (Mrs. Mwakodi) always served tasty soup for the evening meal—cabbage, tomatoes, onions, kidney beans, a lot of water, and sometimes a few chunks of tough meat. She spent several hours each afternoon simmering this soup over the fire.

 

Mama also spent a long time making chapatis—round, flat, bread-like, and fried in lard. Unleavened, and with a dense, rubbery consistency, chapatis are a staple throughout Kenya.

 

One day I watched Mama make them and learned there’s an art to it. She mixed the flour dough and rolled it out like a round piecrust, layering lard into it.

 

Next, she cut slits around the dough so that it resembled a flower with petals. Mama folded each petal-like piece at an angle over the one beside it and toward the middle of the circle, and then rolled out the dough again.

 

She did this several times before frying them in lard over the fire. It took a long time to make them properly.

When we sat down to eat on our first evening in their home, I noticed Mama forgot to put spoons on the dinner table, but I decided to say nothing. Surely, in a few seconds Mama would realize her oversight.

 

While I waited and watched, Bwana and Mama tore their chapatis into pieces, dropped them into their soup, and then used their fingers to pick up one bite after another.

 

I could hardly believe my eyes.

 

I had no choice but to do likewise.

 

Apparently, white people need a lot of practice to perfect that skill.

 

On the third evening, I asked Bwana and Mama if I could use a spoon. They didn’t seem offended, so Dave asked for one, too.

 

From then on, both of us took great pleasure in the luxury of eating with a spoon. (From Grandma’s Letters from Africa, Chapter 3)