Life Beginning

Babies. Girls go NUTS for babies.

I know that Zambian families are also excited about babies. My host-sister in Petauke, Kayula (kah-yoo-lah), is 8 months pregnant and she’s getting bigger by the day. The baby is positioned high up and out, so they’re almost positive it is a baby boy.

It’s hard to imagine what kind of personal impact you have on a group of people by living with them. You become intimate, even through language barriers. When I visited Petauke yesterday, I spent the morning with the host family. Mr. Chanda (host-dad) was away supervising some construction workers (they are building the market place at which the Zambian Food Reserve Agency buys ALL the maize in the land) for an hour. I sat complacently in the already strong morning sun (8am arrival from a 5am bus departure), simply sitting and enjoying their company. Only one of the 4 sisters living there can speak some English, and she happily translated everything I said to her with glee.

It’s like my word carries some grand significance. Judging from their reactions to my description of Chipata, you would think I was unfolding the secrets of Atlantis. Mr. Chanda has lived in Tanzania, Kenya and has traveled to every corner of Zambia. But coming from me, they take some joy from my account, which is altogether flattering.

However, nothing is more flattering than what came next. “It is a boy, we know!” Kayula tells me.

“If it is a baby boy, we are naming him Elliot.”

I couldn’t be more honoured. She slyly asks a few minutes later what my mother’s name is: “Eva,” I admit after some hesitation, for it’s too much! They tell me that if it is a girl (impossible!), they will name her Eva. I feel like this whole situation is too generous, for I’ve only spent a few weeks with them. But they insist.

One of the other sisters is cradling her baby boy of 6 months in her lap. “What is your father’s name?” she asks innocently. Now, this is really going too far! A Cudmore family in Zambia?

They’ve made an impact on me, too. Mr Chanda insists that “when you go back to Canada, it is like you have died. You will not remember us,” to which I flatly refuse. How could he think that? They’ll remember me, and I them.

Kayula is seated (L)