Umoja - The Little Book of African Food
Deedee Cuddihy writes about her experience of meeting the women and children from Umoja Inc.
As a freelance journalist, I'm always on the lookout for new and interesting things to write about. Recently, I've been involved in a project that has given me the chance to get to know a group of African women asylum seekers and to help them produce a simple booklet that I believe will provide a fascinating insight into their lives and cultures.
About the Umoja Inc group
'The Little Book of African Food' is the result of many hours spent in the company of members of Umoja Inc, a group which meets every Saturday afternoon in Glasgow. Umoja is a Swahili word meaning 'friendship' or 'unity' and the Inc stands for 'including new communities'.
All members of Umoja Inc are lone mothers who have fled to the UK with their children (and, in some cases, grandchildren) to seek asylum. All are still hoping to be granted leave to stay. Many have been waiting several years. In the meantime, they have been getting on with their lives as best they can. There is a crèche for the younger children run by volunteers, and the older children are going to school, making friends - and acquiring Glasgow accents!
The purpose of Umoja Inc is to provide a setting where any African women asylum seekers who are in Glasgow alone with children can find support from others in the same situation and help for themselves and their children.
There is no 'typical' Umoja Saturday. One week, the mums might be learning how to deal with the effects of loss trauma on them and their children; the next they could be taking an all-day trip to one of Scotland's historic monuments for a tour and a workshop.
Producing The Little Book of African Food
In fact, it was during the return journey of an outing to Stirling Castle (where other visitors were treated to the sight of some Muslim Umoja members saying their prayers on the grass, having established which way Mecca was) that I spoke to Lucy and wrote down the fascinating story she told me about life in Northern Uganda, where she was brought up on her grandfather's farm.
Fortunately for me, Lucy speaks fluent English (Uganda's official language) as well as a number of African languages. Lucy isn't the only Umoja member with fluent English but the majority of women who contributed to 'The Little Book of African Food' didn't start learning English until they fled to the UK. A number, for instance those from the Congo countries, speak fluent French as well as African languages. (So this project has been a good excuse for me to polish up my rusty French - although I have to say nobody looked too impressed with my efforts!)
But despite the fact that Umoja members come from a wide variety of African countries (including Togo, Nigeria, Uganda, Somalia, Cameroon and Ghana), and some have only a few words of English (a few have never been formally educated), and even the women from Somalia don't all speak the same type of Somali, we were still able to work together and produce 'The Little Book of African Food'.
In fact, I think as well as being a strength of the project, all these differences actually helped to enhance it. Although the book was meant to teach the rest of us something about Scotland's newest incomers, Umoja members also learned things about each other's lives during the course of our Saturday sessions. And where words failed, a kind of sign language came into play.
For instance, during a fascinating discussion about water and the different ways that it is carried from a village well or river to people's houses (a discussion sparked off by a tiny water jar that one of the women had made from playdough), Hortense grabbed a tea towel, wound it into a neat coil and put it on her head, then stuck the little jar on top. Lisho then took the jar and balanced it on her shoulder, to show how water was carried where she came from.
Our natural curiosity about each other and the universal 'language' of food helped break down barriers and overcome communication difficulties.
Not just a recipe book
In producing a book about African food, a compilation of recipes would probably have been the obvious way to go. But where would the fun have been in that for a nosy journalist like me? I believe, and so does Vicky Grandon who set up Umoja Inc back in 2001 (never dreaming that there would still be a need for it in 2006), that fascinating as recipes can be, real-life stories and anecdotes about food and eating, contributed by African women, will be of more interest to teachers, pupils and others than lists of ingredients and methods.
'The Little Book of African Food' is also illustrated by Umoja Inc members. The necessity to keep production costs down meant colour had to be limited to the picture on the cover. A surprisingly high number of Umoja women turned out to be remarkably good at art. But Safiyo, a Somali woman seeking asylum with her grandchildren, is the undoubted star. The delightful illustration on the front of the booklet is hers and, given possession of a handful of felt-tip pens and a sketchbook, she produced dozens more vibrant, intricately worked drawings.
Sharing stories, gaining trust
Although Lucy (mentioned earlier in this article) became a major contributor to the book, she and a few other Umoja members seemed, at the beginning of the project, to be a bit wary of me and not as keen to share their stories as I had anticipated. I concluded that perhaps food wasn't such a huge topic of discussion in African countries, the way it is in the West, and that talking to me about it was, frankly, a waste of their time.
After the book was finished, I decided to ask Lucy about her apparent early reluctance and discovered that my assumptions had been completely wrong. (Note to self: assume nothing - ask!) She said: 'As soon as people start asking me questions about myself, I get scared and my heart starts beating faster. Even if it is about something like food, I think: 'Why do they want to know these things?' because it feels like I am being questioned by the immigration officials all over again. And then I wonder if what I say will be used against me. Also, we have told you only about the happy times for the book. We haven't told you about the bad times. So people might think: 'Well, if life was so good for these people in their own countries, why have they come over here?'
'But I'm glad that I got involved in the project,' she added. 'I was asked to take part in an event in Glasgow recently and when I said I was a representative from Umoja Inc, the person I was talking to said: 'Oh, I know about your group - I've read your book.'
Further information
For further information about Umoja Inc, you can contact the group:
Email: Umoja Inc (umoja.inc@hotmail.com)