My Father, My Father BY …Ijeoma Chinonyerem

My Father, My Father BY …Ijeoma Chinonyerem

Sometime in February, I had to travel to Calabar. My father decided to drop me at the park. We got to Peace Mass and there was no bus. We went to Onitsha Mass. Onitsha Mass had no bus too but unlike Peace, they were taking money from passengers and promising us a bus would come.

I kept on telling him to leave but he insisted on staying till the bus came so he would take me home if they finally didn’t bring a bus.
We waited for 4 hours before a bus finally came. We came by 10, they brought a bus by 2. Neither of us had had breakfast by then.

They started loading the bus then this Evangelist comes with illustrated bibles for sale and starts talking. He opened it and my father looked interested. The pictures must have caught his attention.

“Buy your bibles with pictures. Look at the creation story. Eve was created as an afterthought. She is God’s biggest mistake. She is the origin of the problems of the world. That is why Bob Marley said no woman, no cry. Without women there would be no tears. Have you not noticed how your wife, your daughters are always the problems in your homes? They are never satisfied”.

By this time some men were listening to him with rapt attention so he got emboldened and came nearer, going from man to man.

“Eve deceived Adam. That is how these women are. This is what they do. Beware of the women in your life or they will cause you regrets”.

At this point he came close to my father.
“It doesn’t matter if she is your mother, wife or your daughter. Attaliah put his son in trouble. Jezebel put his husband into trouble. The daughters of Lot put their father into trouble by getting him drunk and sleeping with him. Your mothers, wives, daughters could be your downfall. That is why the bible said suffer not the witch to live. Not wizard. Just witch, because women are the perpetrators of evil more than men. The problems of this world, of man, is woman. If you doubt me, buy this book. See it for yourself.”

He paused for dramatic effect and looked at my father. At this point I was so angry and tired and hungry. I felt insulted. I wanted to kick him. What kind of preaching was this? Turning families against themselves.

The man asked my father who he noticed had shown interest in the book earlier, “Oga onwe nke a na ewetalu gi?”

My beautiful man laughed for some seconds and replied in his Nkwerre accented Igbo, “kwuru shi puo” which literally translates to “talk shit comot”.

I laughed small. I wanted to make it a howling, thigh-slapping kinda laughter, but I was still really hungry and tired so no energy to laugh-troll the man.

My bobo waited till our bus left then he drove home by 3PM. My father’s dismissive reaction to that evangelist was a big deal to me. Our family have been to hundreds of prayer houses courtesy of my father. Once he hears “man of God” he believes whatever you say. The easiest way to scam him is to take the religious route. I’m not kidding. He once wanted to send money to T.B. Joshua on Facebook because he contacted him and said deliverance should be done. I had to tell him it was a fake account and they were scammers not the real T.B Joshua.

So hearing him dismiss this ‘evangelist’ because he disrespected his daughter and the women in his life was a big deal to me. If that evangelist had just preached their normal yeye preaching, my dad would have probably bought a carton of those illustrated bibles and shared as gifts to us.

He is that impulsive when it comes to ihe uka so it felt good to know that talking crap about his women was the line that should not be crossed.

A brief moment of silence for the men who kept on nodding and agreeing with the misogynist Evangelist.
3 Eyaas for their wives and daughters.