She Seized The Balls

Alobwed�Epie Alobwed�Epie

Description

In She Seized The Balls, Ntube�s exploits can best be described as guided by the hand of providence. In a bid to inherit her father�s compound and live comfortably, she destroys the old sacred village grove and fells totemic trees. An epidemic breaks out, killing mostly the elderly. Ntube is accused of causing it because of the destruction of the sacred places. She is brought before the clan council several times but she tantalizes the council with her flawless defences. In due course, she rebuffs her former husband�s bid for reconciliation; falls in love with an influential personality and begets a child with him. She uses the man to achieve the building of a bridge across the river that had enclaved the clan for centuries. With her elevated status among her people she becomes the first woman to be given the prerogative to pour libation in a patriarchal society.

Sujets

• Fiction

Informations

• Publié par: Langaa RPCIG
• Date de parution: 26 septembre 2011
• Nombre de lectures: 3
• EAN13: 9789956726646
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

She Seized The Balls

She Seized The Balls Alobwed’Epie

She Seized The Balls Alobwed’Epie

Langaa Research & Publishing CIG Mankon, Bamenda

Publisher: LangaaRPCIG Langaa Research & Publishing Common Initiative Group P.O. Box 902 Mankon Bamenda North West Region Cameroon [e-mail] www.langaa-rpcig.net Distributed in and outside N. America by African Books Collective [e-mail] www.africanbookcollective.com

ISBN: 9956-726-38-9 ©Alobwed’Epie 2011

DISCLAIMER All views expressed in this publication are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Langaa RPCIG.

About the Novel She Seized The Ballsis sequel toThe Lady With A Stingwhich is also sequel toThe Lady With A Beard . Though each of the novels issui generis,to fully appreciateShe Seized the Balls, it is advisable to read the first two in the order they are published. InThe Lady with a Beard, Emade the heroine gives a code of conduct to her lone daughter Ntube, with emphasis on marrying the man to whom she is betrothed from birth. In The Lady With The String, Ntube finds the man nonchalant and marries a non-native. Her mother (a widow) curses her and refuses to take the bride-price. Ntube is plagued with misfortunes attributed to the curse. After much societal pressure, Emade reconciles with her daughter, neutralizes the curse and promises to take the bride-price. On the way to pay the bride-price, Ntube’s husband’s convoy destroys the clan’s shrine thus inflicting another and more serious abomination on Ntube. While Emade and Ntube are looking for the expensive ritual items needed to have the clan cleanse her, her husband divorces her. Emade dies of shock. Ntube is devastated but composed. With time, the community provides her with the ritual items and bride-price to reimburse her former husband, and so consummate the divorce. She reimburses her former husband’s bride-price but refuses the cleansing and so worsens her relations with the community InShe Seized The Balls,exploits can best be her described as guided by the hand of providence. In a bid to inherit her father’s compound and live comfortably, she destroys the old sacred village grove and fells totemic trees. An epidemic breaks out, killing mostly the elderly. Ntube is accused of causing it because of the destruction of the sacred places. She is brought before the clan council several times but she tantalizes the council with her flawless defences. In

due course, she rebuffs her former husband’s bid for reconciliation; falls in love with an influential personality and begets a child with him. She uses the man to achieve the building of a bridge across the river that had enclaved the clan for centuries. With her elevated status among her people she becomes the first woman to be given the prerogative to pour libation in a patriarchal society. She Seized The Balls, tells the tale of the iconoclastic actions of the heroine, Mary Ntube, Daughter-of-the-Upstream-Python. Ntube undermines the traditional culture of Bakossi people and breaks through the barriers imposed by tradition on her sex. Yet every attempt to sanction her fails perhaps because of her strong character and dazzling eloquence. She seizes the prerogatives of the spokesman of the clan and debunks patriarchy by becoming the first woman ever to pour libation in a male dominated ceremony. A well conceived and structured novel: interesting reading. Kashim Ibrahim Tala Emeritus Professor of Literature and Ecoculture, University of Buea, Cameroon.

Chapter One tube, daughter-of-the-Upstream-Python got to the fugiti N ve. Itwas at the peak of preparing for Easter and many Mission three days before Good Friday – a period her godmother would not have liked to receive a of her godmother’s outstation relatives had come to seek accommodation with her in the Mission. The throng of women who carried Ntube’s things to the Mission were themselves embarrassed by the number of people they met in Nyango Cecilia’s house and so tried to convince Ntube to return to Atieg or seek refuge somewhere else. Ntube stood transfixed contemplating on what to do. Her godmother understood the agony and showing the public face, welcomed her and asked, “Have the flood gates been opened again?” “Mother, they have. The hatchets of the Mbuogmut clan have been once again flung open upon me and I have no choice but to flee from the place. The only neutral place I could think of fleeing to, is here. Unfortunately, your house is too full with guests from the hinterland. Now, I don’t know where to turn to. I can’t go to Ekenzu – my aunt’s place. Ekenzu is the head-village of the Mbuogmut clan. I can’t even go to Meket, Ngomboku, and Muambong because the chiefs are involved in the matter,” Ntube said. “Daughter-of-the-Upstream-Python, if you won’t mind a few days inconvenience, you are welcome. These guests will return on Easter Sunday after Holy High Mass. I can’t ask you to return to where you are insecure. I can’t understand your problems with the people of Mbuogmut. So, ask the women to park your things at that far corner of the parlour. Make sure you don’t expose what you have in bundles. Take

