Unbowed: A Memoir (Vintage)

by Maathai, Wangari

  “Those are my sheep,” said the young man. “At the rate we're walking it will be too dark for the sheep to be outside. I'll go ahead and put them inside the house and you can come at your own pace.”

  The women agreed to this plan and set off at their own speed. It turns out that the white dots on the ridge were not sheep, but the blanched bones of the people the dragon-man had eaten, and he wanted to go on ahead to remove them.

  By the time the young women arrived at his compound, the dragon-man had cleaned the bones and lit the fire in the two huts of his compound—one for him and one for the girls. He had slaughtered a goat and the meat was boiling on a big fire in the young women's house. After adjusting themselves to their surroundings, one young woman became curious and decided to finally confirm her suspicions about the young man. Full of trepidation, she crept up to the entrance of his hut and peeked her head through the door. There he was, eating not the leg of a goat but the leg of a human being.

  “Young woman,” the dragon-man said sternly. “What did you find me eating?”

  “Nothing,” stuttered the girl in a fright. “I didn't find you eating anything. I just found you happy and enjoying the fire.”

  She ran back to the hut to the other girls. “This is no ordinary man!” she cried. “This is a dragon. Guess what he was eating?!” And she told them.

  Yet again, the infatuated girl would not listen. So the second young woman decided to see what he was doing. This time she found the dragon-man eating a head, not of a goat but of a human being.

  “Young woman,” said the dragon. “What did you find me eating?”

  “I didn't find you eating anything,” stammered the second girl in fear. “I just found you nice and happy.”

  But when the second girl returned to the hut, the lovelorn young woman still didn't believe her. That was it for the two other women; they had to get out of there. However, they were fearful that if they left the compound through the normal entrance the dragon-man would catch them and put them in the boiling pot, so they decided to dig a tunnel. Unfortunately, they didn't have any tools. Therefore, as nonchalantly as they could, the two girls went to the dragon's house and asked him for an ax.

  “What do you need an ax for?”

  “Oh, we need to add more wood to keep the fire under the cooking pot going.”

  “Shall I come and help you cut some wood?”

  “No, no, no,” replied the young women hurriedly. “We'll do it ourselves.”

  The dragon gave them an ax, and shortly afterward heard the chopping. After several hours of chopping, however, he became curious to know why they needed so much wood.

  “What are you so busy cutting out there?” he yelled.

  “We're trying to get the meat from the pot and it's proving to be very difficult.”

  “Shall I come and help you?” he asked.

  “No, no, no, no,” replied the two young women. “It's almost done.” And so it was—the tunnel, that is. The two women crawled through it and ran home, leaving their love-struck friend behind.

  The love-struck girl became the dragon's wife. In the course of time, she produced a baby boy, which looked like his father (dragons could procreate with human beings but their offspring was always a dragon) and was called Konyeki. Because her son and husband were dragons, the woman lived completely separate from them. Every day the father and son went out hunting for human beings or whatever they could find and brought back the bodies for her to cook. As you can imagine, the woman was miserable, but she was stuck with her dragon-husband.

  Now it turned out that the woman's sister had been baffled about why her sister had not come home after the dance. (In the stories, you didn't go home when you married the dragon.) So, even though she was heavily pregnant, she set out to visit her sister. Finally she found her at the dragon's compound. Amazingly, the woman was deaf to her sister's pleas to go away with her. Instead, she became alarmed and urged her to leave. “The dragon and his son will kill you and eat you,” she said. “You must leave now. It looks like it's going to rain. As you go home, no matter how much it rains, don't take shelter at the fig tree near the river. That tree is where Konyeki and his father rest on their way home. Go anywhere else, but don't go there.”

  “Okay,” agreed the sister, and she left in a hurry.

  Sure enough, before the sister had gotten too far it began to rain cats and dogs and she ran to the nearest fig tree—the very fig tree she had been warned about. Even though she realized she'd made a mistake, she decided to climb to the top of the tree. “They won't see me up here,” she thought. “I'll wait for them to pass by.” In the way these stories usually work, Konyeki and his father came and rested under the tree. But Konyeki was a curious child. He looked up into the tree and saw a little black dot like a bird's nest at the top.

  “Father,” said Konyeki. “Isn't that a bird's nest at the top of the tree?”

  His father looked up. “I think it's always been there,” he said.

  “No,” responded Konyeki. “I've looked at this tree quite a lot and I've never seen anything like this. Let me check it out.” (At this point in the story, we'd be holding our breath. They're going to find her!) Up he went, higher and higher, the spot getting bigger and bigger, until Konyeki arrived at the top and discovered the woman.

  “Be still. Don't say a thing,” said Konyeki. “If you give me one of your fingers, I won't say I found you.” The woman hesitated. “Just one,” Konyeki said persuasively.

  “Okay,” said the terrified woman. “You can have one finger.”

  So Konyeki took one finger and gobbled it up. “Give me just one more finger,” said Konyeki, “and I'll never say I saw you.”

