No Sweetness Here and Other Stories

by Ama Ata Aidoo

  One day, when I was tiny and I went to spend the holidays with Nanaa I pattered behind her to the farms. I can hear her now. ‘Now, my young scholar, do not follow me: the farm is for seasoned ones like me. Hmm, how can I answer if anything goes wrong?’ . . . And on and on and on. But I went all the same. All I remember is that everything just smelt like it had never done before – or since. Good. Good. Good. It was not just the smell of green leaves. Green leaves and wet earth, fire spilling from a gun and fresh-spilt human blood smell different, to be sure. At Nanaa’s farm, things smelt good. All the vegetables were there. Anyway, we had been hardly an hour there when I began to holler for food. Nanaa muttered something about obviously that day on the farm going to be devoted to eating. And then she dashed behind some bush and came out with this huge yam. I mean it was big. A giant. Of course when you are young, even little things have a way of gaining size in your eyes, but this yam was big. She removed the little kerosene tin pot – they used to sell them for fourpence and sixpence in the market – from its hiding place and poured some water into it. At the sight of the yam my throat had begun doing what throats do. She had said she would cut just a little bit of the tip and cook it for me because she herself was not hungry, and anyway, yam is no good cold. All this sounded fine to me. It just meant that when she came to cook hers, I would have more yam to eat. I already knew that when yam is good it is white or whitish-yellow or something. But when Nanaa cut the piece it was brown. And she said something about that piece being no good. She cut another. It was the same. She cut another piece, it was not different. And she cut another and yet another. They were all the same. Somewhere at the middle, Nanaa looked at the yam and said, ‘Yam, you really are wicked. Why didn’t you leave a piece of yourself good when you were going bad, so I could have cooked you for my little master?’ But I told her to cut on, for I still hoped that all was not lost. So she turned the remaining piece round and cut out the head. It was brown and soft. I threw myself into the sand and dust of the farm and screamed. She cooked me a fresh piece from the barn, but I refused to eat it. It was only later when she boiled some for herself and by which time I was too hungry to refuse anyway, that I ate. And I have never forgotten about that yam. What was it that ate it up so completely? And yet, here I go again, old yam has to rot in order that new yam can grow. Where is the earth? Who is going to do the planting? Certainly not us – too full with drink, eyes clouded in smoke, and heads full of women . . . and our hearts desiring only nonsensical articles from someone else’s factory. . . .

  There was an air of festivity at the Rest House because I had said I was going to eat what Zirigu and his wife ate. The woman came to let me know, with the few words of my language she knew, that I should have given her adequate warning so she could have feasted me properly. I said that was okay because there was another day coming. Zirigu laid the table and when I told him that he should not give me a fork and a knife because I was going to eat with hands and that I only needed a spoon to scoop down the soup, he opened his mouth wide. When I was eating, both of them came to watch me. The food was alright. Of course, it tasted strange like anything else you are not used to. I could detect a not-too-familiar seasoning here, a foreign spice there. But on the whole there was nothing in the strangeness of it that I thought one could not get used to. I have eaten stranger meals. Zirigu let me know of just one anxiety he had. That my bowels would run in the night. Later, he brought the pito. I asked him to sit down and drink with me. He attempted to protest. One doesn’t drink with the master, you know. I assured him it was alright. The wine was good. It has a sweetness in it. As we drank, we talked. I told him more about myself. He seemed to understand and sympathise. When we were through with my bottle, he said that he was going to bring one of his own. He did. Gradually the main part of the talking switched to him.

  .....

  ‘My young Master, forgive me for still addressing you like this. But then, is there anything else I can do? At my age, it is too late for me to start being too familiar with my betters. No, no, don’t say any more. You are a good, young man. I like you. But really, how can I call you this Kobina? Yes, in years you are a baby. You don’t have to tell me that. Can I not see that for myself? I can see that for myself. But now, age alone does not mean much, not much. It is a long time since age lost weight. In the old days, when a person was one day older than you, you had to defer to him or the whole clan would let you know your actual self, an insignificant miserable worm! But when your age does not prevent you from washing the underclothes of a white woman whom you know to be much much younger than yourself, what then is age? Thank God, I stopped doing that a long time ago. As for the black men who became the new masters when the white men went, well, they do not seem to think much of age either. I will tell you something soon. But even in the old times, people said that just to be old in itself was nothing. One could be old wise or old foolish. They used to say that to travel then was the thing. Well, my young master, I, Zirigu, I have travelled some. As I told you, I am an Ex-Serviceman. Went to Burma – or some place like that. Seen the front. But now you tell me you know what it is to be a soldier because you went to the Congo with our boys. Then I shall not tell you about the front. But it was there I learnt about white people. Oh, my young Master, when they are hungry, they can fight for food, and cheat each other like anybody else. . . . Sometimes you put food there for some people who were away. And their friends would eat it. When those people came back and there was nothing, they beat you. Yes, maybe, they would argue with their own brothers, but it was us they beat up. Hah, what man has seen!

