Lanre Arogundade, a former Assistant Editor/member of Vanguard Editorial Board and the Executive Director of International Press Centre (IPC), pays tribute to Sapele, a town in Delta State, his mother’s home town.
Assorted crayfish first aroused my curiousity about Sapele. Layoonu Arogundade, my mum, would return with baskets full of it after each trading expedition to and from Osi-Ekiti; along with different grades of Sapele water the testing of which was a spectacle. Little quantities would be poured on the ground and sparked into flame. Blue flame meant grade one and attracted the highest price; fairly blue fame was grade two for lower price and yellowish flame was grade three and went for the least price.
Testing the ‘cray-fishes’ on market days as we helped Layoonu prepare them for sale was more spectacular – in the left and right corners of my mouth, the harder I worked or the harder I pretended to work! They all tasted grade one and not even the occasional slaps of Layoonu because ‘se ofe kimi jere lori ede kimo se wahala la gbe a lati Sapele ni’ (do you want to deny me of profit on the crayfish I laboured to bring from Sapele?) could deter me. Layoonu can slap and it was in Sapele I really discovered.
The second curiousity arose out of meeting the Abus in Iwoye-Ijesa whenever I travelled with Layoonu for her maternal grandfather’s family functions. Seemingly all looking alike, especially the children of Chief Joshua Adebayo Abu, the first Baale of the Yoruba in Sapele, I thought the Abus were the largest and most beautiful family in the world.
If crayfish that travelled several miles (the 1970s were not years of kilometers) tasted that good, what would it be like at source? And my Abu cousins, would it only be ocassional contact with them? I yearned for Sapele and pestered Layoonu to take me there. She set a condition. I had to gain promotion to the next class and avoid a second repeat of my first year in secondary school. I passed the challenge and Layoonu promptly issued me the Sapele visa during the long vacation of the 73/74 academic session.
In those days, it was a long and winding journey in a lorry (Bolekaja), but on good roads – all the way from Osi-Ekiti to Ado-Ekiti, to Owo axis, to Sobe, to Agbanikaka and so on. As our lorry stepped on the Agbanikaka bridge, a bell rang loudly to my consternation. Layoonu, on whose laps sat Sade, the youngest in our family, allayed my fears explaining that the device was meant to alert vehicles coming from the opposite direction to wait for ours to pass. The bridge was narrow and lacked space for vehicles moving in opposite directions. A good educator, Layoonu also explained that the bridge used to be much more sophisticated and beautiful before it was bombed during the civil war of 1967 to 1970.
The civil war temporarily halted Layoonu’s trading trips to the city where she was taken by her mother, Wuraola, at about age five. Where she grew up as a Sapele babe fluently speaking Itsekiri language and pidgin English, and some Isoko and Ibo; where along with other fun loving kids and teenagers she would swim across River Ethiope; where she watched Hubert Ogunde perform live on stage,had a crush on him and wanted to elope with him but was stopped by the God of Thomas Akinyemi Arogundade, who years later, would come around to ask her hand in marriage. The bridge across River Ethiope into Sapele had not been built way back then, so it was Layoonu that paddled the canoe that ferried her future husband across. Midway into the journey Layoonu had teasingly asked Thomas what would happen should the boat capsize knowing that he could not swim. Thomas burst into loud prayer in his Ijesa dialect: “loruko Jesu, e maa dojude” (In Jesus name the canoe would not capsize) while Layoonu laughed aloud.
We entered Layoonu’s Sapele late at night and arrived the Abus vast compound at Abu junction to the warm embrace of Chief J. Ade Abu himself. Early morning introductions to my new mummies, some of chief’s wives followed: from Mama Tope to Mama Adisa to Mama Tetsoma, etc. Mama Biodun would visit later from her Ibadan base. I was offered grade one Sapele water in Mama Tetsoma’s place which meant the introductions ended on a slightly dizzying note but not so dizzy for me not to notice the frowning Tetsoma.
A fight with her seemed destined and it occurred within days of the arrival of the village champion. If I had informed my immediate caucus of Biodun, Taye and Adisa that a battle with Tetsoma was looming, they would have advised me to back off. It was a duel worthy of a championship label. I boxed her but she readily traded punches. I opted for head butting and she answered with flying head butts. To overpower her, I switched to wrestling, but as I wrestled her to the ground, she unfolded her game plan. Her dangerous left arm went for my neck and she held me by the jugular. It was a strangulating grip and fearing the worst, the other cousins stepped in to end the battle. I was told I did try for Tetsoma was renowned for fighting and flooring adult males.
