Baba Offa walked into the sitting room and the atmosphere changed. He apologized to his brother for arriving late. His mother, Iyá Ibadan never knew he was coming to Lagos. They didn’t normally tell her about their visits. According to him, he had been in the neighborhood for some time greeting some of the neighbours that he was familiar with. He was Iya Ibadan’s second son and a senior citizen living in Offa in Kwara State. He hardly came to Lagos but his wife, a very soft-spoken and kind-hearted woman, came frequently to visit iya Ibadan on behalf of her husband.
Two or three days after her arrival, we never ran short of kòkòrò (corn chips), wàrà (milk curds or local cheese), aadun (peppered corn meal) and ireke (sugar cane). In those days, people coming from the village usually packed assorted snacks and foodstuffs into their luggage as gift items for those they were visiting in the city.
In most cases, this rural hospitality was extended to the neighbours of their relations who also shared in the largesse. The spirit of communal generosity and lavishness was so strong that everybody looked out for one another and acted as one family. These days, such act of kindness is treated with distrust and suspicion resulting in the throwing of those items in the dustbin the moment they were delivered. It wasn’t that there was no distrust and envy at that time too but not many people saw gift items as possible envoys of evil. Nobody, even within the same family, will collect such items from you now let alone eat them. This may be one of the reasons rural visitors come visiting without any bags of hospitality again to avoid any linkage between their gifts and the sudden frequent stooling of the children of their hosts. A kind of “Mosafejo” attitude.
Edible gift items like sweets and biscuits that would make children sprint to welcome neighbours back from work or from a journey no longer have any attraction to the “indoor” children we raise these days. The puzzle here is that those of us training our children to reject such gifts were major beneficiaries of such familial hospitableness. What then could have been responsible for the erosion of this cultural hospitality that was once a filial of communal affection in African society? Our humanity is deserting us gradually because of a modernity that is destroying the civility of our cultural affinity. Soon, everything about our rurality will be subdued and consumed by a civilization that is completely alien to the singularity of our own creation as Africans.
For instance, I lived with my great-grandmother for 14 years in Surulere yet I didn’t allow my children to live with their grandmother in the same neighbourhood where I was raised because of a sociological transformation or societal transmutation that I did not have the capacity to subject to experimentation and helluva consequences. While the deliberation was still going on, I could see that some children had converged by the window side as if they were watching a reality show. I understand when people converge by the windows to watch a TV show but what kind of communal familiarity and neighbourly indulgence would make people to occupy your windows and be listening to family discussions as if they had observers’ status. The height of it is when they now start fighting over space screaming at each other in Yoruba: “kilode to gba ayé mi? Can you imagine!! What kind of effrontery will make people clash over space and strategic positions at gossip centre?. Several times you would scream at them to leave the place they would go and come back after some minutes.
After a very lengthy family deliberation, I was asked to stay with Iya Ibadan in Surulere as I was considered a strategic asset to her business ventures. I noticed that my great-grandmother was happy. My brother too was staying. For now, relocating to Ramoni Street was put in abeyance. One unexpected development at the meeting was that my mother also decided to stay with us for “some time”. I thought she said she was going to her new place in Lawanson. This sudden change in plans was suspect but what could I do. Curiously, I noticed that while I was worried about her staying with us, Late-tua did not look bothered. He was calm and pensive. One week of staying with us, my mother saw nothing that was close to what neighbours had told her about us. We tactically suspended smoking tutorials. We washed all the clothes in the house as if we just graduated from a Laundry Institute. Not only did I sweep our compound, I helped Iya Ronke, our next door neighbour to sweep her compound. I was about to move to Iya Enitan’s house when my mother shouted at me: “Se kò sì?” Won sọ igbale soke fún e ni?” She wondered if all was well with me. I didn’t first understand what she meant by “won so igbale soke fún e ni” and I didn’t bother to ask her. It was much later when I was watching a Yoruba movie in Alhaji Raji’s house that I got the meaning. In the film, some thieves had gone to steal in a herbalist’s house. They had successfully packed their loot from the man’s house. They were getting ready to go when one of them saw a broom that was hung on the wall. Others also looked for their own brooms in the house. For several hours, the thieves swept the entire street from dusk to dawn until everybody in the street woke up to see them sweeping under collective spiritual cooperation. It was the herbalist who restored their consciousness having been satisfied with the efficacy of his charm. Since that day, I never swept beyond my compound before somebody will come and tell me: “Se won so ìgbàlè soke fún e ni”.
