A DREAM COME TRUE ( Student's inspiration to success in education, Chapter 6)
It's another week of the inspirational story that can lead to student's success in education.
The counsel of Mr Effiom the previous night fell on the deaf ears of Chief Atanguma. However, it rekindled the zeal of his wife, Akon and deepened her passion for education. It brightened the vision of Asuama and his two other brothers. Etetim Effiom had visited home the previous day. He was a bright-eyed, sturdy and elegant young man. He was ever smiling, humble and possessed an aura just like his father, which quickly made people to like him at first sight.
Mr Effiom had come along with him to visit Chief Atanguma that night. Before the father introduced him, Asuama had presupposed him to be the first son of Mr Effiom, whom the headmaster had been so proudly referring to. Instantly, Asuama's spirit, just like the Biblical David and Jonathan, got entwined with that of Etetim. Asuama liked him and longed for the day he would be like Etetim- going to secondary school where he would study and graduate and go further to university to read Medicine.
The school had resumed. Pupils and students were preparing to resume too. Asanga would be in primary five, Okutama in primary three and Asuama who would have been in primary four, but could not for lack of school fees. The mother could not raise sufficient money to cover the fees of Asanga and Asuama simultaneously. That really caused great psychological trauma to Asuama, especially when he came out of the house to look at his class mates joyously troop to school. He would go back into her mother's small kitchen, lock up the door and start crying.
One day, Asuama decided to visit the school to see things for himself. He had been advised by his brother, Asanga, to do so for the fee drive had been suspended for some weeks. Asanga was wrong however. Unluckily for Asuama, that day, fee drive commenced after days of grace. The headmaster, Mr Effiom, was personally going from class to class with a long cane to fish out the defaulters with some strokes of the cane on their hands for girls and buttocks for boys. He must be stringent in enforcing the rule as given by the government, otherwise he risked being punished, either by demotion or transfer. When Mr Effiom came to Asuama's class, he sighted him wearing a pensive mood, and he had pity on him by only ordering him to go home without any corporal punishment.
Asuama was crest-fallen. It was then he clearly understood the meaning of poverty and living in
squalor. If only his parents were fairly rich or his father was educationally conscious like his mother, he would not have been in the present condition. Back home, he staggered straight to his mother who was peeling plantain for the day's meal. Without much story from him, his mother knew what had happened in school, because Asuama continued to be in dejected mood.
"Has 'Teacher Effiom not considered you for a few days..?", his mother enquired soberly, dropping the plantain she was peeling to the ground, as if the fees would come the following week.
No, no, he-he o-r-dered me to go ho-m-e!", Asuama stammered with tears rolling down his cheeks. Akon drew closer to console her son.
"Stop crying my son, God understands and he will surely provide for you at the right time", she consoled him, quoting the story of Abraham and his son Isaac in the Bible. She used the soiled hand to wipe away his tears. But deep in her heart, Akon was weeping. She was tormented with grief, but she braced up and held her peace as a mother so that she would not worsen the situation for her son.
In the evening, two of Asuama's older brothers had returned from their routine palm fruits harvest competition (iwukho-eyop) from the neighbouring community. They came back with big parcels of cooked meat, stockfish, dried frogs and some money. They all handed over the food to their father, but only retained the money for themselves. Their father patted them on the heads for a job well done. Characteristically, Chief Atanguma brought out his low stool, sat on it and started sharing the food to other members of the family as usual. As he was sharing the meat, Chief Atanguna was taunting his three younger sons and making sneering and derogatory remarks about education that they were in romance with.
"You are all eating now and enjoying yourselves, when shall I begin to eat the fruit of your education. In my grave...?" He asked sarcastically.
The children did not even look at him nor utter any word. His wife, Akon, also kept mute, while Chief Atanguma was rumbling alone.
It was increasingly difficult for the family to meet their basic needs. Asuama was rapidly growing up and had attained puberty. He needed to change his old, worn and torn clothes; but there was no money for such a "luxury", His shorts were torn in the buttocks and in front. His shorts barely covered his private part. One day, he resolved to do something for himself, otherwise he would be walking naked at his age. He decided to go into the bush to pick palm kernels and palm fruits to crack and use the proceeds to buy clothes and other basic needs for himself.
That is the end of chapter six. See you in chapter seven.
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