Opana – Episode 21

Opana – Episode 21

© Akoto Alexander

Chief: After listening to both parties carefully and having a short discussion with my able elders we have come to a conclusion which will bring peace to both parties. First I would like to throw light on this important things to both of you, we have to note that anything that you come across which is not yours, you must first send the thing to the appropriate quarters for the rightful own to come and claim ownership for the thing with a perfect description. Two we should learn to be our brother’s keeper and have compassion for our fellow man and not treat others like they are outcast. Lastly let’s learn to always live in peace and harmony with each other, if your neighbour treats you in a way you don’t like, first go to him in a submissive way and talk to him or her, if understanding doesn’t come the door to this palace is always opened to handle such matters. Now my verdict, clearly the story that was narrated to us by both parties shows that the lotto coupon doesn’t belong to the woman but for her to have taken good care of the coupon she will be rewarded handsomely. I together with my elders came up with the idea that the woman should be given a portion of the money from the lotto since she was unfairly ejected by her landlord. Mr commander I leave the sharing part to you since you are the reason why we are all gathered here and in addition, for the woman my elders and I have decided to give her a small plot close to the government school so that she can build for herself a small house and move in with her family later for free. With the powers given to me by my forefathers and elders here I have spoken and so shall it be.

Elders: Well said your highness.

Opana: Thank you so much your highness, you have indeed proven to me that domestic wisdom is not for sale anywhere, am satisfied with your judgement and anything the commander says from now will be accepted by me and my family. May you live long your highness and may your reign continue to blossom every rising day, my wise elders I salute you and pray for strength and divine wisdom over your lives, am very grateful.

Eno Bruwaa: My lord even though I don’t fully agree to your judgement, I accept your final verdict and I promise to abide by it. May our forefathers bless you with more wisdom and life for you to continue to be our great chief, it is privilege to come before you and thank you for the land you promised to give to me.

Chief: Am glad everyone is happy with my judgement, from here I will let one of the elders go with you and allocate your land to you for you to start your building project with the money you get from here since you don’t have any place to stay for now.

Commander: Am overwhelmed your highness with the way you settled this serious issue so easily, you have made both parties very happy and everyone has accepted the verdict without any further complain, madam I hereby give you 15% of the total amount and the rest goes to you sir. On this note I will ask permission to take leave my elders since I have to deal with some other matters also at the station.

Opana and his family went back home very excited, Opana and his wife went into their bedroom and had a little conversation and as they came back from the bedroom Akua Yankey started making merry for the victory that came to their side, she gave money to Bernice to rush to the market to get some foodstuffs so she prepares a wonderful meal for the family. Opana also remembered what Skido told him before he fled and he sat Kwaku Mike down to have a man to man talk with his mother sitted in the talk.

Opana: My son time wasted can never be regained, day in and day out you are growing and you need to settle down. Sometimes in our lives we need to move out from our comfort zone to a zone we are not okay with, that is what we call life. Limes and smile have the same words but different arrangement, the sun has a time that it shines during the day and the moon also has its time for glowing during the night, it is time for you to start glowing because it is no longer day time. You might be asking yourself why is your father saying all this things at this particular time, my reason is very simple, I want you to wake up and face the future because you have no business and life in this town. I have been making a little enquires on the course you read at the university and I realise that this place has nothing to do with you and your future, the best and better place for you is the city where chances and opportunities are easy to come by. So at this very moment I have decided to give you money to start your life with it, the money am giving you is my life savings at the bank because I don’t want you to ever say somewhere that your father or parent didn’t help you in life, use the money judiciously and make yourself proud but not we your parent, remember this always that “you can lose money when chasing women but you can’t lose women when chasing money” because women don’t like misery and discomfort. Learn to urinate at one place so that it foams for you, I never had any university education but you can attest to what I have been able to achieve in my life. Son in my hand is a cheque of twenty five thousand cedis seventy eight pesewas, go and pay it into your account and before you redraw it make sure the money is going to be used for something useful and meaningful that anytime you turn your back, you will be proud of.

