The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind (11 page)

In a normal courtship, if a girl likes a guy enough, she’ll ask him to come meet her family. He’ll then visit for several weekends in a row. If all goes well and the guy senses he’s safe with the family, he’ll propose marriage. The girl will say, “Okay, let me go talk with my uncle.” The girl will then speak to her mother about the matter. The mother will talk to the father, who will speak to his wife’s brother. The uncle then approaches the groom’s uncle and the two men convene. The bride’s uncle then names the price of the dowry—usually money, anywhere upwards of one hundred thousand kwacha, or livestock, such as a cow. The bride’s uncle will also be given a “mouth fee,” for speaking on behalf of his family. All of this happens before the wedding is even planned.

In addition to the dowry, the groom’s family also pays for the ceremony and reception: all the food, drinks, transport—spending big if he’s any kind of
bwana.
For a man, weddings are expensive, which explains why there are so many young, single men in Malawi.

My sister Annie’s fiancé did none of this. Three weeks after she dis
appeared, my father received a letter from Mike’s parents informing my parents of the marriage, and how the couple planned to stay in Ntchisi. It then gave instructions on where to collect the dowry, just a few hundred kwacha, of which only half arrived. It would be more than a year before we heard from my sister again.

M
Y FATHER’S SPIRIT SEEMED
to disappear in the days after my sister left. He was no longer his upbeat, optimistic self, and his laughter was noticeably missing from the compound, as if the wind had come along and stolen one of our houses. He seemed to grow increasingly quiet and sullen, which did little to help our confidence in the face of looming hunger. We were all upset about Annie, but what we didn’t admit was that her absence now meant a little more food. With her gone, each person got an extra mouthful at supper.

About a week later, my mother was coming home from selling cakes in the trading center when a thirty-ton lorry passed her on the road. Its load was covered with tarps. A few traders nearby said it was full of maize and headed for the ADMARC in Chamama. When my mother got home, she told us the news and called me over.

“You will go to Chamama tomorrow. Leave as early as possible.”

Chamama was fifteen kilometers away, so of course I grumbled.

“Are you positive it was maize and not fertilizer, because if—”

“Are you listening to me, boy? You go tomorrow.”

If my mother was right, this was great news. Maize was now selling for eight hundred kwacha a pail in the trading center and was sure to increase even more in the coming months. If we could get it cheaper at the ADMARC, then the extra bag or two would help us a great deal.

The next morning I awoke at 5:00
A.M.,
got on my bicycle, and headed for Chamama. I took the shortcuts through the fields to get there faster, but it didn’t really matter. The trails were full of people going in the same direction. All of us carried empty flour sacks.

“Chamama?” I shouted.

“Ehhh,”
they answered.

The ADMARC was located in the center of Chamama’s trading center, along a gravel road amid a row of white, one-story storefronts. The building itself was white with blue trim along the windows, housed behind a wire fence and surrounded by metal sheds that normally held all the grain.

I couldn’t believe what I saw when I got there. The lines stretched from the doors of ADMARC all the way down the road, as long as a soccer pitch at least. One line was for men, the other for women, and each became longer by the minute. I parked my bike against the fence and went and took my place.

At 6:15
A.M.,
the sky was still a bit dark. The weather was cool and pleasant and people seemed in good spirits. But once the scorching sun rose in the sky, I suddenly became aware of how devastating the hunger was for everyone. All around me people appeared weak and exhausted, as if they hadn’t slept. The skin around their cheeks was shrunken, and their eyes were pinched against the light. They probably hadn’t eaten much in weeks, and I suspected the ADMARC was their only salvation. If things went badly for them here, they probably wouldn’t get any better. As the air became thicker and hotter, they began to wilt like potted plants in the sun.

An old man in front of me could hardly stay awake. His hands trembled as if he was cold, and his breathing was heavy. When the line advanced a step, his body couldn’t follow, and he collapsed to the ground. To my horror, the crowd simply stepped over him. In the next line, babies cried and wailed from hunger, and children tugged on their mothers’ dresses, begging for breakfast. If there’s anything I remember most about that day in Chamama, it’s the sound of crying babies.

