The Village Champion

"The flower that blooms in adversity is the most rare and beautiful of all."

Fa Zhou, Mulan

Why was I ashamed of where I came from? Why must we color in the black and whites of our origin?

Oh, the village of my birth, how I have bitten thy hand! How dare I be ashamed of you when all you have done is embellish me?

The village of Asiak Abufa, for so long I have ignored your existence. You, a tiny yet significant part of Southern Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria, that housed the dreams of the unknown. A tight-knit community that supplied the necessities: a school, a church, a market, and a stream. You, a teacher of love, independence, family, and neighborhood, and whom I had forsaken.

In your humility you granted me my mother’s tongue; a constant reminder of who I was, who I am, yet I diminished your existence.

It is in you I experienced my first lessons. Mrs. Inyang, my English teacher, in her tinted spectacles, a pleated dress that was once black that made her look like she was in constant mourning. Like a skilled chameleon incapable of change, she'd rampage through covers of notes, downloading its content, verbatim, into our little minds. On this very day, she conjured a reading passage requiring us to answer the exercise questions that followed, a mundane task that proved difficult for your child to execute.

As I waddled home laced in my brown and white striped pinafore and gito, the assigned passage spread face down on my head, wondering who would decode the hidden messages that made the tiny people cascading the pages so darn happy, I stopped by my neighbor, Emediong's house, who had just arrived from the University of Uyo. How did I know this? His mother, a hairy middle-aged woman, had town cried it through the entire village, explaining to those that had an ear how her son excelled in becoming a mechanic. I went to him to translate the hidden messages, which to this day, I still wonder about his reluctance. In my disappointment, I opted to toll the pictures instead.

Soon after this debacle, my aunt, aunt Mary, asked me to come live with her in Abuja. You knew that this change was inevitable, that it would be the catalyst of my shame, yet…

Upon my arrival at my aunt's house, an unfamiliar but friendly aroma enveloped my nose, promising its untold secrets of happiness. Even outside smelt different compared to the pit latrine outside Mma's house. The house with its heavily embroidered leather armchairs, a couch, a dining table placed at the far corner of the parlor with a cabinet storing the fine Chinas behind it. The housekeeper, Victoria, a young woman of two and twenty, scurried out dressed in black overalls and a white apron secured at her waist. She exchanged some words with my uncle who was standing next to me still clutching his luggage, then Vicky collected his bags and turned to me. "What is your name?" she asked, a simple but complex question for this village champion. "What is your name?" she asked again, this time crouching down as if I didn’t 'hear' her the first time. Uncle Moses, in his benevolent manner, whispered, "Oh, Eno-obong. She's asking your name, answer her." I turned back to look at her, "ami kere Eno." I replied timidly. That should have been the end of her interrogation, but Victoria was nosy as I grew to understand, "how old are-?"

"OH, ENO!! AMEDI?!" I had never met anyone that happy to see me (except my Mma). To be in the presence of such beauty, humbled me. Aunt Mary, the pride and joy of our family. Grabbing my callused hands, "thank you for coming! I didn’t think you would, but I’m glad you did. Mbok, take a sit." She turned to her brother, "Udo, abadie? Mma?" Without waiting for a response, she turned to her maid, "Vicky, abeg get Eno some juice, I’m sure she’s thirsty!" and with a discrete node, Victoria disappeared into the kitchen.

For a long moment, the entire world had gone completely obsolete. Her presence, mingled with the chilled atmosphere generating from the AC, rendered everything beautiful. Even the ants were beautiful, though not currently inhabiting the house, witnessing them through my new sets of goggles, they were.

Oh, dear village, you should have been there!

Few weeks of experiencing the world this way, my aunt asked, "would you like to go to school?" Did this woman just ask me this? Did she not know the response? The truth of the matter is that even if she did know the answer, it wouldn’t have made any difference because the feeling of stupidity when Vicky had explained to me that the microwave was indeed not a TV set or that I could in fact sit on the toilet was incomparable.

