Your love,
Ndali
16
Visions of White Birds
EBUBEDIKE, the great fathers speak of a man who is anxious and afraid as being in a fettered state. They say this because anxiety and fear rob a man of his peace. And a man without peace? Such a man, they say, is inwardly dead. But when he rids himself of the shackles, and the chains rattle and tumble away into outer dark, he becomes free again. Reborn. To prevent himself from falling again into bondage, he tries to build defenses around himself. So what does he do? He allows in yet another fear. This time, it is not the fear that he is undone because of his present circumstances but that in a yet uncreated and unknown time, something else will go wrong and he will be broken again. Thus he lives in a cycle in which the past is rehearsed, time and time again. He becomes enslaved by what has not yet come. I have seen it many times.
Although my host’s promise of salvation was still firmly in place—the nurse had texted him twice since they met and the second time had added a yellow image of a laughing face and repeated that he was a “good man”—the fear came after he read Ndali’s letter. It held him bound for the last portion of the night, dangling flashing images of other men having romance with her in his mind. He was released from this state in the early hours of the morning when Tobe knocked and asked from behind the door if he would go to church. “If you come,” Tobe continued, “you will meet a lot of Naija people there. And I tell you, you will like it. You can thank God for everything, and also, we can buy some things to cook from the market there. We should start to cook before school starts tomorrow.” My host said he would join.
Later, they were walking along a road that appeared like one he’d passed on Thursday, just after he left the taxi. The streets were compact, and the buildings seemed to have no partition between them. A barbershop constructed in glass sat by the sidewalk. A man smoking in front of it, blowing billows of smoke into the air, yelled “Arap!” at them as they passed.
“Your papa arap!” Tobe yelled back.
“Your father, mother, everybody arap!” my host said, for Tobe had told him that whenever he heard that, it meant he was being called a slave.
“Don’t mind them, they are idiots. Look at that dirty-looking man calling us slaves. That’s the thing. They are so foolish.”
They crossed into a lone street whose houses had gates like the ones in Nigeria. Big green metal boxes filled with dirt sat at every corner. But on one street they passed, Tobe pointed to one of the buildings and said that the white people from Europe loved to come and see it. It was a building of rich clay, like nothing my host or I had ever seen before. He was enraptured by the sight. The building was roofless, with mighty pillars. A temple to a Greek or Roman god, Tobe suggested aloud, perhaps so the old European man taking photos of it could hear him. An ancient temple destroyed by age, its old beauty trapped beneath the skin of its ruins. Yet in some way, it still was beautiful, for this is what turned it into a spectacle, why people traveled from afar to see it. A beauty out of ruins: this was a strange thing.
When they turned onto a street Tobe said was near the church, they saw other people who had the color of the great fathers, a group of four men, two of them wearing visors, walking towards the church. With this group, they entered the church. It was full, and one of the men they had seen at the apartment with Nigerians on campus, John, was directing people and offering chairs to those who did not have seats. The place was full of black students as well as some white people. A different kind of white man, one who looked not like the Turkish people but like the ones who ruled the land of the old fathers for many years, stood at an altar in front, speaking in the same accent as Ndali, and he knew at once that he was British. The man spoke about the need to sing with all their hearts. He and Tobe sat in the very back, behind two people who looked somewhat familiar to him.
He thought of the church of his childhood, which he had stopped attending. His father had stopped after the death of his mother, angry with God for letting his wife die in childbirth. My host had continued, sparingly, until an incident with the gosling had changed his mind. The gosling had become ill, refusing to eat and falling whenever it walked. The idea came that he take it to a church where he’d heard of faith healings—of a blind man seeing again. So he took his gosling to the church, carrying it close to his chest. He was stopped at the door by uniformed ushers who thought him mad for bringing an animal to the church. That incident killed his faith in the religion of the White Man. Why would God not care for a sick animal if he cares for human beings? At the time, he found it hard to understand why one could not love a bird just as one loved people. Hoping that he would turn to the religion of the pious fathers, I had encouraged his decision, adding to his thoughts that if he went to an odinani shrine with his animal, Ala or Njokwu or any number of deities would not have cast him away. But like many of his generation, such a thought was verboten.
Now he listened even harder as the preacher began speaking of resurrection and life. The man talked about Jisos Kraist and how he had died and risen. Sleep came upon his eyes as the man, whose voice careened in the air and shifted between high and low, spoke of how only true Christianity could lead to possessing a life of resurrection, of rising again after a fall. He opened his eyes, for the man had spoken to him. He was a witness to how, when lost, a man could descend into the abyss and still be raised up and restored.
When the preacher finished his sermon, they sang, and the church was dismissed. Once the people began to leave their seats, a man tapped him on the shoulder.
“Jesus Christ, T.T.!”
“Oh boy! Happy to see you here.”
“Yes, my brother.”
“How are you, how far, did you later see your friend?”
“No,” he said, and told T.T. everything that had happened. By the time he finished, they were standing outside the gate of the church, and Tobe, who’d greeted a few people, had come to stand by his side.
