A Holiday Weekend

So, Turkey Day has come and gone. We Moundou SALTers were treated to our own marvelous Thanksgiving Day celebration, held in the home of Pastor Sem, and in the company of other MCC workers who were visiting Moundou for the weekend. We had a lovely evening chowing down on chicken, couscous, plantains, stewed carrots, rice and beans, French fries, and more. All were festively displayed on a red, white, and blue table cloth brought from Texas. As we ate and shared stories- people that I had known for a range of three months to one hour- I experienced that wonderful phenomenon of being at home away from home. I'm thankful this year that family can be found almost anywhere.

 The holiday did not stop here. In fact, in Chad, the following days contained two big national holidays. Friday was Independence Day, and today, December 1st, was Presidents Day. Both were celebrated in Moundou with parades in front of the Mayor's office. Friday was more understated. I watched while a small military group put on a display involving kicking up their feet and turning sharp angles, and a marching band played the occasional anthem.

Monday was the big show. I arrived at 7:30, with hours before the excitement on the street. I was fascinated just to sit on the curb and watch people mill around me. Chad is an extremely diverse country, and while I sometimes feel like I live in a small, well-off, evangelical Christian bubble, I delighted in seeing others who live in Moundou. There were as many people of Arab descent as there were people from the South of the country. I heard as much Arabic as French. I saw young women prancing around in skinny jeans while others revealed only their eyes from beneath their sheer fabric dress. I saw children carrying large buckets on their heads, and others carrying around boxes of shoe-shining supplies and a tiny bench that they used to plop down and work. I saw men who looked as if they could have been walking to an office job in the States, while others wore long white robes and caps, held hands, and squatted impossibly low to the ground as they chatted.

 Unfortunately, I have been on an impossible quest to find functioning batteries here in Moundou, and was not able to take a single picture. Again and again I regretted this, especially as the parade went underway and I had the amazing opportunity to see all of Moundou proudly march past me, carrying signs that clearly labeled who they were and what they represented. And wow, there are so many groups that I never suspected existed here in this city! I took this as a challenge to take as many vivid mental photos as possible. 

First we were passed by dozens of primary and secondary schools. All private schools have uniforms, and so each group was clearly distinguished by a different set of clothes and a song that was all their own. The children marched past, feet in step with the songs that soared from their mouths. I saw Franco-English schools, Koranic schools, schools for the Deaf, Arabic schools, a nursing school, a technical school (where all of the participants yielded wrenches, hammers, pliers over their heads) and even my dear Village Altonodji walk by.

 Then we saw businesses and organizations. There were the Scouts of Moundou, dressed in familiar Boy Scouts-style uniforms. There was the Moundou Tai kwondo Academy, with children of all ages carrying themselves with great dignity in their robes. They were followed immediately by a tai-chi school. There was a Young Democrats group, an art school, a soccer team, a women's union. Past me marched a troupe of local comedians represented by three individuals who looked like something out of the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. One man had painted whiskers, a short stumpy tail coming out of his pants, and stuffing in his clothes that gave him an ample belly and derrière.

 There were representatives from each quartier, or neighborhood. The most fun to watch were those people who dressed in what I assume were traditional costumes. Some boys wore nothing but long colorful necklaces on their chests, and grass skirts. They wore headdresses and covered their faces with long veils of dried grasses and danced to traditional instruments that I had never seen before. Another man was dressed as a bull, with large horns sticking out of his head. He was tied up and his friends pretended to lead him with a short rope. Suddenly, as he passed me, he went out of control and launched himself at the unsuspecting crowd, a hair's width away from ramming them with his sharp horns! People screamed, scattered, and then came back delighted and laughing.

I saw dozens of businesses. There were men from the Mondou cigarette manufacturing company and workers from the brewery, wearing outfits made of fabric that was a collage of pictures of Castle Beer. Assala, the well-known local bakery came by on a truck, yielding huge pastries and occasionally throwing a baguette at the crowd. There was a single man carrying a sign that said, in hand-written letters, "homme d'affaires" (businessman). People thought that was uproarious. Then it was our turn to join. Oh, did I forget to mention that I pretended to be an employee of Mama Kiri's work? She works for Sotel Chad, a telephone company, and I was here today because her boss had laughingly suggested that I dress up with them and march in the parade. So here I was, donning a matching wrap skirt, oversized t-shirt with the Sotel Chad logo, a baseball cap, and my own rotary phone. There were ten of us, and when our turn came we jumped right into the middle of the parade. As well-camouflaged as I thought I was, it wasn't enough to prevent people from immediately noticing that one of the people in this parade looked a little different from the thousands of others. I tried to march seriously, carrying my phone with dignity and earnestly answering it from time to time, but it was difficult with people calling NASSARA! (white person) and reaching out to touch me. Things got more out of control when some unseen hand grabbed the hat from off my head, and my fellow "colleagues" turned around to chastise them. I was almost knocked in the head by the sign that my neighbor was carrying as she swung around to shout at the person. By the end, many of us were collapsing into giggles and clutching our belongings dearly. I realized that I was also holding a big piece of cotton, which someone had managed to give me without my noticing as a souvenir from the workers of Coton Chad.

We arrived back at Mama Kiri's work and relaxed with sodas and grilled beef. (And one of the aforementioned baguettes.) The rest of the day was reserved for visiting and lounging. And I needed the time to process all that I had seen! What I really loved about the parade was the chance to see Moundou in all of its diversity coming together to celebrate what it is comprised of. Even in a country ravaged with poverty, insecurity, and mistrust, people take joy in many activities and memberships, and it was a lovely chance to see these things on display.