Shortly after this, Aunt Mary registered me in a school named Word of Faith Group of School, in Area 1. The school head-teacher, Mr. Iyaro, asked me to write a common entrance examination that would determine my class placement—the most gruesome two hours of my life! Because of my lack of grace, he told my aunt that he might have to place me in nursery school but changed his mind last minute after my aunt had pleaded my case and he considered my age. So, he placed me in Primary 2. At 9 years old. I was the oldest of the girls. My, you should have prepared me more.

One afternoon, during French class, my teacher, Mrs. Ukpong, asked, "Eno pronounce this one," pointing her 'friendly' koboko at the writing on the board. I replied, "madame," which she asked in return, "are you a madame?" of which I replied emphatically, "yes." The cacophony of deafening French slurs, snickering, and outright laughter chilled my bones. From that day, the mood of my school experience was drastically altered, from the cleaners to the student, to the teachers. Some were discrete with their malice, others weren't. "My mother says age reflects wisdom. In your case, you might be permanently stupid. Come girls, there's a village missing its idiot." Patricia Iyaro, a freckled face Black beauty, the head-teacher's daughter. She smirked, knowing that her words had struck a nerve and that I couldn’t retaliate because how would I explain my side of the story after I had pummeled her face in. Instead, I darted inside the class with my tail between my legs, awaiting a glimpse of safety.

The chiming of the bell signaled my freedom as I hurriedly gathered my belongings. I had been going to school now for two weeks, and the route from my house to the school perched at the forefront of my mind. You see, dear village, determination can sometimes be considered a sin!

"Are you lost?" An okada said as he came to an abrupt stop. Ignoring him, I kept walking. If I couldn't do anything else right, this one I could do. He continued following me until I began to run.

I walked the pavements from area 1 to Area 11 and the sigh of relief I exhaled when I finally made out the outline of my estate—Efab Estate was exceptional. The estate with its usual familiarity: recharge card seller in her 'Glo' cubicle, the tuck-shop man in his container canteen, and a signboard that read 'SAHAD STORES.'

I staggered towards the estate’s gate, opened, and tiptoed in and scaling the stairs that led to the kitchen entrance of my aunt’s kitchen, when exhaustion finally crept in, and knock knock, I went.

"Eno, wake up! Ma, she's here o," said Vicky.

As we sat in the kitchen in the awkwardness of our charades, my aunt wallowed in, "ENO, HAVE YOU GONE MAD? DO YOU KNOW HOW WORRIED I WAS? COME HERE, LET ME SEE YOU. OH MY GOD, DO YOU WANT TO KILL ME? WHAT WOULD I HAVE TOLD YOUR MOTHER?!" Cramping me in her embrace, which served as permission for the waterfalls.

My aunt began yelling again but Victoria interrupted her and before I knew it, I was getting washed up for supper. As soon as I was done eating, my aunt began the questions that I had been dreading, Vicky behind her, patiently awaiting my reply. I couldn't stop talking!

We spent that weekend rehearsing what I was going to tell the teachers, principal, and schoolmates when they asked why I had left school that Friday afternoon. Nothing she taught me could have ever prepared me for the many questions they bombarded me with. So, as a diligent student, I stuck to the original script, a three-worded answer for an arsenal of questions that barricaded my day, "I trek home."

Soon after my untimely and unwilling 'vacation' from the only premises that would allow an illiterate to witness its grandeur, my aunt began her search, again. It was in these intermissions that I discovered 'That's So Raven!' A Disney Channel sitcom. Sitting there, mimicking every sound, word, amazed at the flawlessness and execution of this foreign language, sparked again the thumping in my heart that you had instilled. It was here that the yearning became definitive.

How dare I abandon you?

