Week Seven Storytelling: How Kengi Lost Her Child

African Mother and Child. John Warburton-Lee.

Today was easily the worst day of my young life. The day started out as any other, I woke up, took my daily walk around our hut, and began to cook the first meal of the day for Nenpetro, my husband, and Gunga, the other wife. Gunga and I have been on strange terms since our quarrel in the garden a few weeks ago.

Nenpetro gave us each a plot of land on which to plant maize, beans, and cassava for us to eat. The land that we were allotted was excellent, yielding much food for our family until Gunga took beans from my land. Naturally, I was quite upset with her, as the beans belonged to Nenpetro and I. In order to show that all was good, we decided on a rule that I had no idea would later ruin me.

The rule of our land was that anything born on the farm belonged to the woman who owned that particular farm. I just knew that this rule would help solve my problems with Gunga and could help our relationship flourish from the broken thing it was.

This morning, I awoke with some strange pains in my side. After cooking our first meal for the family, I went outside to the farm when the pain became too much. I asked Gunga for some tobacco to help curb the pain, as I did not have any tobacco in my farm. Gunga told me to sit down in her garden and smoke the pain away.

As I was sitting on Gunga's land, I bore my child. I knew it was coming but it came as more of a surprise to me. I had no thoughts that I was on Gunga's land or that she could take possession of my child, but Gunga was not the woman I thought she was. She took the child as her own and would not give him to me. I was distraught at the fact that she had my child and let a stupid rule get in the way of myself and my child.

We resolved to go to the town of Manilombi tell him our grievances with one another. We told him the sad story, going all the way back to Gunga taking my beans. He agreed with our original rule, nothing that anything born on Gunga's land belonged to Gunga, including my child.

I will never forgive Gunga for taking my child, even within her legal right.


Author's Note:
The story, "How Kengi Lost Her Child," revolves around two women, Gunga and Kengi. Each woman was given land by their husband. One woman took some beans from the other's land and the quarrel resulted in the rule that if anything was made on one's land, whatever was made there would be the property of the one who owned the land. Kengi had her child on Gunga's land and it was decided that the child would belong to Gunga.

I decided to write this story from the eyes of Kengi, the woman who lost her own child due to rules that she worked to put in place. She goes through so much misery after the loss of her child to Gunga and I wanted to explore her side of the story via a diary entry.

Bibliography
Book Title: Notes on the Folklore of the Fjort
Story Title: How Kengi Lost Her Child
Author: Richard Edward Denett
Year: 1898