As every school pupil will wish for, we wished for same as we could not wait for the clock to move faster than it usually does. We all awaited the moment “Olee” – the school bellboy, will ring the bell to bring the Friday to a close. It was not just students who wanted this but certain teachers wanted it even more. Having the weekend in sight, Jamus, Salam, Muftawu and I already had our plans well set. The norm had always been that on weekends, school children had the freedom to play around and enjoy the day with friends. Although some parents consistently criticized the practice of the school not organizing weekend classes for its pupils, it was an rather a joyful opportunity for us to misuse the time available to us.
As our colleagues usually play games like “Ampe”, draft, scrabbles, football and the likes, the four of us rather venture on a rail hunting expedition. A rail; an animal in the bird family, was one of the few edible animals in the swamp area of “Kasambola”. We hunt these animals so we could make a soup out of them. Luckily for us, there used to be a cocoyam farm just after Salam’s residence. This made a good combination for a meal. We usually prepared to meet Salam in the morning of weekends so we move straight to our usual hunting grounds. Because we knew just as how difficult it was to be successful without planning well enough, it became obligatory to set up a trap in anticipation of making a catch.
“The Master Planner” as we used to call Salam was a reminiscence of his mastery in building a well-suited handmade trapping device for our venture. In him we have the “Alpha and Omega” of our project.
Passing through the smelly “Borla Sintuwaa” (A dumping site), the noisy sawmill and dangling bridge over the “Papalle” (a wide drain), one would have overcome series of hurdles already. Salam, who lives closer starts with the building of the machine whilst we stand there as clueless as sloths. Due to the muddy nature of the swamp we intend invading, we put our toes into black polythenes. The trap is planted and all left is for us to hide, awaiting execution in our plan.
On bad days, your thoughts are as good as mine. We trapped nothing. Most of these hunting days were quite tough for young lads like us because not only were we hiding from the birds to be trapped but needed to be cautious of dangerous animals like stinging ants, scorpions and even snakes. When this day goes well for us, the joy we were filled with was comparable to that of a “Quokka”. We start imagining the part of the meat one will get as his share. We were usually filled with joy as we were filled with the pride of being associated with successfully accomplishing such a herculean task.
Fast forward, the joy turns into fears because one would not know the excuse to give parents for being absent from home for such long hours. Looking back to these happenings today, I will not encourage children to take risky ventures of such nature but at least exploring such is helpful in making children think outside the box as they build their innovative capacities. Now, I can confidently say I can make a soup out of not just a trapped bird but one with a very delicious taste for that matter. The African proverb that says ” A Young Man Who Travels A Lot Is Older Than An Old Man Who doesn’t ” could be a clear testament to the fact that lessons learnt in exploring become beneficial in the long run.
Peace 🕊️
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