“Who fly the bolus?!”
Silence.
“I said, who threw the kenkey?”
More silence.
Obodai stole a glance in my direction. “Adey beg”, I mouthed.
“All of you, follow me”.
We silently marched behind him to our doom. They’d all pay for my mistake.
Believe it or not, this is the story of how I initially became friends with my best friend, Obodai. But we have to start at the beginning.
Grace Period Ends
The first week of high school is never an accurate representation of what to expect. It’s called the grace period, and for good reason: grace abounds. You can get away with almost anything. The whole idea is that during that week you have the legal right to use the statement “I didn’t know” whenever you are caught committing an offence… and you WILL be caught committing an offence, even if you are Angel Obi… ei, Mother Theresa.
You think I’m lying? Look, if you attended a high school with more rules than the Motown I attended, then you didn’t go to school – you went to jail… for three months at a time, three times every year, you were an inmate especially in Opoku Ware where they give you prison numbers. Don’t insult me, I’m writing this while hungry. But back to the matter at hand, Motown is one of those schools with the “mother rule”. Maybe you’ve heard it before:
A breach of common sense is a breach of school rules.
Personally, I believed it was just a means for seniors to constantly have silly reasons to punish you. And my theory was soon proved right.
That first week, you should have seen us… untouchable boys and girls in our oversized uniforms, enjoying grace period like there was no next week. That is, until…
“Next Week” Came.
We worked like slaves, running errands and doing filthy chores. We were always sleep-deprived, mentally exhausted and hungry. The first two, we could adapt to – call it “growth” – but who in their right minds adapted to hunger? We sought solace from our chopboxes, but after two weeks of being kwahyéed, the boxes had nothing more to give.
Remember the guy-guy house prefect from the last episode? His name was Eben. That dude could turn a blind eye to make Stevie Wonder wonder. (See what I did there?). His mates were literally robbing us. They ate more from our chopboxes than we did. I thought mixed school would be good… silly me, I’d forgotten that the houses were not mixed. Eben didn’t do anything to save us. We were on our own, with empty chopboxes, and only the dining hall to look forward to.
The Dumsor Bolus Assault of ’09.
D-Hall food was never enough. But it kept us alive. Besides, by Ghanaian high school standards, Motown’s D-hall food was considered nice. Also, it was a great place to socialize with the girls who were not in your class. Especially the ‘dadaba’ ones on your table who didn’t eat much so you could get second helpings. We were starving child labourers; we couldn’t let anything come between us and our food.
And that is exactly what got me into trouble… food.
Here’s how it went down.
One day, after washing a pile of dirty laundry, I was looking for my last gari to eat (and maybe die) like that widow Elijah met in the Bible. All of a sudden, this senior, “M.O.B.” they called him, walked up to me and went like, “Chale, make I see your box inside”. Legally, he hadn’t yet kwahyéed me… plus if I refused I’d get ganged up on by the other seniors, and he’d tell Smizzle he was conducting an inspection and I wasn’t cooperating. So I obliged.
Like I said, it was my laaaaast gari oo. I was preparing my laaaaaast soakings… but this guy pointed at my laaaaaast tin of milk and said, “Make I feel you”. The impudence! Make you feel what?!
“Oh, M.O.B. adey beg, ma laaaaaast this”. As soon as the words were out of my mouth I knew I’d messed up.
He smiled a cruel smile as he said, “Are you speaking pidgin with me?”.
Speaking pidgin was technically an offense, although everyone did it.
“Ow, please, I’m sorry. It was a slip of tongue…”
Oh chale, hard guy like me, begging like some wuss. The guy did not even listen. Truth is, he had played me. It was an expertly crafted checkmate. Either he got the milk or I got a punishment. Stubborn Ewe man that I am, I wasn’t about to punk out. “Sorry, I cannot give you this tin of milk”, I reiterated in perfect English, signing my death warrant.
“OK, no yawa, go carry scrubbing brush”, was his response. It was almost funny, except it was not; this guy was going to make me scrub the bathroom… because I wouldn’t give him my last tin of milk. Ei, ewiase.
Suddenly, like a melody from heaven, the highest authority in the land – the school bell, rang. M.O.B. cussed. It was time for supper. According to Smizzle’s most recent rules he had to let me go. Of course, I’d scrub later that night, but for the next hour or so he was the jerk who failed to get my milk. I high-tailed it out of the chopbox room, threw on my prep attire and rushed to the D-hall. We were going to have kenkey, AKA bolus… not my favourite, but your boy was hungry.
Now back in 2009, unpredictable power outages (dumsor) were the norm. Also, if the lights went off during dining, the dining hall suddenly became a war-zone. Food would fly everywhere. Students are just crazy like that. On this particular day, I sat with the rest of the Aggrey form one boys, waiting patiently for the senior prefect to ring the bell so we could start eating. I saw M.O.B. enter the dining hall. He walked to the Aggrey form 3’s table, table B3, close to the high table where the prefects sat. My blood just boiled. Ah! Did my mother give me the milk for the two of us? The rage I felt scared even me.
All of a sudden… darkness.
One of the Kingsley girls screamed (they scream at everything), jolting me out of my thoughts… dumsor! I really wish adrenaline and rage had cooperated with my better judgement that evening. Before I could stop myself I had grabbed two bolus(es) from the pan… (Ah, wait… if the plural of radius is radii, shouldn’t the plural of bolus be bolii? Food for thought 🤔). I grabbed 2 bolii and threw them as hard as I could in the direction of the last place I had seen M.O.B. What was I thinking?!
People screamed, people ducked… suddenly, light! It was all over so fast. I looked in the direction of table B3. The mess I saw ehnn, I froze… I’d missed M.O.B., but what I’d hit was the real problem. I don’t know where one of my projectiles went but the second had hit the bowl of pepper on table B3 and painted the Aggrey seniors red. So maybe I wasn’t such a bad shot, after all, M.O.B. was covered in pepper too. The rest were casualties of war. They were all in shock… all except Eben. For someone who was always turning a blind eye, why was it today of all days that he saw where the bolus was thrown from? And why was he not sitting on the high table like any normal prefect? Why, oh why did he have to get caught up in this?
He walked calmly, too calmly, to our table and asked, “Who fly the bolus?”. Silence.
“I said, who threw the kenkey?”. More silence.
Obodai, a guy from A-Dorm, stole a glance in my direction. He’d seen me! Would he snitch?
“Adey beg”, I mouthed.
He nodded ever so slightly and I breathed a sigh of relief… he wasn’t a snitch, plus I think he approved of my shot. Call me selfish, but I wasn’t going to sacrifice myself for everyone. Jesus’ sacrifice was enough. That one sef, see the way they lashed Him.
“All of you, follow me”, Eben grunted.
We were dead.