MUSINGS; HOW DO EWES LOOK LIKE?

HOW DO EWES LOOK LIKE?

My name is Mamavi  Perfect Selenu Goh.

Born to an ewe man who comes from somewhere in the Volta Region.

My name is Mamavi Goh

And I am an Ewe!

Even though I can't speak my native language fluently, I am a proud one!

A proud one because my language is said to be a heavenly language.

The only language spoken in heaven.

Oh Yes!

If you think I am telling lies, find out for yourself when you get to heaven.

.... But wait! Is there a particular look an Ewe man or woman must have??

I mean, must one look a certain way to be associated with the tribe?

Until I mention my name, people usually do not believe when I say I  am ewe.

Here is one of such examples.

Three weeks ago, I made a new friend who told me I didn't look like an ewe because ewe girls are fair.

And who said ewe girls are/must necessarily be fair before they will be considered as one?

Are there not fair girls in other tribes??

Let's leave that!

I have to repeat times without number to the new people I meet every day that I am ewe.

You know why??

They say I don't speak like one.

They say I speak without the ewe accent.

Wait a minute!

Do all ewes speak with an ewe accent? 

I doubt!

Do ewes have a particular facial look??

I doubt!

Until I mention my name to someone I meet, they either say I look like a Liberian or an Ashanti!

Why??

Because  I don't look like an ewe.

....but how do ewes look??

Just how do they look???

MY STEP MOTHER, MY LOVE!

MY STEP MOTHER, MY LOVE.

 

I had always believed the stories I had heard about the wicked attitude of step mothers until my dad married another woman three years after my mother's death.

Ours was a happy family until my mother had an accident and subsequently became ill. Due to my mum's predicament, my dad was unhappy most of the time. My elder sister could also hardly concentrate at work and I was usually unhappy at home.

Two weeks after my mother was discharged from the hospital, having been hospitalized for three months, she finally bid farewell to Mother Earth one afternoon when I was preparing her favorite dish: yam and kontomire stew.

Life was tough right from my mother's death through to her burial:
the house was quiet most of the time; my elder sister and I hardly talked to each other and our Papa hardly ate or said anything to us .

This rather strange behavior went on for two years until the third year when my elder sister suggested to me that Papa should get a new wife. I received the news with mixed feelings, and this wasn't because I wasn't concerned about Papa's happiness, but I was particularly concerned about the kind of detestable things I had heard my friend Aku say about her wicked step mother.

Personally, I had come to the conclusion that all step mothers were wicked. Prioritizing Papa's happiness, however, I agreed with my elder sister, Nana, that Papa should take a new wife .

On the afternoon after we had gone to church to celebrate mum's third anniversary, Nana and I went to Papa's room to suggest what we had discussed earlier. It was difficult for Papa, as he saw no need in taking a new wife. But Nana convinced him and reminded him that we were girls and so were not going to stay by his side forever, even the more when I had two more weeks to enter the secondary school.

After the discussion with Papa, he agreed to marry a new wife as soon as he found one. Soon, I had to go to school. Though I was sad I was leaving Papa and Nana behind, I was happy that I was leaving home for a new town and an entirely new environment, where I was going to meet and interact with people from diverse backgrounds.

In my third week in school, Nana and Papa visited me and in addition to the things they brought to me, Papa informed me about the new woman he had found and the preparation he was making towards their marriage ceremony.

By the fourteenth week of my first year in high school, I was homesick and was anxiously waiting to go home to meet Papa's new wife. It was like God heard and answered my prayer, as went on vacation in the sixteenth week. On the day of vacation, I quickly bid my friends goodbye and headed for the bus terminal to pick a bus back home.

On reaching home, I met a woman at the gate whom I assumed was Papa's new wife. As we stood there exchanging pleasantries, Papa came out of the room to welcome me. And before I even sat down, he introduced the woman to me as his new wife, Aunt Rebecca. She hugged me and welcomed me back home.

