Holes

After just a few days in Swaziland, I noticed that many of the women and men from about 50 years old and up had holes in their ears, often in both earlobes. These aren't the small holes that one has when they get their ears "pierced" as we think of in America. Nor are these the large holes held open by "spacers" as some of the kids have in America. I was curious.

As I was reading a book about Swaziland (that I ordered from Amazon before I left for Swaziland) called "The Kingdom of Roses and Thorns", I soon learned about this cultural mark.  The book follows the lives of five Swazi women, and was written by Debra Liebenow Daly. The book outlines that in 1968, when Swaziland gained its independence from Great Britain, King Sobhuza (the current King's father) issued a royal decree that Swazi children should "open their ears" to the king. He was to be recognized as the ruler of Swaziland. The chiefs (there is a chief of every little township in Swaziland) took this decree of the king literally, and ordered the Swazi soldiers to slash large holes in all of the Swazi children's earlobes. An excerpt from the book:

"One soldier held a child down while another soldier took a long rusty knife and carved a hole into each of the child's earlobes. Then that soldier pushed a dirty stick through the earlobe to keep open the piercing."

This seemed slightly barbaric to me, but I confirmed the story with a gogo "granny" (how we refer to older women here) and with one of my co-workers at St. Theresa's. They both recall the day vividly and stated they were scared but were told not to cry or they would be cursed. They went to the chief's area of rule, and a hole was cut in each ear. Afterwards, a "small piece of wood" was placed into each earlobe. My co-worker Martin said it hurt quite a bit (no anesthesia was given), but they realized this was a matter of Swazi culture. I asked him why he didn't pull out the stick and he said he would have gotten in big trouble! (The sticks were eventually removed once the holes had healed open). 

I am not quite sure when this tradition fell by the wayside, but it is no longer practiced.  There is just the ever-present reminder of the practice when you look at the ears of any middle-aged or elderly Swazi.