by Uwem Akpan
YET A HEAVINESS, a discomfort, a homelessness descended on my heart as I pushed my purchases home. It was the fear of my two neighbors.
It worsened the farther I got from the conviviality of the square. I texted Caro about it, who said the best thing was to ignore them. But I kept thinking about whether I had greeted them the right way, whether I had moved too close to them during the second hello. Were all my neighbors like this? Though I decided to be checking my peephole before leaving home, how would I avoid them going up to the apartment? Should I ask Lucci for advice?
When I got to my building, I breathed in, steeled myself, opened the front door, and entered. I stood quietly by the mailboxes, listening and scanning the stairwell. In my village you greeted your neighbor, unless something was wrong. How do you live close to people who do not want to greet you?
An African American man walked in behind me. Though he was struggling with eight different breeds of dogs, all on leashes, he nodded and smiled and greeted me warmly and introduced himself as Keith Jim-Stehr. We connected right away. He was a slim friendly guy with a neat fade haircut. He was wearing green cargo shorts and a blue sleeveless top. He told me his great-grandparents were from Alabama. The dogs were excited, some licking my hands, others jumping about. Though I did not like dogs, today I appreciated their welcome.
“Hey, Ekong, I got to know you were here when I overheard your neighbors—I’m sure you’ve met Jeff, the Asian, and Brad, the white guy, and Alejandra Ledesma, his girlfriend …?”
“Not the girl … yes, yes, any problem?”
“Well, I heard them talking about the African carrying his luggage on his head. I thought they were going to call the cops on you. Last year, someone on the second floor called the cops for a Black guy who came to visit his Latino friend.”
“Really?”
I was noncommittal, for even in my village it was unwise to jump into neighborhood gossip. I changed the topic and told him how much I loved the city already. I eagerly accepted his firm handshake when he could finally move all the leashes into the other hand.
He was a middle school teacher and walked dogs on the side, an occupation I never knew existed. I was happy when he asked me to wait for him to take his dogs to his apartment so he could help carry my cart. He apologized that the dogs would be noisy some nights, especially since his apartment was directly under mine. I said it did not matter, for I was a deep sleeper. Be that as it may, I did not understand why someone would go to the trouble of having dogs and then pay another to walk or keep them.
“Ekong, where should I visit in Africa?” he said cheerily when he returned.
“Big question—fifty-four countries!” I said, as we began to trudge up with the cart.
“That trip has been on my bucket list for centuries, man. Tourists’ reviews online all sound the same.”
“It’s confusing. Even I know so little of my continent.”
“And I know so little about my roots in the South. Some would even say I look down on southerners. But it’s a bit more complex, because I’m proud of my grandpa, who fought gallantly in the Second World War in spite of the bruising racism back in Alabama … well, I’ve never had the good fortune to be near you guys, bro.”
“The feeling is mutual, bro. Let me think carefully where to visit.”
When we reached his landing, the dogs growled and pounded his door. I smiled an empty smile to assure him it was nothing. “But, hey, Ekong, you know what, maybe I should start with your country. I read somewhere Nigeria is the Giant of Africa. Now, that’s my kind of tourist spot!”
“Let’s just say the so-called giant is a bad mess right now … I’ll get back with you on where to go, okay?”
“No hurry.”
When we gently put down the cart before my door, I thanked him for his hospitality. As soon as he was gone, I locked up with the three keys and bolts, as Lucci had instructed. I polished the peephole with my index finger and peered out through it. They were not there, but I had a clear view of things.
THE NEXT DAY, I woke up late and tired. After breakfast of eggs and bread, I set about dressing up in my native Annang attire for the midmorning Mass. I put on my male wrappa, ofong-isin iden, and asine-ata-ukang, traditional dress, and cap. The peephole assured me outside was okay. But then when I took the first few steps down the stairwell, I realized it was too steep for my own good. I was like a lady riding with her skirt up to her waist; I was in the wrong clothes for this sport.
When I persisted on continuing down, I slipped and grabbed the banisters. I gave up. Luckily nobody saw me. I scrambled back up to change into a pair of trousers and shirt and blazer. With a map app, I found my way through the square’s madness to the famous spires of St. Patrick’s Cathedral.
