Life is a Market
Said the gourd. Wrapped in a shaved goat hide, given a neck of something like bamboo and strung twice with sinew the instrument was talking to us through the man playing it.
Life is a market place
and when you have bought and sold
all that you need
it is time to go home.
Or words to that effect, given that it was in Gurune. I freely confess to taking license. The funeral dirge was translated by Emmanuel who led us through the day, from greetings to seeing the body, to drums and dancing, burial and the final respects to the elders.
Akah has gone home. He bought and sold everything he need and has probably gone to a better place. He worked as night watchman for the girls at one of the CUSO houses. Vanessa, Zuzanna, Bailey and a woman named Rosalinde employed him. And after letting the chickens out on thursday morning Akah died. He had been sick for a long time, there is some speculation that it was AIDS, but it’s tough to know. He never went to the hospital, despite entreaties from the girls and his sons. He was supposed to go the day he died.
So last night was his wake, and today was his funeral. When we arrived we heard the funeral dirge, followed by some serious drumming. As the players played people went up and stuck thousand cedi, five thousand cedi notes to their faces. Harvest songs they are called, pulling in funds for the funeral. And as they played people danced. We were escorted inside to see the body, sleeping almost foetus-like on his side he looked peaceful. There was beauty to the pose that is unlike anything you see in a funeral home, with its makeup and glossy attempts to mask death, make it more inviting. It somehow becomes harsher, more threatening.
So we left Akah sleeping and returned to our seats outside, seats that were specially designated for us, the white contingent. It is a funny thing, this, and I don’t know what to say about it yet. Maybe I will never know how to feel about being automatically special because I’m white. I know part of it is honouring guests, but . . . but.
As we sat and watched the drumming, the dancing, we saw a slaughter. First it was a chicken, neck wrung not five feet from me by one of Akah’s brothers. Then the kid. The baby goat’s neck was twisted until broken, and though it may seem cruel to us, was probably as humane a way to go as any being that is take by us for food. It didn’t last as long as a bleeding, and probably hurt only as much as anything that doesn’t cause immediate death. Still, a strange thing to see, this provocative killing at a funeral. Certainly not consistent with the way I feel I’ve been trained to understand death. Celebrating life at a funeral through sacrifice. I don’t know what was done with that meat, but I guess in my outsider’s way understand the show of respect it was.
And then came a procession, of boys, first, dressed only in shorts and carrying bows, then men. Drawing their strings and pretending to fire. I wish I knew what it represented, something to do with hunting or fighting I can only imagine, but I don’t know what. They went inside the compound, and after some time came out with the body. It was wrapped in a mat made of sticks that served as a coffin and a beautiful blanket to wrap the mat. He was paraded around the neighbourhood, with a procession of people and musicians behind him that kicked up enough dust to blind the dead and choke their ghosts.
And then he was put in the ground. Buried in the chieftancy’s graveyard, the royal family of Bolgatanga’s burial ground. He had some connection to them, was of royal blood. And he died alone with his radio in the garage of a CUSO house, isolated from his family in a way that seems so unlike this place, that leads to the speculation about AIDS. They wailed at his death, there was serious mourning happening. But he lived an isolated life that I only saw the very end of, and that raises questions. What was it that led him to the place where he died? Was it self-imposed exile, or stigmatization? These are questions that will never be answered, but should always be asked. And I wonder:
If life is a market place
does that make it a place for bargaining
the chance to see friends
and celebrate the people around you
before you go home?