© Copyright 2006 by Douglas Perron
[As told to the author by Publi (nephew of Zam, the village chief). Translation by the author.]
I (Publi) was sitting here counting my gold coins, both worried that there is not enough to provide for my bride-to-be and, yet, consumed with an anger to throw them off the Cliff of Spirits – fling the dirty coins to the Rocks of Sorrow below. I could do that, but not as a sacrifice to the gods, as my people did long ago. I do not want to insult the gods – to say they prize money. For greed and honor and tradition have lured the troubles to overrun our village, called Moola, like a plague of poisonous snakes. The troubles are coiled and waiting to strike anyone. But our ignorance casts its spell across the village, like the mist on sacred Lake Delu in the early morning. And as such a mist had killed the people of the Village Daze, bringing poison from the waters, our mist of ignorance will destroy our village, but it will not have mercy on our peoples to send them to the Great Beyond. [Author's note: refers to old incident of sudden inversion of lake water that released poison gas, killing the villagers as they slept.] Instead, most of our peoples will begin the journey of “sorrow of heart” and “poverty of soul.”
Let me explain. For the past few generations, the pride of our village has been in its wealth in money – the roob (a gold coin). We still value craftsmanship and knowledge, but not as we did, well before even the memory of our elders. Today, our village seems strong, because it is wealthy. We pay many warriors to guard our lands. We bought treasures that the peoples of other villages only dream of having. Our temple is of shiny black obsidian and gleaming white marble, from the south, and jewels of fire red and forest green, from the north. And our village has a fountain of sweet water from the deep, there for the taking. My Uncle Zam boasts of our wealth. He is the village chief.
My Cousin Cebo, the village “holder of coins,” says Uncle boasts of clouds. Because even though you can see a cloud, a bird can fly through it, as if it isn't there. And the wind can blow, making the cloud vanish. But Uncle Zam and the village elders say we are strong as ever, that we have roob for anything.
Some troubles have always been here. But recently, many, many more have arrived – like a plague. Life has become harsh and dark since Uncle Zam sent our warriors to destroy Gana and Roq, two villages far away. Some men from those villages set fire to our two best grain silos. Those men died in the fires, but Uncle was so angry that he decreed death to the people of those villages – as a warning to all the other villages that they should never cause trouble to the great village of Moola.
My friends, Eace and Gowill, died in the wars on those villages. Their mother is wailing with the grief of ten-thousand days. She blames Uncle Zam, saying there was no need for fighting. The families of the dead children, women and men of those other villages also say so. Some have sworn vengeance on Uncle Zam and all the peoples of our village. Uncle Zam boasts of our warriors, saying no one will dare attack us. But many of us think that he knows not. And Uncle has posted more warriors around and in the village than ever before. They watch carefully everything we do.
I am frightened that I will do or say something wrong and the warriors will take me to prison. And I am sad that Uncle shows no sorrow for those many dead children, women and men, nor for their living relatives, nor even for our own dead warriors. My father says that is the way of the duty and honor to the village – a chief can not be sad. But I look at the mothers and the widows and feel sad. How many more people will die for duty and honor, or for the anger of Uncle Zam? This is very bad to disturb the spirits. For they will have a fearful just cause on those responsible and haunt anyone who dares to add others to the spirit world – for that is only the privilege of the gods.
This fighting costs many roobs. Cousin Cebo said our village does not have our own money. He says all the village money, since I was of nine years, has been borrowed from the Han. Uncle Zam borrows and borrows, because the Han honor us as a great village with which to lend money. But Cebo says that Uncle does not understand numbers and even at our most prosperous, with great crops and beautiful baskets to sell, we will owe the Han until my son's son has a son – long after the chief and the elders go to the Great Beyond. And many days are added with each new borrowing, extending our dark Winter of poverty to come. If the Han demanded return of their money, we would have to give them all our possessions or go to war with them. Our village will suffer on either path. Father says not to worry, because we are too powerful for the Han to destroy and they have invested too much in our village to have their warriors destroy it. But I worry, for I think not that the Han give us their money for keeps.
Cousin Cebo thinks that by Summer next, or the one following, all our roobs will be gone, and so too, the chances to get more. Then our way of living will collapse, like the stilts of a hut eaten by termites.
Uncle Zam calls Cousin Cebo a “friend of troubles,” a “bringer of dark days” and disloyal to the family and the village. He has warned others to listen not to Cebo or they will be disloyal, too. I listen to Cebo, but I make sure that Uncle Zam, or his eyes and ears (– spies), the watchful gesta, do not see me do so.
Cebo is to be forced from the village upon the morning sun. It is a new law – called the disloyalty act – that Uncle Zam and the elders decreed. Cebo's mother pleaded for him before the elders, but they do not hear. The disloyalty act forbids complaints against the village – for the ways of Moola are sacred. And Cebo has spoken many complaints against Moola's ways and Uncle Zam.
I will come of age in one moon's time (– a month). Then I will be of fourteen Summers. I have been promised a beautiful girl, Amore, in village Sante, as my bride-to-be. Tradition states that I marry her in Sante, then return to Moola to make a home, in the ways of Moola. As I am a nephew of our village chief, I am to become chief some day – family has power (– nepotism). But I think I want the honor not, if as chief, you must tell your people untruths and send them to war to defend your honor and that of the village. This is like bees in my head. I want to be of truth. I could not send my fellow peoples to the spirit world for something so like a cloud, as is honor. I would rather not return to our village, as I can do nothing to stop the troubles and would surely be sent off, like Cousin Cebo, for speaking disloyalties.
