If arrested say Kyrgitt posted it
Many communities in Kenya undergo the rites of passage facilitated through circumcision ceremonies.
Circumcision is a surgical procedure that can be done either traditionally or medically.
Though I’m oath bound by culture not to disclose what goes on in my community’s highly classified rites, (a full declassification brief from the National Security Governing Council and the Pentagon is required here)… what i can say is that manhood is not determined by the cut, but by the rites that accompany it.
We are taken through very important lessons on identity. ( Kalenjins never lose their identity however wealthy, traveled or exposed they are). We are taken through how to adult. How to acquire wealth and most importantly, social integration. For instance, I’m not allowed to linger around ladies who are my mother’s age mates unnecessarily nor should I ever have a sleepover at my mother-in-law’s house, even during war. I’m supposed to whistle as i approach the kitchen area to announce my presence since its taboo to evesdrop on women’s conversations or find them sitting ‘comfortably’. Taboos and norms vary from tribe to tribe.
Most teachings have had to be updated such as men not being allowed in the kitchen and this was based on traditional home settings where the kitchens were detached from the main house and was usually converted into extra sleeping space for unmarried girls or female guests. Also, science supports the idea that men make better cooks anyway, so that rule is obsolete
However, the rites of passage through our traditional circumcision ceremonies is a camp where we translocate boys to men through teachings. In my community, the defence and provision of the community at large is definitely top on the course study. Old men and sages take the initiates through history, culture, teachings on practices such as cattle raring etc. It’s the one camp in a man’s life that defines his entry into responsibility.
We take our boys through it at the dawn of teenagehood, when his mind is morphing into a grown-up’s mind… when he knows the family unit amd its dynamics, when he is old enough to use an arrow to hunt or protect, when he is old enough to mould his destiny. The surgical procedure of circumcision makes it an indelible milestone, because through the pain associated with it, the lessons will forever be etched in his mind.
When you see people sometimes taunt others to get circumcised first, they don’t understand that its not the cutting that makes the man, but the rites of passage. The reason Kalenjin culture doesn’t recognise toddler circumcision or hospital based circumcision without follow up boot camp sessions is because the cut is incomplete without the transition into manhood through the rites.
Of course modernity is a bitch.
Anyway, patience, perseverance, the long wait of the hunt, retribution, defense and mental stamina, makes a man. Emotions must be handled in controlled environments. Outbursts and kneejerking is utter suicidal.
Gladly, a majority of Kenyans have their own format of rites. You don’t have to be cut to be a man. Your council of consorts and boys club can make the difference. Your peers can either build you up or destroy the little maturity in you.
If you have grown into adult hood and there was no time in your life you consider a milestone into manhood, then it’s not too late… seek guidance from fellow men. Again, it’s not the surgery that makes a man, its the mind shift that comes along with it.
Ultimate test of all, is how you respect and regard women. Real men never feel emasculated, they encourage a society of flourished women.
Babu Owino, represents everything a rites of passage tries to address.
