No man's land!

Should you go to mbeere you will hear many amazing stories. This small society, surrounded by hills carries many tales that are as intriguing as they are unbelievable. Today I bring you one such story.

Growing up in mbeere, storytelling was an evening pass time in most homesteads. While awaiting the preparation of the evening meal, children sat around the fireplace in a detached kitchen listening to grannies retell stories that had been passed down generations. The little ones did not notice the passing of time as they sat there, listening to the old folk narrate their own encounters and of others before them. The crackling fire and the silence outside only served to add to the mystery of the tales that spewed forth from the old folk.

It is reputed that up on the hills of mbeere, just before the rains, huge fires breakout and burn up most of the vegetation. These fires have no known source and will usually burn themselves out with time. Usually they start up at night and by morning are gone out. You see folks usually clear their land just before the rains in readiness for planting of crops. Some light up small fires to clear the bush in readiness but which are confined to a small area. The hills are left for grazing of domestic animals thus no one would want to burn the vegetation there since they are no man’s land. Yet the fires do happen according to folklore.

A story is told of a man who had taken a small piece of land for himself up on a famous hill. Having worked hard all day, he had retired up his tree house (I will tell you about these another day) for the night. However, he was woken up in the middle of the night by loud voices coming from around him. Now this was a surprise since no one ventured out in the night and he had no neighbors he knew of up on the hill.

He peered in between the tree branches on which he lay but could not see any human form in the direction from which the voices came. Yet the whole place was light up in a big fire whose source he could not determine. The man was so shaken by the bizarre happenings that he could not get courage to get down from the tree to investigate. The voices went on as the whole hillside was burnt and miraculously his tree house was spared. That was warning enough for him and he left the place at daybreak never to return to his farm on the hill. Many who heard his story laughed at him for not knowing that no one could lay claim to the hills that were no man’s land for ages.