Apart from the motor drivers and touts, some students in my school visited Baba Saku Ala’ye. Those were the big boys, the senior students who were never afraid of teachers in the school.
Baba Saku Ala’ye told us that marijuana was a good muscle pain reliever; it could also cure anxiety and sleeplessness; it was a strong manhood booster, and most of all it was the greatest medicine for courage.
Then one day, Baba Saku Ala’ye traveled to Ikorodu, a nearby town about a 30-minute drive from Imota. It was a Saturday and his son was not in; neither was anybody else, except me. Baba Saku Ala’ye left his wares with me, each finger long, wrapped in white papers. I could not now remember the cost of a stick. However, five or six customers showed up that day. As they puffed and exhaled the weed, one of them, a fellow with downcast eyes, gnashed his teeth in excitement, and pulsed his cheeks in and out like a blacksmith bellows. The smell of herbal fragrance filled the air. It was soporific.
I wondered what sort of life that was. My mind went to my parent’s advice about staying away from bad friends. I even thought about the fact that if Mr. Kuti had paid the rent, Alhaji Adegun would not have sent us out of his apartment, and I would not have found myself in this predicament. I was about to become a lost soul.
Alhaji Adegun came to the rescue. He knew what was sold at Baba Saku Ala’ye’s compound. Alhaji offered us one room in his family compound at Itun-Onabu. He stayed in the main compound with his wife and children, while we lived in a room in the boys’ quarters. The house, near the residence and not the palace of Oba Ranadu of Imota, was adjacent to the post office operated by one Mrs. Onikoyi.
Six of us moved into the 10-by-10-foot room. Meanwhile, two other students were already living there—eight of us in all.
Some students from my school lived in the next compound. Four of them shared a room. The front of the compound had a beer parlor operated by the Olufowobi’s family from Epe in Lagos State. Baba Ramo, probably in his late forties or early fifties, also lived in one of the rooms.
Baba Ramo was irascible and rascally. He had a gap tooth pillared by big incisors. He also had a cocky grin, which often turned into a grimace. His laughter was ribald. He liked us because we were scholars, and he wished he was as educated as we were. He also loved his only child then–a lovely girl named Ramota or Ramo. But he quarreled with his wife often. She was hot-tempered, short and stern looking.
Whenever we gathered in one of my friend’s room, Baba Ramo often joined us to hear the gist from the Lagos boys, as he was fond of calling us. Along the way, he told us tales about his escapades as a young boy, hunting in the dense forest with his father. He loved to amuse us with stories of mysterious animals such as the giant antelope with six legs. Some of his tales sounded like fables to us, but we never questioned him about them. We loved his stories. They were enigmas that always ended with “finis,” a folksy way of saying finish.
He also told us about herbs and juju. And those were the scary tales. The more we listened, the more they fascinated us.
One day, and I could not now remember how the discussion started, Baba Ramo told us about the Kiriji, Ijaiye and other Yoruba wars. Then he told us that many great Yoruba warriors had, among other fetish devices, a bullet-proof device (Ayeta) to deflect ammunition. According to him, a typical Ayeta, about the size of a kolanut, is sewn into a hat, cap or the edge of a cloth. Any bullet aimed at the wearer of this charm is deflected away.
When he said this, he looked at us and probably thought that we didn’t take him seriously.
“Ehn, Eeeehn; books should not make you forget where you are coming from,” Baba Ramo said blandly as he made for the door. He turned back and said, “I’m coming back.”
And we waited. About five minutes later, Baba Ramo emerged. His eyes were red like fireballs, and he shook and puffed as if he was possessed. He wore a red vest dotted with white cowry shells. A small brown gourd, held by a rope, dangled from his neck. He held a Dane gun.
I was cold to the bone.
“Ooookaay, who would like to test me with the gun?” Baba Ramo asked through a dazzling smile. “Whether the bullet proof vest would work or not, who would like to volunteer and take the gun from me and shoot me?”
Nobody answered.
“Anyone who doubts the Yoruba powers should come and shoot me,” Baba Ramo asked again.
When we didn’t say anything, he filled the silence for us.
“Finis,” Baba Ramo said, and he added his ribald laughter.
He left. As we began to discuss this matter, Baba Ramo returned. This time, his body was bare from the waist up as he exposed his rounded and well-shaped arms. He had an amulet on his left arm and a cutlass on his right hand.
Again, silence filled the room.
“Can you see this charm?” Baba Ramo asked, pointing to the amulet on his arm. “This is to prevent machete cuts. As I put this on, nobody can cut me with a machete and make me bleed.”
I swallowed hard and watched my colleagues as their eyes opened widely.
Baba Ramo beckoned to Brother Jide, the eldest among us, to take the machete and strike him anywhere on his body. Brother Jide nodded his head in rejection. Baba Ramo called for any other volunteer. Nobody moved. As we took in more of what was unfolding, Baba Ramo hit himself harder and harder with the machete on the thighs, legs, chest and arms. After about twenty of such heavy hits, he stopped. He panted and then roared with an elated laughter. I was scared.
