Ipods in Accra Page 7

  It was just two days before the ceremony, and I wasn’t any the wiser about what it involved. We were having a great time at Nana-Amma’s, but a sinking feeling came over us every time we got in her car – we knew it meant heading out to see another friend or relative. It felt like she was showing us off to everybody she knew in Kumasi! If we didn’t go out in the car, visitors came to us, including Mum’s cousin, Auntie Leila, and her two year old daughter, Bella, who arrived that day.

  Nana-Amma had already gone with Comfort, her maid, to collect Tanisha from the airport. She was coming all the way from America for my puberty ceremony. Mum could see how anxious I’d become, but mistook it for meaning I was concerned about the puberty ceremony. I was, but that wasn’t the only thing whizzing around in my mind.

  I couldn’t tell her I was petrified of Tanisha and Mum blocking me out again. This was the big test. Tanisha hadn’t been in London since Mum and I had had that chat. About a year ago, I had confronted Mum about the way she had excluded Delphy and me after her sister, Tanisha’s mum, had died. It had lasted for years: as soon as Tanisha showed up it was like Mum forgot she had her own daughters. So this was the moment when she’d have to prove herself to me. The thing was, I wasn’t so sure Mum would pass the test. She’d already been going on and on about how proud she was of Tanisha for studying law at university. Every relative we went to see asked about Tanisha and suddenly everything became a ‘How wonderful is Tanisha?’ moment! I realised I had to keep mentioning my puberty ceremony to remind Mum about what I was to be doing – otherwise it sometimes felt like Delphy and I weren’t in the room.

  Auntie Leila walked in, wearing a blue dress Mum had bought her.

  ‘Well, what do you think?’ she asked.

  ‘It really suits you!’ I told her.

  ‘Since I had Bella, nothing is the same!’ she said, patting her bottom.

  ‘That part of you has always been that big!’ Mum said, before running out of the room.

  ‘See, Makeeda, that’s why I loved your Auntie Jennifer more …’

  ‘Liar! Jen was worse than me!’ Mum called back from a suitable distance.

  It was weird hearing Mum and Auntie Leila mess around. I wondered if Tanisha and I would ever be like that without me worrying about how much time she and Mum spent together.

  Everyone has a glamorous auntie and Auntie Leila was ours. She used to model in Italy. She got spotted when she and her mum were in Rome on holiday. She met and married Uncle Paolo nearly ten years ago. He was a famous TV executive who gave it up to teach in deprived schools in remote parts of Ghana five years ago. Mum hadn’t thought that Auntie Leila would be able to handle not having her hair done every two weeks, or not having a regular manicure or the odd paparazzi camera flash in her face. She had surprised everyone by sticking it out for the past five years and had even had her first child Bella, but now she was getting ready to return to Europe. Mum said, despite her looks and career, Auntie Leila was the most grounded person she’d ever known.

  Bella came running into the living room. She was really cute, with Auntie Leila’s face and Uncle Paolo’s brown hair and freckles.

  ‘Babbo, babbo!’ she said, and she ran back to the courtyard with Delphina chasing after her. She would babble away quite easily in a mixture of Italian and Twi.

  When Uncle Paolo walked in, he immediately hugged me and then Mum. He was tall and had brown hair and hazel eyes. His mum was Ghanaian and his dad was Italian, and he looked like a movie star – well, he used to, before he grew his dodgy beard. Auntie Leila kept threatening to shave it off him in his sleep.

  Mum received a phone call from Nana-Amma who was still on her way to the airport, informing her that I had to be seen by the Queen Mother that same day or I would not be able to have a bragoro. Nana-Amma had forgotten to tell us earlier, so we now had less than half an hour to smarten ourselves up and head over there! The Queen Mother was head of our clan, so going to see her was a bit like meeting a minor member of the British Royal Family.

  Leaving Bella and Delphy with Uncle Paolo, Auntie Leila, Mum and I set off for the Queen Mother’s house. Apparently there was a rule that, if she didn’t meet me, the puberty ceremony couldn’t proceed. We jumped into Uncle Paolo’s car and Auntie Leila drove us to the Queen Mother’s home. It was a weird journey. We drove past the road that housed celebrities and even saw a half-built house in the shape of a fish. (The bottom half was a house, but the top floor was the shape of a fish.) Auntie Leila said the owners lived abroad and came from a long line of fishermen. She slowed the car down and we stared at the building. ‘If you get lost, follow the fish, Makeeda,’ Auntie Leila said and we all burst into laughter.