As the morning dragged on, people began selling their places in line. These men had no money, but they had arrived around 3:00
A.M.
and secured a good spot in line. As they neared the building, they turned to the person behind them and said, “Hold my place,
eh?
” then walked to the back of the line. They found the person shaking most from hunger,
the man whose eyes were dim and dancing in their sockets, and told him, “I’m ten minutes from the door. You can have my spot in exchange for a little maize on your way out.” People jumped at the offer. This happened all day.

That morning, my mother had dipped into her inventory and given me a cake for the journey, which had sat like a stone in my empty stomach. But after many hours in line, I became very hungry and weak myself. The heat from the other bodies was like being surrounded in fire. People began smelling bad, and my head felt like a plastic
jumbo,
caught in the wind and drifting into the sun. Even my fingers were sweating.

As we inched closer to the door, people became impatient and began pushing. They simply couldn’t wait any longer. Someone pushed me so hard from behind that I had to grab hold of the man in front of me just to keep from falling down. Soon people began running from the back and squeezing in front, twisting and squirming into the line like mice under a door.

“
Eh,
stop cutting!” people screamed, the hunger straining their voices.

“We woke up with the first cock! We’ve been here all day!”

But people still kept coming. Everyone knew there was only one truck of grain, and it would run out eventually. The more people cut in line, the more the others panicked.

Both lines mobbed the front doors. The wave of bodies surged behind me, pinning me against the man in front. I couldn’t breathe. I planted my feet to keep from falling, but when I leaned sideways for some air—no more than three inches—the man behind me tumbled forward and sparked a chain reaction. Four men collapsed on top of him, causing a great crash of knees and elbows. Once the dam had broken, the crowd rushed over them to fill the empty space.

As the mob swallowed me again, a strange thing happened. Everything went quiet. The screams and moaning of children fell away, along with my own fear. I looked out through the tangle of faces, fingers, and teeth and saw my great reward. The ADMARC building lay just ahead, only a few short meters away. A shallow rain ditch circled the building like a castle moat, and in my misery, that ditch became like the great river Jor
dan. There I was, standing atop the mountain, peering into the Promised Land. All I had to do was make it across the water.

Twenty minutes later, with a few more surges of the crowd, I felt my feet clear the distance. A second later, I was inside. The ADMARC office was quiet and peaceful and the air suddenly became cool and fresh. Ahead of me, I saw a hill of maize as high as my waist, more food than I’d seen in months. The sight was intoxicating.

But just as I stepped inside, I heard more commotion near the door, where I’d just been standing. Two workers now stood before the crowd and made an announcement: “Ladies and gentlemen,” one said, “we’re sorry, but we have only ten bags left—”

The crowd didn’t wait for him to finish. The riot I’d just escaped now exploded into one giant fight. Men used their fists to claw their way forward. I saw a woman fall to the ground and vanish. Another man was dragged to the dirt and trampled. Just near the door, several women carrying infants jumped out of the line to avoid being crushed. These women had been there since sunrise, but by pulling themselves out of the fracas, they also lost their places. I watched them walk away with nothing, wondering if they’d make it through the month.

Turning away from the violence outside, I realized it was my turn in line. I had four hundred kwacha in my pocket. It was enough to buy twenty-five kilograms of maize, which was the advertised limit. But now at the seller’s table, I was told I could purchase only twenty. The price remained the same.

“So how much do you want?” the man asked.

“Twenty.”

He gave me a ticket and pointed down the line. At the other end, workers used metal pails to scoop the maize. The men looked muscular and healthy, nothing like the people outside. The worker who measured my maize then cheated me. He filled my pail very quickly then tossed it onto the scale, causing the needle to bounce wildly from one end to the next. But before it could settle, he whipped it off and emptied it into my sack.

“Next!”

