Witchcraft tale

Tumie Modise | Monday September 8, 2014 12:31

To this day I still do. Unless I really see a witch myself, I still refuse to accept that some people are more gifted (or cursed) in that way than the rest of us and possess those extraordinary powers. But just in case its true, surely a transparent audit of how that even came about would be in order, or I am just letting my imagination run wild?

The closest I have ever come close to ‘seeing’ a witch or witches is when I was a little girl. I am certain that for most folks who grew up in the village like me, we each have our different witchcraft tales to tell.

I am no different. It so happened that one early morning while we were fast asleep, my older sister suddenly let out a shriek. In those days, just like most girls, we shared a room and we each had our separate beds, side by side.

By then, my sister was a secondary school student while I was still at primary school. Her screams jolted me up from my sleep.

Opening my eyes and feeling annoyed, there she was, standing on top of her bed! Within minutes, even before I could say a word, my mother was already in the room.  Up to the mid 90’s, most households in the villages did not have any electricity. Only government offices and hospitals were lucky to have that while most businesses just relied on generators for power. Our homestead was no different. Candles were a no-no at home and we only used paraffin lamps or gas powered lamps, which when lit, could light up the whole house.

This particular night though, we had gone to bed around 10 at night after the usual studying. I still recall that I had slept first. Now the unwritten rule was that whoever sleeps last was to put off the lamp. I believe this is what happened, even on that day. Yet here we were, up at 3am and as fate would have it, woken up because of that very same lamp!

According to my sister (she can still vouch for that), she was jolted up from a sleep after feeling a ‘cold thing’ on her back. This thing was not only touching her back but she was actually sleeping on top of it! Nothing she was saying at that point was making any sense, worse, she was still half asleep! Not wanting to see this ‘cold thing’, I soon moved a safe distance, just closer to the door. The only cold things I could imagine at that point were either a frog, or worse, a snake! My father came inside to investigate too.   I cannot be sure but I think he had a weapon of some sort with him when he did. Moments later, there it was, the cold thing, under the moon, it even shone. As we moved further back, he yanked it up from the bed.

Holding it in his hand, the thing now looked vulnerable and totally defenseless. How that lamp glass (galase ya lebone) ended up in my sister’s bed is still a mystery to this day. But my father was not very amused, because all he said before storming out of the room was a curt, “ga o ba itse kana bone ba, ha ba rata ba dire digalase tsa mabone bo mpopi!”.

Today, 20 years or so later, the official version is still that it was just witches at work. I don’t buy the story, but I still don’t have any other explanation either. But I know we even had a suspect. What other possible explanation could there be that a lamp glass could roll (walk or even fly) 3 meters by itself and just landed under someone’s blankets?

Growing up, we always had those tales of how at our village, suspected witches would occasionally be rounded up, before being frog matched to the notorious pharing caves, where they would then be hurled and head first(and alive) into the deep cave. Their bones are still there to this day.

I mentioned this to a friend of mine the other day; that I will only believe in witches the day I see one flying past me aboard a broom.

 There are a thousand things I would do if I personally had those powers. For one, I am very certain that I would not be anything like that rumoured witch in our neighbourhood, the one who died a pauper.

The only ‘proof’ of her choice of profession was that, apparently her humble mud house had no windows, also that her peaches were the tastiest in our whole neighbourhood.  Villagers though.