Afua's Tale

This is my story 'Afua's Tale' It is a long and complete piece of writing.
I've structured it so that you can skip to any part that you like! 

It's one of my most favourite stories that I have ever written because it really hits home, (not just because the protagonists' name is the same as my own Ghanaian name).

It is about the slave trade and is a fictional recount, by a fourteen year old girl that has been taken from Ghana and travels through the middle passage to America. 

This story was actually a history project from last year!!

I am so happy that I was given the chance to express three things that I love so dearly in this project. Writing, My Ethnicity (Nigerian and Ghanaian) and History. 

Click below to skip between different diary entries!

Day 1 

Day 2 

Day 3 

Day 4 

Day 5 

Day 1 Monday 7^th July 1802

Hello Diary,

You are fairly new and I'm sure you will be a great comfort to me in the same way my old one was. 

                             

Dear Ekuwa (my most treasured friend in the world) has somehow managed to find paper for me and has bound many pieces together in order to make you!

You see diary I'm scared, terrified even! Terrified in such a way that I can barely write. Nearly a year ago I had just bid my mother and father farewell and made my way to the beach…

My beloved beach oh how I miss it! I do however miss my people and family the most, the Ga people one of the two peoples in Accra, beautiful, strong, intelligent and courageous (With my father as their chief of course).

I loved my mother and father in a way that’s indescribable they were what I lived for and what I still live for in hope that I will one day see them again.

Just thinking about them makes me feel like drowning in a huge wave of tears and self-pity. As I was saying before I met Ekuwa at the beach and we played in the soft hot sand and the beautiful blue sea happy and thankfully blessed. When suddenly, entirely out of nowhere sprung out strange pale skinned human like creatures much like the Mediterranean people I had seen father talking to a few years ago but the difference is, is that these people were even paler and had pure anger and hatred plus something that came across as greed displayed and spread out across their face as if they were hungry lions that had just spotted a juicy gazelle.

My natural instincts were telling me to run but my feet were glued to the sand then much to my horror stood the village outcasts (Kwaku and Yaw). Ekuwa grabbed me and we tried to run feet burning heart pounding head hurting but of course it was no use… They chained our hands, feet and neck and dragged us to a dangerous part of the beach.

Ekuwa and I stared in awe at an enormous ugly building that stood before us and had almost appeared as if by magic. We were shoved inside and the pale men examined us and poked and prodded us and looked at us in places that were quite inappropriate. I tried to scream but my throat wouldn't work. I felt like I had just swallowed all the sand on the beach and couldn't even whisper.

As the doors were closing I saw the pale men hand Yaw and Kwaku something heavy and lots of shiny things.

Ekuwa and I didn't understand what had happened and why we were there we just cried silent tears and prayed. A few hours later a big door opened and I thought ‘finally my prayers have been answered! We are now safe’ but instead different pale men came and they had masses of people from all over Ghana! I could see Fante people; Ashanti people Akan people and many more!

I was shocked but many things shocked me. Many things indeed, the first thing was how awful the people looked! Many bleeding with open wounds and puss pouring out. They all looked tired and hungry and thirsty and desperate. They must have been travelling for an excruciatingly long time and looks like they have  travelled by foot. (And I thought that travelling from Accra to Kumasi on the back of a Camel was extreme).

The next thing that shocked me was how many people there were and how only 6 pale men could control them all and bring them here.

Days passed weeks even (with barely any food or water) and the same thing kept happening more and more people kept being shoved examined and imprisoned in this ugly building when one day the door opened and people began to get dragged out by even more pale men with a ridiculous was of speaking and bizarre accents!

Goodness Gracious I must go now diary! I will write in you later I promise!

Day 2 Tuesday 8^th July 1802

Good evening diary,

Ekuwa snuck me some candles and matches so I may write in you tonight.

Where was I … ah yes …

We were all dragged to a huge boat and no matter how hard we tried to get away we were thrown on the boat and forced to lie down on our sides. I desperately looked around for Ekuwa but she was nowhere to be found. I was too weak to cry so instead I slept.

When I woke up I couldn't move a muscle there were people all around me crying, groaning, vomiting and to my greatest horror there were pale men throwing many over board.

It became extremely dark and I couldn't see a thing for quite a while. I heard whips cracking and the pale men yelling and suddenly I saw a light a bright light but this time I was not deceived and I knew I was not dead, I knew the torture would keep coming. I knew I was not safe.

