And Home Was Kariakoo (12 page)

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Photo Caption 7.2
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Both streets head off towards the old German and Muslim cemeteries we visited yesterday. Behind the streets, as well as farther up along them, are the original native quarters of mud and wattle and thatch. We head back to the plaza. Looking out at the harbour, to the left, the water enters into a creek; a paved walkway runs alongside, facing a deep green wall of mangroves across the channel. The telltale smell of rotting garbage accompanies the walker. To the right of the harbour is possibly the fish market, next to a smaller harbour.

In January and February 1959, the English writer Evelyn Waugh, at the age of fifty-five wishing to winter at a place not wasted by tourism or politics (and without a prohibition on alcohol, like parts of India), came to eastern Africa on the
Rhodesia Castle
and landed in Mombasa. He then travelled south, mostly by road, visiting many
towns and taking full advantage of his privileged status to receive hospitality (and information) from local British officials. On February 24 he flew from Dar to Kilwa Masoko and the next day was driven to Kilwa Kivinje. His travels were quick and what he saw was fragmentary, but still the observations were often quite apt:

Visiting Kilwa Kivinje every morning to look around, we are a curiosity in a town where very little happens. It is assumed that we are looking around to buy property. What else would Asians want here? The plaza, facing the harbour, pulls us like a magnet every time. Once, when the tide is out, we walk on the squelchy wet sand out to the dhows, watch the repairs in progress, listen to the tock-tock-tock of small hammer on wood, as pull-carts arrive carrying sacks of salt to be loaded.

One afternoon we stop on the main road at the site of the
mwembe kinyonga, the hangman’s mango tree. I first read about this tree in Dar’s daily paper, the
Tanganyika Standard
, as a schoolboy, at about the time of the country’s independence. Julius Nyerere, the prime minister designate, the report said, had visited Kilwa and was taken by the town’s elders to the site where their fathers were hanged for resisting the Germans. A casual bit of news, but it intrigued me sufficiently that this became a place I wished to see someday. But now as we walk over to this almost mythical site, as significant surely as any war memorial elsewhere, it turns out to be a disappointment that signifies to me many things at once. The dead tree—and the hanged men—are memorialized by a rather forlorn white monument standing at the roadside by itself, close to two huts and a vegetable patch; there is no ornamentation or boundary, any relief to give it stature and draw attention. The inscription is crudely painted by hand in black, its uneven lines ending abruptly with broken words. The information presented is inaccurate. This careless memorial is the contribution of the independent African government; and—one thinks in despair—it was probably constructed with foreign aid, anyway. It is further irony that the century-old memorial down the road to two Germans martyred to colonialism is more impressive, the inscriptions precise.

Behind the adjacent hospital is a cemetery that could have been used to bury the hanged.

German colonialism was resisted all along the coast and in parts of the interior, from 1885 to almost 1910. The leaders of these insurgencies showed courage and resilience and fought to the bitter end; sometimes they used Islam as a rallying cry, and only the Germans’ well-equipped and greater numbers, with the aid of sea power, defeated them; when captured, the leaders were hanged from a locally
designated tree. One of those hanged in Kilwa, at its famous tree on the site where I stand, was Hassan Omari Makunganya, a chief of the Yao tribe.

One morning when the German forces based in Kilwa were away in the interior to quell Chief Mkwawa’s now legendary resistance, Hassan Omari attacked the boma with a large force. He almost took it. But the boma proved a good fortress, the askaris with their superior weapons were adequate, and Makunganya was forced to retreat. He continued a guerrilla war in the area, until von Wissmann, the soldier governor in Dar es Salaam (and Bismarck’s personal friend), became utterly exasperated and sent reinforcements to capture the chief. Makunganya fought to the end and was captured but not killed. Von Wissmann himself came to Kilwa to give him a trial, bringing the rope with him to hang Makunganya and three of his companions.

Makunganya was a charismatic figure, and his capture and public hanging from the mango tree by von Wissmann, who himself was already feared and held in much awe in the country, must have been a momentous occasion for Kilwa. It is described in some detail in a Swahili long poem, called “The War Against Hassan bin Omari” by Mwalimu Mbaraka bin Shomari.

There are in fact a number of historical poems describing resistance to the German occupation of mainland Tanzania. Swahili poetry is traditionally a public form. The poems are sung to an audience, always to the same tune, in a low droning intonation. I can recall, while walking in my Kariakoo neighbourhood, hearing poetry recited on the radio somewhere. It is a haunting, unforgettable sound. Even today, Swahili newspapers will devote a column or two to poetry sent in by the public.

Among Makunganya’s collaborators there were four Indian
shopkeepers of Kilwa. According to the poet Mzee bin Ali bin Kidigo bin il-Qadiri, who narrates the proceedings of the trial in his “The Poem of Makunganya,” upon the Indians’ denial of the charges against them, the German officer Hans Zache stormed to their houses and found the incriminating evidence in a book in the house of Kasum Pira. This was presumably a log of the revolution to come, when all the Germans, including Wissmann would be dispatched to Berlin.

By official German accounts the death sentences of the four Indians were commuted to imprisonment and heavy fines. The poet narrates:

The Indians were chained and put into prison

waiting for the steamer. When it arrived they were put into it.

They all travelled, reached Dar es Salaam.

