NKEMAKOLAM

                              Photography by Kray

AUTHORS: UZOAMAKA OKAFOR, CHIOMA ABIAKAM (talkingpapers.blogspot.com)

You see, this man Etiosa has been my friend for some years. Eight years to be precise. We met at the clinic my wife delivered of our first child.
"Be a man," he told me when he noticed how troubled I was as I waited for my wife to put to bed.
“What does it mean to be a man? I asked
"I'm not even sure I know. I'm Etiosa." He said introducing himself.

I just nodded as I was in no mood for a conversation.

“Are you waiting for your wife too?  I asked after a while.
"Yes."
“How have you managed to maintain such serenity?"
“Oh, she just had another miscarriage so we came to see the doctor. She's not in the labor room.

I was short of the right words.

"That's very sad. Be a man. I said."
“What does it mean to be a man?" He asked.
"I'm not even sure I know." I reply, and we both laughed.
"I'm Nnabuike," I introduced myself. “I'm sorry about how I reacted earlier."
"Oh, its okay. I can't say I understand how it feels to wait as your wife puts to bed, but I can imagine you must feel really tense."

Immediately, I realized what he meant when he said his wife had another miscarriage.
“Oge Chukwu ka mma. Gods time is the best," I said.
"Eziokwu. True talk."

Through our eight years of friendship, my wife had put to bed four times, Etiosas had miscarried about twice that number. He took each loss calmly. He was a troubled man with a calm look. He would not entertain any talk about re-marrying either. I heard he banned his only sister from ever visiting him again when she kept insisting he took another wife or got a woman pregnant out of wedlock.

So, you see why I was shook when Etiosa told me casually over a cup of palm wine that he planned on taking a second wife. He said it in his usual calm tone. He discussed weighty and light issues in the same tone, that it was sometimes hard to decipher how serious he was, or not, from his tone.

"Did you hear what I said?" he asked after I was yet to make any comment.
“I heard you. When did you make this decision?"
“The day I nearly died when I fell off the palm tree. I fear that when I die, I shall have no child to my name. I may as well be buried outside my fathers compound."
"Have you discussed this with your wife?"
“I haven't. I do not know how to break the news to her. I am deeply concerned about how she'll react."
"I am concerned too, thats why I asked if you have told her."
"I will eventually have to. I do not know the best way to yet."

We keep silent for a while, the only sound we make coming from the sips we take of the palm wine.

I speak: Etiosa my dear friend, I do not wish to cross the boundary in this our friendship. Forgive me if I do by this question, you know matters of this sort are private and delicate.
"Ask on, I'm listening."
"What is the problem exactly? Have you tried to find out? Is it from you or your wife?"
“More than one question you have asked my dear friend."
“May my curiosity not kill me."
“It clearly is not from me as my duty stops in putting the child there. I do not think I can do anything beyond that. I wouldn't say it's from my wife either as she conceives. What the problem is, I have always pondered since the third miscarriage she had seven years ago."
"Perhaps it is spiritual then."
"I have paid my dues as far as God is concerned. Besides I cannot think of anyone or any reason someone would not want me to have a child."
“People do not need reasons these days to be wicked. Think of Ahamefula who was poisoned. He couldnt hurt a fly even if he set out to.”
"Eziokwu. True. What you have said is the truth. Let me hope this is not the case, for it is even worse if we are fighting a battle we do not know."
"That is why there is Chukwu, God. He fights our unknown and unseen battles," I tried to reassure him.
"He has not fought this one well. She is pregnant now," Etiosa said, sipping his palm wine. "But I cannot be so hopeful. I should find a new wife soon enough."

I looked into my half-filled cup of palm wine and wondered what I would do if I was Etiosa, how my wife would react if I told her I wanted a second wife. All I knew was that I could not be Etiosa. There were somethings a man cannot handle and for me, this was one of them.

"Does your wine taste funny to you?" Etiosa asked, taking me away from my thoughts.
"No, it does not. Your palm wine has always been the sweetest till the end. Why else do you think I come to your house this often?"
"Hahahaha. May palm wine not be your downfall."
"It is better we choose how we die, for as they say, 'something must kill a man'. Why do you ask, by the way?"
"Mine now tastes foreign on my tongue."
"Are we not drinking off the same bottle?" I asked as I sipped from his cup. "It tastes just as sweet as mine if not sweeter."
"Hmm. Maybe my grief is now in my tongue." Etiosa said.
"Maybe. But no amount of sorrow can make palm wine taste sour in my mouth."
"Let's pray such sorrow doesn't come to you."

About a year after our conversation, my home felt death's icy touch. I felt a tip Etiosa's grief as my wife lost of our fifth child. Children actually, for it was dead twins she delivered of. I could only imagine that Etiosa must have felt more than 10 times the loss I felt.

"How do you talk to a man about itching shoes, when he doesn't even have feet to wear one?" I asked Etiosa when he came to sympathize with me.
"It's a rude thing to do."
"Exactly."
"Very rude, and insensitive too. But I hope I am not the man you speak of for I've been blessed with my own children too. Triplets, as you know."
"Did I not feel the joy with you as I would, mine?"
"You did, and that is why we should sorrow together over palm wine."
"My dearest friend, everything now tastes sour in my mouth, including palm wine."
"Hmmm. We prayed such a day would never come, but now it has you must brace yourself and be a man- for yourself and your wife. Not all prayers are answered, but what is yours will eventually be. Nke gi agaghi a ko gi. Yours will not elude you."
"What does it mean to be a man?"
"This is the same question we have asked ourselves in our deepest sorrow."