A Girl Named Disaster

“The room behind the woman was full of wonderful things, but what interested Nhamo most was the little girl. She was wearing a blue dress, and her hair was tattered into two fat puffs over her ears. The woman smiled at her in the kindest way, and Nhamo knew the white bread and yellow margarine were meant for the little girl. She thought the woman looked like Mother.”

Nhamo’s magazine cover is symbolic of comfort and belonging (See: Symbols & Motifs). She cherishes the cover, because she sees the woman in the image as her late mother and the little girl as herself. Nhamo has grown up with a maternal absence, and thus craves maternal love and care. The magazine cover offers her the illusion of these comforts, becoming her talisman throughout her wilderness adventures.

“Nhamo lay awake and tried to sort out her thoughts. Could she have been mistaken about the shadow by the stream? She was certain it was a trick of the light, but everyone else took the appearance of a leopard spirit seriously. It was almost, she thought as she rolled a sleeping toddler back onto her own mat, as if they were expecting it to appear. And as if they were expecting it to come looking for her.”

Nhamo’s leopard encounter complicates how she sees herself, her role in the village, and her connection with the spirit world. When she tells her family about her leopard sighting, she embellishes the story to get attention. However, her family still believes that the leopard is a bad omen. The Shona people regard animals as possible reincarnations of wandering or angry spirits. Therefore, Nhamo’s leopard encounter forebodes danger in her future. It also worsens her alienation from her family and community.

“After a while, the conversation reverted to roora, the bride-prices that had been paid for various relatives. This was a very popular topic of conversation. Fathers counted on the wealth they would get for their daughters. How else could they be rewarded for raising otherwise useless girls? How else could they afford to buy wives for their sons and ensure that they would eventually become ancestors?”

Nhamo garners much of her social, cultural, and spiritual understanding from listening to the villagers’ conversations. Their dialogue about marriages, daughters, and dowries during Masvita’s mhandara celebration heightens Nhamo’s alienation and isolation. She doesn’t have a mother or father, and therefore offers no value to her family. Nhamo’s future is uncertain, because she’s a young orphan girl who’s historically been rejected by her community. This conversation therefore signals The Quest for Freedom and Belonging Nhamo soon must undergo.

“Nhamo understood that most witches were tolerated, as you might tolerate a bad dog in the neighborhood. But if someone had done something really evil—like spread cholera, for instance—wouldn’t that person be punished? Nhamo had heard a story of a witch who had her eyes poked out with a sharpened stick.”

Nhamo’s Shona traditions and beliefs inspire her fear of being seen as a witch. Nhamo has always been different from her female cousins and peers. Therefore, when she starts seeing the leopards and survives the cholera epidemic, she worries that she has a dark and wicked force inside of her. Her cultural and social environs complicate how she sees and understands herself, reflecting The Impact of Social and Environmental Challenges.

“‘If only I had kept Runako at home,’ said Grandmother as she cleaned the last crumbs of sadza from her bowl. ‘She met a boy at that school. He was called Proud Jongwe.’ Ambuya spat out the words. ‘Proud! I should like to know what he was proud of. Useless would have been a better name […] Poor Runako. She seemed so intelligent, but they say girls turn stupid for a few years after they become women.’”

Nhamo’s understanding of her parents originates from her family’s stories about Runako and Proud. Since Nhamo loves, trusts, and respects Grandmother, when she hears her story about Runako and Proud’s relationship, Nhamo feels disheartened. Grandmother sees Proud as Runako’s ruin, blaming him for what happened to her daughter and granddaughter. Nhamo internalizes this tale and starts to see her father as a villain.

“It walked into the village. It did not kill a goat or a chicken. It walked past a small child and took her mother, is it not so? […] Then, when this girl approached the age of womanhood, the leopard came again. It appeared to her by the water—to her alone—and it spoke to her in the banana grove by night. Its footprints were seen in the dust of graves. You all know that the totem of Goré Mtoko’s family is the leopard. The solution to this problem is very clear.”

The muvuki’s interpretation of Nhamo’s family’s situation worsens Nhamo’s alienation and entrapment. As the muvuki is respected by the villagers, Nhamo’s family heeds his warnings about Nhamo’s parents and decides to marry her off to Zororo. This decision catalyzes Nhamo’s journey into the wilderness, thus spurring The Quest for Freedom and Belonging.

“‘You have to. If I could come along…’ Ambuya sighed. ‘Well, I can’t, and that’s that. I know all about Zororo. Believe me, you wouldn’t last a year before he either beat you to death or one of his wives poisoned you. Your only hope of survival is to go. I gave Runako her chance long ago. Now I’m giving you yours. I only wish you were older.’”

Grandmother’s character is a force for change in Nhamo’s life. Grandmother doesn’t want Nhamo to experience the same fate as her or Mother. She urges Nhamo to free herself from her impending arranged marriage and to make her own way in the world. She gives Nhamo the allowance to escape and the tools she needs to survive throughout her journey.