…

They were brought out like slaves, chains cutting them.

Today why regret the trouble you yourselves invited?

From Dar es Salaam, the poet says, they were sent to Tanga to work on the railway, but this is disputed by scholars.

The poet was from Zanzibar and his name implies that he may have been from the Qadiriyya Sufi sect. (I have altered the translation
a little.) His tone is sycophantic towards the Germans and mocking towards Makunganya. Wissmann “has a pure soul,” “is glorious … has no fear,” “is a good man.”

(Such poetry, with “Uncle Tom” attitudes, have been found extremely embarrassing, especially by the intellectuals of the 1960s, who would rather have wished them away. Perhaps there’s greater tolerance—and wisdom—now, enough to separate poetry and history from sycophancy, and even to understand the sycophancy. And with so much dependence on Europe today—even the volume from which I quote the poetry comes from Germany—who dares cast a stone with a clear conscience? We should not forget either that Makunganya himself was a businessman and traded in slaves.)

Mwalimu Shomari, another poet who deals with the subject, leaves no doubt about local feelings following the hanging of Makunganya:

I tell you, my friends

it’s the time of the European

hold on to my words

and avoid trouble

Our grandfathers were diwans

they were sultans

now who knows us

who notices us?

Il-Qadiri’s poem was translated and published by Hans Zache (known locally as Bwana Saha); Mwalimu Shomari’s poem is from an edition by Carl Velten. Both Germans were present at Makunganya’s trial and hanging, as was Mwalimu Shomari, who, according to Velten, helped him translate the letters incriminating the plotters.

There is a Makunganya Street in Dar, next to Indira Gandhi Street. But there is no mention of him on the memorial to the mango tree where he was hanged; it mentions Kinjikitile, the prophet of the great Maji Maji War of 1905–08, as having been hanged there, but according to historical sources, Kinjikitile was captured and executed elsewhere.

We are sitting at the restaurant on the main crossroads one morning, over a breakfast of mandazi and chai. Outside in the glaring sunshine, on the road, as cheerful as ever are the buffed-bodied bus touts. All that coiled-up energy, you feel, bears some menacing potential—perhaps it needs only a spark to set it off? And you wouldn’t want to be in the way. Barely visible across the road is the white German monument. Down from it is the opposition party office, looking lively—it’s hardly surprising for the opposition to have a following in this long-neglected town. We’ve noticed that the breakfast of choice here is “supu”—a beef soup with one big bone in it—and chapati. The only people who can afford it are the bus touts and a few others who look like businessmen.

One such businessman, a slight, well-dressed man in shirt and pressed trousers, upon overhearing our inquiries, volunteers the information that he belongs to the Qadiriyya Sufi tarika (order) and agrees to show us his mosque, which is close by. It turns out to be a fairly new, tall white structure. Outside it stands the sheikh, a handsome, tall, black-bearded African in immaculate white kanzu and cap. Yes, they do the dhikri, the sheikh answers with twinkling eyes, a silent meditation every day, and yes, once in a while they do have the chant—and in a beautiful voice he sings it, “
La illaha ilallah, Muhammadur rasoolullah, Abdul Qadir Jilani
 …” The second name upon whom God’s blessing is invoked is that of the twelfth-century Sufi mystic from Iran, founder of the order, whose branches can be found all over the world. It is an enchanting experience.

Later that morning we have tea with the businessman, and he tells us he is an exporter of timber to Zanzibar and beyond. He has a mill in the forest.

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Photo Caption 7.3
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We return at night from Kilwa Kivinje, the landscape pitch-black except for the occasional solitary lamp outside a dwelling: a family cooking, or sitting down to eat, or simply chatting for a while before turning in. And it hits me, something that is so obvious and that I always knew: so much of the country lies in total darkness at night.

But the African night is unforgettable; it sits forever on your heart.

M
ILTON
’
S
“Q
UILOA
”
WAS
K
ILWA
K
ISIWANI
,
THE
I
SLAND
. A view of the Island is what our beach hotel promises its few visitors, and provides, in the hazy distance towards the southeast; but tourists come to Tanzania for its animals, not its history. Tanzania’s history is of little interest to the world, or even apparently to itself. The Island is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, but that means practically nothing so far.

We decide to visit the Island.

Masoko harbour, a short distance from the hotel, is quiet. Under a large tree some hundred yards from the water a group of men and women stand and sit waiting patiently for something to happen. The two European prospectors from our hotel have flown to Mombasa; their ship, heavy with equipment, is set to depart soon with its Filipino crew to join them. One of the young men waves at us. We hoped to visit the Island by dhow, but the wind is wrong—it will take us three hours to cross the channel by dhow, the motor boat operator tells us, but he can take us in fifteen minutes. We have no choice and negotiate a price. We board the boat, and this being their signal, the waiting men and women come down at a trot to take their seats around us,
without charge—they’re going our way anyway. The sea is choppy, and the full boat cuts diagonally across the channel towards the other shore. When we arrive we remove our shoes and wade to the beach. By this time a man with a cell phone has attached himself to us as guide. He seems quite unnecessary; at the ruins he tells us what’s already on the plaques, which tell us exactly what’s written in our slim volume on ancient Kilwa. The published literature on the ruins is sparse and out of print. Here, at the site, there is no resident office, no literature; no one who knows anything more than us.