The old man then told us that as long as the amulet remained on him, there would be no cut. But if he took off the amulet, something would happen. And I was afraid of what might happen. Suddenly, Baba Ramo unhooked the brown, circular amulet. And there, everywhere he had hit himself, emerged huge contours, reddish and thick like millipedes.
“Ehn, Ehn finis,” Baba Ramo said with a loud giggle.
From that day, Baba Ramo became a mystery—a demon who could drink hot pap with the devil. But he remained our charming old friend.
One day, he told us another story. Baba Ramo said there was a place in Ogun State, called Imosan, close to Ijebu Ode—a city located in south-western Nigeria. Ijebu Ode is about 110 kilometers from Lagos. In Imosan, there was a sacred forest where people visit on pilgrimage for the Agemo festival. Agemo was a masquerader. People also went during the convention to get power and test the efficacy of dangerous charms. At the convocation, people cursed one another as a sort of greeting.
Although I didn’t know where Imosan was then, I had watched the Agemo festival held at Imota. The masquerader often came out as part of the ritual to celebrate the death of an illustrious citizen (known as indigenes). The ceremony was held at the motor park, and indigenes of Imota within and outside the town came home to celebrate the occasion. One of the spectacles I found most intriguing was the cane whipping. (People actually took turns whipping themselves with canes.) There was also the rich, rhythmical heavy drum beaten by bare-chested men, and the sonorous tone of the gong created by a maestro. When the Agemo, a mat-like masquerader appeared, the arena turned into a frenzy of prayers and rapturous dance.
Baba Ramo explained that when he was a teenager, he went to Imosan with his father. Upon their arrival at the convocation, Baba Ramo said he observed that people would curse themselves thus: So, you made it again this year, may you not come next year.
Baba Ramo said he was scared but confident that his father would shield him from those flying curses. On the second day of the convention, Baba Ramo said he wanted to empty his bowels. So, he told his father.
“Abomination,” his father shouted. “Ye, ye, ye child, you want to kill yourself? What a sacrilege!”
Baba Ramo said he wondered whether he had said something wrong while his tummy continued to rumble. At that instance, he was about to empty his bowels in his shorts. His father told him there was no public toilet in the area, and if anyone excreted in the bush, the feces could be used by evil people. The elderly man then brought a gourd from his khaki pouch. He opened it and p
oured some black powder into Baba Ramo’s left palm. He told Baba Ramo to swallow it. The little boy swallowed the powder. Instantly, Baba Ramo was relieved. He felt no need to clear his bowels again. A few days later, the convention ended and everybody left. And that was when Baba Ramo’s problem started.
“For three days after we got home, I couldn’t go to the toilet,” Baba Ramo told us as we listened to him with pity. “I continued to eat a lot of food, but my stomach became bigger, rounder and thicker, like a rock. When it became painful, I told my father.”
“What did your father say?” Rotimi asked mischievously. Rotimi was a fair complexioned boy, with brown specks on his face and body. He was a year my senior at school.
“Wait now. I’m coming to that,” Baba Ramo said, shifting left and right on his seat as if something had bitten him underneath his trousers. A half-moon shaped grin appeared on his mouth.
“My father shouted in surprise. He said I wanted to kill myself. Why didn’t I tell him I could no longer discharge,” Baba Ramo said.
“So my father brought another small gourd and poured some black powder, different from the one I took at Imosan,” Baba Ramo continued. “I swallowed it. Thereafter, he poured palm oil into my hand, and told me to lick it. I did.”
We were quiet as we waited eagerly for Baba Ramo to continue the tale. Instead of continuing the tale, he giggled uncontrollably. We were infected. Baba Ramo looked unto the ceiling, patted his rotund belly and exhaled loudly.
“Immediately after I took the concoction, my belly started to sing,” Baba Ramo said. “I ran out of the room toward the bush toilet at the back of the house. Before I could even lower my knickers, the thing exploded from my anus,” Baba Ramo said with a childlike guffaw.
We joined with raucous laughter.
“Finis,” Baba Ramo said triumphantly, “Finis.”
You Should Have Brought Chloroquine
When it’s not yet time for a sick man to die,
Death will get him a good herbalist. – Yoruba proverb
The first time I was ever admitted to a hospital was in 1993, and what landed me on the sick bed was heartbreak. I was a young bachelor with a good job and a bright future. My family and other friends expected me to marry soon. At 29 years, I thought there was still enough time left to settle down. But when the only girlfriend I had said it was over because I was an “Egba man,” I was deeply troubled. I was crushed not because she left me, but because the excuse was cruel. I am from Abeokuta, the Egba community in Ogun State, and her uncle, who had lived among the Egbas, said Egba men weren’t any good. According to him, we were treacherous. It was also unfair because, although I’m an indigene of Abeokuta, I was born in Lagos and attended school in Lagos.
