The Alo Man

by Mara L. Pratt-Chadwick; Louise Lamprey

When it was time for the feast to begin, girls and boys went about first of all with water in calabashes and jars, that every one might rinse out his mouth and wash his hands before eating. Mpoko and Nkunda had been taught always to do this before a meal, and they had also a kind of wooden toothbrush which kept the teeth cleaner, if anything, than the ones sold in shops. Some people say that the care which these tribes take of their teeth is the reason why they usually have such very white and sound ones.

The men and women did not eat together. The principal men were served first, and after they had taken what they chose from the dishes, the women and children had the rest in their turn. Meat and gravy were cooked in one dish, dumplings, kwanga, or cooked rice were served in another, vegetables in another. The people ate with their fingers. A lump of kwanga, dumpling, bread, or cooked rice was taken in the fingers and dipped in the broth. The dumpling was swallowed whole; it could not be chewed, as it would stick to the teeth like so much glue, but it would slip down whole like an oyster. Groups of friends or relatives ate together, and good breeding was shown in the special care which every well-brought-up guest would take, to eat no more than his proper share. Greediness is very unpopular among the Bantu, and any unfair division of food is regarded as the worst possible manners.

During the days that the feast lasted, appetites were saved up for the evening meal, and nobody ate anything during the day except perhaps a little fruit, a handful of peanuts, or some sugar-cane juice. The Alo Man told tales, there was much dancing and singing, naps were taken at any time of day by those who were sleepy, and the children played many games. The children often made almost as much noise as the grown people, for the boys had a band of their own. Nkula, who had a biti—a kind of marimba—which he had made for himself, was leader.

A game that was a general favorite was played with the biti and the other instruments, and a needle. In playing it, the boys divided into two camps, Mpoko being captain of one, and Satu, a boy from a neighboring village, of the other. Boko, one of Mpoko’s players, was sent out of sight and hearing, and Mpoko then took a needle—a rather large bone needle used for raffia or sinew—and hid it so that both camps would know where it was. Meanwhile Satu’s camp had agreed upon a certain note in the scale played on the biti, which should be the “guiding note.” Then Boko was called back to hunt for the needle. When he came near the needle, the player of the biti, Nkula, who was in Satu’s camp, must sound the guiding note, mixing it up with as many variations and other notes as he could, and when Boko moved away from the needle, the guiding note must not be sounded. Of course, if Nkula did not keep to this rule Mpoko’s side would make trouble for him. To win for his side, Boko must not only find the needle but must name the guiding note.

Boko had a quick ear, and he was a shrewd boy. Within two or three minutes he was nearly sure where the needle was, but he was not certain about the guiding note. Satu’s side made such a racket that all the notes in the scale seemed to be part of it. Mpoko felt more than once like calling out “Otuama” (you are warm) when Boko stopped two or three times almost on top of the needle, but of course that would never do. Then Boko walked across the ground and came back, went straight to the hiding place, picked up the needle, and sounded the correct guiding note!

After they had kept quiet, watching the search for the needle, as long as active boys could, they played the game called “antelope.” Boko, having won in the last game, was antelope. A line was scratched on the ground, marking out a large court, and all the boys except Boko got down on all fours with their faces uplifted. They were the hunters, and they tried to touch Boko with their hands, or kick him with their feet, or butt him with their heads, or pen him up between them and the boundary line. Since they had to chase him on all fours, Boko had an advantage, and once he jumped right over a hunter who almost had him. When they finally did get him hemmed in and he ran out of the ring, they all got on their feet and chased him, and Nkula, the first to touch him, was antelope in his turn.

Some of the smaller children were playing a game of their own, under a bush where the fowls had been having a dust bath. The large, black, glossy loso (canna seeds) were used in this game. While one player went out, the others hid a canna seed in one of five little heaps of dirt. The searcher had to sweep away the four heaps that did not hold any seed, and leave untouched the heap that did. If he guessed correctly, it counted one game for his side.

When they were tired of “antelope,” the older boys played a rather difficult memory game, called “loso,” with forty canna seeds. Satu and Mpoko chose sides, and all sat on the ground around an open space. Satu, taking twenty seeds in each hand, led the play. His side had agreed beforehand that the seventh seed thrown should be the “playing seed,” and the other side would have to guess which it was, and pick it up. Satu threw first a seed from the right hand, then one from the left, counting aloud as he threw until he had thrown ten all together—solo, beri, tatu, inno, tano, tandatu, pungati, inani, kenda, ikundi. Then he threw down the other seeds helter skelter, without counting, but so as not to disturb the first ten where they lay.

Then Satu chose Boko to go away out of sight and hearing of the game, and Mpoko and his players consulted as to which the “playing seed” was. In throwing the seeds, Satu had tried not to call attention to pungati, the seventh seed, in any way, and had told his players not to seem to be watching it when he threw it. They did not. They were so very, very careless just at that moment that Mpoko wondered if that were not the “playing seed.” He took note where it fell and saw that it lay near a little hump in the ground. When he told his players what he thought, they said that he was likely to be right, and when he picked up the seventh seed and said, “This is the playing seed and its name is pungati,” Satu admitted that it was and that Mpoko had won.