By
Obododimma
Oha
The idea of
“mpanaaka” (literally, handheld meal) should be familiar to many children who
grew up in rural Igboland. In some Igbo dialects, the term is used in referring
to a kind of emergency bush lantern, normally held in the hand, too, with a
thread to draw paraffin and give light while cooking or looking for something in
the dark. It also speaks of poverty and ancientness and is hardly found in many
parts of Igboland today. But “mpanaaka”
as food gift is not a happy term, for it conjures up a marked distinction
between proper feeding from a dish, administered by a parent who really cares,
and another parent who feeds a child that is an outsider, just for the
fulfillment of all righteousness. In other words, somebody who calls it “mpanaaka”
has already encoded an attitude of objection to it, as not being “real caring.”But
let us even take its very context further: giving “mpanaaka” to a child occurs
when that child has visited the homestead, maybe that child’s parents are away
or have not got food ready. Greedy children observing a family devour a
sumptuous meal may prompt this giving of “mpanaaka” as a way of “reducing” the
weight of the observation or a response to the pathos evoked by an embarrassing stare. The child given “mpanaaka” or
who eats “mpanaaka” (“iri mpanaaka””) may also get it as a reward for the usual
visit, called “ịpụ ufere” or “ịpụ ọrịrị” (going out for recreation). Usually,
this “ufere” is to another homestead believed to be on friendly terms with own
homestead. Although children sometimes spend their “ufere” in the “enemy”
territory and may be given “mpanaaka” out of additional spite, spending “ufere”
is usually in homesteads approved by adults. In that context, “mpanaaka” is not
really given to the child at “ufere” but to the “invisible”witnesses of the
“kind” gesture performed, witnesses and visitors who may have come to spend
“ufere” along with the child.
These days
when children can easily be kidnapped or used for ritual, apart from
postcolonial elitist alienations from community, “ịpụ ufere” and “mpanaaka” are
casualties. They are fast-dying practices. Moreover, children may be sternly
warned by their parents not to accept “mpanaaka” (in which case the child would
be in a dilemma whether to accept or not, especially if the child finds the
food particularly irresistible or is hungry. It brings up a big probem for
risk-taking in “iri mpanaaka.” Is accepting “mpanaaka” to be decided by the
child who has a conscience and is pushed by other variables, or should the
child, who is considered a minor and
is denied his or her rights, listen the guiding voice of the adult who has
obviously been distorted and spoilt by the politics of the world?
Another
thing: “mpanaaka” may become “more delicious” than the dish the child has known
all along in his or her parents’ homestead. It may even be of poor quality and
badly prepared, but the child who receives an “mpanaaka” could value it much
and rate it higher. In that case, the child has an additional psychological
reason to take “mpanaaka” out there. Have stolen apples stopped being tastier
than the ones properly bought or harvested? In that line, too, “mpanaaka” could
be attractive and taste “better” because it is from that other homestead.
As one
recollects “mpanaaka” and its presence in the childhood of many that are Igbo
elites today, one thinks, too, of the psychological and philosophical issues it
brings up, especially childhood as the context of personal choice and
decision-making. Also, are adults training children to continue prejudices or
to end them, to build community or to destroy existing ones?
What of the
macro-level of “iri mpannaka” in global “ịpụ ufere?” Are not some countries
perpetually greedy and watching the lips of another organized nation-family at
table? Are they not perpetually begging with their eyes, following the morsel
as it enters the mouth, and even swallowing nothing except their saliva when
the other swallows the food? “Mpanaaka” countries amuse me in their attachment
to discarded things, alias “tokunbo.” “Mpanaaka” countries wait for others to
produce, even theories! Then, they queue
up hungrily to receive pieces on the palms of their hands, hoping to
impress the less-fortunate fans who bring up the rear. “Mpanaaka” countries do
not understand who owns and controls this global playground and how. “Mpanaaka”
countries, in their hunger for food from the other homestead should know that
they are symbolically saying very sad things about their own homesteads and
their mothers.
Now, you can
see that, in spite of some good things in “mpanaaka,” I am on the side of those
mothers who frown when their children eat it!
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