IN this village homestead, on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day we paid respect to Jesus Christ because he saved us from our sins. Then we poured beer on the ground before the elders drank it to give respect to our ancestors, because we believed that they understood our problems because they lived in this village before they died. In death, they were a lot closer to God and Jesus Christ than we were. But my grandmother, Mbuya VaMandirowesa, paid little attention to the birth of Jesus Christ. She did not even believe that He was born on Christmas Day and that He was the Son of the Virgin Mary and also the Son of God.
One Christmas time, before independence, Mbuya VaMandirowesa ordered the killing of a beast for us to eat, mombe yemadiro. Mbuya said she wanted the beast killed on Christmas Day.
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