Eating love — A village romance

With no source of income left, she headed back to the village to start afresh.
Like Piri, Misheck was going back to his village too. Three years gold panning along the Mazowe River and doing odd jobs here and there had yielded little.

Back in the village Misheck was the first born son in a family of six children. His father was dead. And here he was at the age of 30 returning home with no money, no job and worse still, no wife.
What would his mother and neighbours say about him?
In the past he had relationships with women in Harare, but none of them fulfilled his picture of a good wife.
Besides, an urban woman was unlikely to become a good rural wife.
Women from the city were used to drinking sweet tea, eating fresh bread and fried eggs every morning.

Such luxuries did not exist in the village. It was all hard work and a village breakfast of mahewu, the non-alcoholic fermented maize porridge drink.
Misheck would go home and find a wife. Later on, he might consider returning to the city to look for work again.
He first saw Piri as she struggled down the aisle of a village-bound bus with an oversize plastic bag full of groceries.
Misheck thought she was the kind of woman his mother would like – fat with strong legs. He caught a glimpse of her bottom. It was big and beautiful.

Misheck smiled to himself, hiding two missing front teeth, result of a fight with fellow gold panners a year ago.
He made the decision to propose love to Piri long before the bus reached the Hwedza mountains.
Piri had wedged herself between two passengers right at the back of the noisy bus.
Misheck knew that one does not climb the mountain straight up; you go round and round until you get to the top.

Before he even greeted her, Misheck asked Hwindi, the bus conductor, to pass on a bottle of Fanta, two buns and a boiled egg to Piri.
She made eye contact with Misheck and smiled, covering her mouth, in case Misheck noticed that, like him, she had two missing front teeth. First impressions were very important.
She accepted the gifts. Then she made a sandwich with the one egg and drank the Fanta quietly.
Other women passengers looked at her with envy. In these hard economic times, men no longer offered gifts so easily.

Hwindi came back and told Piri she could keep the empty bottle because it had already been paid for.
When Piri finished eating her egg sandwich and drinking the Fanta, Misheck decided it was time to make his first move. He would be welcome.
A woman does not accept a man’s gifts unless she is willing to be his friend. This woman will be his mother’s daughter-in-law, the new muroora.
Misheck asked to swap seats with the old man sitting next to Piri.

The man got up, winked at Misheck and whispered, “You are a hunter my son. A real hunter has an eye for good meat.”
“When I saw you come into the bus, I loved you immediately. I bought the Fanta, buns and egg so that you can taste my love for you, unzwe rudo rwangu kwauri. I knew you would make a good wife for me. You are fat enough, healthy and strong. Although you are dark in complexion, to me you are still beautiful. I would not be embarrassed to show you to my mother,” Misheck said.
Piri laughed, hands covering her mouth again to hide the missing teeth.

This young man is full of words and he is not bad looking, she thought. Then she played hard to get, as a girl is supposed to do.
“How can you say you love someone you do not know?” she asked him.
Misheck said all that did not matter because they were already on the journey to know each other.
The only reason he would turn away from the journey right now was the question of totems, mutupo.

He belonged to the Soko, Monkey or Baboon totem and if this was Piri’s totem as well, then the love he felt for her in his heart was doomed. People of the same totem should not fall in love, let alone marry. It was taboo among the Shona people to do that.
Piri said she was Chihera, belonging to Mhofu of the Eland totem.
“VaHera women are hard workers. They also make good wives,” Misheck said, clapping his hands together with joy and revealing his missing front teeth.
She took the hand off her mouth and smiled back at him. Four front teeth missing between the two of them. The stage was now set for a romantic conversation and laughter.

Fanta, buns and an egg on their own would not have won Piri’s heart. It was the praise poetry that did it.
By the time the bus crossed the Save river, Misheck was reciting the full praise poetry of the VaHera clan to Piri: “Ndidewo Chihera Mukonde, mwana wa Mhofu, Chidavarume, Chireranherera (love me, you daughter of The Great Eland Bull, lover of men, you the carer of orphans).”
A man who can recite to her the praise poetry of her people so well had to be a good well-grounded traditional man.

Nobody, not even her former husband, the father of her two teenage sons could recite the praise poetry of the VaHera clan.
They reached his bus stop first. Before he got off the bus, she declared her love for him. Her village was several kilometres further on, just off the main route before reaching Dorowa mine.
The following day Misheck presented himself to Piri’s parents. They gladly accepted him, hoping Misheck would bring cows for the bride price, or at least some goats and cash to show that he was serious about taking Piri as wife.

Misheck’s mother took one look at Piri and shook her head. His mother said she would not accept a daughter-in-law who had been married before with children and worse still, who was older than her son.
Misheck ignored his mother’s disapproval.
A neighbour said Misheck had chosen an older woman because he wanted a mother figure in his life. Such comments angered his mother even more.
“Why would he look for his mother when I am still here? Did I not breastfeed him long enough? No, I will not accept a woman whose uterus has already been used to bear children for another man’s clan. I will not

be shamed that way,” Misheck’s mother declared.
She was convinced that her son had been bewitched to love a woman five years his senior.
Misheck insisted that he loved Piri.

His mother was furious, “What is love? You want to spend the whole day eating love? Look at our poverty. We cannot eat love. Leave this woman alone and go back to work.”
Some people in the village did not like Misheck and Piri’s union as well. They said Piri had deprived Misheck the opportunity to choose his own virgin bride, an innocent village woman not yet corrupted by the values of the city.
Piri confronted her critics, “I have done no wrong to anyone. When I met this man, he was alone, one ari ega. Kunhonga hakusi kuba (to find something lost is not to steal).”
Misheck would not be swayed away from his love for Piri. Within a few days, Piri moved into Misheck’s mother’s kitchen hut, as a new muroora should do.

Misheck’s mother would not touch what Piri cooked. The fights between mother-in-law and muroora were unbearable.
Misheck and his bride moved a little away from the main village compound and set up a hut that served as kitchen, bedroom and granary all at the same time. They had a piece of land, a village spring nearby and firewood from the hills.

The romance between Misheck and Piri continued to blossom. He accompanied her to the grinding mill, to look for firewood, to fetch water and everywhere. In the dry season, he sat next to her on an anthill while she caught the red ants – majuru – for relish. When the rains came, they went back to the anthill soon after sunset to catch the nutritious ishwa – flying ants.
Sometimes Misheck went hunting rabbits, trapping mice and fishing in the Save River.

Upon his return, Piri recited the Soko clan praise poetry to thank him for the meat he brought home.
“Hekani Soko Mbire yaSvosve, Vanobva Hwedza, Vapfuri vemhangura, vanaisi vemvura, VekuMatonjeni (Thank you Soko Mbire of Svosve, Those who come from Hwedza, The iron-smelters, the rain-makers of

Matonjeni).”

Throughout the rainy season, they were seen in the field plowing, sowing, weeding and laughing together.
There was love and friendship in their rich laughter. Piri and Misheck were not just lovers; they remained good friends, despite the tragedy of two miscarriages.
Misheck’s mother could not stop the romance between Misheck and Piri. She accepted that these two were thriving on love.

Six years later, a village romance that started with a bottle of Fanta, two buns and one boiled egg is still growing.

• Dr Sekai Nzenza is a writer and cultural critic. She holds a PhD in International Relations and is a consultant and director of The Simukai Development Project.