Luke Judge

Last week, I attended a wedding accompanied by my West African workmates. It had been their dream to attend a Kenyan ceremony right before they left for their respective countries. So, when one of our colleagues sent me an invitation card to his wedding, I decided to tag them along.

The church service was normal. In fact, they seemed to identify with how the Anglican service was conducted. I was even pleased with myself when we walked outside as the bridal party proceeded to take photos. No major hiccups. Nothing had made me cringe. The pastor had spoken in fluent English.

Then I got this question from the elderly mother of my West African friend who had accompanied us. “How come both the bride and groom were only represented by their respective single mothers?” she asked, curiously. I was hasty with my reply. I mean, with a trend in developed countries of families broken by divorce, I thought it would have been quite clear why the couple were only represented by their single mothers. “I believe their parents divorced,” I shrugged.

I didn’t know that I was opening up a can of worms. I was then given a lesson on how even though families break and married couples divorce, at the time of weddings, everyone should forget their differences and come together for the occasion. Moreover, in West Africa, it is only men who walk the bride down the aisle. If the father is deceased, one of his brothers is the only man allowed to substitute for the absent father.

I was afraid to tell them that in this part of the world, some men use the names of their mothers as surnames. A good example being one of our record-breaking Kenyan athlete, but that would have fuelled another debate. And besides, why should I need to justify that?

I was just shocked that people still bury their heads in the sand over single mothers. If for example in the case of my colleague, his mother had got pregnant and the supposed boyfriend/father abandoned her, and she went ahead to raise his child to a man by herself, why would she want anything to do with the biological/ceremonial father at the wedding? Not that I stand for divorce and single motherhood but in the society in which we live, these are common things.

Anyway, aside from being asked why the bride did not consider adorning traditional ornaments or putting on an African wedding dress, we went to the grounds for the reception service. I was glad that they enjoyed the njahis, chapattis, mukimos and rice, which are the common food for that particular ethnic group.

The entertainment segment followed. The event’s MC spoke mainly in Kikuyu with a bit of English and Swahili in between. They were utterly bored and with good reason. I spent the better part of the afternoon translating the MC’s jokes. Not that they sounded the same after translation, but yeah, I tried. The thing with African jokes is that you cannot possibly translate them and come out with the depth of humour. Lost in translation, the jokes just loose their meaning.

We then danced to a mix of songs the Deejay played. At least the one thing all Africans have in common is knowing how to dance. Whether you understand the particular language matters not. From Zimbabwe’s Oliver Mtukudzi’s Tuku music (may his wonderful son rest in peace) to danceable South African Kwaito or even better, the Nigerian tunes that are currently threatening to rule our airwaves, we danced as if we could not stop.

I was made to know that in West Africa, this ceremony would have been accompanied by drummers mixing the beat and dancers moving to the excitement. But I was glad they enjoyed our dancing, anyway.

The speech and gift segment followed. This is usually my favourite part, well, the dancing too, except, I also enjoy the “oh” and “ahs” when certain members of the couple’s family give speeches. Guests are always whispering, add giggling, “Oh, they are so learned,”…”Oh, his mother looks so young,”…”Oh, they look so much alike.” I think the ‘oh’ we stole from the whites who colonized us and we misuse it a lot in our conversation.

I wondered, and I know most of Kenyans who attend these weddings wonder, why there is always an unused gift tent put up on the wedding grounds with beautiful ladies waiting to register gifts. It doesn’t make any sense because in this segment, the MC normally calls on both sides of the bride and groom family to offer their speeches. This involves the parents of the bride, praising her prowess in cooking, and sometimes, even issuing empty threats to the groom’s family. Most often, it’s threats about the daughter being taken back to her parental home, if not treated well. Then automatically, you see a huge unpacked gifts brought to the high table, usually a refrigerator, big plasma TV, a gas cooker, or a bed.

Then it’s the turn of the groom’s parents to brag about their family and how lucky the bride is to join them. How they will take the best care of her possible, and once again, an unwrapped gift reaches the high table. The crowd go into whispers, debating which side bought the biggest gifts.

A Kenyan wedding, like any other, cannot be completed without the wedding cake. Guests wait for their piece of the cake as if they have never eaten cake before, and as juvenile as it may appear, it always works for them. “Hmmm,” they’ll sigh, licking their lips and debating the taste. Then, just like clockwork, they all vanish one-by-one, even before the occasion has finished. I hear this happens in West Africa, too. So that was sorted–I didn’t need to explain our flight from the scene to anyone.

As we were leaving, I was asked one final question. “Why is it you Kenyans do not dress-up appropriately for weddings?” You see, my guests had arrived in beautiful kitenge dresses and head wraps, while yours truly wore a long skirt with a casual blouse. My dressing was mild compared to those who had come in jeans trousers, they told me. But I could learn a thing or two, they continued, on how to be ‘truly African’ and stop living in my modern ways.

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dual Fuel Cookers & Ranges bride and groom, hiccups

For most of us, cooking is more or less a solitary event. Kitchen stoves, office microwaves, and dorm room toaster ovens fry, zap and roast our turkey sausages and hot pockets. The Food Network beams braised duck and truffle polenta recipes into our living rooms while we hurriedly transcribe their instructions. It hasn’t always been this way…

Long before the advent of automated heat we gathered around fires to cook our food and share our stories. Cooking was communal. That was the beginning of civilization says Ray Werner, a seventy one year old baker activist and community oven evangelist in Pittsburgh– “the day we decided to stay in one spot, to grow grain, to harvest it for flour, to abandon the nomadic culture of hunting and gathering.” Werner takes collaborative collective cooking very seriously. He believes cooking together brings communities and neighborhoods back to life. Baking as block party? Werner is out to rebuild Western Pennsylvania one loaf at a time.

Werner’s first community oven convert, Braddock Pennsylvania’s Mayor John Fetterman, didn’t need much convincing. Fetterman presides over a city in desperate need of infrastructure. And a restaurant. This past January the city’s only hospital closed and with it the city’s only ATM and sit-down restaurant– the hospital cafeteria. How can a city create infrastructure when commercial capital and social capital are staggeringly low? For Fetterman, the answer was build it themselves. “I bounced the oven idea off John about two years ago, and he wanted to build it on the spot,” says Werner. “About six months later, he had it up and running, And what happened next? People just started using it.”

The wood-fired Braddock community oven sits in a former vacant lot next to a former convent and across the street from the last remaining U.S. Steel plant in the area– a reminder of industrial halcyon days gone by. A local mason constructed the hearth from reclaimed stone and cinderblock from a run-down garage. With a few thousand dollars the oven was built and turning out smokey pizzas and gooey frittatas. “That this pile of material that was once a dilapidated garage in danger of collapsing could be repurposed for a bread oven is just a win win for everyone,” says Fetterman. Since its opening, art installations, literary gatherings, and Slow Food events have attracted hundreds of people to the site.

Werner continues to sing his gospel of baking as community bonding all over Western PA. Community groups, neighborhood associations, and galleries have all asked him for help. He’s set his sights next on central Pittsburgh– the Polish Hill Civic Association has found a site and raised thousands of dollars at a recent fundraiser. “Pittsburgh really is the city of neighborhoods– we have over 80 neighborhoods,” says Werner. “I want it to be the first city with a community of community ovens.”

This post originally appeared on refresheverything.com, as part of GOOD’s collaboration with the Pepsi Refresh Project, a catalyst for world-changing ideas. Find out more about the Refresh campaign, or to submit your own idea today.

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