Taiye Selasi - GHANA MUST GO

I bought “Ghana Must Go” more for the title as I didn’t know much about the author.  I was always amused by the nylon bags so nicknamed. Those bags that you find in every West African home.  So I have just completed the book over a two day period just bumming, reading and taking a break from the World Cup. As  with many books that I am drawn to, it is difficult for me to provide a proper synopsis  of the book without betraying the feelings that the book draws from the recesses of my soul.

The writing style is difficult. It is less the telling of a story and more the peeking into the minds of its characters.  It reads a lot like secrets told to a priest in a confession box or thoughts to a therapist. You see, behind the façade, are battle weary children who fight wars not always of their choosing and more often than not are wounded. The book is an explanation of sorts written in stacatto & short sentences.   As I read the book, I wondered   whether the author was telling her own story.  Each time I come across a new book, I google the author and try to understand what drives them. There is so much similarity between Taiye’s own life and that of the characters in the book. Taiye is the daughter of a Ghanaian Doctor (absentee) Father & a Nigerian Mother.  Although the book is not an autobiography, it goes  without saying that her own experiences influenced her writing of the novel. Perhaps an exorcism of sorts.

Back to the book. Dr Kweku Sai is a successful surgeon - the best at John Hopkins & his wife Folosadé Sai is a drop out lawyer. Dropped out to take care of the family. That reminds me of my parents.  Of their story.  Of the women who - of necessity - give up their careers  so that the men could pursue theirs.   The understanding between a couple in love is that one successful career - often the man’s - is good for both and for the family.  When such decisions are taken, future eventualities are discounted and people wrongly assume the successful career partner is the brighter & better of the two. Kweku Sai hails from a dirt poor  family in Ghana and transcends the usual barriers to become a very successful surgeon .  As fate would have it, Dr Sai however loses his job at John Hopkins rather unfairly. He takes the fall for the hospital, for a mistake not of his own making.  In the capital vs labour equation, he is dispensable.  He cannot take the failure &  deserts his family to return to Ghana to continue his practice. Broken dreams. Abandonment. Failure. So Folosadé has to bring up their four children alone. However the abandonment by the father - although understood in the circumstances - affects his children adversely.

Olu follows in the  footsteps of his father to become a surgeon but wonders whether, like his father & his grandfather before him, he has might have a penchant for leaving. Not clinging. He loves his girlfriend Ling & marries her in Vegas but worries that he too might at the slightest excuse, up & leave.  He fears attachment because he worries that he has that “gene” that will cause him at the slightest challenge to desert the fort.   His fears notwithstanding, he is determined to keep the Sai name alive. To be as good a surgeon as his father was. He cannot help it really since his fathers former colleagues always remind him how great a surgeon his father was.  Keeping all his hurts to himself, he must be strong for his mother and his family. When his father dies, Folosadé calls him with the news. It falls upon him to tell his siblings and ensure they come home to Ghana. He is the strong one, the first born, the surgeon who followed in his father’s footsteps. The one who appears  well adjusted.   In many ways, I find my fears in Olu. My fears though are of a different nature. The fear of being attached. For when you get yoked you open yourself to the possibility of rejection.

Taiwo & Kehinde are twins. The middle children. Peas of the same pod.  They too suffer from their father’s absence in the hands of a step-uncle. Taiwo - drops out of Yale while Kehinde becomes a successful artist. They  both have demons that  have never been exorcised and never spoken about. Demons that eat their lives. Kehinde - despite his success - has this demon that causes him to slit his wrists so he can bleed to death. He becomes a recluse.  No one thinks much of middle children. Often they are a parentheses, left to their own devices. As a middle child, I understand the complaints of those like me who find themselves without purpose in the big scheme of things!

Sadié is, the last born & mum’s favourite. She  wants to be as successful as her siblings. I remember how we always told our last born brother that he could never drop the baton passed down from five siblings before him.  The pressure is often unfair & enormous. Sadié too has her demons that lead her to bulimia.