So, this made me ponder and ponder. No matter how many times I tried to push this out of my mind, the thought kept rushing back like a powerful tide. It ebbed then returned with a mighty surge. I couldn’t eat well for several days. I walked around in a daze, in a world devoid of meaning. I was in extreme anguish and my heart throbbed more and more than I could endure.
Five days later, I went to the hospital. I was feverish when the nurse first checked my temperature. Thereafter, I was checked into a ward where I spent three days. After a series of tests, I was diagnosed with Hepatitis B—an infectious illness caused by the Hepatitis B virus, which infects the liver and causes inflammation. The acute illness causes liver inflammation, vomiting, and jaundice. Chronic Hepatitis B may eventually cause liver cirrhosis and liver cancer—a fatal disease with very poor response to current chemotherapy.
Well, I couldn’t argue with the diagnosis, but I knew I didn’t have that disease. I was sure of what was wrong with me. It was a broken heart.
Anyway, I was discharged from the hospital after treatment. However, medicine wasn’t the source of my quick recovery. It was my father’s words of wisdom.
“When you want to learn how to ride a horse and it throws you down, you should never give up. Mount it again until you can ride it well,” he said.
For sixteen years thereafter, I was never ill until a day in May 2009.
I was on a trip to the United States to visit my wife and children. On May 9, the journey from the Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos, Nigeria, to Frankfurt in Germany was hitch free. I even had a seat upgrade from the economy class to the business class on the Lufthansa airline because I had accumulated many frequent-flier miles. After about a six-hour journey, the plane arrived in Germany, and I boarded a connecting flight to the United States. Shortly after the trip began, I started to feel uncomfortable. I shivered, my body ached, I lost appetite, and my heart thumped heavily. Not long after, I became dizzy. When I could no longer bear it, I beckoned to a hostess and told her I was dying.
By chance, the man next to me in the three-seater in the economy class, was a medical doctor. I later discovered that he and his wife, who was also seated in our row, were on their way to New York.
I was taken to an empty seat in the business class. After examining me with the stethoscope and checking my pulse with his hand, the doctor asked if I had a history of low blood pressure. I said no.
“You have low blood pressure, you have a circulation problem, but I don’t know why,” the doctor said.
I wondered myself. So, he asked the hostess to give me a bottle of water and some fruit salad. I tried to take them in but without an appetite it was difficult to chew and swallow. My tongue was bitter. During this episode, other passengers looked at me ominously and with piercing gazes as if I had a communicable disease. I looked at myself and thought, “You are all wrong. This is not swine fever disease.”
For the rest of the journey, I was in excruciating pain. At one point, I could not feel blood flowing in my legs. I was taken to the kitchen area where I laid my legs on a stool. After about thirty minutes, I was relieved when blood started to flow to the legs. But, other areas of my body were still on fire. This lasted for about four hours. And it felt like forever.
When we entered the U.S. airspace, I forced myself to eat some fruit cocktail. The doctor and the hostess said that, if my condition didn’t improve, they would call the ground for an emergency when we arrived at JFK airport in New York. In addition, the authorities would make plans to quarantine passengers in the plane for about 12 hours or so to ensure that I had not spread a disease. But I knew it was not swine fever because the disease had not been reported in Nigeria, and I had not visited any infected countries.
Miraculously, I was beginning to feel better – until the plane landed. I was wheeled from the aircraft to the immigration area and then to the reception. My wife was in the car with the children at the airport. We embraced, and I excused myself to quickly use the toilet. When I returned, I noticed a gloomy expression on my wife’s face.
“What happened on the plane? What caused your sickness? One of the passengers came to me while you were not here and said that I should take good care of you because you were very sick onboard,” Omolade asked in a barrage of questions.
I shook my head and wondered why bad news traveled so rapidly. I told her the whole story when we got home. That was on a Sunday. But I didn’t know the cause of the sickness, except the low blood pressure the doctor said he noticed. I took two tablets of paracetamol, a pain reliever. I also drank some lemon juice with Lipton tea. Over the years, this concoction and chloroquine, an antimalarial drug, had been my antidote for fever.
The following Monday, when I called the hospital to book an appointment, the receptionist told me that the next open availability with the doctor was three weeks away. I explained that I was very ill and she agreed to let me come around and fill some papers on Tuesday morning.
I got to the hospital before 8 a.m., although my appointment was for 9 a.m. However by the time I could finish the paper work, other patients who had appointments with the doctor had filled the clinic. I asked the receptionist when she thought it would be my turn.
“Lunchtime,” she replied offhandedl
y.
Lunchtime? That seemed like eternity to me. I drove back home in pain. I wanted to sleep, but the shivers and palpitations would not allow me. I became so dizzy that I nearly fainted. I was the only one at home because my wife had gone to the office, and the children were in school. I called my wife and told her I wanted to call for emergency service. Then I grabbed the phone and dialed 911.
The Tale of the Cow Tail & Other Stories from the African Diaspora Page 2