We were separated into male and female and dragged and forced to walk. I thought my limbs would drop off at any second. I had purple red and black marks all over my back. I just wanted to be back home in my cosy bed and my loved ones by my side.

A very fat pale man stood in front of us and started dancing like a wild baboon. I cocked my head to the side to try and interpret his message; I soon got my answer as Africans all around me started mimicking him. So I did too and as soon as I leapt once I fell hard to the ground. The pain was so severe that my tears couldn't even fall. I shakily stood up and looked at the man. With hatred I had never experienced before and muttered the most evil Juju curse I could come up with. And I screamed for the first time. Not in fear but in anger and frustration. These ugly weird savages. These nasty unhuman beings. Look at what they have done to us; the people of Africa.

Through all my anger I started to realize that they possessed all the power and all the control. I stopped screaming before the pale man could identify who it was and tried my best to dance like a baboon with rabies.

As we were all jumping around a sudden burst of pain hit my back. I couldn't hold it in and cried out and then I noticed so had everyone else. They threw seawater on us. On our raw backs. I don’t know what planet these people come from but they certainly are not Earth natives. No one I have ever known could ever even think of being that cruel! Not even Kwaku or Yaw.

We were pushed back onto the boat and then fed with the most revolting gloopy substance I had ever seen. I couldn't eat. I just couldn't. The smell around me could kill a herd of cattle. I was lying in something brown, green and sloppy and all over my body lay gashes of all shapes and sizes.

Some Africans started singing the only thing besides each other that could keep them happy. I recognised one song sung by the person in front of me and tapped them on the back.

I couldn't believe who it was when they rolled over. It was Kofi oh dear diary it was beautiful Kofi. Kofi was the boy that I was to be betrothed to however the truth is, is that we were already in love (but only mother knew that).

When I saw his face I cried tears but this time it was tears of joy and sadness mixed in and he did the same! I whispered to him "Wɔkpiti eŋɔɔ" and he replied "Mi sumo bo". A sweet promise between the two of us.

He noticed that I hadn't touched my food and pushed it towards me and nodded his head. At that moment I understood. I understood that I had to stay strong for him, For Ekuwa who I may never see again and for everyone back home. And so I ate every last morsel of the nasty substance and prayed and prayed and prayed.

The journey was excruciatingly long however most of which was spent holding Kofi’s hand.

One sunny day the boat shook and jolted to a bumpy but firm halt.

We were dragged out and pushed into a building much like the ugly one back in Ghana but smaller. That’s when I noticed… when I noticed that less than half of us actually survived this strange and evil journey and that made my heart break into a billion pieces that could never be glued together.

I have to sleep now diary as I am needed on the tobacco field early next morning so I will write in you then. Goodnight my dear friend.

Day 3 Wednesday 9^th July 1802

Good Morning diary,

It is lunchtime and I am now ready to continue my story.

Something very strange happened after that!

One by one they began to haul us out of the prison and inspect us and then shove us back in. Very strange behaviour if I do say so myself.

After the ‘inspection’ something equally strange started to happen. The fittest African men were forced to stand on a podium whilst a pale man said words I could not understand and then handed the African man to the last pale man that raised his hand. The man was struggling with all his might bound in chains and taken away on an animal much like a donkey but slightly bigger.

There were many pale men and women dressed in the most outrageous clothes I had set my eyes on. The women were smiling; laughing and communicating with the men. Children were also present in the crowd playing with wooden objects very different to our own toys.

I watched in great confusion and fear as one by one the male equivalent of my species began to disappear some to the same pale man; others, taken away immediately.

One of the light skinned men that had inspected me earlier came and opened our cage and dragged a young girl that looked about my age. I heard her scream and froze. I knew that scream it was Ekuwa! I jumped to my feet and screamed her name. She was in the middle of trying to fight off a pale man however when she heard my scream she flinched and nearly turned around but didn't. 

That one action told me that she had no hope that we would ever see each other again for she hated goodbyes and so I watched closely as several pale men jumped onto the podium and poked and prodded her body and started to raise their hands. When finally the last hand shot up and the wooded hammer made contacts with a part of the podium and I watched her still in chains and screaming get handed to a rather slim pale man (most of which were quite fat) and thrown into a wooded cart.

The man that took her stayed in the crowd and even if she didn't have hope I did. I started to pray with all my might that I would be thrown into that wooden cart beside her.

