Hiyah,
We had been up half the night with countless tales from
Ama about happenings at the coast with the Whiteman. One of the most fascinating
was how easily he takes to the big waters. It was told us that he on a daily basis, takes his clothes off leaving
just some under pants, jumps into the sea, goes under water for a while and
comes up again, repeating this many times before eventually coming back to
shore visibly unharmed. Most peculiar of all, he would go far into the sea and
return much later looking very pleased with himself. Ama had heard it tell that
the Whiteman finds this daily chore very relaxing though she could not
understand why he never disappeared permanently under the water and why the
undersea people never cared about keeping him with them for good. She just did
not get this one.
‘But, that is where he comes from; he comes from the undersea kingdom!’ I blurted out recalling the numerous stories Otiti and the other palace story tellers had told us about the White people who in the past had come over the seas to visit the King.
‘What do you mean?’ Ama enquired.
‘Well, it is said that the White men used to come to
see the king, bring him presents; buy
things that they needed and when they were leaving after trading with the
chiefs, the king gave them numerous presents and sent some of his soldiers to
escort them back to their ship. The soldiers stayed on the coast and watched
till they had travelled some distance and disappeared into the sea, before
going back to report to the king. ’
‘But these ones do not go back; they just go into
the sea every day and come back up again. ’ Ama uttered exasperatedly.
‘Maybe they go to tell their people about us;’ ‘But I do not understand why they have to do
so every day;’ Edugie looked puzzled, no doubt imagining how difficult this
would have been for her had it been her job.
‘No, I haven’t!’ she responded.
‘So why are they staying here at the coast instead
of coming to see the king?
‘All I keep hearing is that they are quarrelling
with the King.’ Ama volunteered.
‘Why would anyone want to quarrel with the king?’ I
asked.
‘The way they speak through their noses is annoying
because you cannot understand them, maybe they have said something under their nose
and someone has told the King the wrong thing.’ Uwa had not said anything till
now; she looked thoughtful; nodding her head at the same time. ‘Chief, my dad,
told me that the reason we are here is that they the Edo chiefs want to try to
sort things out, maybe this time, the Whiteman will speak slowly so that they
can be understood and maybe not speak so much through their noses.’ Uwa added. This
seemed to make a lot of sense, after all no one of us wanted any disagreements
between the Whiteman and the King particularly as the Whiteman used to bring
presents to the King.
Princess Iyomon.
