Just for perspective

More often than not we are reminded that we truly live in a whole other world here in Africa. This week I was given many of those reminders.
A man in our church is 28 years old. He is planning to get married soon. He asked me to visit his wife to be and talk with her. I agreed. In the course of conversation I discovered that she is a Christian, she comes from the same area the husband to be comes from and her parents have readily agreed to the marriage. He needs to pay her parents 2 more cows in addition to the amount he has already paid to fulfill the dowry amount. I also discovered that she just turned 16 in December. Apparently, this is not uncommon.

On the same theme, there is another man named Moses in our church. I married him and his wife 1½ years ago. Apparently, he had circumvented the normal procedures for getting married and did not fully pay the bride price. He told me that he did. The father of the bride even gave written permission for them to be officially married. But in the past few months the father who has many cows and therefore very rich has run into some huge problems. His cows wandered into someone’s field and destroyed many of the crops. He is being held directly responsible for the damage his cows did. The judgment against him is nine million shillings. That’s about eight thousand dollars. The average income of a family here in Tanzania is about $600 a year. He owes about 14 years worth of income. Now, the father is calling in all the debts that are owed to him so that he can pay this fine. Remember how this Moses has not fully paid his dowry? Well, he still cannot pay the 2 cows he owes and he has no money at all. So, the father-in-law has taken back his daughter and her kids until the dowry is paid. I don’t think he intends to marry her again to someone else but you never know. I think he is just trying to get Moses to pay him his two cows.