Karungi Pamela
17 August 2008
opinion
Kampala — It's a frosty Thursday morning in the north central Tanzanian district of Kondo, am standing in a rusty street side shade in an effortless attempt to escape from the hard-hitting sun of Kondoa Township. Anxiously, I look left and right as I wait for Musa Bingwa (my aide and tour guide), who is gone to buy a few refreshments before we embark on our much anticipated mission.
Our mission is to take some quality time off with the Sandawe, the only remaining group of the San people living in East Africa. They originally lived over much of Africa, but are presently living between the Mponde and Bubu rivers.
The San, called the Bushmen by the Dutch in South Africa, were the first people known of in the Rift Valley.
Finally Musa arrives back from the little shopping spree that took him about thirty minutes, with enough refreshments (80 percent of it water) in hand. We then venture deep into the Sandawe communities, and the first thing to strike us is the racial difference between the Sandawe and her surrounding tribes. Whereas most of the tribes in Tanzania are Bantu, with common features, the Sandawe are San with a light skin complexion and are smaller, with Bushman-like popcorn hair.
They have an epicanthic fold of the eyelid common to the Bushmen. They speak a language that is inclusive of click sounds as consonants and is tonal, in no way related to the languages around them. "The language spoken in this part of Tanzania is quite difficult to master", cautions Musa.
In fact, true to his word, I almost bite my tongue in an endeavor to mimic a rowdy group of rustic Sandawe youngsters. However, the language is closely related to the languages of their counterparts - the San and Hottentots Khoi of southern Africa, and is classified as a Khoisan language.
In the past generation, the Sandawe's constant movement lifestyle, which was enhanced by their movable dwelling structures called Sundu, played a leading role in socially and politically isolating them from main stream Tanzania. However, the village-based development program of central Tanzania encouraged the Sandawe to limit their movement and settle down in solid rectangular houses similar to those of the tembe, their Bantu neighbours.
Hence they developed a more sedentary lifestyle based on farming rather than their hunting and food gathering lifestyle. As a result, the Sandawe have now come to own cattle and cultivate with metal hoes instead of their original wooden digging sticks, but still maintain their hunting of pigs and elephants.
The men also still gather wild honey, and women gather wild fruits and vegetables and dig roots with sticks, this testifying as to why the Sandawe are much healthier than their Bantu neighbours. They do not suffer the Kwashiorkor or other deficiency conditions of their neighbours.
Though they held none on our date, the Sandawe commonly hold all-night dances to the beats of drums in the moonlight. "The Sandawe have a great musical and dance tradition that spans hundred of years" wisely asserts Musa.
In many of their traditional principles, they emphasise living in harmony with nature, which is also a common principle of the San people of South Africa.
They are traditionally religious and are much closed off from Christianity. They believe in a high god called Warongwe, a distant spirit that is-not active in their lives.
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