  The woman agreed, so Konyeki took another finger. This went on until Konyeki had eaten all the fingers on one hand. “Now you must give me a toe,” said Konyeki, smacking his lips. “Just one toe and I'll never say I ever saw you.” The woman, who did not know what to do in her situation, gave him a toe and he ate it. “Give me another toe,” Konyeki said. “If you don't give me another toe, I'll say something. My father's down there, but if you give me the toe, I'll keep quiet.” This went on until her feet had no toes. Then Konyeki, still unsatisfied, decided to work on the woman's breasts.

  Now the woman had only one hand to hold on to the tree. Once Konyeki had eaten all the fingers of the other hand he called down to his father. “It's coming down, Father,” and he pushed the woman off the tree. When she hit the ground, her womb burst open and out came baby twins, both boys. The two dragons were very happy with their extra food source: They both ate the woman but Konyeki took the babies back to the compound.

  Once they arrived home, Konyeki turned to his mother. “Could you cook these two little moles for me?” The woman recognized them as her sister's children. She put the babies in a basket she used to ripen bananas and trapped two moles and put them in the cooking pot. When the son came for his meal, the mother gave him the two moles. “These moles are too small and they have fur. My moles didn't have fur,” grumbled Konyeki.

  “These are your moles,” insisted the woman. “You eat them.” So Konyeki ate them.

  Over the next few years, the woman nurtured the boys alone during the day as Konyeki and his father went out hunting. The boys would play outside during the day, and every night she would hide them. Konyeki, however, was shrewd. He went to his father. “Father,” he said, “if you watch around the homestead there are too many footprints. I wonder whose footprints these are? They are small. They are not like my mother's.”

  The father told him to ask his mother, who didn't bat an eyelid. “How many times do you think I go in and out of the house?” she asked Konyeki. “The whole day! Those are my footprints!” Konyeki was still suspicious and kept asking her about the footprints, and every time the mother had the same response.

  Eventually, the boys became young men and the woman wanted them to escape. In order to escape, however, they needed weapons. The mother went to Konye
ki and his father. “You know, you go from my compound every day and leave me alone. If there were an ambush I would never be able to protect myself.”

  “What do you need?” Konyeki asked.

  “I need a spear for both hands.”

  So Konyeki gave her two spears. Another day, the woman raised the issue of security again, and Konyeki asked her what she wanted. “I need a shield for both hands.” And Konyeki gave her what she wanted. The next day she wanted a sword, and she got one for each hand. Each day she would arm the young men and during the day they would duel and exercise. Eventually, they became very strong and she felt the young men were ready.

  One thing remained. She needed to know just how strong Konyeki and his father were. She tied some grass, sweet potatoes, and grain together and went to the two dragons. “I really want to know how strong you are,” she said. “If we were ambushed, I need to know whether you are strong enough to protect me. Try to lift these loads.” Because the dragons were stronger than any human they could lift the loads easily. The woman continued to increase the weight of the loads, adding heavy stones from the river and putting them inside the bales. Every so often she would tell the dragons to try their strength and they would lift the loads.

  One day, however, the load became so heavy that even they could not lift them. They pulled and heaved and tried to help each other: They were desperate to prove they could do it. Just as they were struggling to lift the bales, the woman opened the door and out came her two nephews, who butchered the dragons on the spot. The sons and the woman escaped and the woman went back to her people, perhaps a little wiser.

  “And that is the end of the story,” my aunt Nyakweya would say. “Now you tell me a story, or you will be eaten by a mole!”

  By then the food would be ready and would be served whether we had another story to tell or not. After the meal, we would all fall asleep, and storytelling would be put aside until the following evening, when the family would gather again around an open fire.

  PHOTO CREDITS

  AP/WIDE WORLD PHOTOS: Wangari Maathai plants a tree with Gordon Brown.

  GREEN BELT MOVEMENT ARCHIVES: Canadian ambassador hands key to Wangari Maathai; planting a tree in Kibwezi; march to protest logging in Karura Forest; Wangari Maathai before gates to Karura Forest.

  WANGARI MAATHAI ARCHIVES: Wangari Maathai with her mother and aunt outside mother's home in Ihithe; Consolata Missionary Sisters; Wangari Maathai yearbook photo; Wangari Maathai at the University of Munich; Wangari Maathai's wedding reception; Wangari Maathai on honeymoon; Wangari Maathai and husband in scholarly robes; Muta, Wanjira, and Waweru Maathai as children; Wangari Maathai in Uhuru Park; Wangari Maathai, her mother, and Vertistine Mbaya in Ihithe.

  MIA MACDONALD: Ihithe Primary School; the path Wangari Maathai walked to school; reinforced door of Wangari Maathai's home; Wangari Maathai on the telephone with the Norwegian ambassador.

  MARTIN ROWE: valley near Ihithe; Freedom Corner in Uhuru Park.

  FLORENCE CONRAD SALISBURY: four young women at Mount St. Scholastica.

  STANDARD GROUP (KENYA): Wangari Maathai leaving the office of the Deputy Supervisor of Elections; dismantled fence in Uhuru Park; Reverend Timothy Njoya speaking to journalists; Wangari Maathai in Nairobi after winning the Nobel Peace Prize.

