African outfits

African outfits
Our crazy family

Thursday, February 9, 2012

Martha's house

Today we went to see Martha's home. Martha and Ancela were our cooks during the time that our team was in Ndu. Right now Martha is cooking for our friends the Schroth's so we still see her almost daily. Martha's niece Courage lives with her and has recently finished cooking school. Courage is working alongside our cook Irene until the end of next week and then she will be our cook through the end of our stay here in Ndu. Martha and Courage walk about an hour each way to get to CBTS to cook for us, and then walk home at the end of the day. Goodness is Martha's daughter and she walks to school each day with her Mom and Courage. It was a beautiful walk but being this high up in the mountains, I was winded by the time we got home. Martha even took us down into the part of the farm where the sugar cane is grown so that she could hack some off for us. It was interesting because her family lives in this "compound" and have for years. She showed us the houses her brothers owned, step siblings, her late father and then her house. All the houses have separate cook houses where they prepare their meals. She showed us where the women go when they are in mourning - they gather with all the other female relatives and stay in this mud house for 4 or 5 days. The men have a different house where they mourn and they stay there for 3 days and nights. People who come to give their condolences bring food and go to these houses of mourning - the men to the men's hut, the women to the women's hut. What a treat to get to see Martha's world. We even got to see the pigs that we help to fatten up with all our scraps.

1 comment:

  1. Can't imagine what the Food Safety police over here would say about the cooking conditions over there. :)

    ReplyDelete