  As our drive continued, I realised that some areas had street lights and others didn’t. I loved seeing the palm trees line the roads. In Edgware, you could walk down the street late atnight and only hear cars driving by; in Ghana it felt like there was always noise, no matter what time of day it was, but a completely different kind. The insects hummed their notes through the air at night and then the chickens took over in the morning. Nothing was ever still. Everything was moving.

  We drove down several bumpy roads, and found ourselves outside a compound with deep-red gates. After beeping the horn, the door was slowly opened and we parked in a courtyard. Mum, Auntie Leila and I stared around us. I think we were all thinking the same thing: was this it? Where was the flashy stuff? There were solar lamps lighting a pathway towards the house, but absolutely nothing that told you royalty lived there. The strange thing was that it looked just like Nana-Amma’s place on the outside. We were met by a man, who walked us in.

  The man was tall, wore sunglasses and a smart top and trousers, which wasn’t quite a uniform but looked too official to be casual. He looked like an FBI agent or something. After a brief greeting and a few questions about why we were there, he let us into the main house.

  I suddenly felt anxious. What if she refused to allow the ceremony? What would I do then? Mum began straightening my blouse and fixing my hair so I knew this whole thing was making her nervous too.

  As I looked around at the hallway, it seemed really normal. The walls were cream and there were plants in every corner. There was a seating area and we were asked to wait there. Within minutes, we were ushered into a living room that had a settee covered in yellow flowers and a small coffee table.

  Everything was made of mahogany or some other dark wood. There were carvings in a glass cabinet in the corner. I wanted to have a proper look, but Mum held me back and muttered that we’d never live it down if I broke anything.

  ‘I’m nearly sixteen, Mum,’ I complained.

  ‘Let her look,’ Auntie Leila added.

  ‘OK, but do not touch a thing,’ Mum said.

  I went to the cabinet and peered at the shelves of wooden carvings. One had people at some kind of ceremony; each person’s ntoma had been carved in such a way that you could see the tiny patterns in the wood. There was another of a woman holding a baby. These carvings weren’t like the ones I’d seen being sold near the airport – these looked older and special.

  ‘Makeeda,’ Mum called.

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Come and sit down. I think she’s coming.’

  I quickly turned round, but suddenly knocked into something – a small table – and sent a wooden statue flying. It was a carving of people with arms and legs entwined, and right now they were sprawled on the floor. I hadn’t seen it as it wasn’t in the glass cabinet with the others. Mum gave me a horrified look and held her head in her hands. She was speechless – that was the scary part. As if on autopilot, Auntie Leila jumped to my rescue and began putting the carving back in place. She finished and we sat down, just as the maid walked in with some water for us.

  When she offered me a drink, Mum declined on my behalf and the maid left.

  ‘Hey,’ I protested.

  ‘Listen, you’d only spill it and I think we’ve had enough drama,’ Mum replied.

 
I looked around me. The walls were lined with pictures of previous queen mothers, but there only seemed to be four photos. Mum said that was because, in the past, people believed photographs captured their spirit, so they either looked away, or simply refused to have their photos taken.

  ‘This place feels a bit …’ Mum began.

  ‘Sumsum w ha’ Auntie Leila replied, recovering from a shiver down her spine.

  ‘Do you really think it feels a bit spooky, Auntie?’ I asked.

  Nana had once told me that royal figures were meant to have mystical pagan powers and that they were worshipped prior to Islam and Christianity in Ghana.

  ‘Makeeda, didn’t anyone ever tell you about how the elderly sometimes take on supernatural qualities …’

  I laughed. No one believed in that superstitious stuff much now.

  ‘You laugh, you’ll see,’ said Auntie Leila.

  ‘Hey, please don’t go wishing anything on my daughter!’ Mum said, irritated.

  Mum believed it? She’d always played it down when Aunt Grace said stuff like that back home!

