Afro Tori; In Shreds by Afamefuna Uche & Oni Toyosi

Shivers ran down my spine as I saw the amount of blood gushing out of my genitals. The ritual has just been carried out. The long awaited mutilation. Here in Eke, the ritual is highly- priced and according to the popular belief of the people, it is meant to be seen by every teenage girl as something worth waiting for.

I shook my head in agony, using the tip of my tongue to swipe the edges of my teeth. Mama did not tell me that this was what I was going to pass through. The room was dark but for the tiny rays emitting from the local lamp whose bottom was perfectly rhymed with the surface of the Kakaraka- an old stool sitting at the left hand corner of the room.

 As the stench emanating from the pile of clothes beside the raffia mat I laid on pinched my bleeding nostrils, I remembered my mother’s narration of the tale of her experience of this torture. She had sat me down one hot afternoon after her return from the farm.

‘Befua, my heart, you see' she smiled and displayed her perfectly arranged teeth. My mother is known for going about her daily duties with a bright smile. Her ideology about it is that a smile adds a beautiful touch to the physical stature of a woman. ‘You see’, she continued, ‘as a woman, I find it sometimes difficult to thank my creator for making me a woman’. I frowned at her in a way that seems to purport that I was asking her a question: are you serious?. I was startled by her statement. The skin covering my forehead, a little above the fresh pimple beside my left eye-brows folded. How could she say something like that? My mother, a fifty-seven-year-old woman was a strong and wise woman who knew the importance of carefully selecting her words. She once told me that words are like the tip of a sword with blades on both sides, they are bound to have an effect on the listener, whether carelessly uttered or cautiously spoken. ‘The difficulties that accompany womanhood, sometimes seems too much a load for me to carry. Our elders have said that it is the beauty of a woman’s character that truly defines how beautiful a woman is, not the physical beauty’. She flashed her gap-tooth once again and with the corner of her left eye, she looked at a brown cockroach desperately running, probably towards the smelly fufu in front of us, and crushed it mercilessly with her pale foot.

 I squeezed my lips in disgust as the burst of the insect gave a very loud ptaah sound. I looked at her and opened my mouth as if to say something. She continued, ‘That, you see, is the exact way that life has treated me. I have been crushed. But you see, I thank my creator for sending you my way. You are a priceless jewel to me. I know my ancestors will be angry with me if I do not tell you what I am about to.'

 I widened my eyes expectantly, waiting to hear an incredibly heady speech as usual. The one and only question that was running through my mind was: what is going on?

‘ I have kept these words in my vacuum of thoughts for years waiting for this moment, my daughter, you see, I have spent the larger part of my day on earth and time is no longer my friend. You see, as you grow and transit into womanhood, do not allow anything stop you from achieving your dreams.’ I saw a tear drop from her left eye as she used her index finger to trace the curve of my face. 'I believe that you can become what you wish to become, just like me, you will pass through the initiation rite in that room’ she pointed her fore-finger towards the red hut, few meters away from us.

 ‘’ It is a norm and it is our culture. Please do not be discouraged like me. I am a coward and I do… n… not’. At that point, tears have started to pump out from her eyes, I quickly wrapped my arms around both sides of her plump waist and muttered ‘Mama, you are not a coward’. She kissed my fore-head, stood to her feet and walked inside our thatched-roof house.

That was over two years ago. Back here in the room, I came to full consciousness of my environment and was held aback when I realized that a dark- skinned and rotund woman had been standing in front of me. I struggled really hard to register her face with my brain. I had seen this woman before. I stared at her and tried to speak some words but the only word that came out of my mouth was ‘why?’

To be continued...

Afamefune Uche & Toyosi Oni