The male cage was reopened and to my greatest horror Kofi was the next struggling African. When I saw him clearly I gasped in despair He was bound in heavier looking chains and had been abused, he had fresh cuts in the neat lines.

Apart from the gashes Kofi was very fit and in a good condition compared to other boys his age and so I wasn't surprised when many of the men began to raise their hand and shout at each other angrily. I was extremely shocked and happy however when the man that took Ekuwa was the last man to raise his hand surely that means that he had won Kofi?! And I was right he took Kofi and somewhat gentler than how he handled Ekuwa put him on the cart.

The man then sat on his animal and I started to cry because I thought that he was going to leave but he didn't he stayed. African after African, men, women and children were brought onto the podium and dragged away and every time the man that has Ekuwa and Kofi bid I prayed and prayed that he would lose and by the grace of God he did.

Before I knew it, it was my turn to stand up on the podium and I was terrified but too emotionally worn out to even whisper. The pale man came up onto the podium and played with my arms and face and then went back into the crowd to raise their hands.

My heart beat slowed down and I could hear it so clearly it scared me and I looked directly into the eyes of the pale man that had Ekuwa and Kofi. I waited and waited for him to raise his hand and even though I had only been standing on the podium for a few minutes it felt like hours. The pale man didn't raise his hand once and the tears began to fall. 

I didn't even pay attention to the man that had won me but just as the hammer was about to bang onto the wood just above me the pale man that had Ekuwa and Kofi raised his hand and for the first time in forever I smiled, I smiled a warm smile, which shocked a lot of people around me especially the Africans left that were watching. I didn't struggle when the man came to collect me and let him place me in the wooden wagon.

I didn't react to Kofi and Ekuwa when I got into the carriage I just closed my eyes and silently prayed. I prayed for a good 5 minutes and just thanked the amazing miracle worker above for helping me survive the boat journey and reuniting me with the 2 most important people to me in this strange land.

After I finished praying I turned to Ekuwa and saw that she was sobbing, I wrapped my arms around her but didn't tell her everything would be ok. I wanted to but couldn't bring myself to, I couldn't lie to her when I was just as scared as she was. The only thing that stopped me from breaking down into tears was the fact that I knew I had to be that little bit stronger than her so she felt that tiny bit safer.

I turned my head to look at Kofi and he just simply kissed my forehead and rested his chin on top of my head. After a few seconds I could feel droplets trickling down my head and realized that he too was crying.

It made me remember that even though back home he was training to be a great leader and a fierce warrior, he was still only a 14 year old boy scared and worried just like Ekuwa and I. We are only weak children that cannot fend for ourselves against the great white beast…

I must go again diary, I am so sorry but I will continue later.

Day 4 Thursday 10^th July 1802

Hello my dearest diary, how are you?

I shall continue telling you my story now.

We arrived at a place covered in plants and grass. I was very surprised to see other people that looked just like me on this site. Some looked miserable and had gashes all over them and pale men yelling at them whereas others appeared to be  laughing and joking with each other, but they all seemed to be working, working very hard.

I tried to crawl out of the wagon but the pale man stopped me and roughly pushed me back in. Another pale man slowly walked up to the wagon that Ekuwa, Kofi and I were in. He had a weapon in his hand much like the one I saw the other pale men using on some Africans back on the ship. He stared at us and I started to stare back giving him my best warrior glare I could, to show him that I was not afraid (even though I was very scared).

He laughed as if he knew what I was doing and used his weapon on me. It felt like a tsunami on fire had just hit my arm and I tried my best not to cry out. It left a thin red line on my arm and my arm continued to bleed. The man with the weapon yelled something and other humans like me rushed up to us and began to pull us off the wagon.

They took us to a place that looked very much like a small wooden house and left us there.  And this strange place diary that I am talking about is where I still am.It is called a plantation and all the people like me have to work and work for the pale men.

I am a field hand for half of the day and for the other half I help in the big house which is where Master Peters and his wife and children live.  

Kofi is a field hand and works in the field all day, Poor Kofi gets whipped daily by the pale man with the weapon. 

The Pale man with the weapon is called an overseer and his weapon is called a whip. Ekuwa in my eyes was extremely lucky and works in the big house all day. All she has to do is cook and clean, serve food and sew clothes, but Ekuwa hates it, she takes it as a great offence and thinks that Master Peters put her there because he thinks she isn't strong enough to work on a field. However I know this is not the case. Ekuwa is very clever and I'm sure Master Peters just doesn't want her to find a way out, besides a clever girl must be able to learn their language very quickly, (Master Peters is the pale man that took me from the podium).