  ‘Of course not,’ Auntie Leila protested. ‘But Makeeda needs to respect the fact that we Ghanaians have our own beliefs. I mean, the whole point of the ceremony is to request blessings from the goddess of fertility, isn’t it?’

  ‘Well put,’ said an elderly but strong voice from the door.

  Auntie Leila almost lost it, nearly jumping out of her seat, but Mum grabbed her arm and calmed her down. We stood up as the Queen Mother walked in to show our respect. Our eyes followed her as she slowly sat down opposite us. She was dressed in a blue and yellow ntoma designed into a long loose dress. As she sat down, her maid immediately covered her legs with a blanket. Her skin was deep ebony-brown but only slightly wrinkly, which I found surprising for someone who was in their eighties. Her hair was wrapped up in a duku and her eyes sparkled as she smiled at us.

  ‘So, you’re having your bragoro?’

  ‘Yes, Nana,’ I replied.

  We are meant to call all elderly people we meet ‘Nana’, as a sign of respect.

  ‘Are you excited?’ asked the Queen Mother.

  ‘Yes,’ I replied.

  ‘Good! Most western girls would be petrified!’

  Mum and Auntie Leila laughed a little nervously. I suddenly wondered if there was something really terrible about the ceremony I hadn’t been warned about. The Queen Mother beckoned me over and took a good look at me. Then she explained that in the past this examination involved the girl standing naked before the Queen Mother, but she had ‘the eye’, whatever that was, so it wasn’t necessary.

  I looked at Auntie Leila, who had suddenly got a smug look on her face.

  ‘You have my permission,’ the Queen Mother said in herdeep voice after a few moments. ‘You are definitely still on your journey. Take your time and never forget, just when you think you know everything, there’s always something new to learn. That, Makeeda, is what romance is really about: the surprises.’

  Mum and Auntie Leila stared at me after that comment. It was hard avoiding their glare, but I didn’t want to tell them I knew she was talking about Nick.

  ‘I think you should wait outside,’ she said to me after a pause. So I went back out into the hallway and sat down. The maid came out of the shadows to close the door for me. I smiled and thanked her, but I really wanted to hear the conversation, but it was over quite quickly.

  The drive home was really strange. Mum had to remind Auntie Leila to be careful on the road, because whatever the Queen Mother had said had obviously totally freaked her out. I tried to find out what it was, but Mum told me some things weren’t meant for my ears. To be honest, I was glad that the attention was away from me but Auntie Leila’s erratic driving had me wondering if I’d actually make it to my puberty ceremony in one piece. After a few miles, Mum made her stop and she drove home instead.

  As the gates opened on to Nana-Amma’s courtyard, I saw her car. Tanisha was here. We walked in and Tanisha rushed to hug Mum. I tried hard not to stare at them for too long. Something about that hug made me feel anxious. I couldn’t recall the last time Mum had held me for that long, but then I lived with her all the time, I supposed. Tanisha hugged Auntie Leila, then went back to hug Mum. Within minutes they werelaughing and joking and, although everyone got caught up in greeting her, I seemed to be frozen to the doorway, watching. I felt a knot grow in my stomach. Mum’s animated gestures on seeing her niece made me feel like I was a piece of furniture.

  ‘Makeeda? Aden, wonkyia wunna?’ Nana-Amma asked me.

  I immediately went over to greet Tanisha. ‘Hey,’ I said, hugging her. It was weird. We were so close, the way we communicated by phone, email and IM, we were more like sisters. However, seeing Tanisha suddenly made all my insecurities come flooding back. Was I going to have to compete with her yet again for Mum’s attention?

  ‘Hey yourself! Looking forward to tomorrow?’

  Everyone seemed to stop what they were doing to listen to my reply.

  ‘It’s not tomorrow, it’s the day after!’ Delphina interrupted.

  ‘Oh right, but you’re excited about it, right?’ Tanisha asked again.

  ‘Yes, and a bit nervous,’ I said. I knew exactly what she was doing, but I wasn’t going to take the bait. I wasn’t going to admit to being petrified.

