Abalo’s Special Day

     Abalo sprang from his sleeping mat of dried fleshy stalks woven together like a rug long before cocks started to crow in his West African village of Anfoin and hopped into the misty courtyard. His uncle was coming from America that morning. He swept the hard red earth carefully with the coconut stalk broom. Then he gathered the rubbish into a basket.

     “Where’re you going at this hour?” a woman drawing water from the deep well at the village square asked.

     “The rubbish heap.”

     “So early?”

     Abalo hurried on. His father had asked him to keep his mouth shut about his uncle’s coming.

       On the outskirts of the village Abalo trotted through corn plants on both sides of the footpath and tipped the rubbish where wild grasses grew. Beyond, shrubs stretched into the aged palm trees. The smell of humus diminished as Abalo skittered  back to the village. The rising sun was a huge red ball. The day will be oven-hot, Abalo thought.

     Abalo caught a whiff of the fermented scent of akume—a corn dough meal—sizzling over the wood fire. He wished he wanted it with the glutinous okra soup. But he didn’t. He was too excited to eat. Uncle Koku had gone to America after winning the Diversity Visa Lottery. He was coming back with a special gift for him. What was it? Abalo wondered. Blue jeans and T-shirts? He crouched on a neem tree trunk and stared at his mom. She understood.

     “Okay,” she said. “Take money from under my mattress and go buy tapioca and doughnuts.”

        At this time chickens, goats and pigs released from their enclosures ran around, clucking

and bleating and grunting.

     Abalo soon returned, munched the doughnuts and sipped the tapioca porridge, smacking his lips. This was really a special day. If he didn’t have akume for breakfast, his mother bought him corn porridge and bread. This was when she sold enough smoked herrings. Tapioca with milk and doughnuts was a treat.   

     Abalo was drawing water from the well when the long cylindrical drums at the Regent’s palace throbbed to summon the elders. He watched with anxiety as his father set out for the meeting. Abalo hoped he would be back before Uncle Koku came.

      Abalo took his bath with coir—fiber from the outer husk of the coconut—and soda soap in the open bathroom separated from the thatch-roofed mud huts. Then he smeared shea butter carefully over his body and threw a printed cloth over his shoulders.

  His father soon returned. At this time Abalo hawked fish. But today, he stayed home. It really must be a special day. It was not long before his uncle arrived in a taxi, lugging a suitcase.

     Abalo’s parents hugged Uncle Koku, grinning like a quarter moon. After Abalo had brought his uncle water to drink, his father gave him a look.

     Abalo understood and was slinking out of the room when his uncle said, “Let him stay.”

     “No,” his father said. “A child shouldn’t listen in to grown-ups.”

     “That’s not a problem in America.”

     “We’re in Togo. He may do it over there”

     Abalo heard the conversation. Was he to go to America? he wondered. No, impossible. A village boy like him will be lucky to go to Lome, the capital city. But America! No, his father was only joking. Yet Abalo’s curiosity was pricked but he was afraid to eavesdrop.

     Abalo and his friends stopped chuckling and tackling each other over the punctured plastic ball when his parents led his uncle out. Uncle Koku winked at Abalo, slid into the taxi and waved profusely to everybody. The way his uncle grinned at him as the taxi pulled away in a puff of red dust, Abalo suspected he had brought him a special gift.

     “Papa, can I see the present?”

   “Which present?” his father said and Abalo’s lean shoulders fell.

     “I thought…”

     His father grinned. “Supposing you’ve more than a present?” 

     Abalo wondered what could be “more than a present”. Has his uncle paid for his sixth grade education since his father’s farming activities hardly supported him? Yeah, that must be it. No longer will he be expelled for school fees.

     “Your mother will help you pack. You’re accompanying your uncle to Lome.”

     So, this was it. Lome! A grin broke over Abalo’s oblong face.

     “You’re even going beyond Lome,” his mother said.

     “Where then?” Abalo asked.

     His mother looked at his father who nodded with a grin. “America,” his mother said.

     Abalo almost froze with joy. He couldn’t believe his ears as his mother told him that Uncle Koku’s son was finding it difficult making friends in America because he couldn’t speak English. He wanted Abalo to live with them so that his child could have a companion.

     America! His father was right. This was more than any gift Uncle Koku could have given him. Abalo stood there dreaming in broad daylight. In his mind’s eye the drab life of the village melted into an American dream full of special days.