Good bye Nana

Nana with AM's brother Abrantie

It’s a sad thing to happen at this time of year, but AM’s grandmother in Ghana died on Christmas eve. DadaK, not wanting to spoil Xmas, didn’t tell me until the end of our family BBQ yesterday.  What a brave man. I couldn’t have done it.  I had wondered why he kept telling me funny stories all day – I guess it was to keep his mind off it.

So it’s good that we went to Ghana when we did. AM will always be able to remember her. The grandma who liked eating cows foot soup, waved her walking stick at naughty children and didn’t care who saw her without her top on.

I’m glad she got to meet him again before she died. (They blew bubbles together in Mensakrom when he was four).  Nana was more tolerant of his outrageous daring than of her other grandchildren – he was the only one who got to ride in her wheelchair.  She found it pretty funny that he wanted to give her hugs every time her saw her. She thought he was very handsome and said he was her husband. This is a form of Ghanaian endearment I can’t quite get my head around. He had to give her 5 cedis when we left, because husbands don’t go away  without leaving their wives some money.

Nana was funny, forthright, generous and strong. She had two husbands, but reckoned the first one was no good. She bore eleven children and lost six. She has more descendents than she or I could count. In the 1940s she and her second husband (DadaK’s dad) and some friends hacked out farms and founded a village in the tropical rainforest of Ghana where they  farmed cocoa, plantains, cassava and cocoyam. She was a devout Christian and sang hyms to herself in the afternoons.  She liked boiled peanuts, etoh, dokono, palm nut soup and mangoes. No-one seems to really know who old she was.

AM with Nana in the village when he was 4.

The children all told me “don’t eat with Nana, her food is yucky”, but sometimes I did, and it wasn’t. She liked having company when she ate, it meant a lot to her.  She’d always keep a morsel of meat for Daniel, the great-grandson who was in her care. She’d secrete it under the lid of her cup until he next bounced into the room.

In spite of her having no English and me having very basic Twi, we communicated fairly well about the basics – what foods we liked, where people were, had I showered yet, would I buy her some tea bread, etc. For more complex conversations I’d rope in family members to translate, with varying success.

She was bedridden, I think because of a stroke, and in a lot of pain. I’d give her a massage most nights with the hot ointment DadaK told me to bring from Australia. She was depressed about not being able to walk, so I’d listen to her about that.  I hadn’t really expected to slide so neatly into this daughter-in-law role, but I liked it.  I find it a privilege to get to care for my elders at the end of their life. But it’s not always easy.

In Australia there are a lot of services for older people. Sometimes this is necessary because they have no family, so being old here isn’t easy either, but combine it with family support and people can age more comfortably. My father is showered every day by a community nurse. He has a state of the art walking frame and the backup of physiotherapists to make sure he uses it properly and maintains his strength. He even has someone come in to clip his toenails.  In Ghana all the care  falls on the family, and it can be a burden.  In Nana’s case there were several people to care for her, but they were very tired by it (people in pain can be very cranky and demanding). And because they’d moved away from the village where she spent most of her life, there was no-one to come and just be her friend. Church members wouldn’t come by because she cried too much when she saw them. Grrr. What kind of christians are they?

I bought Nana a wheelchair but she couldn’t go anywhere in it except the bathroom. The corridors were blocked by water barrels and the yard outside was uneven.  Even if they’d fixed that, the roads were unpaved and eroded, virtually impassable even for cars. The wheelchair made it easier for her daughter Serwaa to get her to the shower, but it didn’t give Nana much more freedom. No zipping up to the shops for a browse and a chat on a motorised chair, like people get to do in richer countries. I think of her as the invisible face of poverty. Children are probably most affected in poor countries, but spare a thought for the elders who suffer behind closed doors.

So these last couple of years have been difficult for Nana. She wanted to go to God and now she has. May she rest in peace.

Girls and dolls

Long ago, in the deep mists of time before electronics invaded children’s play, I had a vast collection of dolls.  I held tea parties for them, I created designer clothes, styled their hair, enacted soap operas with and to them. They were a fairly diverse bunch: baby dolls, toddlers, teenagers, miniatures, trolls with green hair, dolls whose hair ‘grew’ and even two dolls ‘of colour’.

One was literally as black as licorice, a skin tone no real human actually has. I found it puzzling then and still do.  The other, Kimi, was a beautiful warm reddish brown that bore a slightly better resemblance to reality – although I don’t think people living in the arctic circle are really that brown, and she was dressed as an eskimo, with a faux-fur trimmed parka to die for.

