Approaching the stream, I saw Iya Kudirat, and some few women flocking around her, they seem to be arrested by whatever it is the information Iya Kudirat was dishing out to them.
I hastened, not wanting to miss out of the fresh amebo Iya has for today; she makes the stream experience worth it everytime, and because of her some women travel from other villages to fetch water from our ogbaneke stream, I wonder what they told there husband’s when they got home and what excuses they made for coming this far, I believe wherever the men of their lives were they will no doubt boast about how loyal there wives are, going all the way to Ogbaneke stream to fetch clean quality water, as our village stream was rated, they wouldn’t know it is amebo, well prepared amebo from our chief of gossip staff Iya Kudirat.
The small polished brown skin woman sat on a little hill six steps away from the waters of ogbaneke, she always wore here traditional beads in her wrist and even though she was coming to the stream to get soaked by the waters, she maintained her ‘rich people’ lifestyle of tying two wrapper and a blouse well tucked in the grip of the wrapper she tied firmly to her waist.
The beads she told us is her valuable property, her husband had purchased it from the Owu market, known for the high cost of commodities sold on there on that day, she had even said he bought it for a hundred cowrie pieces, and even though her husband is now the man in the lives of three women, her position remained uncontested.
She will always boast of sucking the fresh oil from Baba Kudirat and leaving the empty chaff for the other two women to contend with. Her popular style of gesticulations when the topic discussed is getting interesting made her all together an experienced gossip bearer. She knows how to revoke the emotions, the sighs, hiss and disgust from her listeners as she took them on her tale bearing journey.
Who are they roasting this time? I wondered as I got closer, taking attendance with my eyes the number of women present, it seems her tale bearing is having new customers every Ogbaneke day!
The Ogbaneke is the name we gave to the day we came to the stream to do all the laundry, we had tried in one accord to forge an out of this world name for it and were thrown into wild jubilation when the name Ogbaneke was given, we didn’t know the meaning, we don’t even care to, our achievement in naming this stream after our will has been the most celebrated feast.
In no time, the name took over the stream and everybody began calling the stream Ogbaneke, a kind of acronym for the stream where women do laundry.
Ogbaneke is the women’s day, only the women came to the stream apart from little boys that followed their mothers to whirl away time, there is no trace of a teenage or adult masculine gender, you won’t dare come. Some women gets as free as taking a bathe there in the presence of other watching eyes, it’s a sight, one every woman looked forward to and iya kudirat knew how to turn the whole attention to herself, we made her the head woman without any opposition.
“….the screams were louder than that of the roaring of the lion in the jungle, she yelled with so much strength that Baba kudirat had to abandon what he was doing to go to their house. You know women can’t go to separate these kind of fight, please ooo, I don’t even want to enter another person’s pot of hot gbegiri” my ears began to receive the signals of the discussion as I got closer, I dropped my pot close to the river and sat aimlessly on the floor like other women and listened to our news broadcaster of the day.
“She’d almost passed on if not for the quick intervention of my husband,” Iya Kudirat swell with pride, pushing up her left eye brow as her lips parted to show her set of Kola stained teeth.
“That man is a real man!” she exclaimed. “I couldn’t help but remember when my own Damilola laid his hands on me, the pains from the stings of his hands and fist were ever so romantic, it hurts yes, but somewhere in my heart I was glad my husband is a real man, only real men gives physical correction to there wives, the beatings is nothing compared to a pot of nkwobi sold at the village joint by that light skinned igbo woman that looks like she came from dubayi” she stressed, showing us the scars of the marks of the beatings her own husband gave to her.
“And even though Baba Kudirat has gotten so weak that he hisses at my extreme foolishness and walk away when my mouth moved faster than Niagara Falls, I missed the days when his fist descended on me, I wailed as I protect my face from the raging blow and allowed my body to suck in the whole pain as he brushed me and lands on my with his palm and his fist, nothing is like unto the sex we had afterwards, he will mount on me and ride to hell making those horsey sounds and massaging the swellings I have gotten from his rage, after which I will prepare his special delicacy for him. I trip for my Dami over and over, he knows me best, when to hit me, where to hit me, when to insert those hose of his in me and massage my bruises, unfortunately, we heard that she died by sunrise, she didn't give her husband any child of his own, she couldn't even bare the pains that makes womanhood the beauty it is, I have always known that jumoke, from the way she walks briskly away from here, shaking like a frozen commodity, she is nothing close to being a woman, we are known for our prowess in mastering pain or am I not right? "
"You are right ohhh" the women replied, making their faces to buttress their strong support for what was just said before taking turns to talk about how they purposely provoke their husbands just to test his masculinity.
Comments
Post a Comment