My brother and I did good boys for one week. It was not our will but we had to put up such “nice boys” drama to show our mother that we were good boys. For one week, Iya Ibadan enjoyed her sleep without any interruptions. For the first time in so many years, I had to force myself to read my books at home. Since it was an unusual exercise, in less than 20 to 30 minutes, I slept off. Even before falling asleep, I was just reading what I didn’t understand. I was enjoying the pictures more than the letters. At her age, Iya Ibadan had seen more dramas in her life than the skit we were doing. She knew it was all a camouflage to deceive our mother. We were not that nice but Iya Ibadan still loved us like that because we were the first set of her great-grandchildren. For good one week, we operated under a regimented regime that was watching our moves and activities to establish if what the neighbours had told her about us was true. She didn’t know we knew her plans.
After one week of choreographed seriousness, I fell into her trap. From school, I went to Mr Olaoye’s house because he was my friend. Though he was the one who invited me, I followed him to his house on Clegg Street, Ojuelegba to help him wash his dirty clothes. I was very good in laundry and so, washing his clothes was not a big deal for me. Mr Olaoye so much enjoyed my company that he did not want me to go back home. Reluctantly, I managed to leave his house around 7 pm before sauntering home with adventurous satisfaction. I couldn’t take the straight road (Barracks) home to avoid getting home late. I decided to go through a shortcut via the premises of Our Lady of Lourdes Primary school which was on the same street. This would take me to Adana Lane and Adana Street and burst out at Modèle Street. From there, I would just walk a little path on Aralile Street before meandering my way through the alley that would lead me across Ayeleto Street, Oyerokun Street, Ibukun Street and eureka, I was in front of my house just like that. I saw my mother sitting in front of the house, Iya Ibadan was on her prayer rug in the sitting room while my brother was washing plates in the kitchen. The only thing my mother asked me was: “Nibo le ti mbọ niwoyi akowe?” I told her I was coming from my teacher’s house where I had gone to help him wash his clothes. And she replied: “Iyen na ti e da”. That response gladdened my heart for my mother to say that was good. I had not finished removing my uniform when my mother asked me: “ounjẹ nko?” Despite the fact that I had eaten at Mr Olaoye’s house, I still told her that I was going to eat. She gave me lafun and okro with Titus fish stew. Oh my GOD, it was steaming hot and it was a big portion too. The Titus fish was big as well. I consumed everything with clinical relish. It was a strange sumptuous supper. Stranger still was when my mother served me Tree Top drink. It was the strangest treatment that one could get after coming home late from school but since my mother had said “ìyẹn na ti e da”, I saw it as a reward for my being nice to my teacher. I was so full that I just went to sleep after washing my plates and cleaning the cup. I didn’t know how long I had slept but I was woken up by a barrage of slaps on every sensitive part of my body, especially my face. I struggled to defend my face but she had pinned down my two hands with her knees. She was using her right hand to control the movement of my head left, right and centre. Finally, I succeeded in removing my two hands from her knees and the first part of my body that I needed to defend was my face because I didn’t want my face to look like “ojuju calabar” in the morning looking at the way she was assaulting it with slaps of assorted categories. As I struggled to free myself, she became more agitated and twice I felt her teeth on my body meaning she bit me. She was the one beating and battering my body and she was still saying “ṣe o fe pa mi ni”. I had to correct her by telling her that she was the one beating me now. Iya Ibadan too came out of her room and started shouting: “Fausa, o je ma se ara è lese”. What kind of conspiracy is this? Was I not the one that was being bruised? I managed to free myself from her and I ran to the backyard.
Some minutes after I came out, a black cat appeared from nowhere and I ran back inside. Thank GOD my mother didn’t lock me out. I didn’t use to fear cats before but since I watched Hubert Ogunde’s new film titled “Ologbo Dudu”, I decided to stay away from them (including our own) seeing the degree of wickedness and evil they perpetrated in the film. Needless to say that I vomited all the lafun that I consumed with relish that night. Who would be battered like that at 2 am and wouldn’t vomit. No wonder my brother was laughing when I was eating the meal. For almost one week, I was doing “baby shower” because of the bruises on my body particularly the two spots where she bit me. “Baby shower” is when you get to the bathroom, lock the door, turn on the shower to create the impression that you are bathing. Meanwhile, just wash your head, your shoulders, your knees and your legs. That’s why children sing the song: “Ori mi, ejika, orunkun, ese….ori mi, ejika, orunkun, ese…..
To be continued