Nana, my elder sister, had moved out of Papa's house. My mother told us before she died that we should not be staying with our parents by the age of 24, as it was needful for us to live alone when we were approaching the time of marriage. Nana was 25 years old and so this was what informed her decision to move out.

Three days into my vacation at home, I was getting to know more about my step mother. She was rather the reserved type and did not talk much. She always made sure I got everything I needed. And I was wondering if the niceties of her behavior were genuine or she was merely trying to please me at these initial stages of our getting to know each other. 

                                                                I was anxiously waiting for the day she was going to start maltreating me because I had heard so many bad stories about stepmothers maltreating their step daughters and I thought she was not going to be an exception.

But days passed. Then weeks passed. Yet Aunt Rebecca continued to show me love and care each passing day, just as my late mother used to.

Soon, my holiday period came to an end and I had to go back to school. Aunt Rebecca bought all the items I needed for school, took me to school, and gave me some money in addition to what Papa had given me.

When my friends and I met in school and I told them about the love and care my step mother showed me during the vacation period, Pamela my best friend told me to wait until she gave my Papa a child of her own, as that was when the maltreatment was likely to start.

School was fun that term with lots of educative and entertaining activities, aside academic work until school went on vacation again.

This time when I got home, I was greeted with a surprise: my step mother had given birth to a baby. I was mad at Papa for not telling me that Aunt Rebeca was pregnant and that she had even given birth. Papa explained to me that she gave birth earlier in the day before I arrived home.

Before I completed my three year study in high school, my step mother had given Papa two children. I had two siblings: a boy and a girl. Aunt Rebecca did not maltreat me. She continued to show me love and care. Anytime I asked papa for something and he declined, Aunt Rebecca automatically became my next option - and she usually indulged me.

Similarly, I loved my siblings dearly. They called me big sister.

Few months after my final high school exams, my results were released and I passed with distinction. My step mother convinced Papa to make me join her sister in the United Kingdom for further studies.

Naturally, I was super excited when one day my step mother called me and informed me I was going to join my step aunt in the UK to further my studies.

Few weeks later, I arrived in the UK to start a new life. I felt sad leaving behind my elder sister Nana (who got married to a pastor), my Papa and Aunt Rebecca as well as my two siblings. I promised Aunt Rebecca I was going to make her proud. So I was bent on working hard towards my dream of becoming a lawyer.

Living in the UK was a worthwhile experience for me. Though there were times I could go out to have fun with my friends, I always chose instead to study and I did study seriously. Papa called me almost every month to check on me, but Aunt Rebecca and I were on the phone almost every weekend .

Two years into my stay in the UK, I decided to go back home to visit Papa and Aunt Rebecca when school was on vacation. One afternoon when I closed from school, Aunt Bea, my step mother's sister whom I was staying with, called me and asked me to come home immediately I closed from school. She didn't sound cheerful on the phone. So I quickly rushed home, leaving my friends behind.

On reaching home, I was given a rather devastating news: I had lost my step mother. There and then, my world, in my mind, seemed to have come to an end. Aunt Rebecca, I was told died, when she was being delivered of her third child for Papa. She died, leaving the new born baby behind.

Compared to when my biological mum passed on, this time I wasn't so concerned about Papa. I was more interested in my two little siblings and was even more concerned about the newly born baby.

As well, I was sad that aunt Rebecca could not live to enjoy the fruits of her labor. Just when I had a couple of years to complete school to start work and earn an income, so I can fulfill my promise to her, death had cruelly snatched her away from us. I had promised Aunt Rebecca that I was going to buy her a car. Now, who was going to ride the car when I eventually earned enough money to buy it?

I had lost an asset at the time I least expected it. I had lost a woman who proved to me that not all step mothers were wicked. A woman who showed me so much love and care like my late mother did when she was alive. I had lost another mother again!

