Excerpt from the Book, “Shadows and Traces of My Uncle.”
6 min read
By Kur Wel Kur, Adelaide, Australia
February 11, 2016 (SSB) …After the attendees finished eating, it was already dark. Frogs were calling for their mates. And mosquitoes, buzzing. The crowd dispersed and Mr. Deng and his mum were alone.
“What took you so long? It has been ages since you left,” his mother asked him with tears blurring her vision.
“Mum, it takes ages to learn how to listen and respect the military officers and to acquire necessary skills to be a soldier,” Deng said knowing that her mother has a lots to say in that night.
“What necessary skills? Didn’t I tell you that, when you left, by joining the army, you were escaping the responsibility of taking care of me, your mother? As you know my strength is leaving me little by little every season. So, in every season there must be a job I have to avoid because my body dropped the expertise of doing that particular job in the last season,” his mother explained to him in the midst of her sniffles.
“Mum, I know that, but my country needs me, my people need my youthfulness and I hope all will be okay if we, as people of the South or natives gain independence or a voice in the political decisions,” Deng almost shed tears.
“Son, the country is ours and I am your mother. At least get me grandchildren. But can you do it without a wife? You’re like an egg exposed to all sorts of dangers: the heatwaves of the summer, the cold of the winter. Floods. Fires. And when the egg dies, it dies without any trace left on earth,” in the cover of the night darkness, the mucus parachuted in her nostrils, which mixed with tears. The salt in both stuff blended in her mouth.
“Mum, I don’t have time right now to look for a wife, I was granted only three days to visit and after the three days, our battalion will go to the frontlines. So mum, maybe after my assignment, I will apply for a leave and if successful, then I will come and get married,” he said knowing that he has fifty percent chance of making it out of his assignment alive and he knew his mother knew it as well.
“Son, your life
Is worthless
Without a wife
So you’re not going anywhere,” she said furiously.
“I know you don’t mean that,” he said with a smile showing in his eyes while his lips remained shut.
“What? Do you want me to lynch myself in order to understand that I do mean every word I said in this night?” she said, screaming.
“Mum, calm down and try to listen. If I decide to stay over time, the army will collect all goats, all sheep and all cows, literally, every animal we own as a family and they will start killing them for meat even if I report to my battalion the same day they took our cattle. Mum, without cows, can I get married?” Deng asked while staring at his mum’s shadows.
Ajoh Bol Jok waved her hands. A gesture, which meant to go in a rude manner. Deng went to the byre to sleep while his mother remain seated in the place she sat 8 hours ago. He thought about the whole conversations for a while, but he felt asleep instantly. For three days and nights, he would be free of sentry and curfews. His mother wept in her traditional veranda, thinking about the continuity of her family on her younger son’s side because, only him, was without a wife. Her elder son was 33 years old with three wives and six children among those wives. She loathed the idea of losing him as innocent and young as he was.
He was just 22 years when he left for Bilpam in Ethiopia for military trainings and he spent a year training so then, in that particular night, he was 23 years old, full of life and his bones and brain cells still growing. One enemy bullet to his head or heart could end all that fresh and energetic life pouring out of him. Ajoh Bol growled at that thought, a thought of receiving the news of his son’s death at that early age, without a wife and children.
As she sat there sobbing and thinking about the future of her son, the fire edged out of its original place, consuming the six woods of arm lengths to their tails. She didn’t bother to edge kindling into the fire so eventually, the fire died. As she was half naked and wore only an old and faded skirt, a skirt which had lost its flexibility because of the dirt it gathered for years. She shivered. She could feel her toothless lower and upper gums grinding. She could hear her lungs, rattling up and down in her chest in arrhythmic manner.
But she couldn’t go to her sleeping corner for a cover. She pinned her buttocks on a stool for the last 12 hours. She could feel her bladder stretching upward to her stomach to accommodate the flood of urine, streaming out of her kidneys, but she refused to excuse herself for a pee.
At five-thirty in the morning, she convinced herself to go for a rematch with her son in same conversation as of last night. When she got up, she found that numbness from sitting in the same position had paralysed her lower parts. She couldn’t stand without help so she wiggled next to the wall and seized it. She stood finally. It took her 10 minutes, thudding the ground with her feet, one at a time for her body to recover.
Having recovered, she scanned the ashes, hoping to find a live amber, but every amber is dead cold. For the first time she had to go out to her neighbours, fetching for a fire. Ever since, she been the one suppling every villager looking for fire with fire.
Mr. Deng awakened by his mother’s footsteps, rolled over negotiating with himself whether to get up and go outside or goes back to sleep. He persuaded himself to get up and look for something to do. Winter times are the busiest times.
Deng decided to do the scaring job, to scare away the sorghum eating birds. In the middle of the garden, his mother made her elder son built the platform. The platform always towers the sorghum plants so when people sit or stand on it they have better views of the whole garden. They then use slings and clods of mud to scare the birds, which always come in large numbers.
He lumbered along, towards the platform. His mother was preparing breakfast from the last night leftovers. When she heard Deng passing by, she peeped and called him back for the breakfast. Deng hurried back. They ate in silence.
After finishing, Deng left for the platform at seven-thirty in the morning, and he sat on the platform scaring away the birds until 1 p.m., that when his mother took over for him to have his lunch. He took a few minutes to gobble down his lunch and strode back to the platform….
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