Reunion in Barsaloi Read Online Free PDF

heavy necklaces in time. I used to watch my husband dance like that and every time it never failed to excite and move me.
    The sadness and the sense of uncertainty have faded now and I feel happy and free. I’m ready now to meet the family tomorrow and can even look forward to it. At peace with the world again I crawl back beneath the mosquito netting, sniff the sweet smoke from the fire and fall fast asleep.
    We meet up next morning at the post office as arranged and are immediately surrounded by the same young men as yesterday still keen to test their marketing skills. To our surprise someone gives Albert, who we have told them – to spare me any hassle – is my father, a traditional hardwood rungu club.
    But it’s not until James has had a few words with the youths that we’re left to go round the market more or less in peace to find a nice warm blanket for my mother-in-law. I have two other blankets in my luggage,an orange-red one for Lketinga because I know he likes this colour, and a checked one for his older brother. The Samburu men wear them as warm clothing. For Mama we buy a good thick wool blanket.
    Then we take the cars to a wholesale food store and order a 55-pound sack of rice and the same of good quality maize meal, as well as various cooking fats, powdered tea, sweets, soap and other bits and bobs. At the same time we order up several pounds of tomatoes, carrots, cabbage, onions and oranges. We have to take something for ourselves too unless we want to live on goat meat.
    Just before we leave, James runs across to the tobacco shop to pick up six pounds of chewing tobacco, which for the old folk is almost more important than food. A woman dressed beautifully in traditional clothes climbs into one of the cars with us, delighted to be given the chance to get a lift for the long journey. It goes without saying here that if there is a spare seat in a car someone must fill it.

From Maralal to Barsaloi
    A t last we’re on the road. James is leading the way on his motorbike. There’s a new road because the old one is now definitively impassable. It’s a pity as I’d like to have shown it to my companions. The new one was just finished a few months ago and makes for a relatively easy ride. For the past few years they’ve had to put up with a five-hour detour by way of Baragoi.
    Soon we leave the last few mud holes and puddles of rainwater behind us as the road starts to climb mercilessly. James’s motorbike kicks out a thick cloud of black smoke. A few people on foot pass us coming the other way towards town, the woman carrying calabash gourds filled with milk to sell. Every day they walk hours in each direction in order to make a small profit.
    The hollowed-out calabash gourds are light and have been used as containers since prehistoric times. The Masai and Samburu use strips of leather decorated with coloured beads or little shells to strengthen them. To keep them reusable the women scour the interior every night with a red-hot firebrand that sterilizes them. That’s why the milk usually smells a bit smoky, but back in Mama’s hut it always tasted wonderful to me.
    The men are usually pulling one or more goats behind them, sometimes even a cow, taking them to market in Maralal. They only part with animals when they urgently need money for ritual celebrations, weddings or hospital bills.
    Even when our driver has to engage the four-wheel drive this is a much more comfortable way to travel than the old bush road. There are no elephants or buffalo breaking suddenly out of the jungle to bar ourpath. After an hour or so of driving up hill and down dale we get to a small manyatta village called Opiroi. A few women sitting outside the huts with their children look at our cars while the little kids, either naked or wearing just T-shirts, wave from the side of the road. The little square is dominated by a half-finished church. We press on, however, because we want to get to Barsaloi as quickly as possible. Every