“As Nhamo bailed out the boat, a strange sensation came over her. It was extremely unpleasant. For a minute she thought she was going to be sick, but then she realized that this illness came from her spirit, not her body. For the first time in her life she was completely alone.”

Nhamo’s journey through the wilderness challenges her psychologically and emotionally, invoking the importance of Resilience and Personal Growth. Nhamo has freed herself from her social entrapment when she flees the village and ventures out in search of her father’s family. However, the wilderness threatens Nhamo’s heart and mind in new ways. Her physical trials often beget her emotional frustrations and mental anxieties. These are the internal battles Nhamo faces throughout her journey into adulthood.

“When this was done, a heavy feeling of despair fell over her. It had been all right when she was telling the story. Somehow, she was transported away. Mother had been there; and even the njuzu girls had listened from their watery houses. Now she was all alone on a tiny island.”

Nhamo develops survival mechanisms for herself throughout her time in the wilderness. She once used storytelling to comfort her family members and friends. However, in the wilderness, storytelling helps Nhamo to escape her own physical trials and to quell her own emotional sorrows. Her communications with the spirit world similarly offer her solace. Whenever she stops telling the stories or talking to the spirits, her loneliness returns.

“With careful management, she could live there for years, planting at the beginning of the rainy season and harvesting at its end. But of course she didn’t want to stay for years. Father’s family was in Zimbabwe. The thought of aunts and uncles and grandparents waiting for her there was cheering.”

Nhamo ventures through the wilderness on The Quest for Freedom and Belonging. Whenever she gets too comfortable in a particular camp or resting place, she reminds herself that she needs humans around her. Imagining her new life with her father’s family in Zimbabwe often gives Nhamo hope and encourages her to stay focused on her primary goal.

“‘I’m a mhandara, just like Masvita,’ she told Mother. She smiled at the shining water and tantalizing strip of land. She was someone important now, a future ancestor. She had proven her willingness to bear children. She wouldn’t have a party, but that didn’t take away from the importance of what had just happened. When a girl became a mhandara in the village, they said she had crossed the river into womanhood.”

When Nhamo starts menstruating, she feels as if she is growing up and becoming a woman. In the Shona tradition, young girls aren’t valuable unless they can have children, so Nhamo interprets her first period as a sign of her worth. She feels that she can envision her future for the first time in her life. At this juncture of the novel, Nhamo still defines her personal value according to the Shona people’s conservative ideas about gender roles.

“She had won! She had driven off a huge baboon troop. She slid back into the cave and let her pounding heart settle down to its natural rhythm. She felt like vomiting, so great had been her fear, but she had won! ‘I, Nhamo, have taken this cliff for my own,’ she said. ‘And the island. This is Nhamo’s Island. I am the boss of all baboons.’”

Nhamo develops Resilience and Personal Growth over the course of her time in the wilderness. She is scared and timid when she first leaves home in Crocodile Guts’s old boat. By the time she reaches the island with the baboons, however, she has developed new strength of character. She can claim who she is and what she wants and needs. By naming her little cliff on the island after herself, she is demonstrating her courage, fearlessness, and her determination to survive.

“She stopped to watch flecks of light on the lake. Breezes ruffled its surface, and occasionally a tiger fish leaped after a low-flying dragonfly. Otherwise the lake was devoid of interest. Blue and endless, it lay between her and freedom. She never even saw a boat on it.”

Lake Cabora Bassa symbolizes the unknown. Nhamo knows that she must travel across the lake to reach her destination. However, the longer she is out on the water, the more impossible this journey feels. She starts to see the lake as a barrier to her freedom, and thus an environmental challenge she must overcome.

“You don’t have much time, little Disaster, said Crocodile Guts. When the rains start, you’re going to have elephant-sized waves on that lake. Nhamo covered her head with the dress-cloth. You can’t play ‘let’s pretend’ now. This isn’t the deserted village, Mother insisted.”

Crocodile Guts and Mother are narrative devices used to spur Nhamo into action. Nhamo’s relationships with these two spirits grant her the courage to go on even when she despairs. The spirits also mobilize Nhamo’s narrative and propel her from one setting to the next. At this juncture of the novel, the spirits remind Nhamo of the importance of human relationships and community. They help her to refocus on The Quest for Freedom and Belonging.

“Nhamo’s spirit threatened to abandon her. She felt like an antelope circled by hyenas. Sometimes an animal simply gave up and let itself be devoured. I am Nhamo Jongwe, a woman, not a little girl, she told herself. […] It wasn’t much consolation, but it was enough to keep her spirit from entirely fleeing her. Keep thinking, she ordered her body.”

Nhamo’s personal growth throughout the novel helps her discover her true self. In the village, Nhamo sees herself as a helpless, unwanted little girl. Her time in the wilderness changes these negative core beliefs. Even when she feels despairing and discouraged, she can find the internal strength to go on. She has proved her resilience to herself along the way.

“Her spirit wandered in confused dreams. The voices of the underground people muttered as they lifted her. They carried her along a path with branches rushing past overhead. A silvery gray twilight soothed her burning skin. Presently, she was in a room with white walls where a woman sat reading a book by a window. Nhamo opened her eyes wide to make out the figure. It was Mother.”

