This morning over chai and chapati (African tortilla bread) I got the run-down on the Pallangyo Family Tree. Apparently, Grandfather Pallangyo was born in 1869 in Arusha. As a member of the Meru Tribe, he married early and often, and by the time he died in 1994 at the ripe old age of 125, he had taken six wives and had a total of 56 children.
I told them they were crazy. It sounded like a biblical chronology of years, wives and children. Nobody could live that long today, and not make the Guinness Book of Records.
But they defended their Grandfather, and even invited me over to the Grandmother's house (the youngest of Grandfather's six wives), to see a picture of him in '93, the year before he died.
As we finished the conversation, I looked at my homestay brother Elidaima, 23 in disbelief. I asked him, "So, do you ever wish you could have 56 kids?"
He paused, and took a quick glance around the room. Then he looked at the ground with this sly grin across his face.
I had my answer.
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