How wicked was death to have visited my home for the second time! How wicked was death to have taken my step mother away just when I was about to go back home to visit her!

She was gone and was not going to come back again!

I had lost my step mother!

I had lost my love!

  

MARRIAGE NSEMPIISMS; AN OPEN LETTER TO EFO

 AN OPEN LETTER TO MY DAD, EFO.

Dear Efo,

It has become very necessary that I write this note to you. This is due to a comment I heard your friend, Amegah Agbodeka, make when he visited you last Tuesday. I know you taught me well enough to not eavesdrop on conversations and I swear on the testicle of my pet goat, Zorro, that I did not. The matter I am about to address happened to pass through my ears when I was bringing you the roasted plantain and groundnut on that day - but I am glad it did. I am also very convinced to speak to the matter because when your friend said the things he said, you did not verbally agree or disagree with him. I fear that your silence meant you consented to what he said.

If I heard your friend right, Efo, he said that he would not allow his daughter to marry Barimah Adakabreh Frimpong-Manso, the goldsmith's son. He added that it will only be over his dead body that their union will take place. He then concluded that he would rather his daughter married Mr Zomerlo's son, Koku ItisbytheGrace Agbemabiese, or any other man from the Ewe tribe. His reason was as trifle as a dry tree branch; he did not want his daughter to be corrupted by another tribe.

Efo, I am writing this to you (I hope Daavi reads it too) to state emphatically to you that I will not marry a man from my tribe or any man of an Ewe descent. I am making you aware before you birth the idea of making me marry one. This is not to say I am not proud of my heritage. Neither am I saying that there are no good Ewe suitors out there (how can I even say things like that?). Efo, your daughter is a proud Ewe lady. You taught me how to be one and if after this life I am given the opportunity to come back to the Earth, I will beg God to make me come back as an Ewe.

Efo, did I tell you that my friends in class are envious of Ewes? A big part of the reason is our fine Ewe lecturer. He is not only handsome and intelligent but he uses every opportunity to tell the class about our tribe and clear some of the misconceptions people have about us. On one occasion, he told the class that the our language is so 'heavy' it is the only language spoken in heaven. Since that day, some students have been worrying me to teach them the heavenly language. Even my ethnocentric friend, Naa Atswe, recently told me she wished she was Ewe.

I am well aware, Efo, that you have had problems with men from other tribes because they married my aunties and did not treat them well. I am sure it is the hatred in your heart that Amegah Agbodeka wanted to capitalize on; the reason he came to you and no one else. He knew you would speak to him from that bias and encourage his already established incorrigible thought. But Efo, do you know that, just like you, there are people of other tribes who hate our tribesmen because their natives were not treated well when they married Ewes? I am sure you also know that the success of marriages, an example being you and Daavi's, has nothing to do with the tribe one marries from. It takes completely different set of factors that are not the subject of this note so I will not touch on them.

I also know that language and other cultural differences could pose some challenges in inter tribal marriages. This is especially so with regards to which way the children should be brought up. However, I believe when handled with maturity, it will be an issue to not bother oneself about.

Efo, I will not marry an Ewe because I believe in inter tribal marriages. I want my daughter, assuming I marry a Fante man, to have an Ewe-Fante identity, like; Elikem Kwayisibea Mensah. Ah Efo, isn't that lovely! Or, I marry an Ashanti and we name our child; Nana Kossi Azameti Atuobi-Yiadom.

I want my children to be exposed to cultures other than mine. I want to teach them how to tolerate people from different cultures, teach them not to be stereotypical of others and instill in them how to live at peace with all men. Indeed, marrying a non-Ewe will not automatically teach them all these but it will be a starting point. The rest, they would learn from school hopefully.

Now Efo, do not be too worried about all that I have said. My position on this matter is not too entrenched. If I ever fall in love with an Ewe man, the narrative will be a different one. If not, don't expect that I will bring one home.

Your lovely Ewe daughter,
Mamavi.