Nhamo’s emergence from the wilderness and into the Efifi community is symbolic of resurrection. Nhamo collapses after she drinks the goat’s milk because she’s overcome by hunger and fatigue. Her collapse represents her spiritual death. When she wakes back up in Dr. Everjoice Masuku’s hut, she is coming back to life. She has crossed the archetypal threshold from childhood into adulthood.

“[Dr. Masuku] wasn’t married, either, and never intended to be. ‘It’s just another name for slavery,’ she declared. Nhamo thought this was astounding. How could you become an ancestor if you didn’t have children? How could you become anything without a husband? But [Dr. Masuku] insisted that marriage was the worst thing that could happen to an intelligent woman.”

Dr. Masuku’s character changes Nhamo’s impressions of gender roles and gender equality. Unlike the other women Nhamo has known, Dr. Masuku has no interest in finding a husband and starting a family. Nhamo is still making sense of Dr. Masuku’s nontraditional lifestyle at this juncture of the novel. Dr. Masuku’s declarations about womanhood, independence, and marriage inspire Nhamo’s evolving perceptions of freedom and of herself.

“‘You know what I mean. She can’t read or add. She’s totally unsuited for modern life—and she’s bright enough to take advantage of good schooling. In fact, she’s brilliant.’ Nhamo’s heart burned within her. Mother’s praise meant nothing. She wanted to get rid of her.”

When Nhamo overhears the Efifi adults discussing her future, she fears they will reject her. Nhamo is familiar with abandonment, and resents Dr. Masuku and Dr. van Heerden for planning to send her away from Efifi. She doesn’t want to leave the little island community, because it is the first place that has felt like home since she left her village in Mozambique.

“She told her everything she had kept hidden for fear of being sent away. She told about the ngozi and the escaped marriage. She told about the cholera epidemic and the muvuki. She told about the panga. ‘I thought it was a gift from the dead Portuguese. Really I did!’ She told about being possessed by Long Teats and killing the black dog. ‘No one will want me now. I’ve turned into a witch,’ she sobbed.”

Nhamo wins Dr. Masuku’s trust, love, and care when she confides in her about her past. Nhamo sees Dr. Masuku as a mother figure. She tells Dr. Masuku the truth about her experiences because she wants to be close to her. Her emotional outpouring in this scene captures Nhamo’s profound longing to be loved and accepted.

“Nhamo began to get seriously worried. She wanted to get rid of Long Teats, but no one had mentioned driving away the njuzu. And she couldn’t part with the vadzimu. Although in one sense Mother had returned as a Matabele doctor, deep down Nhamo knew the truth. Her real parent was with the ancestors. And someday Grandmother would join her.”

Nhamo’s connection with the spirit world grants her a sense of belonging. Nhamo is glad when Baba Joseph offers to get rid of Long Teats on her behalf. However, she doesn’t want this exorcism to destroy her connections with the rest of the spirit world. Nhamo values these connections because the spirits have become her teachers and guides. These facets of the Shona tradition remain important to Nhamo throughout The Quest for Freedom and Belonging she undertakes.

“Nhamo was happier than she could ever remember. She was accepted. She was safe. And everyone went out of his or her way to make her feel wanted.”

Efifi offers Nhamo the home and family, love, and belonging she has sought since she was a little girl. Nhamo imagined she would satisfy these longings in Mtoroshanga with her father’s family. However, Efifi, Dr. Masuku, Dr. van Heerden, and Baba Joseph ultimately become her new support system. In Efifi, Nhamo feels seen and understood, valued, and accepted. The construction of these lines echoes earlier passages describing Masvita’s relationships with Nhamo’s former village. Therefore, Nhamo has exacted the life and love she always envied Masvita for having.

“If this child hadn’t resembled my first wife, I would still have accepted her,’ announced the old nganga. ‘She has obviously inherited my ability to communicate with the spirit world. She has been trained by the njuzu. I am pleased to welcome her into our family.’”

Nhamo’s great-grandfather helps her understand her paternal past and thus herself. He is the only Jongwe family member who truly accepts and welcomes Nhamo. His character offers Nhamo a gateway to understanding and healing. He both clarifies her father’s history and encourages her spiritual connections. Nhamo’s experiences with her great-grandfather while in Mtoroshanga help her to reconcile with her unresolved familial history.

“Efifi looked exactly the same as Dr. van Heerden’s Land Rover roared through the gate. Nhamo sighed with relief. She was so used to losing things, she was afraid Efifi had vanished. […] It was wonderful to be back!”

Efifi provides Nhamo with a consistent homebase that she can rely on. When she leaves the island community to stay with her father’s family in Mtoroshanga, she fears she will never return to Efifi. She is familiar with loss and abandonment, and so expects to lose the home and family she created here. However, the setting’s changelessness conveys its safety and security. The novel therefore suggests that no matter how much the individual changes, her true home will always welcome her back.