  ‘Of course, some of us fought. That’s how people died. Or lost legs and arms. And to this day that I am talking to you, my Master, I don’t know whom we were there fighting and why.

  ‘You know book, my young Master, so to be sure, you’ve read all about the ex-Servicemen and the promises and how nothing was done. A few months after we came back and found ourselves demobilised many of us started going to pieces. I was afraid of not having anything to do for my living. With my friend – he was Setu’s brother – I left the Gold Coast. Where have I not been in West Africa? Togoland? Nigeria? Sa’Lo? But everywhere it was the same, there were always too many ex-Servicemen already without jobs. I tried peddling, bicycle repairing, carpentering. . . . It was the same; emptiness behind and emptiness before. We came back. But one thing I forgot to tell you. Before I went to the war I was selling yam in the big market in Takoradi. It was a good trade. And when I was just about to leave, I gave the little money I had saved to my own brother. My father’s child. My mother’s child. I said to him: “Buda, keep this for me. If they do not kill me and I come back, I will still trade in yam. And maybe we will do it together because it is a good trade.” My Master, I will not talk too long. Buda is my own brother. He came after me one year and a half from the same womb. When I returned home from the wars, he had eaten the money. Married a wife with some of it, and the two of them had eaten the rest of my money. You people over there think that all of us over here are thieves and murderers or something. But listen, when I didn’t take a knife and cut my brother down, I know I can never kill anybody else in cold blood as long as they call me Zirigu. In fact, that was one reason why I left this land with Setu’s brother. And we came back after six years, with nothing. At that time, both of us thought we were already getting too old. We heard there was a place somewhere in the big city where other ex-Servicemen were training to be cooks, steward-boys and garden-boys. I talked it over with Setu’s brother. He said, “Chah! Allah, I will not do it. You know, Zirigu, I have a hot heart in my chest. How can I serve another man? Cook? Steward-boy? Garden-boy? Chah. It all means that some fool who is big only because he is white or because he can read book will make me a dog. I will beat him or kill him and go to prison before I am awake.” He went to prison later because they say he did other things. But I don’t know. I think he was a good man. He said to me: “You, you are a cool one. It would be better for you to do that tha
n wandering. Go and train.” I did. I worked in white men’s homes for about two years. Setu’s brother was not finding things easy. One day he said, “Zirigu, you are a sober man. You must think of marrying. You are already too old.” I said, “Yes. Maybe I will go home next Christmas and marry.” He said, “You know my sister, Setu?” “Yes,” I said. “Her husband died. She has one child, a son. You are not a Believer and my father’s ghost will curse me for what I’m going to ask you to do. But you are a good man and she is a good woman. Marry Setu and look after her for me.” My young Master, I met and married Setu. Her brother was right. She is a good woman. Like most of our women, she always believes in a woman having her own little money, so that she does not have to go to her husband for everything. On the coast, she mostly sold roasted plantains and groundnuts. Here, she makes kaffa.

  ‘And how did I come here, you are asking me, my young Master? I will tell you. The last white master I served on the coast liked me very much. When he was going to go away for good, he told me not go too far away from the bungalow. In fact, that I should stay in the boys’ quarters for the first two months after he was gone. That in the third month, a new master would come from their country. My old master was going to leave a recommendation with me for the new master so that he would employ me I said, “Yes, Master.” But just a few days before he left, he let me know that there was a Government Rest House attached to his office in this area. That the keeper of it was going away for some reason of his own. My master knew it had a better salary. He had recommended me for it. That’s how I came here.

  ‘Yes, my Master, that is more than ten years ago. At first, it was only white people who came here. Then a few black men began coming too. Now, they don’t come any more – I mean the white men. How can I be sorry? Do I sound sorry? Between me and you, I can say that I don’t know whether it has made much difference for me or not. Sometimes I am really glad when I think that our own people have done so well. About two years after the white people left, I stopped wearing the uniform. No one seemed to notice. Now I can feel the type of person a visitor is and then I may or may not even wait at table. But that is all, I am still Zirigu. I thank God that my little sons here seem to be doing well at school. I don’t think I will have money to send them to college. But I will not grieve about that. Setu is a good wife. For the rest, I don’t know. I have lived here for many years. It is the only home the children know. I hope that by the time I am too old to be the keeper here, the children too will be old enough to look after themselves.

  ‘Master, I’m sure it is very late. After all that tuo and now the pito, I’m sure you need a long night’s sleep. I only hope you will not have to get up to look after running bowels.

  ‘Sleep well, my young Master.’

  ‘No, neither of us is going to bed yet. No, not until you have told me the rest of the story you promised.’

  ‘Weyting?’

  ‘You said you were going to tell me something else soon.’

