1. Childhood

Actually, it had all begun like a dream. You know the sort of dream which seems to have originated from nowhere, yet one was always aware of its existence. One could feel it, one could be directed by it; unconsciously at first, until it became a reality, a Presence.

       Adah did not know for sure what give birth to her dream, when it all started, but the earliest anchor could pin down in this drift of nothingness was when she was about eight years old. She was not even quite sure that she was exactly eight, because, you see, she was a girl. She was a girl who arrived when everyone was expecting and predicting a boy. So, since she was such a disappointment to her parents, to her immediate family, to her tribe, nobody thought of recording her birth. She was so significant. One thing was certain, though: she was born during the Second World War. She felt eight when she was being directed by her dream, for a younger child would not be capable of so many mischiefs. Thinking back on it all now that she was grown up, she was sorry for her parents. But it was their own fault; they should not have had her in the first place, and that would have saved a lot of people a lot of headaches.

       Well, Adah thought she was eight at the time when her mother and all other society women were busying themselves to welcome the very first lawyer of their town Ibuza. Whenever Adah was told that Ibuza was her own, she found it difficult to understand. Her parents, she was told, came from Ibuza and so did many of her aunts and uncles. Ibuza, she was told, was a beautiful town. She was taught at an early age that the people of Ibuza were friendly, that the food there was fresh, the spring water was pure and the air was clean. The virtues of Ibuza were praised so much that Adah came to regard being born in a God-forsaken place like Lagos as a misfortune. Her parents said that Lagos was a bad place, bad for bringing up children because here they picked up the Yoruba-Ngbati accent. It was bad because it was a town with laws, a town where Law ruled supreme. In Ibuza, they said, you took the law into your own hands. If a woman abused your child, you went straight into her hut, dragged her out, beat her up or got beaten up, as the case might be. So if you didn't want to be dragged out and beaten up you wouldn't abuse another woman's child. Lagos was bad because this type of behavior was not allowed. You had to learn to control your temper, which Adah was taught was against the law of nature

The Ibuza women who lived in Lagos were preparing for the arrival of the town's first lawyer from the United Kingdom, The title 'United Kingdom' when pronounced Adah's father sounded so heavy, like the type of noise one associated with bombs. It was so deep, so mysterious, that Adah's father always voiced it in hushed tones, wearing such a respectful expression as if he were speaking of God's Holiest of Holies. Going to the United Kingdom must surely be like paying God a visit. The United Kingdom, then, must be like heaven.

The women of Ibuza bought identical cotton material from the UAC department store and had it made into lappas and blouses of the same style. They dyed their hair, and straightened it with hot combs to make it look European. Nobody in her right senses would dream of welcoming a lawyer who had come from the United Kingdom with her hair left naturally in curls. They composed songs, weaving the name of the new lawyer into them. These women were so proud of this new lawyer, because to them it meant the arrival of their very own Messiah. A Messiah specially created for the fight for the rights of the people of Ibuza. A Messiah who would see to it that Ibuza would have electricity, that Ibuza would have a tarred road (which Adah's mother called 'Koltar'). Oh yes, Lawyer Nweze was going todo all sorts of things for the people of Ibuza.

Adah's mother was a seamstress, so she made most of the blouses. Adah was very lucky, because she has some remnants from the materials made into a frock for her. She still remembered the frock; it was so big for her that she more or less swam into it. Her mother would never dream of making her a dress that was exactly her size because, you see, she would soon outgrow it. So even though she was a small girl, too skinny for her age, whatever that might be, she always had dresses three or four sizes bigger. That was one of her reasons for liking old dresses since by the time her dresses were old, they fitted her. She was so happy with this new 'Lawyer dress' that she begged her mother to let her go with the women to the Apapa Wharf on the great day. It pained her so much when she realized that she was not going to be allowed to go hccnust- it fell on a school day.

School – the Ibos never played with that! They were realized fast that one's savior from poverty and disease was education. Every Ibo family saw to it that their children attended school. Boys were usually given preference, though, so even though Adah was about eight, there were still discussions about whether it would be wise to send her to school. Even if she was sent to school, it was very doubtful whether it would be wise to let her stay long. 'A year or two would do, as long as she can write her name and count. Then she will learn to sew. Adah had heard her mother say this many times to her friends. Soon, Adah's younger brother Ben Started school.

It was at this time that Adah's dream started to nudge her.  Whenever she took Ben to Ladi-Lak Institute, as the school was called, she would stand by the gate and watch all friends lining up by the school door, in their smart navy – blue pinafores looking clean and orderly. Ladi-Lak was then, and still is, a very small preparatory school. Children were not taught Yoruba or any African language. This was why it was such an expensive school. The proprietress was trained in the United Kingdom. At that time, more than half the children in the school were Ibos, as they were then highly motivated by the middle-class values. Adah would stand there, filled with envy, the envy later gave way to frustration, which she showed in many small ways. She would lie just for the joy of lying; she took secret joy in disobeying her mother. Because, she thought to herself: "If not for Ma, Pa would have seen to it that I started school with Ben". And this thought made her frustrated filling her heart with evil deeds which she plans of executing any moment she has the opportunity.