If only the dead could talk
IF the dead could speak, I am sure we would routinely hear voices from their whitewashed tombs demanding some modicum of respect from visitors. Called “graveyards,” “cemeteries”, “kumarinda”, “kumakuva” or “kumabwiro”, these spaces are no longer considered sacred.
Despicable things now happen in graveyards yet the dead remain dead silent.
This week, yours truly visited a popular graveyard north of Harare to bury a colleague and what he saw was disturbing.
The lion in some people seems to roar each time they hear of a funeral. They will pour their curves in body-hugging black costumes in which they will be struggling to even walk.
And all this is meant to attract the attention of mourners, and only God knows to what end?
“Forty years after Independence people should be free to put whatever they feel like. This is not an era where you dress in shabby clothing when going for a funeral.
“You should be smart and we do not want prefects prescribing what to wear and what not to wear,” I heard an elderly man being told straight in the face after he had challenged a certain lady who was scantily dressed.
“Mazuva ano unongopawo mutemo kumunhu wawakaroora, kwete nyika yese,” the young lady retorted. She was putting on a dress that was long enough to cover the essentials and short enough to distract mourners.
There are also showy men who go to funerals for the wrong reasons. Most of the time, for them it is about flaunting their wealth.
They are quite noticeable in their swanky apparel, top-of-the-range vehicles and the penchant to quaff ice-cold beers even at gravesites.
These are the kind of men who will not miss an opportunity to answer their highend phones while priests are performing burial rites.
“Hallo, hallo, I will call you back later, I am at a funeral. We are about to finish so I will call you as soon as we are done,” they would normally say while twiddling their car keys.
The naughty ones will even block the hearse just for their names to be called on the public address system so that everyone knows the kind of car they drive.
Far from being a solemn place to lay the dearly departed to rest, graveyards have evolved into burgeoning marketplaces where everything, from sex, alcohol, ice cream, soft drinks, water, freezits and maputi, is sold.
“We sell these things here because mourners want to eat. We have children to go back to school at the end of the day, so we have to ensure we make as much as possible. This is a battle for survival and whether or not we are at a graveyard does not count when children demand school fees.
“Life has to go on,” one trader said. Florists and sign-writers are also part of the cast.
“We have good business here these days because there are not many of us. I know people have no choice but select from the different flower arrangements we have here. My younger brother is a sign-writer, so we just join forces and we make our living from selling to these mourners,” said one florist.
They sometimes improvise by maintaining graves in pristine condition for a fee.
“We can maintain the grave for a small fee. This ensures the grave is kept in good shape while you do not get embarrassed in the event you bring your friends and relatives here,” he added.
Professional mourners can be found on site. A lot happens at graveyards and guards always have to be on the lookout for mischief makers.
“Some people come for various reasons here. Some come to plant juju, while on some occasions we have seen people bathing naked on top of graves as part of rituals. Some people also try to steal tombstones.
“We have a lot of work because some people think they can steal from the dead. We also have challenges with residents who live nearby who frequent this place to fetch water and even use the toilet.
“Sometimes we catch people having sex and you wonder whether or not they appreciate this is a sacred place,” said a groundsman who spoke on condition of anonymity.
If only the deal could talk.