Article September 13, 2004 Issue

CURSE REVERSED

By Yvonne Joy Prinsloo

Three very happy young children arrived at the kitchen door, staggering under the weight of an old wart hog's skull they'd come across in the South African veld. Probably with a "what it means to have sons" look on my face, I encouraged them to leave it on the lawn outside, and then went out to admire their find of something new—and very different.

The following day, I noticed the local witch doctor walking around our house, looking very disturbed. Finally, she picked up the skull and threw it far into the bush. When I asked her what was troubling her, she explained that a newborn child, whom she had delivered and I had visited the previous day, had begun to cough. She had come to make sure that no one had put an evil spell on my home to affect the child adversely through me. The witch doctor had been horrified to find the wart hog skull, a sure sign, to her, that someone had cursed my home to hurt the child. Fear engulfed her. She told me I had broken a cultural norm by just visiting the child, since I was not a member of the family. This meant that if anything happened to the child it would be my fault.

Now I knew where the skull came from. The skull actually had been put there out of love, not hate. Likewise, my visit to the mother and child was not meant to disregard cultural tradition; it had only been an expression of love. There never had been a curse. But I also knew that I shouldn't just ignore her fear of a curse, and, though I knew I wasn't truly to blame, I felt some burden of responsibility for the child's health. I decided to pray until I felt at peace about the situation.

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