Life at National Service camp: By Rama Bhikhabhai 8 th May 2014

File photo of National Service recruits
at camp - not related to the article 

1.1    Background

My parents had migrated from British India to Tanganyika Territory in 1947. I was born in Dar-es-salaam. Then it was a cultural norm among the Indian society to educate their girls till primary education for 8 years only. As I was very much interested in studying further, I was allowed to go to Indian girls’ secondary school for additional four years to achieve Cambridge School certificate.

Tanganyika became independent from British rule on 9 December 1961. By 1964, main land Tanganyika united with the People's Republic of Zanzibar to form the United Republic of Tanzania. As in 1962, less than 2% of 11-16 year old children were in secondary education and about 85% of population was illiterate. To overcome the problem, free primary education was offered to all children. Talented students were selected for high schools and at universities free of charge.

 In 1964, an act of compulsory National Service was introduced for all, boys or girls, who had graduated free of charge from high schools and University. According to the act, one should do two years national training service which included both military as well as nation building activities. Out of these two years, six months should be spent on the military camps and during the rest of 18 months one should practise the normal profession with reduction of the salary by 40%.

The aim of staying in a camp for six months was to provide standard military training as well as training on human rights, civics, and the history of the union of Tanganyika and Zanzibar, and also aimed to impart students with a sense of unity and patriotism.

Many of my class mates went to India or UK for further education with the aim of settling overseas due to the political instability. My father could not afford to send me abroad. I was one of the two Indian girls who were selected from our school to go for high school education (A-level) in 1965. It was a dilemma whether I should accept the offer of going to A-level or not, because if I accept, I had to go for six months of national service after I finished my studies. My parents were not keen on this idea as this was a new concept for them. They were fearful for my safety and what the society would say for sending a young girl away to unknown challenges. Obviously my parents were protective, worried and anxious, as I had never lived away from them. But I managed to convince them after weighing the pros and cons. They were very proud of my academic achievement so far and wanted me to fulfil my dream. We decided to tackle the problem when it came.

After two years of A-level, I was selected to join University of East Africa in Dar-es-salaam for my Bachelor degree in Science. So going for national service was prolonged for another three years until 1969. All girls and boys who got a degree from the college were asked to report for national service. It was inevitable to refuse and the only way to evade the service was to get married. My parents were worried and we found out more about the life in the camp from our Asian neighbours, whose daughters were a year or two ahead of me at the college. It sounded safe and full of experiences, except the standard of living in these camps was very primitive compared to our comfortable lifestyle at home. After lots of discussions, I was brave enough to accept the challenge of being there for six months.

On the way to National Service camp

I came to know that we were asked to join the national service camp in a remote location called Makutopora, which was situated in the middle of vast dry and arid part of Tanzania just few miles away from Dodoma, the National Capital city of Tanzania. Some of Asian female students from the University were also coming there. To avoid hardship, some candidates had already prearranged light duty certificates from doctors. My friend, Nurun and I had decided to do full duty.

We were late by 10 days to report at the camp. The reason being, we were granted special permission to attend our graduation ceremony at University.

It was a long arduous bus journey of 436 kilometres from Dar to the main town Dodoma. We had to sleep overnight at one of our community member’s residence. From there we had to take a local bus to the camping site in Makutopora. For both of us, it was the first time ever to venture on such gruelling travel without the protection of any adult male family escort. The military camp was right in the bushes and buses did not pass nearby. The bus driver dropped us near the main road and showed us the direction towards the camp, which was nowhere in sight. There were no proper paths or road signs except thorny bushes.

As this camp was newly started, we had heard that standard of living was not very high. We were advised to take a little wooden trunk or suitcase, as it would be used as a dining table and an ironing table. My wooden trunk had very few necessary items just to last me for five months, but it weighed a ton whilst carrying through the bushes and forest. Unfortunately, luck was not on my side, as the handle of the trunk came off and it was impossible to carry it to the camp. I hid it under bushes and marked the place, as not to misplace my precious treasure.

 1.2    The first night at camp

It was about four in the evening when we entered the camp. We were exhausted. On arrival, I immediately noticed that we were the first two Indian girls in this camp. All the eyes turned towards us. I saw all kinds of activities going on, but the most eye-catching was a group of African youths marching with rifles in hands and singing in that solid heat of the day.

We were given military khaki skirt and trouser, green T-shirts and a beret. When they saw that we were exhausted, they helped me to bring back my wooden trunk from the bushes.

A lady afande (leader) guided us to the north part of the camp, where women’s tents were situated. She showed us the tent, which had holes everywhere along the wall and in the ceiling. One could gaze at the clear sky and count the stars through the holes. The tent had two rows of simple spring beds on sandy floor. One row was full with ten beds, whereas the other had only five beds and ours was the last in the row with some empty space for more beds for late arrivals. The leader informed us that there was only one bed available and we had to share the bed at least one night. Behind each bed, along the wall there was a shelf or a stand made of wooden sticks. I could put my wooden trunk on that and that was my only furniture for the next six months beside the bed. I also noticed that the lower part of the tent was torn off in many places and I could see that the space was big enough for any wild animal to creep into the tent at night. It was a scary feeling.   