Akua Yankey: My son I went some but didn’t say some is not accepted by our elder so to add to what your father has said I want you to learn how to face your troubles and problems squarely and don’t find excuses to back out, alcohol is for the fool who wants to procrastinate says the bible, beautiful women will come when you have been able to establish yourself well because you are addressed the way you dress. Am stressing on this because I know your weakness with women, without women in the world the world would have been a very boring place to be and with women in the world the world is a very difficult place to be. Know the friends you are going to affliate yourself with since our elders say “show me your friend and I will show you who you are”, remember you will be leaving this house alone without nothing but it is your responsibility for you to come back with something, that something should be something you worked for with your sweat and not what you cheated or deceived someone to get. On this note I bless you with the blessings of a mother to a son and I pray that the God I serve will protect and guide your steps as you step out from this compound. I will miss you but don’t be running back to us so soon, don’t forget God in all you do and come back home when you have been able to establish yourself well. You are my only son and the elderest of my children, be a mentor and role model to them for them to always look up to you. Go and get rich out there.

Opana: Before I forget make sure you don’t ever pull that chain you have on your neck off, anytime you feel it is strangling you then it means there is a looming danger approaching so it’s either you move from where you are or you stop what you are doing. Listen to your instincts anytime they prompt you of something and I know God will see you through in this life, you are my only heir and my lineage depends on you so don’t forget to make me proud. Now leave the house before your sister comes because if she comes to meet you here, your going might be delayed………..

