TRUE

Bana Ba Tau le Nkwe

The Great Roman Empire created the Christmas holiday to appease Christians and pagans with a day worthy of a festival. But for the great Mapulana nation of South Africa who are largely based in Mapulaneng, the biggest festival in their calendar is the annual initiation school graduation. It wasn’t different last month as thousands of boys became men and girls graduated into women. There were more than ten such schools in the kingdom.

This year’s initiation graduation was captured by a television crew for an SABC commissioned series which is funded by the National Lottery Distribution Fund. It will be screened in 2012. The documentary, aptly titled O’Mang seeks to unearth the roots of South Africa’s often forgotten Black cultures. It is being filmed all over the country and various tribes feature in the series. The core focus is on events that shape each tribe.

Kasiekulture followed the crew over three days as they explored the story of Mapulana and their initiation (koma). The Mapulana chapter of the documentary started in their ancestral land of Pilgrims’ Rest, which according to historian Billy Malele is where Mapulana settled after defeating amaSwati at Moholoholo mountain by hurling rocks at them. “They deployed various chiefs to guard boundaries. they deployed Mogane, Mashego, Mashile, Malele and Chiloane to various outposts. Every terrain was allocated a chief to guard against the return of the Swazi army”, he relates in the documentary.

On the subject of initiation another historian Jonathan Malele elaborated about how around 1830 Mapulana decided their men had to be trained to withstand any threat they might face in the future as they were fresh from a battle that saw them flee from Barberton to Hoedspruit under the barrage of amaSwati Army. “They chose the harshest of weathers, Winter to conduct the training. It had to happen far from women so a mountain was chosen. Everything that a boy is taught and trained for in our initiation schools is meant to make them brave, never fear cold, understand astronomy, how to start a family and treat his wife”, Malele said.

Unlike the much-hyped and controversial amaXhosa, Mapulana initiation is only held in Winter. He added that circumcision (lebollo) was also added to go with the training as there needed to be a measure to counter venereal diseases which made the foreskin stiff around the glans. Initiation took six months then – which is a far cry from the six weeks of nowadays.

"Government demands that it be six weeks to ensure that learners are back to school in no time. So we are guided by legislation but we still initiate them correctly even though circumcision is not a big part of it”, says Sehule Initiation School minder Robert Mashego, who is also the chairperson of initiation school minders in Limpopo Province. His younger brother Linos was running one school in Thabakgolo this year.

The O’Mang crew, led by veteran film and documentary maker Bjorn Rudner filmed the graduation ceremony from August 4, 2011, when the initiates leave the burning school behind, watch a stick-fighting (matube) until Saturday when they go home. The Mapulana chapter of this groundbreaking documentary is hosted by artist Zakhona Mogane and revolves around her journey into Mapulana history and culture.

“The people here have a colourful culture and some of the things we have seen exceeded our own expectation”, said producer Rudner, who was excited by how the script started writing itself on the second and third day.

Linos Mashego told this newspaper that this year they initiated 166 boys and 93 girls and all of them returned home safe. His older brother says it’s a far cry from what is happening in the Eastern Cape where the journey into manhood is often the last journey taken. “They need to come to Mapulaneng and learn how initiation can be performed correctly. It’s a birthright, not a commercial enterprise”, Robert, who is also a traditional healer said.

Next year, another bunch of Mapulana boys will once again take the journey into manhood at one of the 13 or so initiation schools in Mapulaneng – and the custodians of Mapulana culture are adamant that they will continue returning home in one piece – minus a foreskin.

* O’Mang will be screened some time next year.

TO COMMENT ON THIS POST GO TO OUR FACEBOOK PAGE: THE Kasiekulture BLOG & write your comment on the wall

PERSPECTIVE

THE RITE OF PASSAGE IN BUSHBUCKRIDGE
Recetly thousands of Mapulana children returned back from their bush intiation. Below we try to unpack the difference between Mapulana and other tribe's circumcision, not initiation.

In Bushbuckridge (Mpumalanga) news of initiate deaths are met with skeptism and lack of understanding. This community has been initiating its offspring for generations but they still have to report their first casualty at the hands of school minders. Apparently it is safe to assume that initiates used to die back in the days as a result of diseases and other unforeseen circumstances like as a result of power struggles that happen between school minders. It is on record in this community here that every person who can run an initiation school can effectively use the science of lightning and thunder to send a message to his rival that he will discredit his name by killing all his initiates. Thus, when rain starts in winter and there is lightning, there is a strong possibility that some of the residents here can pinpoint the source of the rain, the thunderstorm and the reasons behind the winter rain.

Thus, it is safe to say that the community here is very conscious of their culture and tradition. They protect it like vultures. Interesting enough, their initiates never die at the school even though they go through the same procedure as everyone else from the Eastern Cape to KwaNdebele. The only difference being that school minders and initiates in Bushbuckridge are camera shy. They don't allow cameras or the press into the initiation school premises. Never.

To boys around this area as well being a man involves undergoing cultural rituals which involve initiation. The one difference with the way it is done here is that recently most parents opt to take their boys to hospitals for the circumcision a year before their initiation. They have come to accept that initiation is not wholly about circumcision but cultural etiquette, morality, responsibility and the readiness to be a man, in all respects.