The place where the podium was is called an auction. Master Peters didn't win Kofi, Ekuwa and I as I thought he did. He had to pay for us.  He owns us now. We are his slaves.

You are probably wondering how I figured all of this out but the truth is… I didn't. Instead I was told. I was told by a very wise 45 year old Nigerian man called Chuka. Chuka was captured from the Igbo land in Nigeria as a very young boy and but on a smaller ship to help the pale men navigate around West Africa. He was of course forced to learn their language and because he travelled a lot he learnt many other African languages. However when the white men that he was with had decided they had all they needed and wanted to settle in ‘America’ (the country that I am in) they sold him to a passing by Master Peters. Chuka was master peters’ first slave and had been enslaved for just over 20 years.

Chuka knows the white savages’ game. He knows what they are doing and made sure that the rest of us slaves know too. We are part of The Slave Trade Triangle…

A place named ‘Europe’ took people like us from Africa -and still are- and put them on a boat (just like us) and take them to ‘America’ (where I am now). We work and work to produce precious goods for Europe.

Europe then takes those things and makes thing into even more valuable things and sells them to greedy bad Africans (Yaw and Kwaku). And the triangle would start again.

I asked Chuka when the triangle will end and he simply replied ‘it doesn't’. Those two words made me sick with worry for the fate of my home.

Chuka is a very kind teacher to us children, telling us all tales from his travelling days and stories of his childhood. He taught Kofi, Ekuwa and I the white people’s language which is called ‘English’ and let the overseer believe that he taught us English which I find very amusing. As soon as I could understand English I was given a new name ‘Janet’. Of course I answered to the name and acted as if I was learning how to be a proper slave but really I wasn't. I refused to learn and still do. I know who I am. I know where I come from and no cruel beast can ever take that away from me!

There you have it diary, the events of my life leading up to now. I must go, goodbye and I will see you tomorrow.

Day 5 Friday 11^th July 1802

Hello Diary, now I have my story so far out of the way. I can write in you properly.

The morning bell has just gone off which means that I have five minutes to eat my breakfast and get out onto the field, to worm the tobacco plants and fetch water. After that I have to sweep the dining hall clear the table (which I get to do with Ekuwa). Then I go have to rush back out to the field to mentor young Benji and teach him how to pick the cotton buds from the cotton plants since the overseer is too lazy to do it himself. Benji is 5 and was born into slavery and doesn't know what it’s like to be free. His mother died a few minutes after he was born (so I am told) and I have promised myself to make sure that these people do not brainwash him, I tell him stories of Africa every night and I am slowly teaching him Ga. 

What I am doing is tremendously risky however Benji cannot grow up thinking that he is a nothing because he is a very imaginative boy and is without a doubt something special and when we find a way out; he will be something great. I just know it.

After I help Benji pick the cotton buds, I go to the far side of the plantation to harvest corn. As I am on my way I hear an ear piercing scream and I turn to see Kofi being tied to a tree and whipped several times then untied kicked and punched in-between his legs and then tied and whipped again. It was the overseer; he was beating Kofi but why?

I ran over to the overseer and tried to stop him. It was a very foolish move but I had to do something. The overseer shouted gruffly ‘get off me girl’ and started whipping Kofi again and so I ran in front of the whip and let it crack on my back, I hadn't been whipped for so long that I didn't remember how painful it was and fell to my knees. 

I looked up and saw that this whip had spikes on it, metal spikes. I just couldn't believe my eyes. I shouldn't have been that surprised that the white men would think of weapons like this to hurt us but I was. 

‘I TOLD YOU TO STAY AWAY, ONE MORE STUNT LIKE THAT GIRL AND YOU WILL GET EXACTLY WHAT HE’S GETTING’ The overseer roared. 

‘Please Afua just go, I’ll be fine. Just leave’ I heard Kofi whisper and I saw the pleading look in his eyes and just as I was about to turn away the overseer snarled words that made my blood boil.

‘You see nigger that’s your problem she is not Afua she is Janet you are not Kofi you are Johnny, you are not people, you are slaves, worthless good-for-nothing niggers, you are by far one of the most revolting things I've seen and not one White Man cares a tuppence about you! Believe me boy if I could put an end to you, all of you right now on the spot I would!’

