cockroach

I used to be a cockroach...

Life was really hard - I would eat amongst other things, grass shoots, succulent leaves, unripe paw-paw, and postage stamps. Unable to afford soap, I gave up bathing entirely for I hated to bathe with dirty water - to just rub it down a body already greasy with sweat and dirt.

I had to leave this neighbourhood fast!

There was nothing here for me – nobody liked me. Nobody here cared enough to help me. All I needed was a smile – a hand of friendship stretched in my direction. Here, they conspired against me - they conspired to frustrate my soul. They burnt my belongings when it seemed I was making way in the world they hated the sound of my second hand transistor radio permanently tuned to the BBC. They hated the smell of fried plantain which sometimes came from my section of the yard… I had a hand in this particular hatred on days I was able to get my hands on ripe plantains. On such days, I would make some dodo and sing war songs at the top of my voice.

The first time I did, it was not meant to annoy anyone - I had only wanted to let Etsu the west African god of mischief know I was still holding on…. Still hangin' in and that there was nothin' he could do about it.

I was thoroughly battered no question, but I was still me - I was who I was - still a spark of the great God in whose heart I was still a dream. I loved God and I was fearless!

Where was I….

Let me tell you how it happened – how they burnt my belongings!!! Don't you remember? They burnt my belongings when it seemed I was making way in the world….You remember now? Right! ...

'Twas funny how the poor conspired one against the other. At least the rich held parties and hobnobbed together, they networked and tried to consolidate their wealth through marriage and friendship, through favours and I-owe-you-one's …but the poor? They were really poor. Poor in charity, poor in faith, poor in hope, poor in everything.

I still laugh when I recall how they had carefully watched as I made my way into the compound expecting me no doubt to let out a scream, and shouting, run towards my burning abode, beating my chest and probably looking to the sky and crying in ululating tones crying "WOE IS ME"…....................but I am beating the gun.... still I can't help but wonder where the hell those creeps are now?.....what the hell they are doing now? - what was new in their live - those appalling creatures...yes indeed I am beating the gun........No! I have to beat this gun! Yes! I am still struggling but my heart is in the right place - not so the doubly wretched - wretched in body wretched in mind. Yes they did me in somewhat and made my heart angry - but so do mosquitoes and tse-tse flies and rats. Do I despise them? No!

Listen! I was returning from the waterside where I had gone to hear stories. You guessed right. I had no job or let's say I was in between jobs - waiting for God's dream to end……

At the water front y’know, we traded stories, laughed, helped the men with their nets, sort their fish into grades, this and that and that and this stuff. We also fiftied cigarettes and sometimes we just sat and watched the River gently flow by. We were mostly gentle souls. All we wanted was to pacify the raging despair within our souls… until our dreams were ready for us to inhabit.

I hated my life but was willing to soldier on.

My heart quickened at the sight of smoke coming from my section of the swampy compound where I’d been allowed to put up a Batcher. Batcher? Basha?, Bacha?... I can't vouch for its right spelling - I was a nouveau pauper.

I’d been whistling as I approached the compound. My soul was happy - for Waka the fisherman, had regaled me with stories from his days as a palmwine Tapper. Waka the great!

"Now das my luck" he complained "to suffer-suffer for my daily bread." He talked about the risks inherent in the only occupations open to him – Palmwine tapping and fishing.

"Just my luck" he said without emotion "I either falling down from those tall tall trees or I drowning in de bad bad river"

"Waka" the entire congregation, which he presently addressed, shouted. "Speak am well well. Scatter de grammar"

"Bookooroo" someone else added rather shrilly. Bookooroo was derived from Book and was a euphemism for people who tried to show off their great learning.

He had fallen… yes you guessed right – from the tallest palm tree in the whole of the Niger delta. "Him papa head good" someone had said of him when he had made a quick recovery two months later.
To this day, he walked with an endearing limp a result of his injuries and Waka! he became known - pidgin for Walk!

In mid-life crisis, loath to climb another palm tree, like working men the world over, he retooled and retrained. He became a fisherman. Such however was the bond between Him and his former colleagues that they would bring him a gourd or two of frothing undiluted palm wine in the evenings - after the days work. They in turn would be roast fish - hotly spiced.

