A picture speaks louder

It still haunted me.

Memories of growing up…hungry desperate desolate. I grew up knowing that I was an abandoned, unwanted unloved baby. There were nights hunger gnawed at my belly which would growl brazenly as I trolled through garbage for something to eat. It was survival of the fittest, struggling with stray dogs and cats, vultures and goats; we scavenged for remnants and debris in the scrapheap of life.

I could not escape the flashbacks; especially with triggers like this. I picked up the morning paper and was confronted with a super-sized picture of a woman and her child captioned “extreme poverty in Africa”. The child was ugly in the way malnutrition defaces innocence, bulging eyes with a glazed look, protuberant belly barely covered in a tattered Ankara buba. The photographer also managed to catch some flies keen on sharing the limelight; perched on the child’s snot dripping nostrils, now dried and caked after many hours under the sun.

Beside mother and toddler a strategically displayed bowl of rice and a medley of other nutritious goodies received with gratitude from donor nations. I stared at the photo of the mother and her child. Tears filled my eyes. A myriad of emotions coursed through me…anger, frustration, sadness, shame. This was the single story of Africa as told by the developed world. This was how this journalist chose to depict Africa. Then fury took over, righteous indignation, who was this artist to pass judgement. My anger was short-lived. Why this portrayal? Why tell a half-story? I looked closely at the headline; it was an award winning feature photograph. My life was illustrated as a derogatory art form.

Many people in the wider world  still clung onto the image of  Africa as a dark age continent where people live on trees , have only just become biped as we shed our primitive coating of body hair.

I can’t remember my mother; she vamoosed very early on. I did not have a father. I learned to be streetwise before I could walk. I lived on my wits and charity.

And believe me, I know about charity.

I’m from Imeobodo, a close-knit community with population of about 5,000 people, hardworking petty farmers. We farmed mostly yams, cassava, chickens and then a few goats and cows; nothing much but enough. People were in high spirits after the harvest season. I remember the new yam festival… gaily dressed young people full of smiles, nubile maidens, strapping swash-buckling lads with raging hormones and joie de vivre. Those were the days.

I can never forget Omekwakwa the small town big-time tycoon, he was kind to me .He would often give me the odd 20naira which would tide me through the week. He owned the petrol filing station with a minimart. Everyone knew everyone. Obidigbo who owned the hardware store which doubled as an off-license but he was stingy…I never saw his one kobo. Kingsley ran the beer parlour cum Isi-ewu joint…he was good to me and often saved me leftovers. I ran minor errands for him. Then there was Mr. Ikhile the photographer. He could be seen around the village taking reportage photographs. He would photograph the masquerades, young boys chatting up girls, or even us in mid fight quarrelling over nothing.

There was mischief, but crime was almost unheard of. The ambience of the village was one of warmth, and contentment. If it sounds like utopia, that’s exactly how it felt.

I had a natural aptitude for maths and the sciences. Fortune must have been smiling on me at last; I won a scholarship which saw me through secondary school and then a bursary that got me through university. Me a nobody. My peers, who had relatives in the city left after secondary school to learn a trade, further their education and adopt the sophistication of the big city. It was exciting and equally intimidating to see some of them when they returned home at Christmas. I envied them, they viewed me with disdain.

Secretly my dream was to marry Chinasa whom I had a crush on. She was not an urchin like me. Even though she did not rebuff my advances at courtship, she had not encouraged me to take it further.

Chinasa had a more suitable suitor whom I could not measure up to. He had a motorbike, and travelled to the bigger neighboring town to trade. Her mother favored him over me. It was not as if I was unattractive or lazy, but my penury and the stigma of my birth was common knowledge in the village. Who would want their daughter to end up with that rascally boy with no pedigree?

Nonetheless, Chinasa occupied my sleeping and waking moments. I vowed that if I ever ‘made it’, I would woo Chinasa.

A tannoy announcement in the refined tones of the reception clerk quickly brought me back to the present. I was at the Magazine stand at the Lagos Sheraton; I composed myself as best I could, shaking my head in dismay, my broken heart crying out as I took in the photo in the front page, It was sheer exploitation.

”Mr. Ogendu please to the front desk” the announcer repeated over the loud speaker system. That was me, As Chief geologist with a top multinational Oil company; I was meeting the Japanese entourage who were keen to do business with us. We were having breakfast and then flying out to Warri by Aero contractors.

My heart continued to race as I imagined a picture from Mr. Ikhile’s collection. Me. plastered on the front page of the newspaper desperately scavenging for food. Yes! No one could call me a street urchin any more. It was my past. Those days seemed so far away yet the wounds were still fresh. I had moved on in life.

I looked at the picture again; that was my life; that was me, my private shame, taunting me. That was what drove me to do my best every day, to be the best I could, for my past was never too far behind me. I smiled, wiping away a tear; confident no-one could guess where I my journey began. I paid for a copy and tucked it under my arm.

I was lucky indeed, clearly not everyone was so fortunate.

I reflected and wondered silently what Mr. Ikhile the photographer was doing these days…