  As this book reflects, my life's work evolved into much more than planting trees. Two organizations that I founded, the Green Belt Movement and its sister group, the Green Belt Movement International, demonstrate that evolution. By planting trees, my colleagues in this grassroots movement and I planted ideas. The ideas, like the trees, grew. By providing education, access to water, and equity, GBM empowers people—most of them poor and most of them women—to take action, directly improving the lives of individuals and families.

  Our experience of thirty years has also shown that simple acts can lead to great change and to respect for the environment, good governance, and cultures of peace. Such change is not limited to Kenya or Africa. The challenges facing Africa, particularly the degradation of the environment, are facing the entire world. This is why the Green Belt Movement International was founded. Only by working together can we hope to solve some of the problems of this precious planet.

  It's my fervent hope that you will seek to learn more about the work of the Green Belt Movement and the Green Belt Movement International by visiting our Web site, www.greenbeltmovement.org. Please share in our message of hope.

  Wangari Maathai

  FROM LEFT TO RIGHT: My mother, Lydia Wanjiru; my aunt Nyakweya, the storyteller; and me outside my mother's home in Ihithe about 1993.

  Overlooking the valley near Ihithe where we had our farm. In the time since I was a child, the valley has been largely deforested and planted with tea and coffee.

  Ihithe Primary School (building in foreground) today. I began studying there in 1948. Tea fields have since been planted in front.

  Consolata Missionary Sisters at St. Cecilia's in the late 1950s. On the far right is Sister Germana, one of the nuns I grew close to during my four years there.

  The end of the path I used to walk on from Ihithe to St. Cecilia's boarding school at the Mathari Catholic Mission and back home again during school holidays, as it looks today.

  In Kansas in the early 1960s. FROM LEFT: Elaine (Klaas) DeWulf, Florence (Conrad) Salisbury, Agatha (Wangeci) Kahara, and me at Mount St. Scholastica.

  My yearbook photo in 1964, when I graduated from Mount St. Scholastica. Quite a ‘60s look!

  At the University of Munich, 1968. On the far left (standing) is my friend Fräulein Dr. Koch, whose high German I could follow but whose Bavarian dialect was beyond me.

  ABOVE: Mwangi's and my wedding reception at the United Kenya Club, 1969. Mwangi is to my right; my father is standing to my immediate left and my mother next to him. Next to her are my father's youngest wife and then my brother Kibicho.

  RIGHT: On honeymoon at the Gedi ruins near Mombasa, Kenya, 1969.

  With Mwangi on November 8, 1971, the day I received the diploma for my doctoral degree.

  My children, Muta, Wanjira, and Waweru (left to right), in the late 1970s.

  1979: The Canadian ambassador hands over the keys to a car to support the Green Belt Movement, which was launched under the auspices of the National Council of Women of Kenya (NCWK). I am fourth from the left.

  Planting trees in Kibwezi, southeast of Nairobi, on May 26, 1979, with the then director of the National Environment Secretariat of Kenya.

  Leaving the office of the Deputy Supervisor of Elections in January 1982, after a ruling that I would not be allowed to run in a parliamentary by-election.

  In Uhuru Park, Nairobi, 1989, when the “park monster” was still set to be built.

  February 22, 1992. The fence around the work site for the Kenya Times complex in Uhuru Park is finally dismantled.

  Freedom Corner in Uhuru Park in 2005.

  The reinforced door at my home in South C, Nairobi. The police broke it open in 1992 to get me out. The door and door frame still bear the marks.

  Rev. Timothy Njoya (center) of the Presbyterian Church of East Africa talks to journalists at my front gate, having been refused entry to the house by police, January 1992.

  FROM LEFT TO RIGHT: Me, Vertistine Mbaya, and my mother at my mother's homestead in Ihithe.

  Marching to protest illegal logging in Karura Forest with members of the Green Belt Movement and Kenyan civil society.

  Rallying supporters at the gates to Karura Forest after contractors fenced off the work site, October 1998.

  En route to a meeting in a parliamentary constituency on October 8, 2004, I eceive a call from the Norwegian ambassador asking me to keep the line open for a phone call from Oslo.

  I plant a tree at Freedom Corner in Uhuru Park with Gordon Brown, Chancellor of the Exchequer of the United Kingdom, in January 2005.

  In Nairobi shortly after being awarded the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize.

  FIRST ANCHOR BOOKS EDITION, SEPTEMBER 2007r />
  Copyright © 2006, 2007 by Wangari Muta Maathai

  All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Anchor Books, A division of Random House, Inc., New York, and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Originally published in hardcover in slightly different form in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, in 2006.

  Anchor Books and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

  The Library of Congress has cataloged the Knopf edition as follows:

  Unbowed : a memoir / Wangari Muta Maathai.—1st ed.

  p. cm.

  1. Maathai, Wangari. 2. Tree planters (Persons)—Kenya—

  Biography. 3. Green Belt Movement (Society : Kenya).

  4. Women conservationists—Kenya—Biography. 5. Women

  politicians—Kenya—Biography. I. Title.

  SB63.M22A3 2006 333.72092—dc22 [B] 2006044729

  eISBN: 978-0-307-49233-3

  www.anchorbooks.com

  v3.0