Her Father's Wife

Chapter 14

The young ladies entering the fattening room for the year were warming up. Preparation for them was already in place. They were seven altogether. Among them were, Ona Mazi Nwokeforo's first daughter. Obiageli, Ichie Akukalias third wife. These two were already spoken for. The other five were from different prominent families in Ngodo. Some of them had hidden suitors, while others were yet to get. Some were sponsored by their prospective husbands, like Obiageli, others by their family. The intention of sending them to the fattening room are the same. They were to be trained in all the rudiments of house keeping. They will be given training on comportment, how to run the home, take care of their husband, take care of their look, learn how to walk regally and most importantly, cook all the appetising local dishes. This project isn't for the poor. It costs a lot of money to send a girl to the fattening room. The duration differs as this depends on how long a sponsor can keep his ward. Some ladies from rich homes stay as long as six months, even a year. Some can only afford three months. The old ladies in charge have painstakingly listed all the ladies must have before they will be admitted. These includes, wrappers, George materials only. Ankara, and other materials are considered inferior. Local cosmetics, tiro,uhie, uri, odo, thread for making their hair and food stuff, lots of it. During this period, the ladies were exempted from work or any thing that will task their strength. They were not to go out at all or be beaten by the sun. They were to only eat, practice on how to walk, how to cook all the local delicacies, then rest, sleep and rest. The idea of these practices was to enhance a girl's beauty. In fact it is on record in Igbo land that if a girl goes into a fattening room and come out without getting a husband in a fortnight, she can never get one. This is because, their beauty is at its peak after coming out from the fattening room. And to the men, for another man to give you his daughter, who had been to the fattening room, it is an honour indeed. The place chosen for their camping this year is was at the outskirt of the village. This is to discourage unnecessary visits. Moreover, they need enough space to practice how to walk without people oohin and aahing after them. 'Mgbede' walk is not your regular every day walk. There is no gain saying that a lot of water pots were wasted. Ocheze, the woman in charge lined her students in one single file, all seven of them. Roll your pad, she instructed, they quickly did, they were all excited, balance your pot, they did. Let go, shoulder high, no neck bending, your pot is at stake. Now take a dainty step, lightly now lightly, Obiageli stop stamping your feet. You are not doing a war dance. And you Ona remove your hand from that pot. Now walk without supporting the pot with your hand. This is just one of the many trainings. There is no gain saying that many water pots suffered casualty during this period. Occasionally, they go early in the morning to walk down hill balancing an empty water pot on their head. This is to teach them how to walk shoulder high, daintily, regally, gently like a queen. How to turn carefully without tilting the head. You don't slouch and you don't shake head from side to side. This training will continues until the end of the required number of months. This period is particularly important to these girls because, at times, this is the only period of rest they will ever have. Now comes the day they left the fattening room. The day they graced the general public with their beauty. Friends of the maidens as well that of their respective families were invited. Prospective husbands were there too. Those don't need invitation. Relatives and friends came bearing all sorts of gifts for their wards. These gifts comprises of wears, cosmetics, household items and kitchen utensil. Akukalia bought a Singer machine two pieces of wrappers and two blouses for Obiageli. She was wild with joy. Onaedo got a spring bed, a very rare item in the village, two blouses and three pieces of wrapper from her father. There were other gift items too, from friends and relatives. Others also got things both from family and friends. On Eke Ngodo, they went to the market pretending to sell. They brought different kinds of delicacies. Some were selling eggs, some meat, groundnut. Mgbede market is not a serious market, in fact, they were there just to show off. They had their body traced with ' uri'. Different designs were made on their body according to their choice. After the designing, they slept lightly so that the designs will not smear. This is because 'uri'takes time to dry. Their eye lashes were darkened with 'tiro'. The 'uhie' was used on their lips and their heels. They all looked like angels. Ona stood out among all of them. This is mostly because of her colour. She had the kind of colour that is common among Indians. Her skin a kind of golden brown had been enhanced by months of staying away from the sun. The ojongo hair style she plaited stood ' gedem' on top of her head. The complicated design that was drawn with 'uri' on her body seems to gleam against the background of her golden brown skin. She was wearing the same half wrapper of George material other maidens were wearing. The different is that unlike others, almost her whole waist was covered with waist beads. Same goes for her two arm and her neck. It was obvious that Mazi Nwokeforo spared no expense in preparing his daughter for this outing. That day, Onaedo Nwokeforo, was the envy of all the ladies in the village. As the maidens were making their dainty way around the market, walking like they don't want to harm the ground, as if they don't have any energy, serious consultations were going on in the background. Whose daughter is that? Do you know whether anybody has indicated interest in her yet? What is her name? I mean that brown queen selling egg? Ohooo, please come out from there, why? Are you a stranger in this village? Is that not Nwokeforo's daughter? Questions and more questions were being asked and answered. Some of these questions and answers lead to marriage for others, but in Ona's case her suitors ended up frustrated.

It would be great if you guys would check out the video it would give you a touch of the past. To my fellow time travellers cheers!!!
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