Father is very disappointed with me. He says I disgrace him, our village and our traditions by having such thoughts. He says village honor and tradition always come before the life of a man. I understand not. Have not tradition and honor invited many troubles to our village? I am disturbed by my father's displeasure with me. His son is placed below tradition and honor. Am I not of his flesh and his love?
I often visit Sante, the village of my bride-to-be. Those peoples care for one another. No one goes hungry in their village, as some do in mine. They have no wars. Everyone is free to speak their thoughts, on the streets and at the village councils. They have not the hunger for money, as do many of the peoples of Moola. And they have no chief to tell them what to think. Their village council decrees all, but only after the peoples speak.
My father says that if I chose to stay in Sante, I should never return to Moola. He says I must make my life in our village and accept our ways – it is what Moola men do and have done for all of time. He says I am nothing, of little value now, but if I live as a man of Moola, perhaps many Summers hence, I will become a man of worth.
With our village full of troubles, I think the morning sun will visit that day not. And I know that if I live as nephew of the great chief, I will become like Uncle Zam – powerful and cruel and of the people not. I will have been disloyal to my soul.
If my thoughts are foolish and dangerous, as father says, why do others, like Cousin Cebo, Eace and Gowill's mother, and Dugee and Star, the village thinkers, also have the same thoughts. I want to respect our elders and traditions, but not if they invite the troubles to slither into our village. For they are not divine, like the earth and the stars. I know. I once heard father and Uncle Zam and some of the elders speak of their early days of star-gazing with the village girls and eating the cokan plant, just so they may feel like the wind. Both are forbidden by village law. And I have seen Uncle Zam rip plants from the divine earth, in fits of anger, and poison a sacred zubu tree because its roots were moving a wall of his grand hut.
For many years, I had visions of Uncle Zam and the elders in great gardens of honor. Alas, now the gardens are parched soils of the desert. Honor will grow no more. Uncle Zam speaks of the divine earth and skies, from his mouth, but from his heart not. This I can not tell father, for I would surely be banished for such thoughts of our chief. I know Uncle Zam tells us untruths, for I have heard him talk with father about what to say to the peoples. And his eyes are small and move about like the lizard when Uncle Zam speaks the untruths. His soul is silent, as if it has left his body – like those that go to the Great Beyond.
Father says that sometimes untruths are good, because the truths would frighten the peoples and become the spears of our enemies. He says we must always appear strong, lest our enemies believe we have the troubles and could be attacked with ease. But I don't feel strong with untruths. And Father had taught me to fight the troubles like a warrior. Are the troubles not in our village (still) when we close our eyes? Will the troubles not bite, even if our peoples close their eyes to them?
Uncle Zam and the elders say the troubles are not in Moola, lest our peoples see the troubles slither alongside Uncle Zam and the elders, as though they are all good friends. The peoples should think not that Moola's gates are closed to the troubles. For no village has such gates.
Father says it is the nature of a leader and that I am too young to understand. He says I should trust my leaders are doing right and when I think not, I should tell myself that I don't understand the ways of the powerful, but will obey them. He says they must have been appointed by the gods. If not, how could they have the power? Do I think I know better than the gods who should be our leaders? This makes me sad that the gods could not give us better leaders. But since father says life is mostly toil and struggle, I think if we had better leaders, there would not be so much toil and struggle, and so, not so much life. I should rejoice in having more life.
My bride-to-be does not like my village. She says we bully and destroy other villages and we are like stone, instead of like flowing waters, so the troubles can make an easy home in Moola. And she says our peoples claim that they are of the gods and other peoples are not. Peoples of other villages have spoken the same. Alas, this is a truth of many of Moola's peoples, but not all of them.
My bride-to-be tells me that she does not want to live in Moola, but will if her husband says it is to be. But I know our union will be happy not. This disturbs me so. For I know she will be of “the sadness with a smile.” I must live in Moola for my father and uncle. For my wife, I must not live in Moola. I am sad and confused. Is this the life for a man: to have tradition and honor, but no happy wife, no shining Amore? Mother says this is the Great Crossroads – a boy stops, only a man can journey on. She says I must choose my path. And I must journey on – for it is the way of the man (– a rite of passage) that will change me for all the Summers to come.
Father expects me to make him proud at the Dreh Ceremony on next moon. Dreh is for the boys to become young men (– to come of age) and declare their manhood (– allegiance) to Moola. We become guardians of the village and “warriors of the heart” to our way of life. Dreh brings village pride and honor to accept and live it. But it brings village dishonor and shame to live it not.
I do not know what to do. If I accept Dreh, I must accept our way of life in my heart. Yet, I am very disturbed by our ways, for many of them are not “of the heart” or “of the head.” How can I “be of Moola” and “be not of the heart or head”? I do not understand. For I was taught that the evil is always the evil no matter what it wears nor where it lives. I do not want to be known as “Publi, of the village Moola.” I want to be known to all as: Publi, “of the heart” and “of the head.”
Ah, look to the sun!
If only I could be like the sun – shine true light and bring joy to many villages. Behold, the sun is of no village, but it is the sun still. I want to be strong as the sun. Father expects Dreh, but the sun claims Dreh not.
Alas. I know what I must do!
Dreh will be as deadly to my soul as the prick of a geor bush thorn to my body. Yes, Mother told a truth – the boy stops at the Great Crossroads, but the man journeys on. Then be it so. Publi, the boy, is dead. Weep and behold, Publi, the man.
This page: “www.douglasperron.com/MyVillageIsTroubled.html”.
Updated November 15, 2007. by Douglas Perron.