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As Kwaku Mike went into his room to pack his things after the brief meeting with the mum and dad, he packs only some few things of his so that his sister won’t come and see him before he leaves the house, inside him he was already missing her sister and wanted to tell her how much he loved her even though they fight a lot in the house. Akua Yankey on the other hand packs a little food(beans stew and ripped plaintain) into a little bag and hands it over to his son as he was about leaving the house, Opana said a short prayer with his son and before leaving he added an extra seven hundred and fifty cedis to the cheque he had already given to his son. Kwaku Mike left the house very happy and picks a taxi to the bank and makes a deposit of the cheque into his account, when he got out of the bank he quickly made a call to his friend to alert him of his coming to the city and the friend was so happy to hear the coming of his friend over to the city. He rushed to the lorry station which was not far from the bank, he walked to the man selling the ticket but a woman outsmarted him and got to the man selling the ticket first and bought the last ticket the man had for the very bus loading, unfortunately for Kwaku Mike the bus was full so he had to wait for the next bus which was even bigger than the one that was about leaving, he went back to the man who was selling the tickets to buy one for himself but the man told him that for this bus the conductor will collect the money when the bus was in motion so he can take a seat in the bus. He walked to the big bus biting his lips because he felt that woman had not been fair to him by outsmarting him to get the last ticket, he took a seat next to the window behind the driver and since no one was in the bus he decided to eat the food his mother had packed for him and after taking the food he decided to sleep a little because he wanted to stay awake all through out the journey. After a while Kwaku Mike wakes up to see that the bus is half full and he starts getting some funny movement in his stomach which makes him pass some gas out which was unpleasant. Quickly he gets down from the bus and goes to the man who was selling the tickets and asked if he could get a place of convenience to ease himself. After he was done easing himself he walked back to the bus to meet the bus filled up and his seat occupied by another man, he told the man that he was the one sitting there but the man refused to relinquish the seat, some people who were already in the bus before Kwaku Mike got down tried to talk to the man for him to just give the seat to Kwaku Mike but he was adamant saying to them that he was also in a hurry and moreover no one in the bus had bought a ticket like him so no one should bother him all else he will beat anyone who talks against him. The driver came to sit behind his steering but came to meet confusion in his bus, he tried to settle the problem but his efforts proved futile, all of a sudden Kwaku Mike started feeling the strangling on his neck and immediately he remembered what his father said to him and he got down from the bus, some people were against his motive of getting down from the bus but he told them not to worry and that he will wait for the next bus. After the long wait Kwaku Mike hears someone screaming Accra, Accra, Accra, last one going and immediately he jumped on his feet and run to where the sound was coming from and when he got there he saw a black 4×4 land cruiser packed there, he enquired and the driver told him that he is from an NGO and that he brought some white people to run a survey but as he was driving back to Accra alone he had a problem with his car so he had to use his fuel money to repair the car so picking up people as passengers will help him buy fuel back to Accra, Kwaku Mike smiled and told him he was willing to journey with him all the way to the capital city of Ghana. He called his friend to update him on what had taken place and that his battery was running low so should in case he calls him and his phone is off he should know that he is on his way coming. The journey was smooth from the start as the driver made his passengers comfortable by putting on the car air condition, all of a sudden it started raining heavily on the way accompanied with thunder, the driver told everyone in the car to fasten his seatbelt because the journey was going to be tough and rough. After driving like twenty three miles there was this heavy thunder strike and lighting and we heard a loud explosive sound ahead of us and then we later saw thick smoke pushing its way to the sky through the rain, the 4×4 driver stepped on the accelerator so he could get to the place the sound and smoke was coming from. In no time we got to the place and to my greatest surprise the bus that I was fighting my way to get a seat in but didn’t get because of that rude man was involved in a very fatal accident and the bus had run into a ditch and caught fire so we got down from the land cruiser after the driver parked at a reasonable distance to see if there were some people we could save. In the process of going to the burning bus I stepped on something and when I checked it was a new Samsung 6edge phone in a nice leather case so I picked it up and placed it in my pocket before going closer to the bus but the bus exploded again and the flame that met us nearly burnt us, we run back to the land cruiser and looking back I saw a huge tree lying at the side of the road and using my mind to calculate what led to the accident, I came with the view that the tree fell on the road and the driver of the bus possibly tried to dodge the tree which made him lose control and run in to the ditch. As we sat in the car I took my mind back and tried remembering some of the pretty faces I saw in the bus and there was this beautiful lady I spotted and had plans to take her number when we get to the capital city, I was thankful to God in my head but sad I couldn’t get the lady of that very bus. I took my phone out of my bag to check the time and I saw 24missed calls and 4messages on my screen, apparently my phone had moved to the silent mood so I didn’t hear when the calls were coming through. As I checked those who had tried to get in touch with me, I saw that 11 came from my mum, 3 from my dad, 6 from a foreign number and 4 from my friend in the city, the messages also came from my bank, the foreign number and my friend. My bank had sent me my account balance, my friend wanted to know where I had gotten to so that he could come and pick me up at the lorry station and the foreign number was also from Juliana Ohenewaa Dotse and the content was for me to call her back the moment I got the message. I decided to call my father first then later call my mum because I knew they were trying to get to know if possibly I had gotten to the capital city or I was getting closer but the news I got was unpleasant.

On Phone:

Michael Ansah: Hello papa, sorry my phone went to silent mood so I didn’t hear you were calling, I just brought my phone out from the bag and saw your missed calls together with mommy’s own. Eeeeiiiii papa you can’t believe the miracle the necklace did this afternoon at the lorry park this afternoon. Hello papa are you there?

Opana: (in a dull and calm voice) Hmmmm my son am here ooo, your mum and I were calling you for an emergency reason, we wanted to know if you were still in town or you are in bus going to the city.

Michael Ansah: Papa am in a car going to the city, so papa because I left the house for just some hours and you are missing me already? Your voice is even shaking as you are talking or is there a problem?

Opana: My son there is a big problem back here, after you left someone brought news that your younger sister has been knocked down by a toilet car and truly as we rushed there, she was been conveyed to the hospital so that was why we were calling you to alert you of it.

Do you believe it is going to go well for Kwaku Mike in the city?

Is the accident of Bernice a mere coincidence of there is something behind it?

To be continued

 

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