Waka was kind to me and would share his palmwine. I also had the honor to be Fish Roaster in the evenings when the brothers of the order of the of Palmwine Tappers returned. The brothers of that order, were men arrogant as men anywhere - men who had full and total control of their lives and knew it for a dead certain fact. The English milord would learn a thing or two from them. They were kings when they climbed up the tall palm trees of the Niger-delta and kings when they climbed down and even as they sat for roast fish, they exuded a certain understated dignity. These impoverished Royals lived their lives to the hilt and they one hundred percent knew it. They set their own work schedules and drew up their own Gantt charts, decided what to do, who to supply and who could wait… I surpass myself…

Unfailingly each evening, they would toast Bacchus the god of wine. Bacchus who had a thousand African names.
"To Nmayan-nmo" They would say in unison "To you great Nmayan-nmo. The cause of and solution to all life’s problems"

"What do you mean Mmayan doesn't cause any problems" some one posited.

"Leave that matter for another day" One with a gravelly voice retorted "I no get power for argue dis evening"

"I say Nmayan-nmo doesn't cause any problems. I don't care if you have power to argue or not. It doesn't cause any problems"

"But look at yourself are you not a problem to yourself already?"

"You're a damn fool - no wonder your in-laws beat you up the other day.."

"They disgraced themselves not me…"

On and on they bantered.

"Who is that Cockroach" I heard gravelly voice ask. I knew they spoke of me. I kept a straight face fanning the embers of fire over which a sooty basket of fish hung suspended.
"That cockroach is a doctor" Waka explained.
"Doctors do not roast fish! doctor of what?" A new voice cried out laughing with palmwine ejaculating from his nostrils
"I don’t know" Waka answered "He told me he is a doctor and I believe him".
"There are so many doctors these days" A new voice entered the fray "I am a doctor myself".
"Doctor of what?" the one with the ejaculating nostrils asked again doubling with laughter - holding his midsection as though in acute pain "Don’t kill me here" he shouted – more palmwine coming out of his nose. "You will all be held responsible" he cried "You all know what a troublesome woman my wife is"
"Answer now doctor?" Waka nudged the one who declared himself a doctor.
"Doctor of tree climbing" he said resignedly. His thunder had been stolen by the one with the ejaculating nose.
"Come here" Gravelly voiced said to me. "Sit with us. My daughter has just finished standard school. She wants to be a doctor. Are you really a doctor."

Yes! I’d been whistling when I approached the house and my heart quickened at the sight of smoke coming from the side of the swampy compound where I’d been allowed to put up a Bacha. My gait held up – not betraying the emotions I felt. I stepped smartly around what used to be my abode.

Funny enough I felt a gladness that it had been mercilessly incinerated by those who simply hated me and the earth upon which I stood. It certainly was "the peace that passeth all understanding" which I felt that time.

I recalled the dampness of the floor and the rats, which shared my space. One of which I had named Skippy for it would skip on its hind legs when it felt I had had enough of its antics and was going to smash against it something hard. I would always spare it on account of its comic plight. Evolution meant rats like Skippy would multiply and in time we would have smart rats.

If we had enough smart rats, we might be able to reach a compromise with them rats and teach 'em to steal and annoy no longer – explaining to them that there was enough for us all. (It would be easier I reckoned to explain this to Skippy & other members of the rat race than to the stealing machine called government!!)
I had no feelings whatsoever surveying the remains of my home except perhaps worries that Skippy would now have to find a new abode. My main worry was that smart rats such as Skippy would be exterminated mindlessly. I thought how important it was for us to help evolutionary processes by getting a little sense into our heads... by not destroying that which we understood not.... alas the days of a reasoned tete a tete with Rats of the government or ratus ratus genre lay far ahead.

Still, whistling with my hands now in my pocket I surveyed the remains of my home and walked away head high. Freed from my shackles, I walked away. I had had it. I would first go to church and renew my relationship with Him who was patient and would verily receive me. Then I would beg some from the pastor, then I would travel to Warri.
I was no longer a cockroach – smoked out of my hiding place, I was out in the open. Ready to make a hash of it. Cockroaches were afraid to move – having so many natural enemies – preferring the cover of darkness and blended out of sight. I wasn’t afraid to move – not any more. Indeed I had to move for I had no cover.
But scurry I would not. I held my head high, turned around and walked out of the yard. I half expected applause - but that would have to wait for the movie version of my life story. I would first go to church and renew my relationship with Him who was patient and would verily receive me.

Then I would beg some from the pastor…and there was the one with the gravelly voice whose daughter wanted to be a doctor..... Life is tough but to my credit I'm hangin' in there.

I used to be a cockroach….I hated my life .....but was willing to soldier on and to wait for God.........

Life is still tough but I'm still hangin' in....