Reflections on a family -filled festive season
Correspondent | Friday January 9, 2015 16:17
Over the past few years, I have been through a personal hell that I sometimes did not think I would, or even could be resurrected from. It also affected other members of my family nucleus because that’s what happens when one family member is broken and suffering.
So sitting at the lunch table with my family, happy and healthy, on Christmas Day was extremely significant. I soaked in everything about the moment, realising then that the dark days were gone and the same people who were with me when it was bleak, still sat surrounding me. We had made it to see a brighter day.
A decision to retire my bar stool and bottle about seven months ago meant that I would not be indulging in wine or other ‘strong drink’ this past festive season, giving me the opportunity to really have a family-filled festive season.
My family festive got off to a romantic start on a Saturday in mid-December when a cousin I hold very dear got married. My five-year-old son, Nlisi, was part of the wedding party, proudly carrying out his duties as the ring-bearer.
He is my first born son, so I probably don’t need to explain too much how emotional I became upon seeing him wearing a suit. I am already that person who cries at weddings, so seeing my cousin with whom I shared many teenage conversations about this ‘crush’ or the other and who has counselled and loved me through some of my lowest times, now walking down the aisle with the love of her life and my baby looking ever so dapper in a suit, was the perfect reason for me to be the sniffling wedding attendant.
Roads led back to Gaborone after the wedding. In the city, the festive season was alive - or so it felt to me. Shopping malls became increasingly difficult to go to for someone who, in spite of being a ‘people-person’, really doesn’t like crowds in malls or restaurants. Jingles on the radio advertised many ‘Christmas Specials now on’, while clubs and some restaurants-turned-lounge’s also told listeners why their establishment was the place to party.
I finally did my Christmas shopping around the 20th, and on Christmas Eve left Gaborone with my mother, youngest sister and children, for Serowe. My other sister is a ‘Mrs’ now - so she spent hers with her in-laws. It was bittersweet having to say, “see you next year” to her before I left for the village without her. Bitter because all my Christmas memories until last year are filled with her, but now she’s someone else’s sister too and has to spend Christmas with them. Sweet too, because I’m proud to see my sister, who Mama used to sew matching clothes for once upon a time, matured into the woman she is today.
We spent Christmas Day at Majestic Five Hotel in Palapye which has become something of a tradition since our family began going there a few years ago with about 60 other members of the Tebape clan. The idea has been to give ourselves a break from all the cooking that is synonymous with Christmas ko gae.
This year, however, only my parents, sister and children spent Christmas at the hotel while the rest of the clan gathered at one of my aunt’s houses for a Christmas feast. The intimate family time spent with the family can only be described only as precious.
My grandmother and new cousin who recently married into the family taught me how to prepare magwinya the old-school way; with yeast, Holsum vegetable oil and rising dough. I laughed at myself as my grandmother observed with keen interest how I kneaded the dough – something that actually requires a special kind of technique that my maybe “westernised” fingers had trouble grasping.
Even after many of my fat cakes emerged from the cast iron pot gooey on the inside – my grandmother and cousin obviously tickled by my awkwardness in preparing this very traditional snack – I thoroughly enjoyed the experience of learning a recipe being passed down from one generation to the other.
My maternal uncle, my mother’s only living brother, is a joy to be around. A very energetic man who communicates with a lot of energy and a very loud voice, even if you’re standing shoulder-to-shoulder, I laugh a lot when we talk. He has taught me a lot about the rich family heritage on my maternal side.
The structure of my late grandmother’s house still stands, with its old pictures, old books, old furniture... it is like walking into a museum and I love it.
This Christmas, I discovered a bookshelf in the house filled with dusty books with yellowed pages and that ‘old’ smell that’s like a combination of sand and water.
My late grandfather, Molwa Sekgoma, once read these books. I never met him as he passed away before I was born, but I’m starting to learn about him through the old books marked with his handwriting as well as the pictures and stories my uncle told me. And that is what family represents – who we are. Without them, we stand alone like lost children with nowhere to go, no one we ‘belong’ to.
For someone who spent the first 24 years of her life living outside of Botswana, I have a real appreciation of this. So, this festive season, I was happy to sit and absorb the moments and memories with my family that will last forever.