I Would Like To Walk Naked



I WOULD LIKE TO WALK NAKED.
On my recent visit to Kuron, in South Sudan, I found myself thinking how nice it would be if I walked naked? The people we visited are the Toposa, a very neglected tribe in  the south east of South Sudan. They are a sister tribe to the Karamojongs of Uganda and the Turkana of Kenya. They are quite a big group scattered all over East Africa, from Uganda to Ethiopia. Apart from being pastoralists, they are often known for not wearing so much. They are usually adorned in multicoloured beads and wrappers that they either wrap around their lower half or tie across one shoulder.
Many sub tribes of this ethnic group in many countries have adopted the culture of clothes, even though they are usually the last ones in each country to shade off the traditional dress code of their ancestors. The Toposa of South Sudan however, have not yet fully embraced this stage of evolution. The very first people to wear modern clothes are the school girls and boys at the primary school in Kuron, at Holy Trinity Peace Village, the organisation that hosted us. In a few years, ‘civilisation’ has slowly found its way into Kuron.
Back to why I really thought I wanted to walk naked. Before I explain this perhaps I should tell you that South Sudan can be really hot. There were afternoons where we finished lunch and wondered if evening would ever come. Sometimes by 10am it would be so hot you would feel your clothes sticking to your skin. The first impulse would be to remove your shirt, and the boys did remove their shirts most of the time. Unfortunately, I did not have enough freedom to do the same. But I wore sleeveless tops and once as I was talking to some girls when one of them noticed that there was some skin showing between my jeans and my top. She rushed to me and pulled it down, and gave me the look of ‘you indecent girl!’
I would not have been surprised if somebody had done it in my village, or in Juba. But I looked at her, and wondered when she started feeling ashamed of skin. I do not want to approach this in a political way, because I have a political analyst colleague that thinks those of us who have not studied politics have ‘interesting’ views on things like this. Things that are a bit political but perhaps made to look so academic by foreign scholars who sometimes think they are better experts in these things than us who experience them. So I will speak as a common person who has lived and thrived in Africa. It bothers me a lot when I hear people says it’s not our culture for people to dress up in skin revealing clothes. Even back home in Ug, it can get hot. But people expect you to wear jackets to work and long skirts to the village. perhaps I’m politically offbeat, but I remember that our people used to walk naked along the plains and hills of the sub Sahara not so long ago. For all I know clothes were introduced by missionaries a few centuries back.
I believe in evolution of cultures so I’m not saying we should all walk naked. No. I just think that it’s pretty shameful that we grasp so much on to borrowed cultures and claim they are our own. Most of the people who introduced clothes to Africa were from countries that experience winter. In Uganda and South Sudan, even if it gets cold, it is never too cold. A Swedish colleague once witnessed a rainy day in Kampala and made jokes about how the day was much like a Swedish summer day. But this is not about winters and summers, this is about what is appropriate. As I looked at that girl pulling down my shirt, feeling embarrassed, when her tribeswomen and men still walked around in wrappers, I thought about the attitude of the rest of the African people. And I cannot help to think that it is sometimes appalling what societies can achieve. Many times, it is not what they need, but what they see elsewhere.
So one of these days when it’s hot, I would like to think that it’s not my fault that I want to walk naked. Besides, somewhere not so far away from Kampala, a tribe still walks naked. And much as I have spread messages of development there, I hope one day I won’t go there in shorts and every one will be like “please cover your legs. In our culture, we wear gomesis, and cover all seductive skin.” Because if that happens, I might put up a fight and ask them what the hell is wrong with them, and one of them might ask me “were you not here, fifty years ago, telling us to change?” and perhaps then, I will know what it’s like to change just for the sake of change. If it were up to me, with all that heat, people would design clothes that are decent but don’t cover too much, and don’t cause sweating. But then again it’s not up to me, and I’m risking to be socially offbeat. That doesn’t mean I think this whole jacketising and long clothing going on around is a good idea.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

YOU AND I

YOU AND I. Let’s start by stopping and looking around:   There is no one watching. And even if they were, Let’s just let them watch And go on ahead. Let’s ask some questions, and give each other answers. Let’s clear our doubts, it’s only fair. Let’s not be afraid of talking and asking. We are yet so young, we need no wrinkles. We are frightened, some times, I guess, But let’s just break free Like rain from clouds. Let’s chat about our past, And dream about the future. Let’s tell each other stories, we’ve just began. Let’s not make the mistakes our forefathers made, Let’s not regret, we know what we want. Let’s not be fixed to the rules of the past, Let’s craft our own rules and break them if we like. Let’s dart to the square, when we hear the drum, Let’s drum ourselves when the drummer gets weary. And let’s dance to the drums when our hands get tired. Let’s grab a taxi away from town. Let’s stroll on the hushed path and feel the co...
Read more

When the dead help with fiction.

So most of March I was thinking about my grandmother Nyamwire, my dad's mom. Considering she's been dead for a long time, some of my uncles freaked out when I told them she was visiting me in my dreams. I was told to go and pray, blah, blah, blah. To which I replied that I'm trying to decolonise my mind and to stop listening to the demonising of everything traditionally African. Before colonialists arrived, I told them, our religion depended highly on contact with the dead. One of my uncles was so shocked by all this that he just changed the subject. But a cousin of mine was very intrigued and she told me to keep listening and see if maybe grandma had a message for us. A week later I went on a writing retreat in Lira and embarked on my first feature film. There is a character in the story who's the backbone of the protagonist and a symbol of love and protection. I was struggling so much with her back story because she's a Munyankore woman who lives in Buganda. I di...
Read more

Allowed to be 50.

Allowed to be 50. Independence month is coming up, and before I write about this year's I thought I might let you know what I wrote about last year's independence anniversary. Allowed to be 50. He’s only five years old, but he knows more things than everybody I know. He doesn’t judge things or people the way adults do, and he has the most open mind a child can have. He hardly fails to find an answer for people who challenge him. Being nineteen years older than him, I always try to ask him about things that are simple, but even when I ask about adult issues; he usually shocks me with brilliant answers. But when I ask him what independence is he stares at me like a sheep.   He looks clueless. No matter how much candy I promise him, he can’t make up a story about independence (he’s always making up stories about everything - most of it lies). How on earth am I supposed to explain it to his little brain? Seeming to read my thoughts, he walks away to play. I don’t want to...
Read more