I often puzzle  about parents & their children. That within the state of parenthood, it is possible or even needful to love children differently depending on their strengths, weaknesses & characters.  The challenge  though is that no matter how small the differentiation, the child who is loved differently, senses this.  In this home,  Dr Sai loves Olu as they are most alike. Folosadé loves Sadié as she is the last born.  The twins - Taiwo & Kehinde - love each other unconditionally having shared the same womb.  Prima facie,  this appears a perfect balance to a successful middle class home of successful immigrants.  Taiwo  senses that her mother loves Sadié the baby “more” and she resents it to the extent that it affects her relationships within the family & the choices she makes out of it. I remember having a similar discussion with my mother.   I badgered her over the years, for as long as I can  remember,  for a confession that she loved me less.   It was not something that an outsider could put a finger upon since my mum & I were such good friends.  Initially, she always dismissed me by saying “Oh! but your father loved you” suggesting that they both had taken a rational choice and divided  their two daughters between themselves.   Recently, four decades later, when  I asked her again, she explained that I was the stronger of her two daughters, so she needed to bring some balance into the otherwise precarious situation. So I understand Taiwo and can relate to her insecurities. Unfortunately, I am guilty of the same choices. Of loving my children but loving them differently.

The unexplained  absence of the father takes a toll on their lives and inadvertently affects the decisions they each make.  They are a family that is not a family! A family that self destructs because the father deserted the family home without explaining why.   A  family full of secrets and unexpressed grievances.   Dr Sai’s desertion is not so much the problem. The crux of the matter is that their is no explanation.   The Sai family have a semblance of normalcy but has  emotional issues that they need to deal with.  Demons that they need to exorcise.  That Folosadé single handedly raises four successful children is a testament to her own fortitude. The ability to keep her tears to herself, subordinate her desires and keep her eyes focused on the end game.  She was after-all the stronger piece of the Sai puzzle.  Folosadé reminds me of the virtuous woman in Proverbs 31. The woman who often goes unnoticed but who is the necessary pillar for success.  The woman who keeps her husbands name & lineage alive, his absence not withstanding. It’s worse than death. This perhaps is the story of many families...of things unsaid...of problems unresolved...of historical injustices. In many ways, it is the story of my family as well.

So the book starts with Dr Kweku Sai dying of a heart attack in Ghana - alone. His family must rally  together to inter him and perform his funeral rites.  The family is shocked by the untimely death because there are things still to be unravelled.  Even though Dr Kweku Sai is remarried to some local girl, it is a marriage of convenience. No plans, no hopes, no expectations & no children.  It therefore falls upon Folosadé & her children to undertake his funeral rites as his partner fades unnoticed.  It is Folosadé who is referred to as “Dr Sai’s wife” despite the fact that they haven’t seen each other for almost two decades. It is Folosadé who must mourn once again for the departure of her man. The family that has really never spoken about the elephants (there are many) in the room - the absence of a father must make a pilgrimage to Ghana to accord their father -  loved but absent - a befitting farewell to the land of his ancestors.

The journey provides opportunities for the Sai children to unburden the hurts buried  deep in the recesses of their beings, to exorcise the demons and to become a family once again.  In that regard, the book is about the story towards redemption. Redemption that comes too late but at-least it comes.

Nature & Nurture are two sides of the same coin. Twins. The people we become is  in part due to nature & in part due to nurture. On the one hand our experiences determine how we react to situations. When you meet an adult you can never truly judge them because it is unlikely that you have walked the journey they have walked or carried the baggage they bare! Dr Sai’s desire to excel is in part due to the fear of failing - of going back to a place of extreme poverty  that was untenable - of watching a sister die from a preventable disease.  On the other hand though our fates are determined long before we are born. Sai Snr,  Dr Sai & Kehinde Sai are artists. It’s in their genes.

So one day hopefully, we all will tell our stories & exorcise our demons.

Winnie Madikizela-Mandela - 491 Days

 On 2nd April 2018, my brother sent me a message about Winnie’s passing. I thought it was one of those April fool jokes but he reminded me that it was 2nd and not 1st. Winnie was shy of her 82nd birthday.  Over the next ten days I spent my time reading on Winnie, defending her honour, posting about her, blocking anyone who said anything wrong about her. I followed South Africans talk shows and barely slept. I then learnt of 491 days which I ordered in her honour.

