A CAHIR MISSIONARY IN ZANZIBAR

New Zealand Tablet, 13 June 1918, Page 31

A CAHIR MISSIONARY IN ZANZIBAR

(By Rev. 11. 'Gog arty, C.S.Sp., of Cahir, Co. Tipperary, in the Catholic Record.) Gathering nuts brings back scenes in the vales and on the hills of Tipperary, when in late August and September a band of schoolboys would rush to the hazelwoods scrambling for the ripened fruit hanging from the branches. To-day, far from Ireland, in the island of Zanzibar, lost in the Indian Ocean, 1 was only a spectator of a scene in which cocoanuts were gathered by experts. A few days before, I had arrived from East Africa on an hospital ship, and was very anxious to see what I could of the people and their ways during my stay. So when one of the missionary fathers asked me to go and see him gathering in his small crop of nuts— to be sold later on, for missionary fathers do not live on air—l was only too- glad. The “Shamba” —as a man’s private land is called here —was situated about three miles from the town, so, having passed through the narrow, twisted streets, 1 got on to the new road bordered with casuarinas, which ran between the pleasure grounds of the city, lately reclaimed from the sea, but now well laid out. In a few minutes my bicycle had brought me to the hill on which lies the Shamba. The hill is named by the natives “Kiinua-miguu,” which means “ Lift-up-your-feet. A person interested in psychology would see in this a great revelation of native temperament. This hill is the first he meets when coming out of town. Now, a native is like a European or an Asiatic in this, that he always remarks when he is called on to make an effort, and all the world over it requires more of an effort to go up a hill than to slidder down one, or even to walk on the level. So the natives of Zanzibar town named this, the first hill on the road, “Kiinga-miguu” : “Lift-up-your-feet, ” When 1 got to the Shamba the work had already begun. The trees were twenty to forty feet high, and not a branch from the roots to the top, where, under a tuft of long green leaves, the great nuts were not ripening. The experts were two blacks, one Heri, broad chested, muscular, of a gay and humorous disposition, his teeth shining in his smiles fairer than an actresses’. He carried a knife, worn from work, but cutting like a razor. He had in his hand a band of rope, to which he suddenly gave a twist, passed it round the sole of each foot, put his hands to a tree, gave a spring, drew his feet up, grasping the tree between the soles, while the rope, thus drawn taut against the tree, prevented any chance of slipping backward. Again he stretched up his arms, and then, like a frog, followed with a spring. His companion, Faradiah, did likewise, a little way from him at another tree. He was tall and thin, and had not so much stamina. They had this in common—they laughed and sang at their work. They rested half way up, leaning back from the tree, sang out snatches of song or long, low jerks of whistling sounds, like the native birds. When Heri arrived at the top he'pulled out the dangerous-looking knife, tapped at the nuts to see which were already ripe, and then sent them down with a slash to the ground, where they fell with a thud and a hop. Then he sang out, “Ho tena win.” “Ho, mark it down in ink.” _ This cry was to a little black, a scholar, with the high-sounding name of James Bridgewater, who, standing at a safe distance from the trees, noted down with pencil and paper each tree that Heri and Faradiah climbed. - An old man, very old, now came to me. His name was John King. His life story is a wonderful one, and may .be summed up in one word—“globetrotter.” He was born in 'Mozambique, he told mo, many years —the number exactly was a matter of indifference. He was born a free man, he insisted, in contradistinction to the blacks of Zanzibar, who are liberated slaves or the children of such. Further, he is a Roman (sic) and not a Mohammedan. When he

said Roman, with an insistence on the word, my thoughts reverted to St. Raul many centuries ago, who relied, too, on the fact that he was a Roman, though in another sense, in order to have the protection of so great a name and honor. At an early age John King started on his. travels in a sailing ship. He followed the sun sinking in the west, even to the Pillars of Hercules, visiting all the great ports of the Mediterranean. He went as far north as London, which he left as quickly as possible because of the cold and the fog. Again he set out westwards, to the Indies, rounded Cape Horn, and ran up before the Trades to San Francisco. Between that and Zanzibar he did not leave a great port unvisited : Tokio, Hong-Kong, Calcutta, and Bombay are as familiar to him as the ports on the coast of Africa. One of his great exploits was to help the French to dig the Suez Canal. C, Whilst John was entertaining me with his adventures the work went on rapidly, the nuts were rattling down ’mid much singing and whistling. The sun became hoter as mid-day approached .and I was glad to be in the shade of the palms, with the great leaves rustling and crackling as they swayed with the light sea breeze. Heri provided us with a cool, refreshing drink. By mistake ho had cut down here and there an unripe cocoauut, called “dafu,” the interior of which was still in a liquid state. This milk, as it is termed in places, is sweet, cool, and refreshing. Heri, with the awful knife slipped the top off a “dafu” as if it were an egg he was dealing with, and handed it to me as a waiter would a rich goblet. The nuts were now gathered and brought to the lodge, where they lay, looking withered and worn, having survived storms from the bay and other dangers peculiar to the cocoanuts and to the trees which bear them. Two of these dangers are very strange — one a beetle, the other a large crab. The beetle burrows to the centre of the tree, and there her young find rich feasting on the very heart of the tree, causing it to wither and die. The crab comes from the —a large red fellow, —and burrows under the roots to make to himself a nest on dry land. A long journey still lies before these nuts. The inner kernel, called copra, is exported in large quantities to Europe, and oil is extracted, or it is made into artificial “butter” and used as a ration in the French army. The children in Zanzibar regard it without any transformation as a tit-bit. The husk is dried and used for fuel, or fibre is extracted from it and made into rough cordage. The cocoanut plantations are now becoming one of the great investments of Zanzibar, and many hundred tons of copra are loaded yearly on to the many ships which pass on the way to Europe. At last I bade farewell to John, so full of information and so eager to communicate it. He went back to his little house over the sea, whence he could hear the swish and roll of the waves on the shores, and catch sight of the ships coming to and from the many seas Oil which he had sailed.