STAYING AWAY

Staying away from home as good as it is, has some very adverse effects.For starters, death and life continues,and in my community, you are required to make an appearance at every funeral and if you did not make it then,when you finally appear, it is an unwritten rule.you must go and pay your last rites!even if it means standing at the burial ground and observing a minute's silence. it serves well to appease ' the gods' and the clan.
Secondly, there are those people you left as infants.now they have deep voices(males) and the girls that you left running naked around now are grown up women who greet you with a lot of feigned shyness you never imagined possible with them.
Thirdly, there are those that were either born or brought when you were away(don't forget to include animals here) that you have to get introduced to and accustomed to...!it is also so amazing how your memory can fail you(where names are concerned) just when you need to call someone by name, at least to show you were alaways thinking about them.Lastly,there is the always amazing aspect of you being "shown off" to the whole village..... you suddenly become 'our son' that went out to study and is now back
but somethings still remain the same, the cattle still follow the same path to the river to drink water,the boys still sit around or idle around discussing girls while old men still walk around greeting each other and'village politics'and women have refined their ways of simple village gossip.....all in all am glad to be home.
i love being African why lie.till next time...Blessings!