But, as I would tell Caro and Father Kiobel later, though the familiarity of the Mass brought nostalgia, this space was not for me. It was too beautiful, too hallowed, too imposing, and trafficked in too much history and tradition and tourists moping at the altar like a magic show gone bad. Folks just sauntered in like it was a Wendy’s or a stadium—no genuflection, no pre-Mass rosary recitation, nothing. And no matter how much I begged God to save me from Brad and Jeff, I myself was distracted, goggling at this or that part of the picturesque architecture. Moreover, instead of listening to the homilist, my mind kept replaying the booming arresting voice and the unforgettably poetic imagery of the cathedral’s late archbishop Fulton Sheen, whose homily tapes we had listened to in our youth, long after his death. Today, the preaching felt intolerably flat, the whole liturgy as hurried as bad fiction, like these diverse worshippers could not wait to eat Communion and jump back into the Big Apple. It reminded me of John Updike’s “Packed Dirt, Churchgoing, a Dying Cat, a Traded Car,” where he wrote, “In Manhattan, Christianity is so feeble, its future seems before it.”
On my way back, a text from Molly asked how I was settling in, repeating how she and her colleagues looked forward to meeting me the following day. Of course, I talked about my fascination with the square. She politely said it was not her favorite part of town and pitied me, for I would endure this twice daily to and from work. “But it’s still better than coming in from the Bronx daily!” she insisted. I changed the topic, because I loved my square and was actually already roaming it, angling to be picked up by the King Kong lady. But she avoided me, even when I cupped my hands around my mouth and shouted and jumped and waved in the brilliant afternoon sun. I only ran home when Usen texted they were already on our street.
We exchanged big hugs and were as loud and dramatic as only Nigerians can be, so much so that the street stopped and paid us attention. The Umohs were in matching red Nike sneakers, black jeans, and red Liverpool soccer club home jerseys. The wife, Ofonime, a graduate student at CUNY, even completed her outfit with a red headband. Being a Liverpool fan myself, I was so moved by their display I asked for a group selfie.
Though I had not seen Usen for decades, he was still the short lean fierce boy of my childhood with alert eyes and big nose. Now the only big difference in his physique was that he had grown a funny stomach, a kind of hard garri bag that slumped from the chest, like all the fat in his body had settled into a soccer ball therein. Ofonime shared the same height with him, though her complexion was as fair as some of white New Yorkers, or the embassy Muslim.
In my apartment, Igwat, their toddler son, refused to leave Usen’s lap and kept pointing and screaming at the broken floor each time he set him down. He equally eyed me with suspicion, like I came out of the cracks. I was shocked at how Usen promptly dumped him on Ofonime and scudded closer to me to chat; I thought every man in America had learned to carry a child. However, their eight-year old daughter, Ujai, was the most excited to meet me and said her father had told her so much about our childhood. She was all over the place, like this was her second home. She was a tall inquisitive confident willowy girl, so different from her dad. In fact, if the parents did not stop her, she would have unplugged the yellow fillers or th
rown something down the cracks, to satisfy her curiosity. She was as unyielding as Usen and I, when we were her age, when we were poking cricket holes with broomsticks under the full bold moons of Ikot Ituno-Ekanem of yore.
She immediately took to calling me Uncle Ekong, which surprised Ofonime, who said they could not get her to prefix Uncle to Tuesday. Each time I spoke, this American girl listened consumed like I had brought the undiluted truth from the mythic village of her parents’, a place she had never visited before. She wanted to see photos of Ikot Ituno-Ekanem in my phone. I had none.
I was really glad, though, that they had brought me two portions of delicious afang soup and poundo flour, a frozen pack of shelled periwinkles, goat meat mm’ikpa, rings of dried smoked catfish, and ground crayfish and bottled palm wine, which Usen said he bought in Little Senegal. Though I was an alcoholic and had gone cold turkey for ten years, I wanted to open this wine immediately because I was quite curious about its taste. But Usen suggested I refrigerate it for the best outcome. Yet it was the palm oil, “with zero cholesterol,” as Ofonime gloriously proclaimed, and the great spice we, the Annangs, call ujajak that filled my place with Ikot Ituno-Ekanem scents.
