Twin spirits: A lost bond that lives in dreams

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1:08These dreams started from when I was eight years old, but they continued up to like a greater part of my life. I saw at the end of the house a child, a little child wearing a big white overshirt. I could sense that this child feels lonely. Ever since she was a little girl, Claire had spoken with the spirits. My mother's first reaction was panic. And she said, how come you've never told me you're talking to dead people? And then she started to take me to church because it is said that it is wrong to speak to the dead.

1:58I'm Eric Mugaj and you're listening to the documentary From Heart and Soul for the BBC World Service We're in Kampala, the capital of Uganda The city where I grew up I have come to meet Claire Nakato Whose journey takes us to a world beyond the everyday A world where spirits speak through dreams And reveal the deepest of secrets

2:27her story is one of mystery and of healing a search for understanding and for peace it begins with her childhood and growing up in buganda the central region of uganda in buganda my culture back then i don't know if it's still happening now but back then a lot of families especially in my community, used to gather to give back to their spirits, to celebrate their ancestors and things like that. Claire smiles as she talks about her spiritual upbringing, a unique mix of colonial Christianity and traditional Ugandan spirituality. In our own family, we used to gather every end of year. My uncles, my aunties, they would go to one of my grandfather's places every December.

3:21And we would celebrate. They would buy animals like cows, goats, slaughter them, play drums, sing songs, appeasing the spirits.

3:38Claire is gentle, but with a quiet certainty, the kind of manner that only comes from someone who has lived their lives and learned not to fear whatever comes their way. We had this grandfather who was like the medium through which the spirit would come.

4:03And then the spirit would convey any messages to them. My grandfather, who would be seated in the middle, suddenly he would start shaking. Did you witness that? I did. How do spirits look like? I didn't see like spirits per se. But when he would start shaking his head and acting possessed, then the drums would stop and they would reduce and the singing would stop because then that's how they would know that he has now come. And then they would start saying words like, you're welcome, we are happy to see you. And then he would respond in ways of, with a different voice, he had a different voice that he was using.

4:41And then they would thank the spirits and then they would continue the session. So we'd spend like maybe three days or a week there. But her grandfather was not the only person in the family with such a gift.

4:58Claire had her own spirit guide. This is the very first memory like I have about him. I think I was about age. I had a dream where I was playing with those kids we normally play with. and as we were playing I saw at the end of the house a child a little child wearing a big white over shirt and also carrying a stuffed doll in his right or left hand I don't quite remember so I could sense that this child feels lonely and would like to play so I saw him and I ran to him and I said hey come and join us come and join us and he said I can't I can't join you and I said why he said I just can't I said can I come and play with you then and he said yes you can so I left the group I was playing with and then I went and phoned him and I started to play with him so I remember the subsequent dreams I was having were of me isolating myself from the bigger group and just constantly playing with this little boy you had these dreams and how often very often to a point that I started to like sleeping a lot because it was fun having to play with him.

6:16Spent most of your time sleeping. I should say yes, but also I was woken up a lot. Inconvenience by people who thought it's lazy to sleep. These dreams started from when I was eight years old, but they continued up to a greater part of my life. Some believe our dreams connect us with a hidden knowledge, create the channels for spiritual communication. Those who do this say they can see beyond the physical world and into another place, a place that we have long forgotten.

7:02Claire is one of almost 30 ,000 sets of twins born in our country every year.

7:13Among the Baganda from central Uganda is a belief that twins may be spirits who walk among us in human form. For as long as she can remember, Claire says that she felt different. Even her son named Nakato sets her apart. It means young twin sister.

7:38There is a thing about twins giving blessings to people. It's a belief. So some of my uncles, especially one of my father's brothers, used to specifically come and want to hold me or for me to like just give him blessings. So he would just say, Nakato, come and give me some blessings. And I'd be like, I don't have any blessings, but okay. So I would hold his hand because he would also give me like some money. But then there were other people who would ask mom, where is the twin? And then she would introduce me. And then they would say, where is the other one? And she would say, my sister. That's how I found out that one, I am a twin, and two, that twins, they give blessings.

8:25Yeah, so they are not like ordinary children, I guess. Claire knew from a very early age that she and her sister were twins. Or at least this is what her mother tells everyone who asks. But her mother hides a painful secret. We grew up in a homestead of my grandmother, then my uncles, and then us. So it was like a huge piece of land with different houses of families. So I used to go with my grandmother to dig. And one time we were digging and there's like two big tombstones. But just a little behind them, there were about five little tombstones. So it was in the burial ground. The burial ground.

