The Story of Dare’ and the Trip to Africa
In September 2001, a group of Americans traveled to Zimbabwe, South Central Africa. They went to meet and learn from an African Shona Elder, Mandaza Kandemwa. They went to increase their abilities in peacemaking and global healing. Their visit proved to be the beginning of a tremendous international partnership of people dedicated to taking care of each other and our world. Wilderness Sarchild and Chuck Madansky of Brewster, Massachusetts were among them. They came back to Cape Cod with the gift of Dare’ {pronounced Dar- ray} a traditional Shona way of gathering in community for cooperative healing, learning and celebration.
The man they met on their journey was Mandaza Kandemwa. Mandaza is a Bantu shaman or medicine man, in the Shona and Ndebele traditions of Zimbabwe. He carries, with a great heart, an ancient African tradition of peacemaking. It is this tradition of peacemaking, healing and initiation that he offers to us individually and collectively at this time of global unrest and dis-ease. He shares with us the indigenous understanding of the interrelatedness of nature, healing, community and peacemaking. Mandaza’s home is in Bulawayo, the second largest city in Zimbabwe. He has re-imagined a tribal form of the South African tradition of ceremonial healing and council in a contemporary urban setting. It has become a profoundly successful part of the grassroots movement there. These people of Zimbabwe are working to create a sustainable safe community in the midst of the dire economic and political conditions that currently continue to plague their nation. They practice Dare’.
Dare’ is a way for people to gather together to heal each other and address the violence and greed within our lives and the world at large. Each of us comes with gifts and needs. Each of us has suffered and that suffering can turn us back to our community with compassion. Dare’ offers us an opportunity to meet and share our ideas, our dreams and gifts, to encourage and heal one another, and create and celebrate our sacred relationship with all of nature and each other. We respect that Spirit speaks differently, but profoundly, through each of us. Together we seek to find the wisdom to proceed on the path of peacemaking. Dare’ is a community where healing is the primary focus and the exchange between Nature, Spirit, and participants is constant and dynamic.
The Cape Cod Dare’ was founded by Wilderness Sarchild, Chuck Madansky, and their local community in January 2002. It has been gathering the last Sunday of each month since that time. About a hundred people come to Dare’ on a regular basis and many more folks have come and participated over the years. It is free and a place where all are welcome. There are several Dare’s held in US and internationally. Mandaza travels each year working through out the world. He visits our C.C. Dare’, annually, to offer us friendship, guidance, and direct healing. This has significantly helped us to develop into a rich sustainable healing community. The C.C. Dare’ is committed to being a contributing part of the larger Dare’ community around the world. We are engaged in supporting the work of Mandaza and his people by establishing enduring friendships, and raising awareness and funds through their non-profit Tatenda/IHC. Our Dare’ has raised over $50,000 for Tatenda over the years.
The Cape Cod Dare’ had their first trip to Zimbabwe. We sent a delegation of our members to support and study with Mandaza Kandemwa within his home community. Mandaza was fundamental in starting our Dare’ here on Cape Cod. He has been committed to returning to Cape Cod every year since the inception of CC Dare’, to teach us, witness our struggles and growth, and encourage us to truly dedicate our lives to the interrelated work of healing, community, and peacemaking. This trip is an opportunity to significantly deepen our relationships with Mandaza, his family and the cultural ways they practice in their home. It is an important part of our on going collective work to experience the spirit of Dare’ at the root. It was deeply beneficial to experience the power of their cultural ways as we practiced together in their community, with the land, the animals, the plants and waters, and the Spirit of the African world. Visiting Bulawayo will helped us to understand what it is really like for Mandaza and his family to live with the circumstances of the political, social, and economic unrest in Zimbabwe. Our trip will help to fund and support the efforts of Tatenda as they work with the local people in resolving these issues.
During this exchange we shared our gifts and burdens, strengthened partnerships, learned ways of living peacefully in a global community and worked towards partnerships that will lead to a peaceful, healing sustainable community on Cape Cod, in Zimbabwe and around the world. We know that cross cultural exchange is an important key to peacemaking. The trip to Zimbabwe continues to expand our efforts in these matters by cultivating our partnerships, our understanding, and our skills. We will continue to learn the proven traditional ways of the Shona people that can be applied to our own community’s challenges with violence, oppression, loss of connection to nature, and economic hardship. Although only 6-8 members actually traveled to Africa, all the members of C.C. Dare’ were involved in the power and medicine of this journey. It is our vision to have the effects of this trip and all the work we share through Dare’, greatly benefit the whole, from Cape Cod to Bulawayo and beyond. |
