The Bite Magazine - Autmn/Winter 2020 - Issue 28

bitetheatre Agbeke who had left the preparations of migrating back over to her husband, Korode, realises that she also had been daydreaming of living “in a castle [as] queen” for not everything is as she had hoped. As aspirations clash with re- ality and cause a ruckus in her once presumed comfortable family home, Agbeke fights for her role and position, even reaching out to her parents, but to no avail; to ‘six months later’ when she is with child and hopes with her entirety of being that she is finally going to birth a boy, an heir, for her husband, and we witness the influence her late grandmoth- er, Iya-alasho, has had on her as she turns to the family deity, Ifa, for protection for her and her two girls; ‘to 1978’ where Omotola is sent to a Christian boarding school by her father, to help build bridges with Bishop, and where she makes two best friends - Tinu and Ibele, who also live in Ibadan. Agbeke, however, in the hope that she is finally moving up in status in the household, tumbles further back by natu- ral misfortunes and further marital unions by her husband, leaving her at a status rivalled by a house-girl and is repeat- edly oppressed. To ‘Christmas’ that year where Omotola, coming home from boarding school, charters a bus sur- rounded by the typical bus stop acoustics; she narrates of Tinu having a boyfriend, ‘Ranti aka Americana’. As I contemplate why their driver, Alabi, has not been sent to collect her from school, I quickly get over this as actually I love this scene where the characters shout out “Ibadan- Ibadan-Ibadan-Iba! E-wole-E-wole-E-wole e! (Come in)” mimicking the shouts heard by the bus-boy/conductors en- ticing passengers to charter their bus for their journeys, as I, whom, have also lived in Ibadan in my past, reminisce memories from the noise of this scene. Omotola’s return home has her educated in her heritage cul- ture as the consequent change of dynamics in the home sur- prise her astoundingly and as she vows to her sister “I will never let anyone hurt you again; WE will never let anyone hurt you. Right mum?” but Agbeke, having recently been given a reality check of her status, cannot reply. Omotola continues her narration of the holidays home of when she is left alone with Alabi who makes inappropriate advances towards her, but luckily to no avail. This leaves her worried about her little sister’s (Sade) security whilst she’s away. She continues with ‘three years later’ at the end of her fourth year in secondary school, lamenting on how the last year of school will be “weird without Tinu though” who has, weird- ly become estranged. At home, her mother’s low familial status brings woe by those claiming and upholding a higher one above her. Further narrations reveal a heart-wrenching scene of more paedophilia rendered upon Omotola, this time by Tinu’s dad, disguised as pastoral care to a 13-year- old good friend of his daughter. The intention behind this occurrence is later revealed, much to the horror of Omotola, and us the audience no less. ‘Two years later’ her child genius efforts are awarded, and she’s off to university. Agbeke, meanwhile, struggling to maintain her status in the household, yet again becomes pregnant and has faith that the baby is yet another boy that she can finally carry to term. Each child’s birth or each miscarriage as it transpires is of a scene where the mother-character kneels by presumed wa- ter’s side of a blue Ankara cloth and to the music of a cow- bell instrument, uses it to gather and bundle it into a baby (or shakes it out if futile), is both beautiful and reflective of