9:12Yeah, but also the garden. So I asked her, why are these ones small? and then she said because those are little children and I said who are they and then she told me the other ones were her kids that she lost but then this other one was my twins tombstone my twins grave. When did you find out that you had a brother? My brother came out first he was called Waswa and I was called Nakato and that's where my twin had been buried. It was a shocking revelation. The sister Claire had been brought up to believe is her twin was not her twin. In fact, her twin brother Waswa had died in childbirth and his tiny body was buried in their garden.

9:59Slowly, the pieces began to fall into place.

10:10When I started high school my mother took me to my uncle's school my uncle was teaching in a certain school life for me became a bit more difficult I was, I guess, punished a lot for so many things I was not happy very lonely and sad. In her time of need, Claire says that Waswa came to her at night to comfort her. In this dream, I was going to our kitchen, school kitchen, to get food. And on my way back, I looked through a corridor and I saw him standing. Maybe what I should say is we're growing up together. So if I was eight, he was eight. If I was nine, he was nine. So at that point when I was 14, he was also an older boy, still wearing his oversized shirt and carrying his stuffed dolls.

11:07I would always recognize him by the shirt and the doll. So I saw him and I told him what was happening in my life. And he said, let me take you. He said, let me take you because this is not okay. And I said, where? Who are you? And then that's when he told me that he was my twin, that he was Zwaswa. And I was scared to go because I thought that if I go I was going to die. But I was happy that it was him that I was talking to.

11:47The boy that she had been dreaming of since she was a little girl. The boy with the stuffed doll who she talked to, who she had played with in her sleep for all these years, it was Claire's dead brother, Waswa. My other sister was just born a year after me, so we grew up as twins, and my mum used to tell people that we were twins. That's just because people used to ask, where is the other twin? And my mum would just say, oh, that's her twin, so she avoids talking about the sad stories. But this realization meant Claire's life was about to get a whole lot harder. When did your parents find out that you were dreaming about a boy and this boy was your twin brother who had passed away at birth?

12:33How she found out was she had taken us with her to, I don't remember if it was a church or a medium or an African traditionalist. you know she had gone to get some answers because she was distressed her first reaction was shock and panic and she said how how come you've never told me you're talking to dead people and then she started to take me to church so that i can stop because it is said that it is wrong to speak to the dead. So she reacted really angry or what? I would not say angry, but panicked. I think she thought there was a problem with me, a big spiritual problem with me that needed immediate intervention from God.

13:27Claire's mom was desperate for help from God, from anyone. So she turned to a medium for advice. Because of my grades, my mom was convinced that my intelligence is going. The family friend medium told my mother that when I was in school, a spirit, a ghost, came and had sex with me, and it left things in me that are affecting my intelligence. But at the same time, she was also taking me to this other medicine woman. So she used to say, oh, take her to this place and pray. Go to this crossroads, put eggs, and let her kneel down and pray for her intelligence to come back. How did you feel being told to do that?

14:15It was difficult. And I remember she also told my mom to tell me to pray against a spirit of adultery. I was 13, and I was praying against being adulterous. My mom would look at me and say, say you don't want to be adulterous. I would be like, okay, I don't want to be adulterous. Do you know what it meant by then? No, no. I did not know. So most of those activities involved me just crying. What impact did this experience have on you? I hated God, but I hated God too. because God was not serving me. In church, we are told God is there. If you pray to him, God is going to come and save you, right?

15:02In church, they also tell us not to participate in the other things. But here we were also participating in the other things. So I thought this God is not coming to save me because we are participating in these other things. But I needed to be saved. So I had a really, really, really sad teenagehood.

15:48for 33 years. Solar for 25 years. That's enough. The interview from the BBC World Service. Listen now wherever you get your BBC podcasts. America is changing and so is the world. But what's happening in America isn't just a cause of global upheaval. It's also a symptom of disruption that's happening everywhere. I'm Asma Khalid in Washington, DC. I'm Tristan Redmond in London. And this is The Global Story. Every weekday, we'll bring you a story from this intersection where the world and America meet. Listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts. I am Nina Khrushcheva, the great granddaughter of Nikita Khrushchev, the leader of the Soviet Union in 1962.

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17:10From the BBC World Service, this is Heart and Soul. I'm Eric Mugage and we're in Kampala to hear Claire Nakato's remarkable journey guided by the spirit of her twin brother who lost his life in childbirth. There is something that made me hate God more. The medicine man, so I've told you about the medicine woman, the medicine man to whom my mom sent me. When I reached his place, she left me. we were in my grandmother's house and they just locked the doors left me with this man the two of us how he was going to help me was now he spoke as if it was not him speaking like as if he is now there's a spirit on him that is talking he said you're going to sleep with this one and he said i have to be smart about it so i have to do it for a whole week i have to sneak around behind the house, go to this man's room and, you know, we do the rituals and then I leave.

