Sai Hankuri
Although there were three of us sitting under the late afternoon sun, none of us made noise. I could hear the sound of a pestle banging spices against a mortar from a few houses down. If I strained my ears a bit, I could make out a voice on the radio wrapped in static praising “Ikon Allah!” (the power of God). An occasional rooster let us know that it was indeed still daytime. We sat languidly, waiting. Just sitting. Just waiting.
I was invited to a friend’s house for dinner. Rather than consuming appetizers, wine, and animated dinner conversation, I passively watched Rahila’s cousin prepare dinner, something she’d been at for a while. Indeed, the original “slow food”, minus the Alice Waters’ style and a lot more boring. Pots simmered and the women waited, half listening to the radio. It was quite the bucolic scene (if you overlook the cell phone which one of the women clutched in her lap, staring at blankly). Indeed, waiting is something that people here are masters at. Quiet and statuesque, they sit. Is boredom even a concept that exists here? Or the concept of maximizing one’s time? After 30 seconds of sitting I felt the need to look through my bag for something productive – a book? Interview notes? Flashcards? Nothing. “Sai hankuri!” they say. “Be patient!”
Here, patience is a way of life.
Don’t have enough to eat? Sai hankuri.
Stomach pain? Sai hankuri.
Death of a loved one? Sai hankuri.
“Sai hankuri” women with fistula tell me when I ask how their lives have changed because of fistula. “God gave me this illness, I only need the patience to understand why”. When I ask about birthing practices, women tell me that if a woman cries, complains, or moves around too much during delivery, it brings shame to her. Why? “Rishin hankuri” they say, and few things are worse here than demonstrating a lack of patience. I’m told that in an ideal birth, the woman sneaks to her room without anyone noticing, delivers stoically, silently, and alone, such that no one knows of her absence until they hear the baby’s cries.
If I had to point to one cultural division, it would be that of hankuri. Impatient and obstinate in equal measure, the idea of lettings things sort themselves out with time is foreign and unpalatable. And yet, every day here is a lesson in patience. I wait for the internet to load. I wait to understand my research. I wait on government bureaucracy. I wait for the language to come more easily. I wait.
So why aren’t I getting any better at it?