I have always loved Nomzamo Madikizela-Mandela and cut her as much slack as I could. I was drawn to her resilient nature, her sense of style and above all her beauty. But even then I never knew 1/10th of her own part in what is known as “The Steuggle”. The Struugle against  the evil that was apartheid  but moreso the challenge of partriachy. In publishing this book, she allows us to take a peak into a journal she wrote while in solitary confinement and have access to letters she & Nelson wrote to each other. Plus letters they both wrote while incarcerated. The book is not so much a story telling or white washing  of her legacy. Instead through the book she shares verbatim - through those letters - her own correspondence.  As I read, I felt that some things were so personal and that I was peeping into someone’s deepest recesses. 

Winnie was born a Princess from a royal house of AmamPondo. She was born into a family of teachers and in that regard - as black people stood - she was fortunate. Her grandmother had the privilege of being the first woman in Pondoland to wear shoes while she - Winnie - was the first black Social Worker in South Africa. Seeing this in the context of her time meant she was an achiever. She had the tragedy of being married to Nelson. It was a tragedy because in marrying him she married the struggle.  He was already a man under the radar of the South African police and had been charged under the terrorist act & the communist act. In addition he was a man with a previous relationship so she - at a young age - was Step Mother to his children. That too, was a tragedy because Winnie married a man who came  with baggage. 

The outpouring of love at her funeral was amazing. Two weeks later, I am still listening to the tributes over & over again to get a better glimpse of this enigma. What I liked was that South Africans from all walks of life filled Orlando stadium to capacity to pay tribute to uMama Nomzamo. They understood that we must tell our own stories & celebrate our own heroes.  There can never be an excuse for the brutality of Apartheid. A system that was created to dehumanize the black race. As if to add insult to injury, a system that was created to punish people simply for being black. I have read many books on the South African Struggle but none have touched me as much as 491 days. I remember as a young girl watching Sizwe Bansi Is Dead, Cry Freedom & Saraphina. I remember reading Mine Boy. I sang struggle songs without trully understanding what they meant. When Nelson Mandela died, I read “Long Walk To Freedom”. 

As I watched Zenani & Zindziswa paying tribute to their mum, I remembered the suffering that they went through during the 491 days their mother was in solitary confinement and their dad on Robben Island. I thought about the prize they had to pay as young children as their mother was in & out of jail.  I ponder their life and decide that I can forgive them anything because children cannot be separated from their parents & greater family just to prove a point.

I like the matter of fact way that the book has been written. It is up to the reader to deal with their own feelings. It is a book that should be read widely & studied in depth. It is a book that demonstrates the resilience of one’s spirit amidst so much against them. I could never explain or justify Apartheid...To borrow from Zenani’s tribute “The fight against apartheid was not a picnic”. 

Neither Long Walk To Freedom nor 491 days deals with the real issues surrounding the break up of the Mandela marriage. In reading the book and going through the letters, I am still at a loss that that marriage could not have stood the test of time. I would have forgiven Nomzamo anything. In divorcing Winnie - after she had given up so much - my view of Nelson was irrepereably shaken.  This book is not in response to the break up of her marriage and neither is it a challenge to Nelson’s legacy. As Zenani said, they were fortunate & proud to have both Winnie & Nelson as parents and their legacies are intertwined. 

https://johannesburgreviewofbooks.com/2018/04/02/i-am-me-i-am-black-i-must-be-proud-of-my-blackness-read-an-excerpt-from-winnie-madikizela-mandelas-memoir-491-days-prisoner-number-132369/

Hamba Kahle uMama weSizwe. Lala Ngoxolo.

Lola Shoneyin - The Secret Lives Of BABA SEGI's WIVES

This book details the Joys Of Fatherhood. The book was recommended by my friend Muthoni after I waxed lyrical about polygamy and its general acceptance among the luhya people even in this century.  I was taken in by the title and quite amused by it for personal reasons that shall remain, ahem, secret for now.   Ishola Alao aka Baba Segi has four wives and they have - for self preservation - a devastating secret. Actually this is not quite right...three of the wives have a secret and the fourth was not yet included in their confidence. 

Let me digress and focus on the number four for a minute. The number four has special significance in spiritual terms. Four is symbolic of earthly completeness. Four is the number of the great elements: earth, air, fire, and water. All people will come from all four corners of the earth to enjoy the kingdom of God. Four in the scriptures portrays universal observation, worship and adoration as in Revelation 4:6-8. “Around the throne, and on each side of the throne, are four living creatures, full of eyes in front and behind: the first living creature like a lion, the second living creature like an ox, the third living creature with a face like a human face, and the fourth living creature like a flying eagle.”  So I guess, in marrying a fourth wife, Ishola Alao attains a state of completion.  He becomes a total man.