From then on, every learning experience became a fascinating challenge. I would read signboards on the many car rides to my school admission exams, breakfast cereal boxes, pampers advertisements, etc. Anything that would make me sound out words, and they all stuck! My, I forgot nothing. I couldn't. They were beautiful!

My favorite parts about going to school, I realized, were the TEACHERS! My English teachers especially, the bedrock of my academic life, the reason I bear the weights of my mini dictionaries in my purse. To yous, my leaders, I lay my crown!

One day, my aunt got me my very first novel: 'Purple Hibiscus' by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. I was in Primary 4. The dexterity of Adichie's pen was and still is transcendent. In her words, writing made sense. But at a time where my world fell bleak, neither her words nor the leaves of my ONWARD exercise book could accommodate the burdens of my heart.

The thumping silenced.

Years go by, I write nothing, becoming deaf to my environment but ever so often, I would stir myself towards the hardcovers of my notebook, and the ability to convert those feelings into words would somehow elude me… until 5 months ago.

When a person is constantly having a source of distraction, either work, school, etc., that routine becomes you, and having it come to a staggering halt, you are left with this indescribable aloneness. Last year, tedious and heartbreaking as it was for many of us, we all found ways to adapt to the fangs that clawed our throats. For me, audiobooks became a bottomless well of my amassing aloneness. It was here, my baby came alive—Socialmindset Production.

In retrospect, in the early stages of my senior secondary education, my aunt in her helpful ways had asked, "are you sure you don’t want to switch to something much simpler, like the arts?" In my heart, I knew the answer to that question, but stubbornness and pride, a depressing friend, triumphed. This suggestion from my aunt reflected incompetence. Not that people in the art program were not competent or smart but because I equated science as a reflection of intelligence; which is something I desperately wanted to believe about myself. Smart. That maybe somehow, being in the science program, I'd feel some semblance of normalcy amongst my peers.

Amidst my post-graduation blues, while scrolling through Instagram per usual, I saw an ad for the 'Little Black Book' challenge by Vocal Media. A platform for not only writers but for all, that allows publications of a variety of topics dividing them into different categories for each individual to express their creativity.

Here the thumping returned, this time not to be rationalized.

Vocal Media feasted my thoughts, daring me to brave, to take the bait, to be me again. In these moments I realized three things: one, vulnerability and writing are directly proportional to each other; two, fear is a crippling disease, one that won't vanish if you don’t nip it in the bud; three, my mother was a dreamer, and so was I. Hers went with her, mine didn’t have to!

Creating Socialmindset Production soared the energies of my teachers through me. It brought me back to you. It created a channel for my thoughts, and that if unfortunate things happened to me, they could have been worse whether I did anything or not.

Socialmindset Production, a platform that addresses topics ranging from general knowledge, health, social issues, entertainment, etc., through solo/monologues and storytelling. With that, I divided Socialmindset into three categories: writing, voice acting, and podcast productions with each category fueling the other. So far, Socialmindset has published two (2) podcast episodes, both addressing one of the many humanitarian crises (SARS) currently plaguing Nigeria; three (3) stories; and an article.

In terms of story genres, Socialmindset will publish stories focusing on historical African fiction, nonfiction, or maybe both, with voice narrations by me, to be uploaded on the podcast. The stories within the walls of these African countries deserve a confident reflection as ferocious as they are.

It is in you I found my passion, my perseverance, my will to carry on. Without your many lessons, dear village, there would be no Eno. You are my motivation, and I am grateful that I have you because, in a perfect world, these qualities would be enough, and the hunger for creativity would not go unquenched.

How dare I?

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Glossary

This glossary consists of words from a language spoken by indigenes of the Southern part of Nigeria, Akwa Ibom State.

Gito = School sandal

Mma = Grandma/mother.

Ami kere = My name is...

Mbok = Please.

Abeg = Please (in Nigerian Pidgin).

Amedi = You've come.

Abadie = How are you?

Koboko = Cane (flogging)

Okada = Bike man