The Hands of the Blacks by Luis Bernardo HonwanaI don’t remember now how we got on to the subject, but one day, Teacher said that the palms of the Blacks’ hands were much lighter than the rest of their bodies. This is because only a few centuries ago, they walked around with them like wild animals, so their palms weren’t exposed to the sun, which made the rest of their bodies darker. I thought of this when Father Christiano told us after catechism that we were absolutely hopeless, and that even the pygmies were better than us, and he went back to this thing about their hands being lighter, and said it was like that because they always went about with their hands folded together, praying in secret. I thought this was so funny, this thing of the Blacks’ hands being lighter, that you should just see me now. I do not let go of anyone, whoever they are, until they tell me why they think that the palms of the Blacks’ hands are lighter. Doña Dores, for instance, told me that God made Blacks’ hands lighter so they would not dirty the food they made for their masters, or anything else they were ordered to do that had to be kept clean. Señor Antunes, the Coca-Cola man, who only comes to the village now and again when all the Cokes in the cantinas have been sold, said it was a lot of baloney. Of course, I do not know if it was really such, but he assured me, it was. After that I said, ―All right, it was baloney,‖ and then he told me what he knew about this thing of the Blacks’ hands. It was like this: ―Long ago, many years ago, God the Father, Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary, St. Peter, many other saints, all the angels that were in Heaven, and some of the people who had died and gone to Heaven—they all had a meeting and decided to create the Blacks. Do you know how? They got hold of some clay and pressed it into some second-hand molds and baked the clay of creatures, which they took from the heavenly kilns. Because they were in a hurry and there was no room next to the fire, they hung them in the chimneys. Smoke, smoke, smoke—and there you have them, black as coals. And now, do you want to know why their hands stayed white? Well, didn’t they have to hold on while their clay baked?‖ When he told me this, Señor Antunes and the other men who were around us were very pleased and they all burst out laughing. That very same day, Señor Frias told me that everything i had heard from them there had been just one big pack of lies. Really and truly, what he knew about the Blacks’ hands was right—that God finished men and told them to bathe in a lake in Heaven. After bathing, the people were nice and white. The Blacks, well. They were made very early in the morning and at this hour, the water in the lake was very cold, so they only wet the palms of their hands and the soles of their feet before dressing and coming to the world. But i read in a book that happened to mention the story, that the Blacks have hands lighter like this because they spent their lives bent over, gathering the white cotton of Virginia and i dont know where else. Of course, Doña Estefania did not agree when i told her this. According to her, it is only because their hands became bleached with all that washing. Well, i do not know what to think about all this but the truth is that however calloused and cracked they may be, Black hands are always lighter than the rest of him. And that’s that! My mother is the only one who must be right about this question of a Black’s hands being lighter than the rest of his body. On the day that we were talking about it, i was telling her what i already knew about the question, and she could not stop laughing. When i was talking, she did not tell me at once what she thought about all this and she only talked when she was sure that i wouldn’t get tired of bothering her about it. And even then, she was crying and clutching herself around the stomach like someone who had laughed so much that it was quite unbearable. What she said was more or less this: ―God made Blacks because they had to be. They had to be, my son. He thought they really had to be. Afterwards, He regretted having made them because other men laughed at them and took away their homes and put them to serve as slaves and not much better. But because He couldn’t make them all white, for those who were used to seeing them black would complain, He made it so that the palms of their hands would be exactly like the palms of the hands of other men. And do you know why that was? Well, listen: it was to show that what men do is only the work of men... that what men do is done by hands that are the same—hands of people. How, if they had any sense, would know that before anything else they are men. He must have been thinking of this when He made the hands of those men who thank God they are not black!