Page 73 - Obruni In Ghana | Amber Lockridge

OBRUNI IN GHANA 71
My last memory of Mama through the bus window, with a broad crook-toothed grin, her arm pumping violently, shaking the rest of her cloth wrapped body to its ecstatic rhythm. Ato stands beside her looking handsome but sad with his hands in his pockets, trying to smile but refusing to show his teeth.
“Bye-bye, Kukuwa! Bye-bye!”
I will come again. I have to come again. I love Africa too much not too.
“Maybe in a few years.” I tell them. “If I get the money...if I get the time...if I finish school...” But that’s what my mother said 20 years ago in Australia and what my Uncle promised himself after serving 18 months in South Korea. Neither have answered enough ‘ifs’.
And I wonder if I really do want to come back. I admit there’s a part of me that resents being tied to so many other people. They will all want letters, phone calls, gifts, money. I can’t just push on into the present. I feel I’m now bound to provide for