Heather Turek Just another weblog 
While I type, young women in the Benabena village I was in this afternoon are being beaten.
To be honest with you, I’m afraid I’ll hear their screams.
Tonight marks the end of one young woman’s sikmun "sick moon". This is her cultural rite of passage into Bena womanhood. It is called sikmun because "The moon has looked at her and made her sick".
She went into a hut last Saturday and has been without water or even juices from fruit for a week.
Tonight she came out of the hut and she, along with other young, unmarried women of her village are being beaten by older, married women. They are hitting them with bamboo sticks.
We talked to one of the girls this afternoon and she tried in vain to lighten the situation by joking that she’d see us tomorrow if she lived through it.
These women are beaten when their bride price is announced and then later when their future husband presents the bride price to her father. This is so they will be submissive Bena wives.
I visited this girl in the hut a few days ago… I was completely naive to what was really going on. I remember that when I smiled and greeted her she smiled back, but there was something wrong. I could see it in her eyes.
Today I played games with Bena kids and took pictures of the men butchering cows for the mumu (feast) in her honor. I was completely oblivious to what would take place tonight.
This evening we had game night with the students. I was sitting there surrounded by people who were eating icecream and laughing, unaware of tonight’s events. It felt asinine and I felt helpless and ignorant.
This reality is world wide. What’s happening tonight is a symptom of sin. It’s horrific but it’s nothing compared to Hell. I know the one thing that will cause true change is the Gospel.
* The Interface students and people associated with New Tribes Mission are not in the village or in any physical danger.
* Photo copyright 2007 Kristen R. Fields