“But wait! You didn’t—”

“If you don’t like it, you can leave your maize here! There are plenty of people behind you.
Next!
”

With little else to do, I handed him my money, grabbed my maize, and ran for the door, as if I’d just robbed the place. Despite being cheated, I felt like I was on top of the world, the jackpot winner. But my joy quickly turned to fear as I stepped outside into the mob.

A man rushed toward me, shouting, “I’ll give you five hundred for that!”

Another pushed him aside. “No, boy, I’ll give you six hundred!”

I pretended not to listen, concentrating only on strapping the bag to my bike and getting away. The next person could easily just beat me and steal my food. Once I reached the road, I never stopped pedaling. Later, we heard that there were riots at other ADMARC buildings across Malawi, where several children fell from their mothers’ backs and were trampled.

At home, my sisters and parents welcomed me back like a hero from the war. I must’ve looked exhausted, and my clothes were stretched and dirty. I tossed the bag onto my father’s scale and confirmed I’d been robbed. I’d only received fifteen kilos of maize, half a bag, but at least that would feed us for another week.

S
OON AFTER
I
RETURNED
from Chamama, people began selling their possessions.

Standing on the porch one morning during a heavy rain, I watched a line of people walking slowly past like a great army of ants. They were our neighbors and farmers from other villages. The women carried large basins atop their heads containing the items from their kitchens, all their pots and pans, water buckets, even bundles of clothing. A man carried a chicken under each arm. Goats were bound by the leg with a vine, crying and
baaing
as they were dragged through the mud. Men balanced sofas, chairs, and tables across their backs and shoulders, their heads bent and faces
twisted under the weight. They stopped to rest every few meters, exhausted from hunger, before hoisting their heavy loads and continuing on.

At my feet, Khamba lay spread out on the ground, lazily flipping his tail at the flies that had sought shelter under the porch. He was growing even thinner. Our one meal a day didn’t include my dog, and some days, I was forced to eat what I’d normally give him. I felt so guilty that most of the time I tried to avoid him completely. But this morning he’d found me, and together we watched the people on the road.

They all seemed to be in a great rush to get somewhere, to unload these worldly items and put something in their stomachs. They hardly seemed to notice the rain, which had become so heavy their bodies blurred into watery spirits.

I waited for the rain to taper off, then followed them down the muddy trail to the trading center. The rainy season normally doesn’t deter the market women, who stand out all day under giant umbrellas and never get wet. But today their wooden stalls in the market were empty. Many of the shops along the main road were also shuttered, but this was no ghost town. As a light shower fell, the market women and most everyone else now crammed the main road, looking for food. Most normal, everyday trading was now being replaced with the business of survival.

Usually people who wanted to sell their possessions would spread out tarpaulins to display what they had. But now they walked from person to person, saying,
“Ndiri ndi malonda.
I’ve got something to sell. How about this radio? It’s yours for a giveaway price.”

Those carrying furniture weren’t able to squeeze under the awnings for shelter, and the rain soaked the tables and sofas on their backs. But still they continued on.

“Don’t worry about the water,” said a man with a nervous grin. “This is hardwood, it won’t ruin. You’ll have this chair into your old years. How much do you have? I’ll take anything. My children need to eat.”

A few of the businessmen like Mister Mangochi bought things they later gave back. But most people had no money. They simply shrugged and shook their heads.

Crowds now gathered around the few traders who were selling imported maize. The prices were so high that the traders were practically regarded as criminals.

“You people are thieves!” people shouted.

“Who’s setting these prices?”

“You’re killing our children!”

Soon people began selling the iron sheets off their homes for a cup of flour, and their thatched roofs for even less.

“What good is a roof when I’m dead?” one man asked.

A man in the trading center was caught trying to sell his two young daughters. The buyer had informed the police. People were becoming desperate.

By now the December rains had caused the grass to grow very high by the roadsides. And since people were becoming weak or were out looking for food, the grass went untrimmed. The tall grass made a perfect hiding place for thieves, and soon women were being attacked and robbed as they left the maize mill. One morning as I walked home along the mill road, I saw a young mother standing alone, sobbing. The crime had just occurred.