18:11And he told me to not tell anyone because then it would break the whole process. So I was quiet and I listened to him and then I told him, okay, tell him that I will not do it. So I was telling the spirit to tell this man that I will not be sleeping with him. and he got so mad. Tell me, you don't want to get okay. You don't want to be okay. That's not okay. And I said, I will not do that. And he said, okay, you're going to die with your things. And he said, if you tell anyone about it, you will die. I'll kill you.

18:53Your bravery said no. I said no. And he told me he'll kill me if I told anyone. So I left and I did not tell anyone, but I was mad. I went back home and I told my mother, I don't care if you kill me or what you do, I will never go to that man ever again in my life. And she was mad about it. And that was one of the first times I ever stood my ground and told my mother no. So she never tried to send me back to him again. Back to how that made me feel as a child. All these experiences coupled with the beatings and being told that I'm a difficult child, I'm a bad child and things like that, they made me hate myself so much.

19:37Claire says guilt made her pray for the spirit of Waswa to live and to rest in peace. Years went by without him, but she missed his company and wished for him to return. In 2020, I was 25. I woke up at about 3. And this is where I'm not sure. I don't know if I was awake or I was still sleeping. But I woke up and my brother was seated and holding my hand. You know, like just holding my hand and looking at me with like the most kind, loving presence. And it looked as if he had been there from the moment I slept. because I'd left my door open. And I remember I woke up and sat, and then he just stood and left.

20:26And I said, wait, wait, and he could not. He just left. He didn't even turn back. I felt happy.

20:40Claire grew up in a multi-faith family, blending Christian teachings with traditional Baganda customs, a mixture that made her childhood feel like an adventure. But as a teenager, that blend of belief brought new questions and a deep struggle between her faith and her identity. You know how the culture is. You go where your dad is in terms of tribe, clan, and even religion. So being Anglican, especially the earliest stages of our lives, we would all go to the Anglican church. But it was just because we loved hanging out with him, especially me. I think I am more close to my dad out of all my siblings.

21:24He's now a Muslim. We had that conversation and we said, what do you expect of us now? Should we become Muslims? He said, you're now adults. You can choose to be whatever you want to be. My mother, on the other hand, was Catholic. Were you both up a Catholic or a Muslim? I'm born Anglican because my father was Anglican. He is now a Muslim. how did you describe yourself spiritually where you were a christian because you had gone to pray you also had gone to the psychic how did these two combine how did they play out for a long time before the psychic i wanted so much to be a christian uganda is a very conservative spiritually conservative country right i also went to so many churches anglican church and even when i was at uni, I would go to the Anglican church, I would go to the Catholic church.

22:17For some reason, I liked where like a priest is as if psychic and they are telling you things.

22:27What do you mean with spiritually conservative? I mean that anything other than mainstream God is found upon. Like, it's not true. It's not there. You are a witch if you believe something other than and i have a loud mouth right for me i'm not scared of talking about things that are other than i i will stand in front of 20 people who i see are very religious and talk about my meeting with a psychic and i know 20 of them will be looking at me like you girl that is witchcraft i don't believe it but there is one person like this and i saw that happening one person would come, back door, and tell you, I think I would also love to meet that psychic.

23:14I think I found more understanding through this kind of spirituality.

23:26Claire has welcomed me into her circle of trust. She wants me to meet some of her closest friends and her mentor, the lady who has taught her how to embrace the spirits. we are going on a road trip we are going to meet my spiritual teacher a lady who has been very influential in my healing and spiritual journey I've also invited a few other people with whom we meet regularly to have conversations on healing and spirituality as well So we usually converge in small circles and talk. It's like building community. We arrive at Garuga on the shore of Lake Victoria. It is late afternoon. The tropical sun still blazing overhead.

24:22A gentle breeze blows through the quiet forest. So today it's exciting that I can bring them together mentally, spiritually as well. But also, it's important for me to do this with my spiritual teacher. We found shelter beneath a pine tree, settling into a loose circle on the ground. And Claire, as her mentor, ended a question to break the ice. Did you lose people when you became a medium? Yes. I'm very happy about it. And I'm curious, how do Ugandans find, do you find a lot of clients who come to visit you in your medium, do you have a medium clinic? Clinic, I don't fix people. Inid is dressed in African print fabrics.

25:17She is in her early 40s with the quiet authority of a teacher. Inid asks the group how they have all come together. Do you have the feeling that you're on a healing path, a spiritual or religious? I was raised Christian, but also at a point I felt like for me not everything is black and white. My spiritual journey is trying to find answers I've not found in church. And I feel like I can find them in other places that people think are evils. We're all here for different purposes. Those in church are where they are because maybe that's where they're supposed to be. Then we are where we are because that's where we're supposed to be.