Particularly the talkative women chopping bags of cabbage, stirring the pot of porridge and frying some goat meat, in the heat, ko isong. In the sofaless sitting room, the grandmothers’ stories about their teenage era crushes.
The animated men unloading 25kg 3-legged pots from the ‘Matshelonyana’ truck, and the stories of men who kept a watchful eye on the slow-cooking meat.
Not to forget that immediately after the funeral day, when a group of elderly women were washing my father’s clothes, I helped serve lunch to the authoritarian but kind elderly men at the kgotla.
While I fully agree with the measures taken to limit funerals to 50 and not serve food to the public, it is important for us to realize that, without warning, one of the often unrecognized, though important, historical sources of mourning support in Botswana has been snatched away (for now) by coronavirus.
Blessing Kgosi e tsile Kgasa 