“Mehn, casino pays very well for here,” T.T. said. “God sent that woman to you true, true oh. Some of the Turka people are good. There’s a woman like that who really helps a lot of people. She gave a Naija boy scholarship, sef. The boy was working for her, doing everything, and instead of just paying him, he said make she kuku pay his school fees.”
“Hmm, good people.”
“Yes, yes, but be careful eh. Sometimes, the people just get kanji.”
T.T. laughed and said, “Take my number.”
ONWANAETIRIOHA, when he returned home with Tobe, it was already dark. He reached for his phone, and a text message was on it. He read the message from Ndali. Nonso, call me tomorrow pls. He shook his head. He dialed her number, but only a long-drawn static noise came back to him. He resolved to call her after he’d confirmed the job, after he’d known for certain that he would recover that which he’d lost. And when he called her, he would tell her everything—everything from the airport to his meeting Fiona.
He sat back in his chair in his room and thought of the days, of all his being in a new country. He reached in his bag and brought out the photos of Ndali naked. As he watched them, his body caught sensual fire. He brought out his penis. Then he rushed and bolted the door so Tobe could not come in at will. He pushed his ear against it for any sound of Tobe, and when he did not hear, he looked at the naked photos of Ndali and began touching himself, gasping, moaning until he fell into a limp state.
AKATAKA, amongst the people of the world, anywhere, there is a common thread of compassion for a man who is wounded, or poor, or lowly. This kind of man earns their pity. Many would desire to help such a man if they believe he has been wronged. I have seen this many times. This is why a white woman in a foreign land can see a man from the land of the fathers, tattered, broken, and offer help, and in offering, create a pleasant expectation in him.
He woke the following morning, having slept for a full night for the second time since he arrived in the strange country. So full of expectation was he tha
t he called Elochukwu and told him to go at once to the man to whom he’d sold the land and ask him to not do anything, that he would refund the money. “But how is this possible when you don’t give him the money immediately?” Elochukwu said.
“Tell him I will give him double. We should sign agreement; I will pay double within six months. Then I can have my house back.”
Elochukwu promised to meet the man and talk to him. Assured, my host washed himself and joined Tobe, who had cooked fried eggs.
Tobe talked about how difficult it had been to find good bread that morning.
“All of the bread they have are like stone,” he said, and my host laughed. “I don’t even understand this people at all. Not wan single bread in the whole shop.”
“You have watched Osuofia in London?” my host said.
“Heh, the one he went to that place and asked for Agege bread and the Oyibo people were jus looking like mumu?”
They ate in sudden silence, he thinking of how mornings were different here. He’d not heard any cock crow, not even a call to prayer from a muezzin. The image he’d remembered the previous day returned and he saw Ndali almost naked, standing at the threshold of the sitting room’s door. She was standing there looking away, her back turned to him like a thing to be feared. He did not remember what he had done—had he called to her? Had he turned away? He could not tell.
“This people, they stick to time,” Tobe said again. “If they tell you ten o’clock, it is ten o’clock. If they tell you it is one, it is one. So we should go quickly to the letting agent’s office, collect your own keys and go wait for the woman.”
He nodded. “It should be so, my friend.”
“I called Atif yesterday, and told him we have found a place. He asked about you. When I go, after my registration and class, I will go to his office.”
“Thank you, my brother,” he said, for he was paying little attention, his mind fixed on the errand he’d delegated to Elochukwu and the job Fiona would soon take him to.
They cleared the table and left the house, Tobe carrying a bag with his computer inside, and books. The bag resembled the schoolbags children wore on their backs, as Tobe himself wore his. My host carried the bag Ndali had given him, which contained his documents, her letter, and her photos, as he’d been doing since he came to the country.
They found the agent’s office in the interior of the city center, tucked into an area full of clothing and jewelry stores. It was on a street behind the center, compact and full of stores, a cyber cafe, restaurants, and a small mosque. Pigeons hopped about, feeding on something or other. Here they found a lot of white people different from the Turkish people. Tobe said they were Europeans or Americans.
“They are different,” Tobe insisted. “These ones, the Turkish people, they are not real whites. They look more like Arabs. You know how—have you seen Sudan people before? They are different from our black—that kain difference.”
A group of the kind of white people they were speaking about was walking along. Two young women, almost naked, in half shorts, brassieres, and slippers, passed by. One of them carried a towel. “My God, see Omo!” Tobe said.
He laughed. “I thought you were a born again,” he said.
“Yes. But see, these girls fine. But Turkish woman beat them. But Naija still remain number one.”
Egbunu, when they entered the office, the air was filled with cigarette smoke. A stout white woman in a chair was smoking. I noted that at the threshold of the door was a round amulet, the color of Osimiri, with a white inner sphere within which looked like a human eye. Because it appeared so much like an amulet, I came out of my host to see if it posed a danger to him. And at once I saw a strange spirit in the shape of a snake curling around the object. This creature was a fearful sight even for me, a guardian spirit, who journeys regularly into the plains of the ethereal. I fled in haste.
