How girls started having periods
BY Chijioke Chris Chuwa
Chinwendu was running late for Mama’s class again. It was the third time this month alone and she winced as she imagined the hot strokes Mama would bless her backside with.
The Oso was the most revered tradition in the land, a covenant between the first Ada and the gods. Each year, one girl from a particular age grade was chosen by lot to undergo a bleeding ritual to atone for the sin of the first Nwunye. No Oso had ever been missed since the pact was made, at least no one had lived to tell the tale of such an abomination. The Oso was held in such high regard that even the men who were eternally clueless, respected the tradition.
Tales of the repercussions were told in hushed tones around fires. It was rumoured that the Ada would visit the women’s innards with a vengeance; grinding and twisting parts and unbearable pain. She would only be appeased by the blood sacrifice of a robust child of three. No one knew the truth and no one wanted to be in the generation that found out.
Chiwendu shook out of her reverie as she spied Mama on the steps swinging her utali by her plump thighs. All excuses and explanations died on her lips as she glanced at Mama’s pinched face. Better to take her punishment in humility than suffer Mama’s stinging tongue and burning whip.
The day of the Oso dawned bright and warm, a perfect day for seducing blood thirsty spirits. Even the alarm cock held it’s peace, the reverence of the day not lost on even animals. Chiwendu rubbed at her gritty face and yawned. Her imagination had run characteristically wild in the night and she had burned the oil lamp to the wick in her inability to sleep. Chores and errands stole the entire day from her and by the time her mother was marking her body with camwood and coconut oil, Chiwendu was a ball of nerves and fatigue.
Her age grade marched out in a single file, dressed in white, the fragrance of coconut oil pervading the air. Chiwendu brought up the rear of the line, the calabash of drops of blood from each girl nestled in her palms. As Mama ascended the makeshift platform to begin the ceremony, Chiwendu swayed on her feet and the calabash crashed to the ground. Blood sprayed the feet and wrapper of the girls standing closest to her. The whole village went so silent, you could cut the tension with a knife.
Mama ground her teeth and uttered an oath. She ran back down the stairs, her large buttocks wobbling in her haste. Chiwendu didn’t wait, she stepped forward cutting her foot on one of the shards and dashed off into the forest. Freezing rain suddenly poured out of a clear night sky sending the villagers scrambling out of the village square to the safety of their homes. Fires refused to light as the downpour refused to cease for 30 days, the pleas of the chief priest and priestess fell on the deaf ears of the gods. Shivering with hunger, all the women of child bearing age doubled over a month later writhing in pain as blood poured out of them. The only women spared were those pregnant.
No one knows what became of Chiwendu or why she fled that day. Women became at war with their bodies and from that day forward nothing remained the same.
