HOW I TRACED MY GRANDFATHER

THE year was 1969 and I was doing my Form Four at Lusaka’s Matero Boys Secondary School run by the Marianist Brothers of the United States of America. One evening – I can’t remember the exact month but it was during the winter season- my father returned home from an outing and, out of the blue, asked me whether I was aware that his biological father was still alive. “What do you mean, dad?” I asked, surprised. “Your dad died six years ago. You told us yourself that the old man had died of T.B in Fort Jameson (Chipata) and that he was even buried there because the family did not have the resources to transport the body to Lundazi for burial. Are you now saying that he has since risen from the dead for you tell me that he is still alive?” I could see that my father was placed in a tight corner. Yes, he remembered giving me such information. So how was he to explain it to me in a language which I could understand? After all, I was his first born and I needed to get things right so that I too was able to explain it properly to my younger brothers and sisters. “You are right my son,” he said after pondering over my question for a short while. “The old man you knew – the one who died of T.B in Fort Jameson in 1963 was indeed your grandfather but he is not the one who bore me, your aunt Vainess and your young fathers Brighton and Boniface. The four of us, our father is different.” PHILIP(surprised): “How? You mean the late Hoba Chirwa was not your real father?” MY FATHER: “He was my father, of course, and that’s why he took such good care of us.” PHILIP: “So?” MY FATHER: “So what? All I am saying is that Hoba Chirwa was your grandfather but not the one who bore me, your aunt Vainess and your young fathers Brighton and Boniface. Or if I may put it this way, how many grandmothers do you have at our village as of now?” PHILIP: “Two!” MY FATHER: “Who are these?” PHILIP: “Mukhumata and Enesi.” MY FATHER: “You are aware that your aunts Esida and Tafwilapo and your fathers Fumuya and Mbindingu are born of Mukhumata’s womb while your aunt Vainess, your young fathers Brighton, Boniface and I are born of Enesi’s womb, right?” PHILIP: “That I know very well dad.” MY FATHER: “So what I am telling you now is that Mukhumata’s and Enesi’s children are born of a different father and a different mother. Is that clear, my son?” PHILIP: “But you didn’t tell us that dad. What I thought was that Mukhumata’s children and Enesi’s children shared one father but different mothers.” MY FATHER: “That’s the impression that we wanted you to have and I was to keep this secret to my grave had it not been for what I have been told today.” PHILIP: “What have you been told dad? You old people know how to keep secrets!” MY FATHER: “The father to a friend and workmate of mine has told me that my biological father, Falo Chirwa, is still alive and deeply involved in religious activities in South Africa!” PHILIP(excitedly): “Are you telling me dad? Can that be true?” MY FATHER: “My friend’s father swears upon the grave of his dead grandfather that my father is still alive and kicking!” PHILIP: “When did you last see your father?” MY FATHER: “When I was only nine years old…..” PHILIP(interrupting): “What!” MY FATHER: “Yes, you have got it right – when I was only ten years old! Your aunt Vainess was about seven years old, Brighton five and Boniface three.” PHILIP: “No wonder you decided to forget about him and concentrate on calling gogo Hoba as your real father. All of you are now married and raising your own children and it was gogo Hoba who paid malobolo (bride price) for all the three of you.” MY FATHER: “Correct. And he didn’t discriminate. He treated all of us – Mukhumata’s children and Enesi’s children - equally.” PHILIP: “Even me I grew up in Mukhumata’s house. She loved grandchildren unlike gogo Enesi who considered herself too smart to entertain bazukulu! But who was older between Hoba and Falo?” MY FATHER: “Father Hoba was the senior of the two. He was the first born, followed by my father Falo. Remember that the two were blood brothers sharing one father and one mother. Traditionally, even though I am older than all of Mukhumata’s sons, they are my elder brothers because their father was older than my father. They call me elder brother purely out of respect for my age.” PHILIP: “Interesting. Now tell me, dad, did the two brothers have a sister or not? If so, I have never heard of her or them.” MY FATHER: “They had one sister called Lontiya who got married to a Malawian husband. I spent part of my childhood with her at Nkata Bay. But later, my father’s elder brother Hoba called me back to Northern Rhodesia (Zambia) where I grew up until I got married to your mother. My father, Falo, had already left for South Africa by then.” PHILIP: “So it is possible that we have a lot of Chirwas in South Africa who are either our fathers or aunts, brothers or sisters.” MY FATHER: “Obviously.” He then started explaining in detail how he stumbled upon the news of his biological father being still alive… My father used to work for Government Stores in Lusaka as a general worker. He worked there from 1956 to 1977 when he retired and went back to our village of Kahomango in Senior Chief Mwase’s area of Lundazi district. My mother joined him in 1961 along with my immediate younger sister, Juliana, and I, the two of us having been born in the village. By 1969, my family had increased by four additional children, two males and two females. Mid that year, a number of Zambians were expelled from South Africa by the then racist white regime as a punitive measure against Zambia for supporting the African National Congress and other liberation movements in southern Africa. One of these expelled Zambians happened to be the father to a Mr Zimba, who also worked for Government Stores and was a close friend of my father. After he knocked off from work, my father decided to accompany his friend Mr Zimba to his house in Chingwere Township (in our case we lived on the southern edge of Matero Suburb). Mr Zimbia Sr gave a graphic account of how he and his colleagues were expelled from Nelspruit, in the Transvaal area of South Africa (now Mpumalanga Province) and put on a train to Zambia through then Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) then under rebel leader Ian Smith who had declared UDI (Unilateral Declaration of Independence) on November 11, 1965. During the