The Flying Coffin

I live in the land of the Kaonde tribe. There are hundreds of tribes in Zambia that all speak a different language and have different traditions and culture. I experienced one of the Kaonde tribe’s interesting traditions last week. It is called the “flying coffin.”

The rural people of Zambia experience lots of death. I was warned by many people upon arriving in Zambia that death is a big part of village life and one of the hardest things about volunteering. I have been introduced to many people in my village that have passed away during my stay in Kyafukuma.

Most of the villagers that live in Kyafukuma have an education level of grade 7 at best. Many do not finish school because of the hard and time consuming demands of farming (the only way they can access food). Only recently in Zambia has there been a push for young people to stay in school, but there is strong family pressure to help on the family farm to provide food for many hungry mouths.

This low education level effects the lifestyle and decision making of my villagers everyday. They do not have a knack for planning for the future. They very much live in the moment. One of my biggest projects is turning these behaviors around and teaching how if one invests time, labor, and money in to a project now – one can reap the benefits of this hard work later.

There was a man in my village that was working hard in his field last week. He was working along side his wife when she said he dropped down to the ground. She ran to get him water and help but when she returned he had passed. My conclusion was that he must have had a heart attack or stroke. 

My villagers believe that when someone unexpectedly dies juju is involved. Juju is like saying “voodoo” or “black magic”. They believe that when somebody unexpectedly dies somebody else used juju to strike them down dead. How they find this person using juju to kill people is where my story picks back up.

My villagers built the dead man a coffin and placed his body inside. Then they put some sort of secret magic inside the coffin with him (I asked what exactly this was but could not get a straight answer out of anyone). Word got around that the family of the deceased was making a flying coffin and hundreds of villagers caim to witness. I marched out with my camera ready to die for the cause of witnessing something incredible but was told to stay home for safety reasons. Luckily my host father Ba Rocket told me the rest of the story.

6 strong men (including Rocket) picked up the magic coffin and carried it around until it led them to the house of the person responsible for killing the man with juju. (I pictured this like a giant wiji board – like a magnet pulling the coffin to the correct answer). The coffin then proceeded to go through the wall of the accused man’s house, and was used to beat the man responsible to death. Yes – you read that correctly – my villagers beat an innocent man to death because they think he used juju to kill another.

This crazy story happens quite a bit in Kaonde land. Another PCV had this happen to her next door neighbor. She called our safety and security officer and spent a few days in town while her village settled down. It’s too hard to get in and out of my village quickly so I just let the storm ride keeping my trusty dog Piko in site at all times just in case we needed to fight a magic coffin together.

This story gives a glimpse in to the minds of my villagers. When one lives in the middle of nowhere with poor access to education and no access to current news and events – the only other option is to fully accept any beliefs and behaviors being currently practiced. I tried to picture this mind set as I sat alone in my hut in the middle of the African bush. There were a few scary nights when the storms of rainy season rolled in and the thunder, lightning, and rain beat down on my grass thatch roof. But the sun came out as it always does and Kyafukuma became normal again.

I transported fingerlings to my village a few days ago and that was really fun. As I was half submerged in a pond pulling a net to collect the baby fish on a beautiful warm blue sky day I had a scary thought. What am I going to do when I go back to Americaland and have to hold down a real job? How am I going to go from constant field work to being stuck inside with a 9 to 5?? It sounds horrid to me, especially since my life for the past 6 months has been so awesome. I have always wanted to pursue a career that keeps me active and outside, and this urge has never been so strong.

I am still loving everyday of my Peace Corps experience and am constantly in awe of the people of Zambia.