Many people may have heard about the Odenigbo festival, many
people may not. All in all, I just decided to use this medium to share a little
light on my experience today on the “Intellectual and Cutural Festival” aspect
which I attended.
So…..I was asked to go to this festival thing by my dear
mother today. She said it was an Intellectual Cultural festival. It was meant
to be part of a larger festival named the “Odenigbo” held in Owerri every year.
I have a very limited amount of information on it at the moment however, so I
will refrain on speaking on matters I do not know a lot about. In this day and
age, the end result would be that I’d end up throwing controversy on myself if
that were the case.
So I and two of my younger siblings; Chidiebere and Eziaha
were driven down to the church premises around a few minutes to 8 o’clock in
our modest grey transport, an old bus bought a few years ago by my father for
transporting large quantities of every little thing we could think of – people included.
We stepped out of the bus once we reached the church onto
the green carpeted terrace, out to an evening of light and sound filling the
entire premises. We were wide eyed and took the entire scene in. The place was
abuzz with activity; people moving in and out everywhere, meet and greets at
every corner by people who hadn’t seen each other and their families for maybe years,
small children running around playing and all sorts of other activity I’m
really not sure how to categorize due to their ambiguity. That’s how busy the
place was.
We had come late to the event and had to push and prod
through rows of people to find a place in which we could comfortably stay to
see whatever was left of the festivities. There was a beautiful traditional
dance going on at that time though, with young boys and girls dressed in a blue
patterned material and adorned with various decorative ornaments; legwear,neckwear, anklets, earrings and the like. They moved to the beat of the drums
and flutes engaged by the other members of their group who were just a little
distance away in a beautifully choreographed expression of the igbo identity –
if I may describe it as that. It ended too soon, though understandably since we
had come late – 3 hours late by what I heard from a few people I talked to at
the event. The entire arena was illuminated by one of several different color
shades every few minutes giving it a unique aesthetic feel and as usual in
these kind of events my view was constantly blocked by several official and
otherwise self-appointed cameramen and women lounging around. These days
everybody with a smartphone is a photographer you see….
Next, and last – as I was to eventually find out, was a play
which was basically extolling the virtues of Christianity by pitting a native/ritual
doctor against a Catholic priest. A woman was being oppressed after the death of
her husband, which she was accused of and implored the priest for his
assistance. Just the typical Africa Magic melodrama, which ultimately was
actually not too bad. The priest was dressed in white and purple, conspicuously
holding a large yellow bible as well as a rosary. The ritual doctor was a woman
dressed in red who had one eye encircled in white powder/makeup, and was holding
up a wooden staff with a crooked end. The play proceeded as you guessed it
would, ending with a confrontation between the Christian and traditional
parties where the Catholic priest defeated the ritual doctor by bursting out in
song and prayer causing the audience to erupt into a mighty cheer with applause
at all ends. Some women in the audience
were dancing during the song as well. The ritual doctor keeled over, and the
oppressor of the woman came out, writhing in agony and probably confessing all
his misdeeds.
All in all, it was quite the enjoyable learning experience.
I wish I could have been there much earlier, and as the entire event was
completely in igbo, I also wished my command of the igbo language “asusu igbo” was much stronger so that I
may have understood more than I was able to take in that day. As confident as I
am in my command of the language to “communicate” with my fellow igbos, I know
it is limited to my experience and needs. I’m still not sure what I’d do if I ever
come across to what people come to what is referred to as “conc igbo” – thick,
accented, local igbo that would scare anybody in my generation away. But that
is one of the aims of the Odenigbo festival. To enable us, especially the youth
to understand, accept and embrace our igbo identity and culture. The traditions
and history that come with it.
In the paraphrased igbo words of the Archbishop Obinna; Maka
I na-echeta omenalla ndi igbo eba any na I mata ebe any si. It’s paraphrased of
course because my retention of igbo exactly as it’s said in that kind of
condition is not much to boast of at the moment.
Thank you for
coming here. Daalu.
Igbo, Omenaala
and Kolanut
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