When The Sun Was Mine

Chapter Two

I woke up very early in the morning in order to be able to finish my house chores before going to the farm to cultivate some yams. I needed to sweep the compound and wash the dirty plates before leaving. That morning the weather was cloudy. The sky was heavy. But I had to cultivate the seed yams before the season was over. So I left the house with a hoe, knife and shovel. My sister told me she would not join me on the farm because she wanted to go to the market to buy some food items for lunch and dinner. We hardly ever ate breakfast after the death of our parents because we could not afford three meals per day. She advised me to come back home early enough and I consented.

On my way to the farm, I trekked through a narrow path covered by grass. There were few other people I met on their way to their farms. But the weather became darker so some of them started returning back home to avoid being drenched on the farm. As I trudged on, I heard a brittle voice from the back saying

"Lekara, you should go back home till the weather clears."

It was the voice of old Dubor. She spoke to me in our native Káná language. She had been a good friend to my mother. She used to visit our house often when my mother was alive. The two of them usually worked on each other's farms and sometimes went to market together. But she stopped coming to our house after my mother died.

"I have to get to the farm to make sure my seed yams are still in a good condition, Mama" I replied.

It was usual in Capa to address old women as "mama", whether or not they were related to you.

"But you can still do that tomorrow" she reiterated.

"Yes, mama, but I just have to get there since I've already come this far" I insisted.

The old woman walked away, receding into the darkness of the weather.

I was the only one walking on the narrow path. The place was silent but for the croaking of frogs and the chirping of birds. I didn't want to return home because the season for planting yam was almost over. My sister and I had very few seed yams for planting. Beetles had destroyed the first seed yams we reserved for planting. So we had to wait till we were able to buy new ones. For many days my sister worked on other people's farms in order to raise money for us to buy some new seed yams. I didn't join her to work on people's farms; I went to the Capa Stream to catch fish almost everyday, and I also set traps in the bush for rabbits. I sold the fish and rabbits that I caught and gave the money to my sister to help us purchase the seed yams. That was what delayed us. And now the season for planting was almost over.

No sooner had I got to the farm than it started raining. Water poured down from the sky in torrents. I had only been able to dig about ten holes for planting the yams but I hadn't started planting. It rained too heavily that I had to go back home. The narrow path home was flooded. I plonked into a hole and injured one of my toes.

It was really painful but I managed to walk home. When I arrived, my sister had already set fire in the kitchen. It was a small hut that our father had built when he was alive. She was boiling some potatoes. But she took down the pot and put some water on the fire for me to bathe. She knew I hadn't had my bath yet. I felt really cold so I sat by the fire; the heat from it made me warm.

It took about an hour more before it stopped raining. But the roads were already too flooded so I couldn't return to the farm. In order not to waste the entire day, I decided to go fishing in the Capa Stream. The road to the stream was boring. There was no one on the road and my toe was still hurting. So I reduced my pace. When I got to the stream, I saw that the rain had caused it to overflow. There was no way I could be able to catch any fish in that situation. I immediately turned back and started walking back home in total dejection.

On my way home, different thoughts crept through my mind. I began pondering on the misery of living in Capa. There were no modern facilities, no school, no tarred roads, nothing to show that people were living there except for the old brick house owned by the village chief. I began wondering if it wasn't actually true that God had either forgotten or abandoned Capa. I thought that maybe the seven men who first settled in Capa had offended God and made Him turn His eyes away from us. It was a life of total misery. I remembered once when I was still attending the learning centre where Mr. Lekia taught, a young teenage girl had been surprised at my being able to read and write very well in just one year of attending the centre. She had asked me to tell her the name of my village. When I told her I was from Capa, she sighed and said "can a true human like this still exist in that place?". That question came back to mind. What did she mean when she said that? Was it that the people living in Capa were not true humans? If she could indirectly describe me as the best true human in Capa, even when poverty was evident on me, then it meant everybody else in Capa was below poverty line or not true humans. Would they be described as aliens?

Sadness plastered itself on my face and caused my legs to shake. I managed to wobble home. When I arrived, my sister was not there. She probably had gone out to see a friend or gone to work on someone's farm. I went into my hut and brought out a little wooden stool. I kept it outside and sat on it. Then I raised my head to the sky and saw that the sun had begun spraying scanty rays. It pained me that it hadn't done that in the morning. If only it had done that, I wouldn't be sitting on a stool feeling so dejected. But then I prayed that someday it will shine brightly on Capa and the world will have one moment to see the village. Maybe that day the sun will be mine.