But as they will tell you, even those who go to the bush after leaving their foreskins at hospitals do not escape the cut, though it is plainly ceremonial. The boys who went to the hospital first and those who lost their foreskins at the bush do come back the same, and most notably behave the same because they have been initiated the same, which is really what is important.

Reports of initiate deaths and mutilations are received with surprise by the culturally conscious community of Bushbuckridge because for them if only culture evolved with the changing times, there wouldn't be any reason for the initiates to die or lose their penises. Clearly if an initiate accidentally loses his penis because of a careless bush surgeon that says a lot about the commercialization of the school whereby people without skills have infiltrated the institution for personal enrichment.

If initiates are mutilated because culture vultures in the Eastern Cape insist on using a spear to circumcise the boys instead of something that replaced a spear (not a gun) then culture is not to blame but misled practitioners of such a culture need to account for misrepresenting it.

Understandably, Abraham in the Bible used a piece of stone to cut the foreskin of Isaac because arguably he lived in the Stone Age. The Jews of today do not use stones like their great grandfather but what civilization provided with its metamorphosis. So are the bush surgeons in Bushbuckridge. They realized a time ago that their culture was to valuable to be made a scapegoat of moneyhungry individuals and primitivity.

Simply put, the only way to stop the annual deaths is for the Eastern Cape government to come up with legislation that clearly outlaws a spear as a tool of circumcision. For all that is known it will never be as sharp as a scalpel or an Okapi knife.

The practise of initiation faces a real challenge, adapt or die. Interesting enough the culture vultures of Bushbuckridge have already made that decision. Bushbuckridge is a welcome relief in the whole cultural confusion and it can only serve all ethnic groups in South African if they can initiate (no pun intended) a fact finding mission to Bushbuckridge and learn from people who have been preserving the practise for many years, with a clean slate nogal. If a boy has to be intiated inorder to be considered a man, at least that journey has to be safe to be taken.

FEATURE

"EVERY GENERATION BLAMES THE ONE BEFORE" - LESSONS FROM THE ANCESTORS

Those that came before us not only left us mysticism but some wisdom buried in the mystique

In Bushbuckridge (Mpumalanga) news of initiate deaths are met with skeptism and lack of understanding. This community has been initiating its offspring for generations but they still have to report their first casualty at the hands of school minders. Apparently it is safe to assume that initiates used to die back in the days as a result of diseases and other unforeseen circumstances like as a result of power struggles that happen between school minders. It is on record in this community here that every person who can run an initiation school can effectively use the science of lightning and thunder to send a message to his rival that he will discredit his name by killing all his initiates. Thus, when rain starts in winter and there is lightning, there is a strong possibility that some of the residents here can pinpoint the source of the rain, the thunderstorm and the reasons behind the winter rain.

Thus, it is safe to say that the community here is very conscious of their culture and tradition. They protect it like vultures. Interesting enough, their initiates never die at the school even though they go through the same procedure as everyone else from the Eastern Cape to KwaNdebele. The only difference being that school minders and initiates in Bushbuckridge are camera shy. They don't allow cameras or the press into the initiation school premises. Never.
To boys around this area as well being a man involves undergoing cultural rituals which involve initiation. The one difference with the way it is done here is that recently most parents opt to take their boys to hospitals for the circumcision a year before their initiation. They have come to accept that initiation is not wholly about circumcision but cultural etiquette, morality, responsibility and the readiness to be a man, in all respects.

But as they will tell you, even those who go to the bush after leaving their foreskins at hospitals do not escape the cut, though it is plainly ceremonial. The boys who went to the hospital first and those who lost their foreskins at the bush do come back the same, and most notably behave the same because they have been initiated the same, which is really what is important.

Reports of initiate deaths and mutilations are received with surprise by the culturally conscious community of Bushbuckridge because for them if only culture evolved with the changing times, there wouldn't be any reason for the initiates to die or lose their penises. Clearly if an initiate accidentally loses his penis because of a careless bush surgeon that says a lot about the commercialization of the school whereby people without skills have infiltrated the institution for personal enrichment.

If initiates are mutilated because culture vultures in the Eastern Cape insist on using a spear to circumcise the boys instead of something that replaced a spear (not a gun) then culture is not to blame but misled practitioners of such a culture need to account for misrepresenting it.
Understandably, Abraham in the Bible used a piece of stone to cut the foreskin of Isaac because arguably he lived in the Stone Age. The Jews of today do not use stones like their great grandfather but what civilization provided with its evolution. So are the bush surgeons in Bushbuckridge. They realized a time ago that their culture was to valuable to be made a scapegoat of moneyhungry individuals and primitivity.

Simply put, the only way to stop the annual deaths is for the Eastern Cape government to come up with legislation that clearly outlaws a spear as a tool of circumcision. For all that is known it will never be as sharp as a scalpel or an Okapi knife.

The practise of initiation faces a real challenge, adapt or die. Interesting enough the culture vultures of Bushbuckridge have already made that decision. Bushbuckridge is a welcome relief in the whole cultural confusion and it can only serve all ethnic groups in South African if they can initiate (no pun intended) a fact finding mission to Bushbuckridge and learn from people who have been preserving the practise for many years, with a clean slate nogal. If a boy has to be intiated inorder to be considered a man, at least that journey has to be safe to be taken.