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| Illustration by Angelica Alzona |
(By Adaobi
Tricia Nwaubani) - My parents’ home, in
Umujieze, Nigeria, stands on a hilly plot that has been in our family for more
than a hundred years. Traditionally, the Igbo people bury their dead among the
living, and the ideal resting place for a man and his wives is on the premises
of their home. My grandfather Erasmus, the first black manager of a Bata shoe
factory in Aba, is buried under what is now the visitors’ living room. My
grandmother Helen, who helped establish a local church, is buried near the
study. My umbilical cord is buried on the grounds, as are those of my four
siblings. My eldest brother, Nnamdi, was born while my parents were studying in
England, in the early nineteen-seventies; my father, Chukwuma, preserved the
dried umbilical cord and, eighteen months later, brought it home to bury it by
the front gate. Down the hill, near the river, in an area now overrun by bush,
is the grave of my most celebrated ancestor: my great-grandfather Nwaubani
Ogogo Oriaku. Nwaubani Ogogo was a slave trader who gained power and wealth by
selling other Africans across the Atlantic. “He was a renowned trader,” my
father told me proudly. “He dealt in palm produce and human beings.”
