The Reed Dance!

As I mentioned in the last post, Monday was the annual Reed Dance, at which tens of thousands of Swazi "virgins" come to Lobamba, a town just south of mine, to present themselves to the king. As I'm sure everyone reading this knows, my degree is in religious studies, so I'm especially interested in the significance of ritual, which is why I had pretty high expectations going into the ceremony. In watching everyone march to their designated areas, I was reminded of my military days: everyone was in-step and they were singing siSwati cadences. For reference, check out the video below:



I was also able to snap a close photo of the king, Mswati III. He is the one in the middle looking toward the camera. He must have been looking at me, right?



The event climaxed with the king and his "warriors," dressed in traditional combat attire, stampeding toward the women to determine if any are fit to be Mswati III's fourteenth wife.




Not to deflate the suspense, but ultimately the king did not choose a wife, but there is always next year! If you step back from the ceremony, it's obviously supporting the subjugation of women: upwards of 40,000 women cross the country to dance around bare-breasted in the hope that the king will arbitrarily take her as his umpteenth wife. While I was there, though, I couldn't help but feel as though the entire ceremony ironically empowered women. As you can see in the pictures and video, it looks like a sea of people. It was a force, of sorts. The women led everything: they sang, they danced, they spoke, they told people to sit down when necessary. They led the show and everyone, including the king, accepted that.

In my two weeks here, I've that learned this tiny country is cluttered with paradox. The country is democratic, but it has a ruling monarchy; the people are hostile toward colonialism, but everyone is Christian because of colonialism; people are generally extremely poor, but most people in Mbabane dress much more nicely than I do. It's a country that reaches toward its pre-colonial self, which is impossible to achieve, considering the country was occupied for over 150 years.

This weekend, I'm going to South Africa to hike in the Drakensberg Mountains. More to come once I get back.