‖ After telling me all this, my mother kissed my hands. As i ran off to the yard to play ball, i thought that i had never seen a person cry so much as my mother did then. The moral lesson of the hands of the black can be understood and taken in different ways. Taking care of ones self, having respect and appreciation, being honest and helpful, and living to help others and build upon one's self are the moral lessons of the hands of the black. ―THE HANDS OF THE BLACKS‖ LUIS BERNARDO HONWANA 1969 EXCERPT I don't remember now how we got onto the subject, but one day Teacher said that the palms of the black's hands were much lighter than the rest of their bodies because only a few centuries ago they walked around on all fours, like wild animals, so their palms weren't exposed to the sun, which made the rest of their bodies darker and darker. I thought of this when Father Christiano told us after catechism that we were absolutely hopeless, and that even the blacks were better than us, and he went back to this thing about their hands being lighter, and said it was like that because they always went about with their hands folded together, praying in secret. I thought this was so funny, this thing of the black's hands being lighter, that you should just see me now — I don't let go of anyone, whoever they are, until they tell me why they think that the palms of the black's hands are lighter. Dona Dores, for instance, told me that God made their hands lighter like that so they wouldn't dirty food they made for their masters, or anything else they were ordered to do that had to be kept quite clean. The Hands of the Black takes place in the village of a young boy. The author is from Maputo, so we can assume the setting is similar to the Republic of Mozambique. Luis Bernardo Honwana served on the Executive Board of UNESCO from 1987 to 1991. In 1995 he was appointed director of the office in South Africa. He is also an acclaimed author. Luis Bernardo Honwana was born in 1942. "The Hands of the Blacks" is a short story by Luis Bernardo Honwana. The story follows the narrator as he asks different people to explain the reason why the hands of black people are lighter than the rest of their bodies. First he speaks to his teacher, who tell him that their hands are lighter because humans once crawled on the ground like four legged animals, leaving their palms unexposed to the light. Next, the narrator speaks to three religious men, Father Christiano Señor Antunes, and Señor Frias, who provide him with different religious explanations. The narrator then says that he once read a book that explained the phenomenon as the outcome of slaves picking cotton in Virginia. Finally, the narrator speaks with his mother, who tells him that God created black people without lighter hands, but once he saw how they were mistreated by white people, he lightened their palms. The mother says that he did this to show that while black people looked different, their work for God was just as important and valuable. His mother cries and leaves him to reflect on her words. The Young Boy & Her Mother Luís Bernardo Honwana, (born November 1942, Lourenço Marques, Mozambique), journalist and one of Africa’s outstanding short-story writers, who has been praised for poetic insight in his portrayal of village life in Mozambique. Honwana grew up in Moamba, a suburb of the capital city Lourenço Marques (now Maputo). He held jobs as a government cartographer and as reporter and then editor of two newspapers in Beira (Mozambique’s second largest city) while working toward his secondary degree. After completing high school he devoted himself to literary activities. In Nós Matámos a Cão Tinhosa (1964; We Killed Mangy-Dog & Other Stories), he is never didactic, but beneath the deceptively simple surface of his narrative is an implied criticism of a society that has adopted the wrong values. His stories exhibit deep understanding of human experiences and needs. His writing was interrupted by imprisonment (1964–67) for his political activities. Upon his release he moved to Portugal for three years and spent some time in Switzerland, Algeria, and Tanzania before returning home to work with the transitional government. By 1984 he was chief of staff to the president of Mozambique and had completed a novel. He also made several documentary films. Luís Bernado Honwana (born 1942) is a Mozambican author. Biography[edit] Luís Bernardo Honwana was born Luís Augusto Bernardo Manuel in Lourenço Marques (present-day Maputo), Mozambique. His parents, Raúl Bernardo Manuel (Honwana) and Naly Jeremias Nhaca, belonged to the Ronga people from Moamba, a town about 55 km northwest of Maputo. In 1964 he became a militant with FRELIMO, a front that had the objective to liberate Mozambique from Portuguese colonial rule. Due to his political activities he was arrested by the colonial authorities and was incarcerated for three years. He studied law in Portugal and worked for some time as a journalist. He was appointed director of President's office under Samora Machel. Later in 1981, he became Secretary of State for culture. He served on the Executive Board of UNESCO from 1987 to 1991 and was chairman of UNESCO's Intergovernmental Committee for the World Decade for Culture and Development. In 1995, he was appointed director of the newly opened UNESCO office in South Africa. Since he retired from the organization in 2002, he has been active in research in the arts, history and ethno- linguistics. [1] Works[edit] Honwana is the author of a single book, Nós Matámos o Cão- Tinhoso (1964), translated into English as We Killed Mangy Dog and Other Stories, and the tale "Hands of the Blacks". This work has proved enormously influential and a case can be made for it being the touchstone of contemporary Mozambican narrative. We Killed Mangy Dog is a collection of short stories set in the (Portuguese) colonial era at the turn of the sixties and is reflective of the harsh life black Mozambicans lived under the Salazar regime. Several of the stories are told from the point of view of children or alienated adolescents and most feature the rich mix of races, religions and ethnicities that would later preoccupy Mozambique's most internationally celebrated writer, Mia Couto.
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