Keny/Dowry

Alur society has the most complex and interesting way of traditional marriage, it involves dancing, rituals and exchange of gifts ranging from cattle, goats, clothes, money, each of the gifts have the way they are described. From the boy’s side there are normally two groups of people, the elders and the boys, while the elders’ role is to meet with the elders of the girl’s side to discuss the terms, the boys only go to dance and interact with girls. In the picture above i was participating in the mingling of bread, while below we are now taking the bread to be served

Out of the many Keny I have attended the most interesting one was for my friend called Godfrey, we reached the home where the dowry was on Friday night and left on Sunday evening, there was a lot of drinking and dancing. On the last day (Sunday morning) we performed the custom normally done by the boys to the aunties of the girl, that is cooking the traditional source called ‘angira’. Angira is a traditional sauce made out of white beans mixed with okra, awwasi (soda ash) and salt, at times palm oil or ‘moo yau’ (cheer batter oil) is added to improve the flavor, this sauce is normally cooked in a pot and eaten with bread made out of cassava floor. Here the food is ready and being served