Bittersweet 4

 Bittersweet 4

Yes, I was finally at my uncle’s  place. The place I thought would be my salvation.

Fate dealt me the cruellest card. My uncle and family lived in a face-me-I-face-you house, built by him. I stayed in a room with some other cousins I met there. I was 12 but due to the ill treatment and malnourishment, I had suffered at the hands of my mother,  I looked like an 8 year old. I was only ever given leftovers to eat, after they had had their fill, my mother and sister. Truly I was treated no better than a stray dog.

I was dropped off by my mom with disdain, in the evening. We had taken the first bolekaja(a bus made of wood) leaving the village to the town where my uncle resided.  My uncle was a headmaster in a local school but he had a large farm and was into animal husbandry.

I remember my mother telling my uncle’s wife that I was evil and nothing good would come out of me. I can never forget those cruel words, ever.

Food did not appear to be a problem at my uncle’s place. I and the others kids, the cousins there were given rice, stew and goat meat on a large platter, that night. I ate till I could eat no more for I was starved. Maybe that was why I was still in primary 3 at my age.

I got a rude awakening the next day. I had barely laid my head on the mat I was allotted when I got kicked in the leg

I managed to stutter “What time is it?’

And I was given another kick on my shin, I yelped in pain.

I was told, sleepy eyed, on the long trekk to a plantation far away by my cousins that we woke at 4am everyday to gather firewood. The trekk took us an hour, to and fro. Afterwards, we would go to the stream to fetch water and then clean the goat pen, chicken pen and rabbit pen. All three quite expansive. I would then bathe my uncle’s little kids. And then came the shocker...my uncle had promised my mom I would be enrolled in school to continue my education, but he had lied

Instead, I was used by his wife to hawk the soda soap  she produced from one end of town to the other, sadly, 7 days in the week, from morning till whenever I was able to finish selling all she placed on the tray, on my head, which was usually late in the evening

For 3 years I would watch with a heavy heart, kids my age walking happily to school, and back while I hawked soda.

To be continued