Against All Odds

Chapter Thirty Two: To stay away

The cassava plants had been growing well,their stems were increasing in size and their leaves became greener. Obi remembered the last time they came to apply "akpala", fowl faeces and fertilizer to the ground to add more nutrients to the growing plants.

They did this to ensure that during harvest sizeable tubers of the cassava would be harvested. Their corn had been half consumed as she noticed that most of the corn plants had been cut down and the maize cob removed. There were still few maize plants standing randomly in the farm. Their okra plants were being harvested and their mother whistled happily as she filled their basket with Okra fruits.

Obi's mother had instructed her to weed while she harvested and Obi carefully pulled out the grasses around the mounds where their crops were planted using a hoe. Obi hadn't told her mother about where she had gone two weeks ago and surprisingly none of her siblings had exposed her secret.

Weeds Obi abhorred, had started growing on the farm, enter twining with plants and causing Obi injuries. All Obi could think of was what they had learnt in Agricultural studies about weeds competing with plants for nutrients,which was their major disadvantage . Tobe and the girls were at home and the only time came to the farm was when he brought water for Obi and her mother.

Obi battled with a weed called "touch and die" which had little thorns that she found herself painfully extracting from her hands occasionally as she worked. They often dug into her flesh and caused her itching, the other weed was even more dangerous than the first.

It was known as "agbara" or in the biological term Mucuna flagellipes. Obi could never forget the name of the plant because of the project their Agricultural teacher had given them. They were supposed to make an album made up of leaves of known weeds, labeled with their biological names. They had textbooks with pictures of known weeds at their disposal and all they had to do was go to the farm, fish out weeds and attach them to their album.

They had gotten so many weeds that day including :carpet grass(Axonopus compressus) Amaranthus spinosus, Elephant grass (Peniseptum pupureum) Sida acuta etc but when Obi's eyes sighted the last weed deep in mazi Onwukwe, the village palmwine tapper's farm,she decided she had to add it to their album.

Obi went into the bush and began to cut the grass with her hands. It was a creeping grass which bore hairy pea-like seeds. Obi gathered enough to go round her classmates and as soon as she got of the bush she knew their album had become complete
When Obi squatted to distribute the leaves, Cynthia plucked the seed and tossed it on Obi's head and in the bid to shake it off, the fruit rolled inside Obi's uniform. It took enough wriggling and screaming by the girls to get it out.

But by the time it left her clothes, the damage had already been done. Obi barely made it to the school premises before half stripping herself and scratching her body like she was flea infested.

When she got home home that day mma advised that she uses palm Oil,which alleviated the itching moments later. Ever since the embarrassing incident Obi developed a grave phobia for touch and die.
She was too careful dodging and pulling them off without making contact. They were almost done with farm work before Obi heard Chioma's voice.

Chioma carefully maneuvered into farm, bending cassava stems and often bending to avoid breaking them.she threw a quick greeting to Obi's mother before coming towards Obi.

Chioma seemed excited and threw her hands around Obi shaking her vigorously before expressing her source of excitement.
"My aunt Judith spoke with my dad yesterday, she's coming to Nigeria. We're going to see her in Lagos!! She came with my cousins, it's been so long. Obi she said she brought lots of things for Obiefune and I, don't worry I'll share mine with you!"