After I heard those words a ran, I abandoned my corn duties and raced into the overseers cabin and spat on everything in sight, smashed something made out of glass and dashed into the slave house and cried. 

I soon heard the bell for the second half of the day and made my way into the big house to clear up the Master’s lunch. As soon as I saw Ekuwa she knew something was wrong and I broke down into her arms and sobbed ‘Kofi, Overseer, mess, wounded, bandages, later, please’ and she instantly understood dried my tears and nodded and told me to carry on as normal for the rest of the day.

So I did just that and when it was time for us all to wash up for the end of the day she had all I needed.

I found Kofi angrily muttering to himself and kicking the dirt by his cornhusk mattress. He turned to me and I saw the finished result from what the overseer had done to him. Kofi’s face was red and dark purple.

He had cuts all over his arms and legs and a big lash across his forehead. The wounds on his back were so deep that the blood was no longer flowing red but black and his knees were swollen.

I wasn't surprised but I felt miserable and angry. I stayed silent and just stared then I sat down on my own corn husk mattress and just stared into space. He looked at me and I could tell from his body language that he was trying to say sorry. 

I sort of ignored him. Not because I didn't forgive him, I knew that it wasn't his fault in any way shape or form. But I needed to concentrate in what time to get my supplies out so it would be safe before and after lights out.

I just sat there and waited in silence. The overseer came in to check on us. To check that we were behaving and getting ready to sleep. He snarled in my direction and laughed at Kofi. It took every ounce of good in me, to not attempt to murder that thing, there and then. I just couldn't wait until he got to his house and see’s the damage that I had made.

I waited until lights out and when I made sure that there were no white beings lurking around, I woke Kofi up; lit some candles and took out the supplies that Ekuwa had begged the Master for. 

I owe that girl a lot now. She hates the master and hates begging even more. And to make matters worse for her she had to pretend she had ‘female’ problems and wouldn't be able to work the next day unless she had ‘bandages, anaesthetic and a sponge’. 

Master Peters had a strange soft spot for Ekuwa (which she even more strangely despised) and he gave her the things she needed and told her she better work three times as hard to make up for the extra ‘treats’ she got.

As I was saying, I woke Kofi up; lit some candles and took out the bandages, anaesthetic and a sponge with a bucket of clean water from the well. I beckoned him over and put his mattress underneath mine so I would be higher up than him and told him to sit on the floor. He gave me a questioning look; probably wondering where I got the supplies from and I started to clean his wounds.

I hated, hated, hated the sight of blood when I was in Ghana. But being on the plantation meant that you saw a lot of it and so I had to get used to seeing wounds, sometimes much worse than Kofi’s.

One time the overseer even shot old Uncle Paul because he refused to give Annie his granddaughter to the overseer one night. It was one of the most frightening sights, and I knew there and then that white people are a reflection of the devil himself, because only he would ever think of something so nastily unforgiving. 

Once I had bandaged Kofi up, I gave him, his mattress and lay him down. For the anaesthetic made his wounds even more painful. All of this was done in utter silence. For many reasons. The first was that I was deep in thought, wondering things about this cruel world we live in.

Secondly I didn't want to wake anyone up because they would want to help and I wanted to help Kofi myself and because they all had busy mornings tomorrow especially since it was Saturday the next day.

And third, I knew that Kofi was in a lot of pain and so I didn't want him to have to speak. And suddenly, I remembered what the overseer had said to him earlier and I went over to his mattress stroked his cheek and said. “I love you” he nodded and tried to say it back but I knew his lip wound would open again so stopped him and kissed him gently and told him to sleep.

The next morning when the overseer was by me when I was peeling worms off the tobacco plants I shouted “I AM AFUA” and spat on his shoe and kicked his shins and ran away laughing, the old fat lump couldn't catch me and I knew I was in big trouble later but I didn't care. Those actions told him things I wouldn't say aloud!

In the end they WILL PAY.

They can take us but they can’t take who we are…

I am Afua

I am 14 3/4 years old

I am Ga

I am not theirs 

Ne    

If you enjoyed this story and would like to see more of my work (e.g. songs, poems), be sure to let me know and hit me up on any of my social media sites above! If you have any requests for any writing (e.g. carry on chapters from popular books and films), be sure to conatct me!