course of the discussion, my father revealed that his father had also gone to work in South Africa but was not sure whether he was still alive or dead because he left Zambia many years ago when he, my father, was only ten years old. “I was born in 1929 and am told my father left Northern Rhodesia for South Africa in 1939, never to return home, leaving behind four children, including me,” he told the old man. Upon hearing this, the old man allegedly asked my father, “What’s the name of your father?” “Mr Falo Chirwa,” my father replied. ZIMBA Sr(apparently surprised): “Mr Falo Chirwa from where?” MY FATHER: “From Kahomango Village, Chief Mwase, Lundazi.” Mr Zimba Sr stared at my father for a moment, then he said: “I can’t believe this! I hope I am not dreaming. When I look at you, you remind me of my friend Falo Chirwa I used to live with in Nelspruit, Transvaal. He is an elder in Open Door Church, is married to a Sotho woman with whom he has seven children. He kept telling me that he left four children back home but was not sure whether they were still alive or not.” MY FATHER: “That must be my father!” ZIMBA Sr: “I have no doubt about it because you resemble him so much.” According to my father(now late), the old man gave him Falo Chirwa’s address in Nelspruit and asked him to try his luck. But my father decided to give the assignment to me as the long-lost old man’s first grandson. I accepted the assignment with relish because I was keen to establish contact with the biological father of my father, having lost our loving grandfather Hoba Chirwa, many years before. This is how I wrote to my grandfather: “Dear my grandfather. I know you will be surprised to receive a letter from someone you have never seen in your life. Well, let me introduce myself. My names are Philip Chirwa, the first born son of Mr Falison Chirwa, the first born son of Mr Falo Chirwa, who is supposed to be you, and one Enesi Tembo. We are six in my mother’s womb, three males and four females. “An old man by the name of Mr Zimba has told my father that he used to live with a friend called Falo Chirwa in Nelspruit and it is through him that we got your address. If you are my long lost grandfather, Falo,(which I am sure you are) let me inform you that all the four children you left behind are still alive, married and raising their own children. You have not less than 21 grandchildren among them! “As your first grandson, currently doing Form Four in Lusaka, I would be extremely happy and excited to receive a letter from you confirming that you are indeed still alive and kicking. Anxiously waiting to hear from you. Your loving grandson, Philip.” My father gave me money for postage and I posted the South African-destined letter using the Main Post Office in Cairo Road. Then I waited. One, two months passed, there was no reply. Then, one morning, our office orderly at Matero Boys Secondary School brought in a letter whilst I was attending an English language class. I looked at the envelope – it had a Nelspruit date stamp with a note on top ‘PLEASE DON’T FOLD’. I knew immediately it was my longawaited reply. I put the letter in my school bag for reading later. And when I eventually opened the letter, the first thing to attract my eyes was a studio photo of an old man with a fat brown-complexioned woman seated together on a bench. Even before I read the letter, I knew that the old man in the photo was my long-lost grandfather Falo Chirwa because he bore such remarkable resemblance with his late elder brother, Hoba Chirwa. In his letter, which was spiced with a lot of Biblical quotations, the old man said he cried with joy the first time he read my letter. He was particularly excited, he said, to learn that all the children he had left behind were still alive, married and raising their own children. He thanked God for having made it possible for him to establish contacts with his family. He said he was married to a South African Sotho woman with whom he had seven children, four sons and three daughters, all of whom were also married and raising their own children. This meant that he had eleven children in all, I also sent him photos of my family in Zambia, including all of us Lusaka-based grandchildren. From that moment, we started exchanging letters until I completed my Form Five in 1970 and started work with Zambia Daily Mail in January, 1971. Towards the end of 1971, I asked my grandfather to come to Zambia so that he would see the other part of his family. He readily admitted, saying that although he had taken up South African citizenship, he was prepared to return home for good because he did not want to die in a foreign country. He asked me to send him money as proof that he had a family here because his employers in South Africa were convinced that he had no family in Zambia, having left the country many years ago at the outbreak of the Second World War. That did not pose any problem for me since I was now working. I remember sending him something like 48 pounds in British currency mid-1972. Then there was silence, only to hear towards the end of the year that my grandfather had arrived at our village in Lundazi via Malawi! He had posed as a Malawian and joined a group of Malawian migrant workers returning home from South Africa after being informed that Ian Smith had closed its border with Zambia. From Malawi, he asked his way to Zambia and finally to our village. Fortunately for him, his original wife, Enesi, the mother to my father and his siblings, was still alive and the two “remarried” as husband and wife. I immediately applied for leave to go and see him. It was the happiest and most memorable day of my life when we met face to face. Seeing him seated there immediately reminded me of his late elder brother, Hoba Chirwa, who had looked after us and our parents so well. In memory of our first encounter, I surrendered my first suit (the one I bought from my third salary at the Zambia Daily Mail) to him. I visited him almost every after two years before he passed on in October, 1982, at Lundazi District Hospital, his wife having preceded him five years earlier. Meanwhile, during my three-year stay in South Africa as a diplomat based at the Zambia High Commission in Pretoria, I visited Nelspruit (now renamed Mombela) several times on duty and as we drove around the area, I could not help talking to myself: “So my late grandfather ‘chonaed’ here. The world is small.”