When Usen called up Tuesday Ita on speakerphone, he addressed him as “Hughes,” his American name. Both Usen and Tuesday were unbelievably excited I was going to publish our war stories. And I thought Tuesday’s ringing nsasak laugh was exactly as folks described it back home, though he had never visited since 1975. I could not help but gush about how his scholarships had made sure no child was left behind in Ikot Ituno-Ekanem, how his wells had given us clean water, or how his money had helped the widows of Awire Womenfolk to start up small businesses.
“Ekong, I have a very vivid image of your father!” Tuesday cut into my tales. “Before the war, he was one of our primary school teachers and a wonderful choirmaster at Our Lady of Guadalupe.” Usen quickly explained that Tuesday was uncomfortable with being praised and moved the conversation to why I left my teaching job. I told them I had always wanted to be an editor, especially after noticing our schools did not have minority war literature in our syllabi. But when Tuesday volunteered to write the foreword to the anthology because of his experiences in the war as a ten-year-old, Usen and Ofonime exchanged glances and fell into silence. I simply thanked Tuesday, promising to discuss his offer when we eventually met.
After Tuesday praised Father Kiobel for running a wonderful parish, we reminisced about our seasonal festivals, and argued about who among Governors Godswill Akpabio, Babatunde Fashola, and Sam Mbakwe was better at fixing up roads and hospitals in their respective states. Ujai wanted to know who these folks were, and we took time to explain, not because we expected her to get the politics, but because the parents said she was really into anything African and had been asking to visit Ikot Ituno-Ekanem.
But Ofonime became very bitter about my embassy experience, especially about the health of the old Bekwarra man. It got worse when she heard how the embassy had accused the Muslim of prostitution. Ujai sat still for the first time and avoided my eyes.
Obviously, this was the same accusation that had made the embassy deny Ofonime a visa several times. She started detailing how the consular officer had asked how many divorces she had had “before faking this American marriage to Usen,” whether she had ever known any pimps, how many prostitute friends she had. Ofonime sounded very much like the compassionate Muslim lady at the embassy. “I had four damn repeat interviews with this same crazy Asian American consular lady!” she sneered. “Each time, she said I was lying and stormed out and came back as though to wear me down. Are they going to hand me over to the Nigerian police for prostitution? Has someone stolen my identity? Are they going to examine my body? If not for Father Kiobel and sleeping pills, I would’ve lost my mind the days preceding the interviews. Each time she asked me the same questions about divorces and a prostitution past I never had—”
Ujai jumped up and whispered loudly in her ear: “Mommy, you’re seriously embarrassing me with all this sex stuff!” The mother apologized and hugged her.
“Da Ekong, please, you shall be with our family for Thanksgiving, okay?” Usen invited me before they left. “In fact, it will be your official welcome to New York. Tuesday and our friends are invited. We shall serve both turkey and ekpang-nkukwo!”
“Sosongo o!” I thanked them. “I’ve been hearing of American Thanksgiving all my life.”
“Daddy, when is Thanksgiving again?” Ujai asked.
“In just over three months,” he said.
“Okay,” she said, shaking her head.
“No, what’s on your mind, my daughter?” the mother asked.
“Mommy, please, could Uncle Ekong visit us before Thanksgiving?” Ujai said, searching our faces.
The parents said I could visit anytime.
“Yes, my daughter, I will visit you guys soon,” I promised.
WHEN I ESCORTED THEM downstairs that evening, Ujai skipped ahead of us, singing that Uncle Ekong’s house was ancient and ugly and had no elevator, while theirs was modern and had two elevators. She waited for us on each landing. Keith Jim-Stehr exploded out of his apartment and took a position on the landing, recording us with his phone. He was in such a hurry he was barefoot and his shirt buttons were undone. I wanted to tell him to put away his stupid phone, but Ofonime pinched me. Then, twice, we heard Ujai greeting people on their way up the stairs. They did not respond. We and the silent people met on the landing like two opposing waves clapping into Ujai.
