Witnessing an Exorcism

Today seemed just like another normal day at school here in Chome. For the first time, four and a half months after arriving in Tanzania, very few experiences seem to come as a shock or are completely new. Bucket baths are standard; mopping and sweeping with an old shirt, and 13 bundled up pieces of straw respectively seems quite normal; kids refusing to let me carry any of my own things, running towards me and taking my backpack, or bag of rice asking where they should be taking it; squat toilets, which I was born to do. I am a champ at the squatty potty these days let me tell you, my aim is impeccable…since I am sure you all were extremely curious. Everything as the Tanzanians would say is kama kawaida, or as usual.

Today, however, I had an entirely new experience, one that they don’t really tell us about during training like they do with the bathrooms, or corporal punishment. Today, I witnessed an exorcism. Literally. It was pretty crazy to say the least. Sooo, lets start this one from the beginning. It’s a Friday and I had come back to my house to grab a book and some water I had boiled in a seemingly feeble attempt to prevent Giardia. When I walked back out, going towards the physics lab to put some notes on the board to prepare for my class after lunch, I noticed a group of girls gathered around outside of their classroom. This might not seem strange, but there are almost never students doing nothing on school grounds here. They are in class, outside cutting grass (which they do with a sickle by the way…and there is no shortage of grass around here, crazy stuff), sweeping, or doing some form of manual labor. So when I saw the girls all gathered around under the shade of this tree I was curious as to what they might be doing. As I got closer I realized there was another girl, whom they were all crowded around, lying on the ground in the middle of the group moaning. Two of the girls were holding onto her arms, and another was near her head protecting it when she would thrash and squirm. As you can imagine this was slightly alarming to me at first, but seeing how calm all the students were I assumed it was nothing too serious, however serious it appeared to be. As I got closer I thought could she be having a seizure, or some kind of severe panic attack. I came into the group of girls now, looking at the one lying on the ground. When I was right up close I was fairly certain it was not in fact a seizure, as I have seen a few before and this was very much different. She was very vocal, and at times muttering under her breath things I had trouble both hearing at all, or translating for that matter if I could make out the words. I also abandoned the the panic attack guess shortly after arriving when the girl, named Joyce, sporadically would moan, sort of sit up, and her eyes could blink open just for a second before rolling back into her head. Then she would fall back again muttering and yelling and moaning and writhing on the ground. “Is she OK?” I asked the girls …the girls replied plainly, “no.” Haha, I guess it was a stupid questions, so I deserved a stupid response. I asked them what was wrong with her, and they told me she was sick. I asked if her forehead was warm, or was it a stomachache because, well, I really just did not know what to ask them. And I don’t know how to say much other along the lines of sicknesses beyond does her head or stomach hurt. So I asked more directly if they knew what the problem was, and they all said they did not know.

Fifteen minutes or so went by and the bell rang for lunch. Shortly after the school secretary came up behind me along with one of the other teachers of the school. He walked by and said, “oh, she has the devil inside her,” as if this was perfectly normal and I already knew this. He then continued on his way to eat lunch. Ester, the school secretary stayed. She told the other girls to go and get food while she stayed with Joyce.  I thought I might as well stay seeing as I have never seen anyone that so obviously ‘had the devil inside of them.’ So, Ester and I stood there next to Joyce…Ester, gaze fixed on Joyce, watched her movements very intensely, as I shifted my focus between Ester to Joyce uncertain about what to expect. After about five minutes, when nothing but staring had taken place, and when I was pretty sure nothing more would come of the situation, Ester started muttering under her breath, now even more fiercely than before and her gaze locked even more intensely on Joyce. She was slowly inching towards Joyce, and at the same time her hand was rising from her side with index finger outstretched. The muttering got slightly louder as she continued, but only just so that I could partially make out the syllables, and her index finger was inches away from Joyce’s face.  Over an over again she was saying “Toka, toka, ‘oka majina yesu,” in a sharp raspy whisper, which loosely translates to, “leave, leave, leave in the name of Jesus.” From time to time over the next minute or two she would rattle off other murmurings that I was neither able to hear nor translate. With each passing second her finger crept closer and closer to Joyce’s’ face. Finally something happened…Joyce shot up, sitting upright, eyes wide open, staring right through Ester who was positioned directly in front of her. It was still obvious that Joyce was still not ‘all there’ per se…her pupils were still dilated and did not adjust at all even when open to the bright sunlight. Ester, with her finger still outstretched, continued to command the invisible force to leave, but Joyce’s eyes rolled back again as she yelled something along the lines of, “I cant…” or, “it wont leave.” Ester followed her to the ground, and placed her hand on Joyce’s chest now, speaking at normal conversation volume, but with even more ferocity. Joyce tried to fight Esters touch, as if the spot where Ester was touching was burning a hole through her, but Ester would not be budged. Joyce, yelling loudly now, shot up for the second time, eyes wide open. Ester took her by the shoulders, telling her to expel the devil, and to do it quickly. And this time Joyce’s eyes relaxed, muscles loosened and she moved her head from side to side looking rather bewildered. Slowly but surely she took in her surroundings and calmed down (although when she first looked at me, I think she was maybe more confused than ever to see some random white dude sitting next to her). Ester talked to her shortly, making sure she was all right, and asked another student to bring her some lunch. And that was that…the devil was out, and all was peachy keen.