The Life of a Small Villager

The novel The Bite Of The Mango takes place in the country of Sierra Leone, Africa. I only read the first eight chapters and I know that it tells about a very depressing and violent attack from the armed rebel soldiers. In this blog I am going to tell about what life was like for Mariatu Kamara, the main character, before the attack took place. Maiatu lived in a small village with her aunt, uncle, and cousins. The village had around 200 people, and everyone chipped in to help each other out. The women usually cooked, while men fixed the houses and the children played and did chores. The children from the small village did not attend school, which I thought was interesting, because usually the women go to school and get an education while the men stay home and worked. They did not attend school because it was too expensive. Also not receiving an education in this community appeared to not be essential. In Canada everyone has the right to graduate from high school, free of cost. While the children in this small village, learned the essential lessons of life from their family members and the elders in their community. Birthdays weren’t celebrated by any age group however, it comes about as unusual that they celebrated funerals. Funerals were celebrated by everyone staying at home for three days, the adults cried and depressingly communicated. Mariatu’s culture was very interesting to me, because of how different it is from the Canadian culture. Mariatu started thinking about marriage at the age of 12. “I saw Musa the next day at the farm, and I smiled when he looked at me. ‘When his father sees how happy we both are he’ll say yes to our marriage’ I told myself “, located on page 21-22. Here in Canada, it is abnormal for children under the age of 18 to get married because a person is not considered an adult until reaching the age of 18. In Sierra Leone, people take on more responsibilities at a younger age such as washing their own clothes, gathering and preparing food, daily chores which include hauling water than what is expected of children of similar ages in Canada. In Mariatu’s culture, if her grandmother reveals important information it will be cherished and repeated over many generations which is the same practices we enjoy here. “ ‘Whenever you dream of palm oil,’ my grandmother had told me when I was seven, ‘blood will spill by the end of the day.’ ” found on page 25. Mariatu’s grandmother was always right, for example if Mariatu dreamt of palm oil then Mariatu would end up injured to where blood was shed.  This shows  that their cultural beliefs are passed on from generation to generation.This is used in Canada as well. The majority of Canadians live in nice warm houses with several bedrooms and running water as well as other utilities.In Canada only a few children share bedrooms while most have their own room. In the novel it tells about how the people in the village live with their extended family in one small house. The adults slept in the small bedrooms while the children all slept in the living room. Maiatu lived by a river where they would haul water to use in their house. When they needed to bath, or wash their clothes they would walk to the river carrying all the materials needed. In the novel I learned about their unique culture and how different their lifestyle is compared to the Canadian lifestyle.