10,000 young women parade for Mswati
Two of the ten thousand at the reed dance.
I hear that just this Monday, ten thousand half naked young women paraded themselves before King Mswati so that he could choose his fourteenth- yes you heard me FOURTEENTH wife!
The bugger! I can’t get one girl friend and he had ten thousand women to choose from- above the thirteen he has already married.
Ok, I suppose I’m being insensitive here. I should be thinking of the poor girls who are forced by “tradition” to go through with this miserable excercise. I can imagine many of them hiding in the crowds hoping not to get noticed by the King.
And they came down the hill in their thousands...
But then again it seems that some were eager beavers. Tenene Dhlamini, a sixteen year old who took part in the annual Umhlanga Reed Dance, dressed only in a traditional brown skirt, was reported saying : “I came here to dance. I wish the king would have chosen me because it’s nice at the king’s place. The wives live a nice life.”
To take part in the dance, a girl must be older than 13 and a virgin. In 2005, more than 50,000 young women were in the parade. This gets crazier. What a way to choose a wife. I can imagine myself walking up to a Harare girl in the middle of town and saying, “Hey, I like the way you look. Come and be my wife.” It seems utterly nonsensical- unless you are thinking with your gonads.
I can imagine that the King is the envy of many of his fellow countrymen, but he has human rights groups up in arms. In a country that has one of the highest HIV infection rates in the world his behaviour is seen as irresponsible and immoral. The fear is that the “one partner” message that activists push is a bit irrelevant if the King himself ignores it.
It just struck me that I myself could have fourteen wives if I wished. Under traditional marriage in Zimbabwe, I could marry more than one wife. I’ll give it some thought then let you know what I’ve decided…
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The caption to that second foto should read: “And they came down the hill in all their glory”
Imagine your own mudhara doing that. Ma 1