My two neighbors!
Jeff, the Asian American, had tears streaming down his face; he was in wine-red trousers and a black sweater. Brad, the white American, was in black corduroy shorts and a tight green long-sleeved T-shirt, which showed all his muscles. He said a belated hello to Ujai. It was tense. Keith cleared his throat, as though to warn them we had backup. We squirmed against the rails for them to pass, and Usen hugged his daughter with one hand and gagged her with the other. Ofonime whispered to me to hush, that this was not Ikot Ituno-Ekanem where everyone greeted everyone anyway. Jeff and Brad also squirmed to get past Keith, who had established himself like a colossus.
I felt like following my Annang folks back to the Bronx.
However, Keith gave Ujai a thumps-up and pocketed his phone and, buttoning his shirt, descended to join us. He apologized that he had to whip out his phone to record things because he had seen our neighbors from his window returning from the city very distraught. “I knew I had to be here in case shit happened,” he said. “As I told you, Ekong, last year someone called the cops on a Black visitor … horrible, horrible situation. That’s what actually put me in touch with Mr. Canepa, the landlord. We talk. He’s a friend. I’m going to let him know what happened here, in case things escalate, okay?”
“Thanks, bro, you understand our situation,” Usen said.
“So thoughtful of you to record,” Ofonime said.
“Thank you, sir!” Ujai said.
“You’re all welcome,” Keith said.
When introductions were completed, Keith repeated his desire to visit Africa. Ujai blurted out he must go to Ikot Ituno-Ekanem. We all laughed while she went on to impress him with features of our two seasons and her favorite village flowers—the simplicity of ixora, the resilience of mother-in-law’s tongue through our six-month dry season, the jasmine scent of the queen of the night—all rain forest facts they said she had been googling. She unlocked her phone and showed him pictures, like she lived there, of our beautiful Our Lady of Guadalupe Church and school, the lip of the valley, the palm trees.
Nostalgia came over me. It was not so much what the phone could show Keith, but what it could not capture. I thought about our Ikot Ituno-Ekanem valley, which was thick with cashew and guava and mango trees, and one of these was always heavy with fruit, their treetops buzzing with birds, bees, and gnats drunk on the sweet smell of fermented fruit. From the top of the valley, the practiced eye could pick out folks moving on the tracks undernea
th the canopied meadows, like ants burrowing their way through the green clayey ground, the dark blue river dyed olive-green by the sun in the rainy season and a yellow-green in the dry.
The picturesque river lay there at the bottom of the valley, gracious to both the native and stranger, guarded by its narrow white sandy beaches. Even when fog covered the entire valley and obliterated its beauty, it was still spectacular. It was as though it had been stuffed with light cotton to shield our ancestors as they bathed in its depths.
But, on a clear day, you could see beyond the valley to the open market, to the mission with the church marked by a white cross atop it and the cement-colored life-sized Stations of the Cross in its fields, to the bridge that now connected the two parts of the village. Behind the church were our Guadalupe primary and secondary schools, my alma maters, wartime barracks. If you looked sideways on our own side of the valley, you caught how far in both directions property development had eaten into the slope and, the further you went from the village, into the thick forests.
KEITH THANKED UJAI for the photos and, winking at me, announced that someone had finally convinced him where to visit in Africa. We all laughed.
As he returned to his apartment, I was touched by how he had rushed out to protect us, how he had made my guests feel welcome. I felt lucky to have another Black person around. But, as Usen knelt to retie Ujai’s shoelaces, I was getting increasingly angry with Brad and Jeff and hated the stairwell like a shithole. Twice now I had met them here, and twice their nastiness had taken me unawares. I made the decision to confront these amateur sadists.
These four months, no one was going to make me feel like I did in the American visa interviews or during the JFK detention. It was no fun to be squeezed by tribalism back home and then by racism out here. Being a minority wherever you went in the world was no joke. I could endure personal humiliation, but not an insult against my guests. A red line had been crossed.