  After twenty minutes I went to bed. The mosquitoes were fewer, but I still needed to plug in repellent. As I settled down to sleep, I couldn’t help wishing I could do the same for Tanisha.

  Chapter 10

  Drumbeats and Heartbeats

  ‘What’s that noise?’ I said to Delphy.

  She was in the bed next to mine and when I looked over she sat up.

  ‘I think that’s the sound of drumming,’ she said.

  ‘Makeeda! It’s started!’ Nana shrieked, bursting into our room with Mum. She was more excited about the ceremony than I was.

  ‘What’s started, Nana?’

  ‘The bragoro!’

  Oh man, already? Today was the day (according to tradition) I became a woman. The fact was, I had actually got my period eleven months ago. To be honest, being the last one of my friends was a total nightmare. I mean, I didn’t do that thing where I pretended I had got it or anything, but it was harsh listening to everyone else – it made me feel so immature. I was probably the only girl in the world who was wishing for PMS! As the ceremony is meant to occur as soon as you got your period, I thought the Queen Mother of our clan had made a special concession for me, but apparently loads of girls from the UK and US were returning to Ghana to have this ceremony, so I was probably not that special after all.

  I glanced at my watch. It was four o’clock in the morning! Didn’t they know it was just indecent to wake anyone up before seven a.m.? I attempted to bury my head under the blanket, but Mum ripped it from over me with a flourish.

  ‘Move it, missy!’ she said, shaking me.

  ‘Someone is drumming for Makeeda?’ Delphy asked incredulously.

  ‘Yes, they’re announcing to everyone that Makeeda is having her bragoro.’

  ‘Couldn’t they have done it on the radio or something?’ Delphina murmured sleepily.

  When we first arrived in Ghana, we kept hearing radio announcements about everything – parties, weddings and funerals. Delphy and I were a bit surprised: we kept thinking how people in England would be worried about gatecrashers if they announced their events on the radio. Mum said no one here tended to think like that, they saw it as an opportunity for people who didn’t know about an event to attend.

  ‘Delphina, before radios, we communicated with drums,’ Nana-Amma said, coming into the room.

  ‘Oh, right. I knew that,’ Delphy said.

  I knew she was lying and really wanted to say so, but Mum was steering me towards the bathroom. My requests to sleep for another few hours were ignored.

  I was soon dressed in a white ntoma, which was draped across my body loosely, and told to sit in the courtyard.<
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  Nana-Amma’s courtyard was huge; to the left was a small annexe house where Comfort lived with her cousin, Kwadwo, the gateman. Between the two homes were three rows of plantain, avocado and fruit trees. When we were younger, she had told us that she had planted one row for each of her grandchildren Tanisha, Delphy and me. In fact, it was a mini farm, and I suspected the extra rows had more to do with the money she was making. Now and again, I could see where Delphina’s entrepreneurial side might have come from – Nana-Amma had left full-time teaching for farming. Dad used to say she gave retirement a bad name.

  The front gate had been propped open for passers-by to see me. The drummers had already left and I was pretending not to yawn as the dawn broke. The sky was orangey – a deeper, richer colour than the ground. What surprised me was that there were already people up and about, going past to work.

  I had managed to hide my iPod in my lap and was listening to some of the songs Nick had downloaded for me. Whenever someone passed by, I waved and said,‘Maakye!’ Good morning was the first phrase I had learned, and quite an important one, given the fact that everyone in Ghana seemed to be an early riser.

  I was pretty bored, but, after half an hour, there was an almighty argument between Nana, Mum and one of Mum’s aunties, Nana-Adowa. (I called all my parents’ aunties and uncles ‘Nana’ because they were like extra grandparents.) Tanisha and Delphy came running towards me.

  ‘What’s going on?’ I asked. My level of Twi meant that I could only understand the odd word and all I could get was Nana-Adowa saying, ‘We don’t do it like that.’

  ‘They’re talking about you,’ Delphy said eagerly.

  ‘Well, yeah, I got that from their constantly dropping my name,’ I said.

  Delphy’s Twi was actually worse than mine. Mum was hoping this holiday might change that, but, unless Delphy got to meet the couple who ran the largest fast-food outlets in Ghana and Nigeria, she wasn’t going to attempt Twi anytime soon.