What's in a name?

We spent the weekend at Mazowe High School. It's a Salvation Army boarding school for boys, and we were spending the weekend with the administrator, his wife (she is an amazing cook - I think we both put on at least 10 pounds on the weekend!), and his 3 very cute kids. It was a relaxing weekend. We watched lots of kungfu movies (the kids like it, and don't seem to notice that the VCDs are in Thai/Japanese, etc. - they just like the action), and taught the kids how to play "Rook." Amai made us hamburgers - which was so sweet of her, but it was hilarious to watch the kids struggle to eat this strange food! We were going to get a tour of a nearby prison, but people are a little sensitive about prisons these days. We did see into one of the buildings where the inmates sleep - there were no beds/mattresses, but we were assured that each person gets his own blanket. We went to church with all the boarders this morning, and it was amazing to watch 450 boys jumping, dancing and praising the Lord!

We asked our friend what his Shona surname means in English and he explained that it was actually a nickname that his father was given, but that it had then become his surname. It means "you are going to be killed." I guess our friend's grandfather used to beat his grandmother quite badly, and so they thought the name would be a propos for their child. We met another Salvation Army officer whose surname means "drunk" (which is interesting because Salvationists aren't allowed to drink alcohol!) Oh, and we just visited some neighbours whose baby turned 1 month today (we brought a cake, but he couldn't enjoy it). His name is Bothwell, and he's a cutie. I asked the mother why the name, and she said, "oh my husband likes names starting with B." So, I asked him why all of his kids have names starting with B. He explained - "all the way through school, I was second in my class. All of those years I had a boy in my class who always came in first, and I could never beat him. I was always second. He was A and I was B. So, I just wanted my kids to have that memory." What we pass on to our children is powerful...