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Negarit

Mobokkorria following Mokria

By Saleh Gadi
Jul 18, 2006, 12:24 PST

A s a child, whenever I was late for school, I walked through the shortcuts of downtown Keren. Every business I passed by burned frankincense and had a radio on. The first part of the walk took me through a row of small one-room offices where businesswomen run their affairs. For reasons I didn’t know then, these women were considered bad. Their ‘office’ doors were partly covered by worn out, fading and greasy curtains. You could peek inside the depressingly dim and grim ‘offices’ and see a bed, a side-table, an old stool, a radio and a large aluminum bowl – a sort of a manual bathtub. On the walls you could see bargain tapestry depicting saints; tiny frames of single black and white pictures; and a mirror dangling on a thread from a huge nail on the wall. The successful businesswomen displayed a lot of jewelry- golden bracelets, rings and necklaces. At the doorsteps of every room, I mean ‘office’, there was a Mobokkorria, a clay burner, fuming with third-grade frankincense, and a transistor radio blasting in the highest possible volume. The cheap frankincense, sprinkled with Lehteet¹ and Kerbe², permeates a disgustingly stinky odor. For obvious reasons, the Ethiopian soldiers in town had the odor of that alley. I hated that smell so much that I never bothered to learn what the English words for Lehteet and Kerbe were - if I did learn that in my chemistry class, it must be the only thing I forgot.  

The businesswomen burned frankincense to attract customers as per the advice of their voodoo marketing consultants –I still do not understand how a blindingly thick and cheap incense, that felt more like fumigation than an air-freshener would attract customers! But apparently it did, and now, the PFDJ has perfected every tool of immoral and unjust scam. Ironically, one of the main goals of the Eritrean revolution was to clean such alleys and get rid of ‘dhur bahltat’, “the primitive traditions that exploited women”; instead, the PFDJ has legitimized the industry and is collecting taxes- I wonder how they audit the revenues of that “trade” and if they are paid in cash or in kind! 

The second part of the journey took me through rows of grocery, vegetable and garment shops. Shar’e Kheyateen (Tailors’ alley) and Shar’e Semkerriya (the alley of tin Fabricators) were the most colorful and vibrant alleys populated by honest, hardworking patriotic people. The two alleys burned softer and pleasant second-grade frankincense mixed with some sandalwood, the type of aroma you sometimes sense in Churches and Mosques. 

The last part of my journey was as uninteresting as the PFDJ’s chronicle of extortion and warmongering. It took me through streets of walled houses and a police station followed by an empty field before I reached to school just in time for the morning bell.

Early mornings were primetime for four popular radio stations: the BBC Arabic Service and its famous Big Ben bangs, the Umdurman Radio and its melancholic Sudanese songs, Radio Ethiopia and its gymnasium program, dub’dub belu, dub’dub belu (I am not sure if anyone jumped to the stupid command) and often, very sad Somali music that shrieked in the air. The alleys were covered in a mist of incense smoke and wrapped in a strange mixture of music and talk coming out of the tens of radios, the conversation of the people, noises from the few pack animals and shopkeepers muttering ‘Ya Fattah Ya Aleem³’, a casual prayer for a bountiful day. One learns to sift through the decibels, filter out unwanted noise, and listen to specific preferences only. On the tailors alley you would follow the BBC news while still walking because, as if on a competition, every shop had the radio dial on the BBC. You could listen to the first part of the news in the beginning of the block, keep listening while you walked, and finish the news by the time you reached the end of the block: a non-stop supply of free radio- all tuned to one station. Occasionally when ‘Eritrea’ was mentioned in the news, everyone shouted in unison: ‘raise the volume’, a reflex request that gave the impression that a louder mentioning of Eritrea in the news would liberate the country- and that was a moral defiance of sorts.

The tin fabricators, whose honorary president was the late Am Hedug, manufactured tin incense burners; but the demand in the local stock market was always for the popular clay Mobokkoria. They made utensils, kettles, cups, funnels and a host of other tin utensils. You could hear the click-click of delicate hammers hitting the thin metal against the backdrop of one radio station or another. It was almost a morning ritual where the thick smoke from the clay burners, the famous Mobokkorria, infused the morning air before floating to the sky.

