Two Burials and a Wedding

The ratios of weddings to funerals is a bit different here in Bundibugyo than the popular movie title. I would estimate I’ve been to 10 to 20 funerals for every one wedding . . .

Yesterday two of our friends, people who live within a stone’s throw of the mission, buried children. Both had died before receiving medical attention: the first was the boy brought dead to the hospital on Friday. The father of the second called me at 6:30 Saturday morning. His wife had delivered twins at the hospital the day before, and taken them right home. He called to say that one had died during the night and the other did not look well. I was there within fifteen minutes, and had them to the hospital a few minutes later, where my favorite night nurse Agnes was still competently on duty. The grief for one twin had to be put aside to focus on saving the life of the other, so the mother stayed in the hospital with Isingoma while the father prepared for the burial of Nyakato at home.

Then it was on to the wedding: once again the paradoxes so poignantly juxtaposed. And what a day it was. Scott will have to post pictures because the verbal description of the day will not do it justice. We picked up Lynn Leary and her pastor Mike at the airstrip with Pat, back home to quickly change into wedding clothes and decorate the truck with balloons, then on to Ndyezika’s house at exactly 10 (he was very concerned to be punctual) where everyone who could manage piled onto our vehicle. I think Scott counted 20, singing our way slowly to Bundibugyo town, bearing the groom. Meanwhile Massos had taken the girls up to Juliet’s uncle’s home where they bride’s party assembled. Naomi and Liana were flower girls, and Julia and Acacia something like junior bridesmaids. We waited at the church in Bundibugyo town, a crumbly mud-brick but large building that left one questioning whether it was never quite finished or suffered irreparable war damage. The drab church did not matter when the energetic gospel choirs began singing, swaying, clapping. After an hour or more the bride finally arrived, resplendent in white and veil, with her entourage of attendants. Juliet looked stunningly beautiful and happy, and though Ndyezika tried his best to remain appropriately solemn he also broke into the occasional grin. The vows, rings, prayers were pretty much a straight translation from a traditional Anglican service, with the added African element of the attentive best man and matron of honor (our neighbor and friend Buligi and his wife Asita) compulstively dabbing the sweat from the bride’s and groom’s brows, arranging the veil, smoothing imaginary wrinkles or brushing off flecks of dust. Though the service began at a good pace, there were at least three pastors involved in different capacities, a very long but good sermon from Genesis 2 with an emphasis that the phrase “it is not good for a man to be alone” should not be used to justify taking two wives, and an admonition that the families of these two could no longer call them away from each other or interfere in their marriage. There were more songs, offerings, and a very specific and formal process of signing the marriage certificate. Our girls sat patiently up front through it all, smiling graciously again on the way out. Then it was once again chaotic, push and shove, staring onlookers, swarms of kids, trying to prioritize the people into the available vehicles.

By the time we got back to the Community Center for the reception it must have been between 2 and 3 pm . . . There was a diversion to the Masso’s yard for photo ops, the obligatory groupings. Then the reception took another 4 hours or so . . . And as Luke says, was run just like any and every public event that ever occurs here. Major invited guests up on stage in cushioned chairs. Next tier in some decent chairs facing each other across the front . . Then the masses on benches. Everyone sitting still forever, the prayers, the welcome from the LC1, the songs by choirs. The cake was presented and cut and they each fed each other a piece amidst much laughter, then it was basically crumbled into bite-size pieces to make it stretch for the several hundred onlookers, Julia and other bridesmaids serving. Scott was the “Guest of Honor” and in that capacity gave a speech honoring the families and the bride and groom, and pointing to Rev 21 and 22, the hope and beauty that is represented in a wedding being a picture of the “all things new” that God is doing in this world. He did a great job. There was another long interlude while Juliet changed into a beautiful gold gown and then had to ceremonially “search” for Ndyezika who was hidden in the crowd. Later they stood up front, something like a cross between a reception line and the offering at church, people came forward with gifts or money which they dropped into a basin as they shook hands. I’ve never seen so many gifts here, all wrapped in shiny crinkly paper, about half of them from the bride’s family. A CSB student and a CSB teacher each “mimed” (we would call it lip synched) songs played by the DJ in honor of Juliet, and Julia, Liana, and Miss Sarah actually sang “Father we Adore you” with a microphone in front of the whole crowd. By the time the “lunch” was served it was about 7 pm!!!

As soon as people ate the party began to dissipate. At that point we’d been on the go for over 12 hours, kids from the street were beginning to dart in and out hoping for leftover food, and Ndyezika’s friends (including me!) were worrying that the mountain of gifts would be stolen in the gathering darkness, so it was time to get them out. We loaded the entire back of the truck with the loot and the bride and groom and best man and matron into the car, and drove off to their new home. When we arrived some family were waiting, there was a lantern burning in the sitting room of the brand new little cement house that we helped Ndyezika build. Scott demonstrated how to carry the bride over the threshold by lifting me up to everyone’s entertainment, and they entered. We left them there with another gathering crowd, evidently ready to dance through the night out in the grassy yard.

All in all it was a successful day: a beautiful bride well honored, a happy groom whose patience at last paid off, families finally at peace over the arrangement, hard-working friends who spent hours hauling chairs and blowing up balloons and cutting flowers and cooking food. It was a testimony to marriage, to making a commitment BEFORE living together for years and having children, but AFTER finishing school (they were the same ages, 24 and 26, as Scott and I when we got married . . . ). It was an opportunity for our missionary girls to feel included and lovely themselves, to be part of the honored group, to participate. I am haunted by some lingering sadness that the western images of a wedding have so pervaded the African expectation, that the formality inherited over years of colonialism dampened the natural joy of the event. We are praying that the many younger people who witnessed this marriage will aspire to a similar path. And praying for Ndyezika and Juliet. This day was a culmination of many hopes and plans, but also only a beginning. A marriage that has boldly broken old patterns and declared itself before the world and the Lord will definitely come under attack, and they will have a long road ahead. But for today we are all resting in the joy.