  ‘Hah, I don’t know. But listen, my young Master, this place was not like this when I first came here. There was only one block to this main house with two rooms, A and B. With this front room here where we are sitting now. It was later, the first year or two after we had the freedom that they built C and D, and the other kitchen. It has never been used – I mean the other kitchen. If it had been built in the days of the white people, someone might have brought his own cook here with him some time to use it. But our people do not care about that kind of thing. And there has always been me. When they decided to build the other block, they gave notice that for about six months, people should not come and stay. At the same time, they decided the boys’ quarters looked too bad and that it should be renovated. So Setu and I thought that we would go home for a while, leaving the children to stay here with some sisters of Setu’s. We did not want their schooling to be interrupted. Yes, they said they were going to make the boys’ quarters new. The place has always been sufficient for me. Not only because there is an extra room for the children to sleep in, but there is also that land with it. Every year, I have cultivated the plots and harvested good cassava, millet, okra and even yams. My young Master, much of the time, the four of us live on what we earn from this earth. And then we keep what Setu and I make from other work for more important things. Like buying the children’s books, their uniforms and paying their fees. In the years the children were going to school free, we put by the money from those things for other necessary expenses. Because, my Master, for people like us, money is never, never idle. Sometimes Setu and I wonder how God created the other people who have so much money that they can put some in a bank. And yet, we also know that even we are better off than so many of our friends and relatives. But I should not burden you with the troubles of my whole clan. What I was saying is that this place seemed sufficient for us. But still, when they said they were going to do something about it I hoped they would put in a good lavatory, like the water-closet, and give us good lights. Electric lights. Yes, my Master, the lavatory in the boys’ quarters is the old pail and have you not noticed we use kerosene lamps? So I thought, “Zirigu, now you can really become something. When the white people were here, and they were our masters, it was only understandable that they should have electric lights and water-closets and give us, the boys, latrine pails and kerosene lamps. But now we are independent they are going to make this house new. My own people will give me a closet and an electric light.” I did not tell my thoughts to Setu because I was afraid she would say that I wanted to have the same things as my betters. And this is not good since Allah wants us to be satisfied with our lot. She is a Moslem but I am not a Moslem. You people think all of us from the north are Moslems. It is because you do not know anything about the north. Later, I knew from Setu herself that in spite of Allah’s wishes, she too had hoped for a water-closet and electric lights. But she had been afraid to discuss it with me because she thought I would have laughed at her. I asked the man who first told me about the work whether we could have a water-closet and electric lights. He said he was in charge of buying supplies and finding the people to come and do the work. “Yes,” he said, “that should not be difficult.” He didn’t think it would add much to the cost of the work, especially as they had already counted in the boys’ quarters. But he would have to discuss it with the real big men under whom he was working. He was sure they would consider it a small matter and even scold him for not going ahead with it without asking them before. But still . . . And when we came, what did we find? They had put fresh paint on the walls. They had repaired the steps leading to the rooms and they had made us a little verandah. But there were no electric lights and in the lavatory, no water-closet. I discovered they had taken away the old pail and given me a new one. Ah, my Master, I did not know I wanted these things so much until I knew I was not going to get them. They had taken the old pail and given me a new one. My own people who are big men do not think I should use these good things they use. Something went out of me then which has not returned since. I do not understand why I was so pained and angry, but I was. Setu told me that we deserved it for wanting to be like our betters. Allah had punished us. But I do not agree with her. I do want not to be like them . . . or like you. For over ten years, I had kept this place well. I know I had, otherwise why did they still keep me here? Being a keeper, cook-steward here is not a bad job. It is a good job, the type of small job which some big man would want to take and give to a poor and distant relative. And neither Setu nor I know any big men. So they have let us stay all these years because we kept the place well. I serve them well too. I do what they want. My hair is going grey. Is one or two electric bulbs too much to expect? At least, that would have meant not spending sixpences and shillings on kerosene. I have thought and thought and thought about it. I have never understood why. For a long time, I was drinking. I wanted to go away. I wanted to kill somebody. Any time I went to the office in town to get my pay and give my reports about the place, I felt like spitting into their eyes. Th
ose scholars. But Setu talked to me. She said I was behaving like a child. That it is nothing. We should never forget who we are, that’s all. Now the anger is gone, and I stay here. My young Master, what does “Independence” mean?’

  In the Cutting of a Drink

  I say, my uncles, if you are going to Accra and anyone tells you that the best place for you to drop down is at the Circle, then he has done you good, but . . . Hm . . . I even do not know how to describe it. . . .

  ‘Are all these beings that are passing this way and that way human? Did men buy all these cars with money . . .?’

  But my elders, I do not want to waste your time. I looked round and did not find my bag. I just fixed my eyes on the ground and walked on. . . . Do not ask me why. Each time I tried to raise my eyes, I was dizzy from the number of cars which were passing. And I could not stand still. If I did, I felt as if the whole world was made up of cars in motion. There is something somewhere, my uncles. Not desiring to deafen you with too long a story . . .

  I stopped walking just before I stepped into the Circle itself. I stood there for a long time. Then a lorry came along and I beckoned to the driver to stop. Not that it really stopped.