When I rejoined my host, the woman was counting the money Tobe had given her. Later, when they stepped out with the keys, he felt an overwhelming relief. When they came out, it was nearly ten. So they walked to the bus stop. They stood there for only a few minutes when Fiona arrived in her car, dressed in a white frock with a necklace that sparkled around her neck. He shook Tobe’s hand and ran towards the car.
“You’re looking happy,” Fiona said once he entered.
“Yes, Fiona. Thank you. It is because of you.”
“Oh, no, come on! I haven’t done anything. You were in big trouble.”
He nodded.
“I got an apartment with my friend.”
“Ah, that’s very good. Very good. It helps your psyche, you know, to have a house.”
He said yes.
“My friend Ismail is in the office. He is waiting for you.”
As soon as he sat, I noticed that the woman wore—around her wrist in the form of a band—the same kind of amulet I had seen earlier. I flashed the image of the one at the agent’s office in my host’s mind and pointed him to the woman’s wrist, for I was curious to know what it was. Unexpectedly, Chukwu, it worked.
“Es ma,” he said.
“Yes?”
“What is this blue thing that resemble eyes everywhere here—?”
“Oh, oh,” the woman said, and thrust her hand into the air. “Evil eye. It’s like, you know, a good-luck charm. Very big deal to Turkish people.”
My host nodded, even though he could not fully comprehend what the object was. But I was relieved to know it was merely a personal fetish, not something that could harm my host.
They drove, a tune playing from the stereo. She asked him what music he liked, but when he listed them, she didn’t know any. It struck him, once he’d finished speaking, that he did not mention Oliver De Coque. The thought of the singer annoyed him, as if De Coque had done something to hurt him. But he knew that he’d come to associate the memory of the day he was humiliated at Ndali’s family’s house with De Coque, who was playing his music that day. And he now resented the musician for it.
“This is Emre Aydin, a very good Turkish singer. I like him very much.” She laughed and glanced at my host. “By the way, Solomon, I’ve been thinking about your story. It’s very painful.”
He nodded.
“It reminded me of a book I read recently about a man who was asked by his wife to join the army during the war, and when he did, she became very disturbed by the actions, you know, of the army. Hitler’s Nazi army. She left him. It is a very difficult book. You do something great because of a woman you love, and then you lose her. I am not saying it will happen to you, don’t get me wrong.” She waved her hand. “You will be fine and your fiancée will be there for you—I’m sure. I am speaking of the sacrifice. Genau?”
He looked up at her, for her words had shot into his heart and pierced it.
“Yes, ma, I—” He stopped himself and said instead, “Yes, Fiona.”
They passed the strange road again and climbed a mighty bridge, then went down a small ramp made of interlocking bricks. As the car approached what seemed like the limits of a village, giving way to densely vegetated lands, the sun seemed to drop lower, and its heat, visible in the illusory wave, made it appear as if the car had suddenly plunged into a river. But soon the deception was busted, and they entered into the town’s small streets. The car made a grinding sound as it raced past others, jerking so much that even the thought of Ndali leaving him, a thought which had lain like a child in the cot of his mind, shifted violently from one end to the other. He struggled to still it. But he could not.
OSIMIRIATAATA, the peace that concrete hope brings to a man who has suffered cruel defeat is difficult to describe. It is the sublime incantation of the soul. It is the unseen hand that lifts a man off a cliff over a pit of fire and returns him to the road from which he has veered. It is the rope that pulls a drowning man out of the deep sea and hauls him onto the deck of a boat to the breath of fresh air. This was what the nurse had given him. But what I have seen many times before is that the hands
that feed the chicken are the same ones that kill it. This is a mystery of the world, one which, in this strange country, my host and I would come to experience. But I must render it all in as much detail as I can, Egbunu, for this is what you desire of us when we come before you here in the luminous court of Beigwe.
When they arrived in the city from which he’d emerged four days before with a bleeding spirit, his heart was so warm and his joy so grand that he wanted to take a photo of the place. So before they entered, he asked Fiona if she had a camera phone.
“Yes, yes,” she said. “It’s a BlackBerry.”
“Okay,” he said.
“You want a photo?”
He nodded and smiled.
“Ha!” she said, and blew air out of her mouth. “You can’t even tell me you want a photo? You are a shy man.”
She snapped a photo of him folding his hands across his chest, then pointing at the light-box sign on the facade of the white marble building, then with his hands spread out, both ways. He looked through these images of himself looking happy, and they pleased him.
“I will send them to your e-mail.”
He agreed. As they walked into the place, part of his mind was thinking of Ndali, how she would like the photos. The other half was in awe of the magnificence of the building—the blood-red rug with tiger prints, the ornamental lightbulbs, the machines and TV screens. He stopped thinking of all these when he started walking behind Fiona through a narrow hallway. It must have been because of the kind of shoes Ndali called “heels,” but her buttocks danced in a shapely way. And through the white frock, he saw the outline of her underpants.
Ebubedike, it surprised him, the strange sudden beat of his heart at the sight and the quick fist-punch of lust on his mind. It came at him like a burst of flame, so quick and unnatural that he was taken aback by it.
As if she suspected what had happened, she turned. “Solomon, I have told you what he will pay, yes?”
An Orchestra of Minorities Page 30