The weekday routine was predictable. After morning chores we would head to Chief’s Vono distributorship and retailership store on market road. Our duty was to load the iron beds and mattreses into vehicles whenever there were sales. The blast of the bugle from the plywood factory for which Sapele was once famous would signal it was lunch time and arrangement would be made for someone to buy food. Then, one afternoon, I was offered Akpu, which once I tasted made me to forget that I came to Sapele partly for crayfish. I had eaten lots of pounded yam, cassava and yam flours but for my taste bud, Akpu was of a different class. The following day, I offerred to accompany those buying the food. As we entered the compound, I screamed my head off with a heavily Ekiti accented… Akpuuuuuuuuu. My cousins were shocked and almost all the heads in the compound turned in my direction. I wasn’t bothered as long as Akpu was still available. In my itinerant years later as President of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS), journeys towards the eastern part of the country meant compulsory stop overs at Umunede for Akpu.
Before Layoonu returned, she ensured we visited the other two Abu Uncles – Ayodele Abu (Baba Barracks) and Ibitayo Abu (Baba Pupa). I had also followed to her to the banks of River Ethiope where inside moored boats and canoes, she bargained and purchased cray fish and other goods. There was no room for tasting especially with baby Sade on my laps. But my roving eyes saw one to two year olds being dipped into the river to prepare them for the art of swimming. I later heard tales of how some thieves would dive from the birthed ships into the River with non perishable goods. Sapele ought to have produced Olympic gold winning medalists in a country that believes in encouraging natural talents.
Weekends were the real periods of adventures for our gang although my inability to speak proper pidgin English regularly posed major barriers. We played street football and one weekend we headed to the Sapele stadium to watch a football match involving Sapele’s Ethiope Football club. We had no tickets but were determined. I followed my cousins to the unusual illegal entry points. The stadium wall must have been more than 8-foot high and the difficult task was to climb it. Once atop you were required to jump in and sort yourself out. We adopted the gymnastic style to climb by jumping on one another’s shoulders. I made it to the top and jumped into the stadium, but into the grabbing hands of one of the security guards. He rapidly asked me questions in pidgin language to which my replies were obvious nonsense as the thought of being taken to prison overwhelmed me, more so as my cousins had melted into the crowd. An elderly man’s intervention secured freedom for me and as soon as that happened my cousins suddenly emerged, laughing their heads off. I managed to enjoy the match.
On another weekend, we headed to some far off neighborhoods to illegally harvest a variety of fruits including guava and mangoes. Luck ran against us inside one of the vast compounds when the owner suddenly arrived and got us surrounded. He interrogated us and punished us by producing cutlasses for us to clear the compound of weed. We sweated for hours before we were set free. Unknown to us however , there would be another round of punishment at home for the big man happened to know chief Abu whom he had quietly telephoned to relate what transpired.
As soon as we arrived, a livid Chief summoned us, tried us and sentenced us to rounds of cane for embarrassing him. We took turns to lie down and receive our strokes. Now, one of the things I had learned in primary school was that if you were receiving more than two lashes of cane you should as much as pssible ensure that they land almost on the same spot on your buttocks. The first two strokes would be painful, but according to the theory they would drive away the blood and the rest won’t be that painful. Some of my cousins cried, jumped and turned by the fourth stroke. When it came to my turn, I simply laid still while the strokes landed adjusting to ensure they did on the same spot. By the twelfth stroke, I wasn’t feeling much pain and I obviously cried less. My cousins hailed me: “shuo….you strong o….”
But they had one more trick up their sleeves. Layoonu had arrived to take me back to Ekiti ahead of schools’ resumption and on the eve of our departure my cousins convinced me to join them for farewell football. When it was time to return home, I couldn’t find my sandals. The fear of what to tell Layoonu threw me into panic. Pretending to be helping me to look for the sandals, my cousins walked up and down with gloomy looks. Finally, Taye walked up to me saying they had discovered those who took my sandals but they had to be settled before they would return it. They wanted about six pence. I ran home to tell my Mum I needed to buy something urgently. She wanted to know what it was but I mumbled something incoherent. She gave me the money all the same while concealing her suspicion.
We returned to the playing arena but the guys would not return my shoes. Or so I was told because I didn’t see them. Taye, the supposed go-between eventually collected all I had, disappeared and returned with my sandals. It was late by the time I got back and when my mum asked where I had been, she welcomed my incoherent answer with a slap that momentarily produced stars. It was actually the slap that cleared my head and woke me to the reality that it was my cousins led by Taye who had played a fast one on me. We would joke about it years later but in terms of learning to be street wise and not street foolish, Sapele was a great university.
I write this as a 58th birthday memoir. More importantly, I write it as a tribute to my mum, Layoonu Hannah Arogundade, the Sapele babe who trained me and my siblings with love and discipline. And, I write it as a tribute to my maternal Uncle, the great Chief J. Ade Abu, the late high chief Segbua of Iwoye-Ijesa. I still recall how excited he was to see me several years later in the late 80s during a visit home. ‘That is my son, come and sit by my side. I like you. You fired them. You fired those military bastards’, he had said proudly in apparent reference to my exploits as NANS president, which he had followed closely. This year is the 30th anniversary of his demise and may his great soul continue to rest in peace. So also the soul of my departed cousins – Demola, Adisa and Taye – who helped me to see the fun and fury of Sapele streets.
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