The games and plays of the Shona.

By Clemz Chinyani.

(Singing): Amina

(Clap Clap Clap)

Amina Kadeya
(Clap Clap Clap)

Simoreya

(Clap Clap Clap)

Amina one two three.......

Those are the lyrics of a Shona play song, one that has been around for a very long time. When singing this song, two little girls will be either seated on their hunches in the sand or under a shade hitting the insides if their palms together and clapping in a pattern to the words of the song.

Music at play is an integral part and play itself is core to the society's development. Every child, when well, goes out to play. I, when I was a kid used to go out to play with friends in the dusty streets, not caring about food or anything else. Games differ between boys and girls and sometimes, they play together. In the past, my grandmother told me she was a champion at a boys' sport of throwing knobkerries. This was a male sport played when the boys were out at the pasture lands tending cattle. They would gather up while their livestock grazed and play this game where one person would throw his knobkerrie into the air and the others would try to knock it with theirs. The one who hit it first became the winner. No females would participate in this game because they would be all at home doing womanly chores. However, my great-grandfather had female children only and thus grandmother had to take his cattle out to the pastures. She played this sport and outdid many boys. She also fought them. Another favorite sport among the boys out in the forests was fighting with bare fists. Bigger boys would urge on younger boys to go head to head to see who was a better fighter and no one was supposed to say these things back at home, no matter how beaten they were. Nowadays, it is not a common practise of growing young men to go out herding cattle as people have moved to urban areas. People have a  way of calling petty business, 'magames ekumombe', meaning games played while herding cattle. 

Another game played by the Shona was 'Tsoro'. This game involved (and still does) two players seated across each other with the 'Tsoro'  board carved out on the ground. Semi-spherical holes would be dug out of the ground, usually eight of them in two by four rows. They would be filled with small round pebbles which the players move around. This was a unisex game. Then was 'Nhodo', for girls. This game was played in a shallow hole in the ground filled with round small pebbles and by two people. They would throw one stone into the air and scoop the rest of the pebbles out of the hole with the same hand that threw, before the one they threw into the air falls and they have to catch it and toss it back into the air. They would have to return all the pebbles minus one into the hole and continue to do so till the end. At the end of the game, the one with more pebbles was the winner. Then were also games children played not around the home vicinity, usually out in the forests on dwalas. A smooth dwala provided a sliding plane for them and here a pastime called 'Mutserendende' was engaged in. They would take turns to slide down the smooth surface of the rock and sometimes it would be over a water fall, in this case, it would be similar to water sliding in today's pastimes. Sometimes boys would hunt, it was their pastime and it brought meat home, so that was a productive pastime, and younger boys and girls would play house at times, getting primed for what was to come in their adult lives. There was also hide and seek, 'Chamuhwandehwande' games such as 'Mapere' whereby two camps were formed, one had to have a leader, a mother and the other had to be one of predators, usually 'hyenas' which is what 'Mapere' means in Shona. The 'people' would be on one side and their 'mother'  would call them. They would respond saying that they feared the hyenas and the mother would tell them not to worry, they would say they are afraid of the hyenas, but the mother would assure them it was OK and so, they would try to make a break for it past the hyenas. Whoever could not dodge the hyenas would be caught and placed in the hyenas den, that was the end of their participation till the next time. Let me share with you the actual words they would say during the game;

Mother

Vana Vangu!

Children

Woye!

Mother

Huyai

Children

Tinotya!

Mother

Munotyei?!

Children

Mapere!

Mother

Mapere akapera kare!

At this point, the children make a run for it and the hyenas try to capture them. The game continues until all the children are captured, otherwise it goes on and on till sunset and or sunrise (kidding).
Chisarai,
Bye Bye,                                                  Sayonara
                                                                 さようなら.