I’m
making good my promise on your last birthday to write to you. I felt
chastened not being at your wedding.
As
a humor merchant, I would have ribbed your guests with such clowning
they went home breathless! I heard you made history bringing our
state governor to our village. I also hear to honor our august
visitor, our dirt road was graded for the first time in history.
How
I love you for that, cuz! Until that happened, I was afraid we were
frozen in time. The road and the water project we earlier attracted
to the village sometime back resonate.
Resonate
with what, you ask? Your great-grandfather had a vision. He saw that
the future of our people lay in Western education. Pretty uncanny for
one doggedly faithful to his religion and culture, isn’t it?
This
is more so considering he was, like his ancestors, the chief priest
of a diviner cult. While he was steadfast to our traditional gods, he
had the foresight to embrace the new civilization for posterity.
Since
your father lived mostly in cities, I do not know if he knows a whole
lot about the lore of our extended family as those of us who were
closer to roots.
With
that assumption, let me hand down some oral traditions. I trust that
being one of our first daughters, you’ll be a good custodian.
Grandfather
had a harem of 36 wives and several concubines. In his time it was a
status symbol to care for such a large family. Before you have a
heart attack, let me assure you that the wives and the colony of
children they raised were also his workforce. The old man had
extensive farmlands and needed that muscle to cut down virgin
forests.
The
male children were also warriors defending the land from hostile
tribes. In those days there were no medical doctors like you, so the
more children a man had, the greater the chance that some would
survive the killer diseases that were pandemic then.
That
was not all. His early marriages produced mostly daughters. He needed
sons to help him tame the jungles, fight wars, inherit his wealth and
continue with his legacy when he passed. But the more he yearned for
sons, the more daughters he got.
Sons
only started arriving in the twilight of his life. Coincidentally,
they were born just about when Europeans arrived. Promptly he
enrolled all of them in schools except the firstborn male who he kept
as future custodian of his cult.
As
you know, he was our village’s first warrant chief. Since he
was already prominent, the colonial authorities invested in the
indirect rule government they introduced. His picture with his
bicycle, a rarity in those days, hangs on the walls of your late
grandfather’s living room.
Being
close to colonial power, he had an insider view of things to come and
early positioned his sons in the unfolding scheme. Your grandfather
quickly tapped into his father’s vision. He surmounted
tremendous challenges to obtain terminal degrees in the U.S. He then
pioneered the way for his brothers and passed on the education genes
to the rest of us. Imagine how proud our ancestors would have been of
you today if they were still alive!
You
and other female relatives would simply have stunned them. Although
great-grandfather had more daughters than sons, yet not one had a
chance of going to school. He taught them herbal lore while their
mothers taught them how to run homes and farms. That was the practice
at the time. So you find that while your granduncles were literate,
none of their sisters could read and write!
Eshiet
doted on his girls. He so spoiled them that they soon divorced their
husbands and returned home after marriage! Any time I’m home I
will show you their graves. Hopefully, you won’t follow this
example.
While
we were young these aunts were the joy and nightmare of our lives.
They motivated us but also roared quite some too. They protected us
from village bullies even though they too never spared us the rod
whenever we got too big for our skins. Someday I’ll share with
you folktales I learned from them.
I
remember the first two Eshiet daughters — Mary and Sarah. These
two were the real terrors, for even our parents cowered before them.
They talked quietly but carried a big stick! I would dart into the
bush at their approach because, being so rascally, I always got into
trouble.
Aunt
Mary betrayed palpable tenderness when my brother, Mfon, fell from a
sixty-foot coconut tree. We had gone hunting for birds and rodents
but took to tree climbing when we found neither birds nor animals to
target. Overconfident, Mfon started stunting and crashed.
Though
a canopy under the tree cushioned his fall before he hit the ground
with a sickening thud, yet seeing him tumble down, I was as dazed as
a rat mesmerized by a cobra. I cringed and feared he was dead. After
a while, he got up and we committed to say nothing of the accident at
home.
Later,
he was so hurt he went into a delirium or whatever you doctors call
the effect of such trauma. It was then that mom got to know. She ran
into the pitch dark night to get Aunt Mary. In the dark, the old
woman used her sense of smell and feeling to search out herbs in the
surrounding bush.
She
coaxed Mfon to drink some and with the rest she massaged his chest.
Somehow the concoction worked. I’m amazed now that without
CT-scan machines and pharmacies folks could work such miracles.
Decades
later, a U.S. doctor would tell Mfon he was lucky to survive an
unusual heart condition. The doctor asked if Mfon had a trauma to the
chest as a kid, but Mfon could not even remember until I recalled the
incident.
Tiemah,
I hope it warms your heart to know you’re from a long line of
healers and diviners. I hope this tradition inspires you as you serve
others. I pray what light our ancestors had and the intelligence of
Heavenly Father are upon you as you do this.
You
are the product of a long line of preparation. Memories of it are so
gratifying. Seeing you and other family members helps me appreciate
what the dreams and vision of one old man can do for his posterity.
Just goes to prove what Mormons believe that by small and simple
things are great things brought to pass!
Finally,
I hope you work hard on your marriage. I’ve heard how some
folks live happily after getting married. Luckily I don’t have
such boredom, for life without opposition is no life. We bicker,
fight, and get back to love again. We are still going strong 27 years
after and together may age into a legend!
So,
so much depend on perspective and attitude, and I hope you sustain a
positive one. Keep this advice by Shakespeare close to heart: "When
you find a true friend, grapple him to your soul with hoops of
steel." With hoops of love, I should add!
Imo Ben Eshiet was born in Port Harcourt, Nigeria. Raised in his village, Uruk Enung, and at
several cities in his country including Nsukka, Enugu, Umuahia, Eket and Calabar, Eshiet is a
detribalized Nigerian. Although he was extensively exposed to Western education right from
childhood in his country where he obtained a PhD in English and Literary Studies from the
University of Calabar, he is well nurtured in African history, politics, culture and traditions.
Imo is currently a teacher in the high priests group in the Summit Ward of the Greensboro North
Carolina Stake.