Being dead tired, we retired a bit early. It was dark everywhere as there was no electricity in the tent. There was a little lantern hanging from the middle supporting pole, but to save the kerosene it was supposed to be lightened only in emergencies. The spring bed which I was supposed to share with my friend Nurun did not have a good mattress. It was difficult to share the bed as we were sinking. In the middle of night I thought I was dreaming when I saw some rays of light. I ignored that and continued sleeping. Suddenly, I felt a hand touching over my blanket; still I thought I was dreaming. Then I remembered the warning from the ex-national service people, that often the night male guards on duty, came in the women’s tent to tease and scare them. We were recommended to have a torch under the pillow. I heeded this advice very seriously for my personal safety! I quickly took out the torch and lighted towards the intruders and shouted “thief, thief”. The rest of the girls were on their feet chasing the intruders. The girls from the neighbouring tents also heard the commotion and came out to assist us. It created a big chaos in the middle of dark shadowy night. Unluckily we did not catch them, but since then we were conscious about such intruders, and made sure that the lantern was on throughout the night. That was my first night in the camp.

Next day, we hung big empty cans and tins on the main entrance and along the lower open sides of the tent to avoid any foreign person or animal entering the tent. The rattling sound of the empty tins acted as our alarm.

What a relief for the rest of the day and for the whole stay of six months?

 1.3    Life in the camp

It was not an easy life at the camp. There was a big difference in the way one was brought up in a middle class Indian family at home and here in the camp. There were about 1000 other native persons in the camp. Many young girls and boys from the villages, who had volunteered to join the national service were able to face the life without much struggle and hardship, as the standard at the camp was better than that at home. At times I wished I had a faked medical certificate from a doctor asking for light duties, like rest of other Asian girls, but at the end of each day it felt like a challenge that I could cope up with the harsh conditions and I felt proud.   

The life at camp was ruled by the sound of the whistles. The day started with running five kilometres at about six in the morning when it was still dark. One had to sing “Chakam chakam chinja (chinja means kill),” all the way.  All the unpopular political figures like Ian Smith of Rhodesia, Botha of South Africa and Banda from Malawi were accused in the song. In many other occasions we had to sing similar military cadences. I was always scared of running in the dark, as I had heard that often some groups had met wild hyenas on the way.

Some days instead of running in the early morning, we had to go a bit far and dig trenches, one meter wide and one meter deep per person. The aim was to fill the trenches with fertilized soil for growing grapes. Dodoma has a semi-arid climate which was very suitable for growing grapes. The grapes were produced for fresh fruit consumption and for wine production. The ground was very dry and hard and I still remember the first time I struck my trenching hoe. The tool made a big sound and it went high in the air and I suffered from shoulder aches for few days. We used to get covered by the red soil and dust and often did not have opportunity to take shower due to the impending next activity. 

One had hardly rested after the jogging or digging, the shrill whistle blowing was heard stating that it was time to line up for the breakfast. Hot tea was poured in a rectangular aluminium mess tin with a metal handle, with bread and big lump of Blue Band margarine on it. This was a hurried activity and sometimes I got my tongue burnt due to the hot tea. Once I had duty in the kitchen and I saw that there were no knives to spread margarine on the bread. Instinct of ‘survival for the fittest’ came in. We picked some big bones (looking like knife), which were thrown on the muddy ground – the remains of our last night’s stew for supper. Since then my appetite for bread and butter faded away.

The next whistle blew and we were all lined up in our company. The company was divided in the small sections and each group had to perform various activities such as breaking stones, fetch water to make bricks, build house, dig trenches,  harvest grape vines, grow vegetables, clear forests, collect wood sticks (not less than 2 cm in diameter) for fuels and so on. Everybody wanted to join the kitchen duties as it was less hectic, away from the hot, scorching sun.

In the evening we had to again line up in a parade and practice marching. Never in my life had I marched to the rhythm; left right, left right. I was always stepping on the person who was in front of me in the parade. At home we went for long pleasant strolls along the sea side, and never dreamt that I would march like a soldier with left and right steps. I was always pinpointed and taken out of the parade and was asked to train on my own for perfection.  I did struggle hard to march with the rhythm. Once a particular leader was away for few months and on his return, he shouted to me in Kiswahili. -“you, Indian girl, come out of the parade”. I was pretty sure that I did not make any mistake. He said, “You are doing excellent, go and join the group”. I really felt happy, just like when I passed my academic examination.

Besides the parades, we were taught how to assemble and disassemble rifles. Once fully trained, we were sent for practice to shoot at bulls eyes by lying over a sack of sands. I shot fifty times and I still remember the pain in the shoulder for the next few weeks.