Meet Mokria

Mokria⁴ is an Amharic proper name meaning ‘cause of pride’ – someone must have been proud of Mokria! In our case, it is similar to the pride some feel when their leader commits scandals and they helplessly try to justify it and, in the process, make fools of themselves. The Mokria of the old days was a brutal, sadistic Ethiopian Tor Serawit sergeant in charge of one of the night squads that humiliated Kerenites. We gave Mokria another name, we called him Mobokkorria. Once, minutes after the curfew time at six in the evening, I was among a group of young kids he caught while we hurryied to get home. It seemed he was in a good mood and decided not to jail us for the night as he would usually do. Instead, he improvised a punishment that turned out to be an entertainment for him and his squad: he ordered us to climb a big tree, reach a certain branch and come down three times; he ordered us to sing while we climbed the tree: “Abiet, Addis Ababa, Abiet Haile Sellassie”- a number popular with drunk Tor Serawit soldiers. Kidane, a sympathizing Commandis in the squad, whose anger over the junior tyrant’s orders I sensed in his bloodshot eyes, advised us whisperingly, to obey Mokria’s orders and avoid his wrath. We climbed the tree falling, shaking and bruising ourselves. He kept ordering us to sing louder while he laughed and made fun of us. That was Mokria.

If a boy is soft and sissy, usually Eritreans would call him Mobokkorria- a disgracing insult in a macho society. And if someone boasted and lied too much, he would be referred to as ‘Bokhokh… Mobokkoria’! – a fitting description for our current tyrant and his followers, huh!

The Mokria of the early seventies is not around anymore; but we have hundreds of his look-alikes claiming to be defenders of the nation. They have been terrorizing the people all day, every day, for the last fifteen years. At least Mokria reigned the streets only from sunset to sunrise enforcing the notorious coprifuoco⁵, the Curfew. But now we have a senior Mokria who considers Eritreans his toys and Eritrea his playground; and many Mobokkorias assist and embolden him in his cruel game. If Eritreans were fed up with the old Mokria and resisted him, wouldn’t it be natural to resist and fight back against the current, homegrown Mokria and Mobokkorias who are terrorizing them?

We make a big mistake when we refer to the anti-justice lots as “members of PFDJ”. They are not members of anything. Membership requires rights, free thought and free decision- they don’t have any of that. Therefore, it is more fitting to refer to them as blind, unquestioning followers; they should be referd to as Mobokkoria. As a group, they should be identified as ‘Mobokkorrias, followers of Mokria’. 

And the famous Mobokkoria is an integral part of any swindle job:

There was hardly a ‘Qletuni’ event where cheap grade-three incense was not burning. How do I know about Frankincense and its grades and qualities? Because I know of Sheriket Luban¹³. Long before the PFDJ monopolies took over, there was a successful share company that dealt in the processing and trading of frankincense which employed hundreds of people: Sheriket Luban, the Frankincense company which was owned and run by the God fearing notable businessmen of Keren. But Sheriket Luban is a subject of a case study that requires a favorable time.

And the third grade frankincense burned at the ‘Qletuni⁶ party as well.

Qletuni and Zrrefa

There are two intriguing traditions in parts of our culture. Qletuni and Zrrefa⁷. Though Zrrefa is not tolerated by the society anymore; the howling of young girls to Sawa is just that. Zrrefa was (and is) a straightforward social phenomenon: you spot a beautiful young girl, you kidnap her, and you declare her your bride. Families would helplessly lament: Tezzerifa endya! End of story. Qletuni is different.

The PFDJ has adapted all the “Dhur Bahltatat” and perfected it as a tool of strengthening its grip on power and expanding its monopoly on all aspect of life in Eritrea and beyond. It burns cheap frankincense in every city with potential customers; and the Mobbokorrias do come attracted by the cheap frankincense, Kerbe and Lhteet – they are infatuated by Mokria’s Etan⁸.

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