The first was selected for him by his mother; the second was given to him in payment by a sharecropper farmer for a bad harvest; the third offered herself to him for refuge. Only the fourth did he court, seduce and chose.  She was the object of his desire. It is impossible - as one reads the book - to hate Baba Segi for the state of polygamy.  He was a fair man who loved his wives equally to the extent that one can love women equally.  That love notwithstanding, he sometimes  visits a brothel to seek advice from the brothel owner on challenges in his household  and samples some of the available flesh.  In fact as one turns the pages, one tends to like Mr Alao & somewhat pity him.  His wives are not bad either...they are simply pragmatic, chasing away their own demons, protecting their interests and following their dreams.  As it is said, never judge a person unless you have walked in the same shoes that he/she has walked.

For a man, it is important that his manhood is protected - whatever it takes. So the women in this harem will go to great lengths to protect Baba Segi's manhood and will keep their shame to themselves.

Iya Segi - "The fat frog" - gets  married to Ishola Alao. Their marriage is an arrangement by their respective mothers.  Her's a scorned woman & His a widow.  She soon discovers that their daily intercourse will not produce a child.   As many women of her generation would have done, she decides to help her husband.   After all he is an only child and it is incumbent upon her to ensure that his lineage continues.  So she bears him two children - Segi & Akin - from their driver who has no say in this matter.  He has a family of his own & serves his master with loyalty. I guess haters would say that she was promiscuous but yet only the wearer of the shoe knows where it pinches.

Iya Tope  - "The pygmy goat" has no say in this marriage. She was born into a polygamous home and was given as a peace offering to Ishola.  At the age of 23 when there was no other suitor in sight, her marriage to Baba Segi - a self made man - provided a relief from the monotony of the village,   Her three daughters are sired by the meat seller.  Her Wednesday sessions with the butcher give her more pleasure than those with her husband and spare her the shame of barrenness.  The meat seller makes her whimper, sing and howl which is more than she can ask of Baba Segi.

Iya Femi - she of two colours - had big dreams.  As a child, she wanted so much but fate robbed her  of  her parents in a freak accident.  She was passed on to her uncle who - as the inheritor - passed her off as a maid to a family in Ibadan. Her opportunity knocked  when she bumped into Ishola Alao.  As wife number 3, Mama Segi teaches her the secret of Alao's children. She bears two pedigree sons in the Alao household by Tunde. . Tunde - her former boss's son - was her first love and it made perfect sense that he provided the much needed seed.

Much to the chagrin of her mother, Bolanle join's the queue as Mrs Alao the  fourth.  A university graduate, this is not the life her mother had dreamt for her.   She enters - zombie like - into a hostile home where, try as she might, there is no acceptance of her.  In my view, this book is more the story of Bolanle than it is the story of Baba Segi.  Bolanle's entrance into the Alao household destroys the existent tranquillity & equilibrium of the home.  Unaware of the solutions available to her, she is unable to bear children for Baba Segi. Her visit to the doctor (as opposed to a medicine man) to resolve her barren state opens up the Pandora's box which almost destroys the Alao home.  In the end, she exorcises her own demons and finds peace with herself.

In her own defense, Iya Segi insists that Baba Segi remembers the old adage that "Whosoever bulleth my cow, the calf is mine".  For it takes more than shedding of seed to be a father.  Before we label this situation an African affair, we must recall that in  many royal households, it has been rumoured that there was often disinterest in conjugal activities and yet to secure the kingdom heirs were needed. The crown - in some instances -  passed to heirs who did not biologically belong to the man on the throne.  I must also remind the reader that Dr Johanssen Oduor Kenya's Chief Government Pathologist, said that there was really no need to waste DNA analysis on supposed fathers as those samples were less reliable.  Dr Oduor rejected samples from fathers explaining that:- “The only person you are certain of is the mother, unless the child was swapped at the hospital. And there is the factor of men raising children they have not sired, which is not isolated in Kenya. It happens the world over.”

The moral of the book is that Fatherhood is a complex state.