After the dinner, we had cultural evening gatherings where we had to sing all kind of national songs in Kiswahili. The only positive point during my stay was that my broken Kiswahili language, which I had learnt earlier, was improving in grammar.

The sanitary systems were not that advanced. Few meters away from the group of women’s tents, there was a house with a shed, where there were a number of lavatories. There were no water flushing system, it was just a hole in the ground and one had to squat over the hole and finish very quickly before the stench of the smell penetrated the clothes. Moreover there were no lights and no proper locks for the door. In the day time it was all right to use, but we girls never used the toilets in the night. We had heard the story of one girl who went to the toilet shed at night. When she unlocked the door after finishing her business, somebody grabbed her in the shed; in other words somebody was enjoying the sound of peeing and smell of excreta in the darkness! Or she could have easily been raped!

If we felt like urinating in the middle of the night, we just ran out of the tent and quickly did it on the sandy area around the tent. We did not dare to go further in the thorny bush as we were scared of hyenas, snakes and all other creepy crawlies lurking around. When one urinated on sand, there was always a little hole made in the sand. If this hole was found out by the lady leaders in the morning, the whole tent would get some kind of punishment. The punishments could vary from some light duties to clear some bushy area, or to some nasty ones such as carrying a big tin of water over the head and to do frog jumps without pouring the water over the body. The most common punishment was to go in the bush and bring all the dry wooden twigs to be used for warming and cooking food. Luckily I never had to do individual punishment. I knew an Indian boy who denied eating the wine grapes while clearing around in the vine-yards, but his blue tongue revealed that he did eat the grapes. He had to stay in a small prison cell, standing on feet whole day and night.

We also learned to cheat when we were on hard duty; we spent as little energy as possible when it was hard work. I remember our group went to break the stones. Everyone had a hammer in hand and had to break the big stones into small pebbles to be used in building houses. It was a hard work but we worked at a slower pace, chatting and laughing and making the most of that difficult task. When we heard the leader’s footsteps approaching, the rhythm of 20 hammers striking the big stones became faster.  Somehow, there was a feeling of excitement and thrill in playing truants as some work was extremely strenuous.

We were free every Saturdays and Sundays, unless one was on duty in the kitchen. We needed the free days to wash ourselves and relax. Every Sunday evening, we were called to line up with our starched skirts and trousers. Most of the time was spent in preparing the starched clothes. First we had to wash and dry the clothes. In the mean time we had to prepare starch for ironing. We got starch powder which we boiled with water in our mess tins. It was important to use the right amount of water. Otherwise one ended up in either a very thick jelly or thin porridge. The slimy mixture was then used to iron the skirts and trousers. If one was not careful in ironing, there was a risk that one got white streaks of dry starch. If a leader saw such a white dot or streak on the ironed clothes, he or she would order us to remove the spots and re-iron, or if you are unlucky, the clothes could be dipped in bucket of cold water and one had to start from the beginning and spend Sunday evening ironing the clothes.

We had read in biology at the University that stress often had negative effect on growth, metabolism and reproductive system in animals. The continuous alertness stress and fear of getting punishment at the national camp had an effect on our hormonal system. Most of the girls did not get their menstruation for six months.

These were some of the incidences I experienced during six months stay in the camp that made a deep impression in my life and will never forget the hardship we faced. I cannot imagine doing the similar type of service ever again. It was the longest time ever being away from home in Dar-es-salaam from my family.

On my arrival at home, I burst into tears, sobbing away when I laid my eyes on my dear mother. These tears were of joy for reuniting with my family – safe and sound in one piece. They had eagerly waited for my safe return and to hear my stories. It was a day for celebration and merriment. The family was proud for my brave achievements and I felt their love and warmth oozing out. These are the moments I cherish forever.

 1.4    Acknowledgement

I am very thankful to my father who allowed me to study as far as I wanted to. He was a typical Indian gentleman, who had just moved from a village in India to Tanganyika with much conserved cultural attitudes towards his way of thinking and living. He never went to school, but he made sure that we all brothers and sisters got chance to study. He changed his ideology according to the times and circumstances and allowed me to stay at the University campus and do the national service.  Later on, to my amazement he also agreed to my proposal of me moving out of the city to a small village to carry out my profession as a teacher.

I still remember that he was so proud on the day I had a graduation day. It was a great occasion and honour for me to receive the personal handshake and certificate from our President Nyerere, who was also a chancellor of University. The self-esteem and happiness on my father’s face of that cherished moment is still etched on my mind. He proudly distributed to family and friends my photograph with President Nyerere with my B. Sc. Degree certificate. He was unfortunate to attend any school for his education in India, but I can see the self-respect and dignity in his eyes.

He always put the happiness of his children first. 

He has been an inspiration and is always in my thoughts.