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out only what is necessary for these few days. Even Christian women cannot be trusted these days,”Nyangosaid Cecilia frankly. Ntube arranged her things as she was instructed and bade the women who had escorted her good bye. After Easter Sunday, her godmother showed her the guestroom – an outcrop of the main house with its door outside and helped her arrange her things in it. “Daughter-of-the-Upstream-Python, welcome. Let me welcome you once again. Easter period is a very demanding period for me. I pray you, if for reason you think I had neglected you by not paying particular attention to you, please forgive me. It is difficult managing relatives from the hinterland,”NyangoCecilia apologized. “Mother, I think it was the best time God designed for me to be here. Because of the number of people in the house, the prayerfulness of the period and the beehive-like movements, I was so distracted that I forgot about my problems. I forgot I was a fugitive. In fact, I am missing those funny women right now,” Ntube said. “Yes, Daughter-of-the-Upstream-Python, God has a plan for everything. Those who believe in him never pine away in sorrow. His merciful hand guides them to safety. Now tell me, what has gotten wrong again? Did the people not carry out the purification rites they promised?”Nyango Cecilia asked. “They tried to, but I saw no need for the rites. So I stopped them from doing it. I did not want to owe them any good turn. I did not want them to make of me, the head of the dragonfly they could rotate at any angle. That did not mean that I spited them. No, I didn’t spite them. I know some of them took it for spite. It wasn’t. I was simply frank

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with them and so I told them that cleansing me at the time they wanted to cleanse me was like diluting abandoned stale wine with new wine in order to make the stale wine tolerable. What do Bakossi people say? They say that if one breaks the shell of the tortoise then he has not only made it naked but also houseless. A naked and houseless tortoise is of course dead. And can a dead tortoise avoid decaying? No, it can’t. All that is dead decays. Only the stupid dead that think ritual cleansing can change their destiny can be considered as avoiding decay. My people have rendered me both houseless and naked. I know I have become a corn – I am neither a scar nor original skin. So, I am unique and being unique, I am sensitive to abuse,” Ntube said. “Daughter-of-the-Upstream-Python, I admire your wisdom. You are the replica of your mother Emade. But, I pray you, don’t be that hard. You should have accepted the cleansing. When you have a jigger in your toe, the best way to treat it is to remove it. You would have removed that jigger from your toe,” “Mother, that won’t have changed my story. What I think has changed my story is my present stand – my defying what has hurt me, and would hurt any other woman in my place. By refusing to be cleansed by the most powerful traditional doctors around, by refusing to be helped in refunding my former husband’s bride price, by telling the sages of the land that they had a hand in my problems and abandoned me in them, I have accepted death; I have demonstrated that when a wound goes beyond the bone, it is no longer called a wound. I have manifested that, when a dispute goes beyond the competence of a village, and the village takes it to the clan and the clan invites other clans to settle it, it is no longer called a dispute but a war. Ours has gone beyond the clan and I have taken my stand because I

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know I am a living corpse. A corpse has nothing to fear. Should I drop dead now because of my stand, I would remain proverbial in the Mbuogmut clan and beyond. Mother, can you imagine the vileness of our people? I am the lone daughter of a once prominent person of our village. I offend my village, so to speak, instead of my village settling the matter on the basis of the facts before it, it invites the other villages of the clan; the villages of the clan in turn invite villages of other clans and so blow up the offence beyond proportion. They put in motion all the traditional agents for destruction in the name of cleansing rites and expect me to hail them?” “Yes, Daughter-of-the-Upstream-Python, what you are saying is correct but don’t forget that the community is always right and that it is wrong for an individual to challenge it. Early morning rain forewarns adventurers. Your mother’s death is your early morning rain. She was a charismatic, brave and dexterous craftswoman. She outclassed men in the art of drumming and the execution of traditional rites. Yet because she stuck out her neck beyond her prerogatives (the prerogatives of a woman) they killed her. So, be careful,” NyangoCecilia advised. “Mother, if one hits a shell with a stone and cracks it and continues to hit it, is she cracking the shell or grinding it? For sure, she is grinding it. So, take note that where I am, I am being ground by the Mbuogmut clan; and do you think it proper for me to surrender myself for unjustified grinding? My mother used to tell me that a person who lights a fire does not determine how high its smoke would rise. She lit her own fire and thought it was me who lit it but when the consequences came she was the victim not me, Ntube. In like manner the Mbuogmut clan has lit its fire and thinks it is me who has lit it. I say no, I am not the one. Our situation is now

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at the crossroads. Oil-stains will be seen on the whiskers of the dog that licked the oil” Ntube said with defiance. “Daughter-of-the-Upstream-Python, nobody likes seeing stones thrown around where she has a jug of oil. I don’t like the clan throwing stones at you. I admire your determination but I would advise you to tone down. That is your room. I would like you to stay here as long as you wish. I am short of saying that you should forget about Atieg. Stay here; nobody can have the guts to attack you here in the Mission.”

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