to a month. To graduate, she must perform various dances symbolizing the skills she has acquired. She is then covered in oil and red ochre. Afterwards, she is presented to her new husband. Due to a modernized legal system the initiation ceremony now happens later in a woman's life (before marriage) although it still happens at puberty for Luvale girls from rural areas. Child marriages are now illegal in Zambia, so even if a girl reaches puberty at 13 in a rural area, she may do the wali but not get married straight away. Previously, arranged marriages would take place, but in modern times, couples marry for love. Mukanda Luvale males between the ages of 8 and 12 will participate in the "mukanda", sometimes called the kumukanda, a coming age ceremony. It typically takes place at the beginning of the dry season. There are three distinct stages, the first being the preparation, which begins when a village headman ("chilolo") or important elder, having reached consensus with the families of young uncircumcised boys, publicly announces that the time for the mukanda has come. The candidates are then gathered together at the mukanda, where they are circumcised; at this stage, the initiator of the mukanda ceremony becomes known as the "chijika mukanda", or the "planter of mukanda." They will then invoke the spirits before the muyombo tree to bless and purify the children who will undergo the operation. The Luvale consider uncircumcised men dirty or unhygienic. The second stage is the seclusion, where young boys will leave their homes and live for one to three months in an isolated bush camp. This separation from the outside world marks their symbolic death as children. It is said that in some very rural areas where the mukanda is strictly maintained that if a woman is to pass by the boy's "bush camp" whilst they are undergoing mukanda then she must be punished, even killed. The initiates ("vatunduji" or "tundanji") will undergo tests of courage and learn lessons on their future role as men and husbands. They will be taught skills such as making masks, or "makishi", wood-carving, basketry, smithing, and other practical skills. They are also allowed to play games and sports. The curriculum also includes cultural instruction in the ancient form of design and calculus known as "tusona", a tradition of ideographic tracings that are made in sand. Like the female initiates, the