What it Takes for a Munyole Woman to Serve Millet Bread (OWUSIMA) to Her Family

Lovisa Hadira is a house wife and a mother of nine, living in the village of Musitu, Busaba Sub County in Butaleja District. As a family from the tribe of Banyole, the traditional food is millet bread also known as Owusima in Lunyole, (akalo) in Lunganda and (Atapa) in Ateso the food is reach in carbohydrates which helps Lovisa’s family members to stay strong in a community that depends 90% on agriculture. It’s not a very easy task to be a mother and a house wife in a village that has no running water and electricity, no grinding mills to process food stuffs.

If Lovisa doesn’t get a bicycle to help her ease the journey of taking the millet to a grinding mill about 3-5km away from her home, she will have to process the millet flour “manually”. This tough process is what made Noah Wapera to spend a whole day with Lovisa to capture every step of the process that takes Lovisa half a day to set food (Millet Bread) before her family.

By early morning Lovisa wakes up to prepare her kids for school, she then heads the garden where she spends upto three hours, between 9am and 10am Lovisa brings out the millets fingers under the sun to dry, on a sunny day, the millet fingers will be dry by 12pm.

During the drying time, the hens and her chicks also find a meal for their family, a Munyole woman has to be keen to chase away the hen and her young ones, or make sure the millet fingers are put at higher ground where the hens won’t reach.

When the millet fingers are dried, she puts it in a motor, she then pounds to remove the husks, the process takes a lot of energy and some half an hour considering the amount of millet fingers she has to process.

After pounding the millet fingers, she now has to winnow to make sure the millet is clean and almost ready for grinding, this is not all but she is almost there.

At 1pm Lovisa has to pick the firewood; she sets fire in her local kitchen, its unbearable for me, there is a lot of smoke in the kitchen, I am tearing but Lovisa is used to the tough smoke, she can almost bear with it without tears, but there is now hope we are close to lunch

The millet is put in a round saucepan, roasted a little bit, she has to make sure the millet is not burned or the millet bread will be sower, this process is meant to get it ready for grinding, and also roasting the millet gives the flour a nice flavor.

You might think now that is all, but no, before grinding she puts the millet back into a local wooden motor, pounds it again for a few minutes, she will again winnow the millet to make sure that the husks are completely out, if they remain in the millet, the millet bread will be sower, this is the final touch before grinding, after the winnowing then the millet is ready for grinding.

The millet is finally ready for grinding:

But wait, what if the millet is grinded without dry cassava, the millet bread is going to be too dry, it’s like trying to mix sand without cement. This millet is mixed with some dried cassava, she grinds the millet on some ancient looking grinding stone, it’s hard to believe how much work this is, it requires serious informal education, she has done this since she was a teenager and now teaching her daughters. That stone is the machine and she has to be the engine to make sure that millet flour is ready for mingling millet bread.

After grinding the millet, she has to get more firewood which have to be used throughout the lunch cooking process.

Something sweet, while she is processing the Millet flour, she has a small black pot on her cooking stones, the aroma from the covered pot tells me she is boiling meat, mmh yummy, millet bread with beef brings back very beautiful memories of my late mother, oh it also reminds me of Christmas.

Lovisa is up for the busy day, she sets her round saucepan on fire, adds more firewood, after a few minutes the water has boiled, she starts the mingling process, pours the millet flour into the boiling water, a few minutes the white flour is blackish bread and producing a nice scent of food.

She calls on Doreen her forth born who had been washing the dishes, Doreen and her siblings have to come back home for lunch at 2pm, the journey of about 5km from school.

Finally after the sauce is ready, the millet bread is mingled, the table is set for the men and mats are laid for the woman and children, we have the food that has kept generations of Banyole served, finger leaking is what I can say, Lovisa serves the millet bread on a wide plate and beef sauce in round bowls, Doreen her forth born brings the food to our table, she she kneels as its trained and required of Banyole Women and girls. NOTE: no folks, now spoons, no knives, bare hands work here, and you leave the table ready for the next duties.

Lovisa and other Banyole women are heroes; they have done this for years and brought up their children who have grown into responsible men and women.