These two dolls may have been the only dark skinned people in my entire social network. Looking back, I’m impressed that in the 1960s a little girl living on a farm in an almost entirely white anglo-celtic rural area, could own and love a black doll and a brown one.  Especially because I’m realising that in the 21st century, in Australia’s biggest city, you’d be hard pressed to find even one in any little girl’s collection.

I’m reflecting on this because I’ve decided to give Treasure a doll for Christmas. I could picture it – a little girl doll with gorgeous hair, a sweet face and pretty clothes, with whom Treasure would instantly fall in love. And because Treasure doesn’t currently have any dolls (I think the one she had got left in Ghana, & it was more of a soft toy anyway), it would of course be a ‘Black’ doll. If she loves dolls and develops a collection, I’m all for diversity, but for a first doll, I think it should fit into her Black family.

I’ve rarely had reason to venture into the ‘pink aisles’ at Target and K-Mart before so I didn’t realise what a big ask this would be. Having a family of boys means I’m much more familiar with the ‘camouflage’ war, death and destruction aisles. I’d really prefer to always buy educational construction & exploration toys and try & steer clear of gender-stereotyped toys, but I’ve found that the children just don’t appreciate my political correctness. And now after so many boys I’m enjoying the opportunity to indulge in buying girlie things. Treasure is surrounded by people who feel the same way. I wonder if she will grow up with a passionate hatred of pink.

But back to dolls. Three big chainstores were my first stops. Did I find the doll of my dreams? No. Apart from a small doll in a cup cake (did she even have legs??), the best they could offer was an olive skinned Bratz doll or Taylor, a black teenage character from High School Musical with, I’m sorry to be so judgemental but these things are important, a very daggy dress.  If Treasure still likes dolls when she’s seven or eight I might buy her a teen doll but for now, I want to get her a doll she can cuddle, a doll that looks like her.

I sought advice from friends with mixed race daughters and even from work colleagues. No-one could help:

 ”I think I saw one at … umm …. I’ll tell you if I remember”. Gee, thanks. 

“Well, we do have quite a lot of black dolls but they were hard to get and you’ll probably have to compromise and get a Bratz.” Thanks – how about we start a ‘black doll buyers’ support group?

“Have you tried Oxfam?” No, because I’ve given her one in the past and she wasn’t that impressed, and  although some of them are cute, they’re rag dolls and thus don’t fit my criteria.

I realised I was on my own with this.

My next stop was a local independent, educational and politically correct toy shop. Not a Bratz or teenage doll in sight. They had a couple of brown baby dolls. But they didn’t have real hair, just moulded plastic curls. Sorry, this doll has to have gorgeous hair. It probably won’t stay gorgeous, but it has to start out that way. I’m a bit dubious about baby dolls anyway – I mean the ones that are supposed to look realistic, i.e. like wrinkled prunes. Do little kids really like them? Those baby dolls didn’t have sweet faces either, and they were really expensive,  so I added them to my list of  “only if desperate”.

The same shop did, however have a doll that would have totally fit the bill had Treasure been of Asian heritage and I was strongly tempted to buy her.  She was what I call a “little girl” doll and she fit all the criteria of gorgeous hair (sweeping black pigtails) sweet face (easily identifiable as Asian) and pretty clothes (a colourful dress). I think she may be the only Asian doll I’ve ever seen, and I almost bought her for the same reason I buy picture books about children of colour: they’re so rare you have to snap them up in case you never see them again. It’s outrageous really. In my adventures so far I’ve found it’s easier to buy a black doll, or a book featuring black children - but there are many more Asians in Australia than Black people. (BTW I just found some adorable Asian dolls online)

In fact, I had decided that if I couldn’t find my dream doll then I would buy her for Treasure, even tho she wasn’t black, for the simple reason that she wasn’t white. With only 4 sleeps to Christmas I was starting to feel a bit tense about it all. But I had three more shops on my list. The first was another educational (over-priced, middle class) toystore, and I almost didn’t go. But I had to buy vacuum cleaner bags and they’re right next door, so off I went, immersed in pessimism.

But I found her! I found her! Gorgeous, curly long black hair just like Treasure’s. A sweet face with brown eyes that open and shut. An attractive outfit: chiffon top, lacy knitted wrap, jeans and very cute moccasins. Brown skin. The brand, in case you too are looking for a brown doll, is Les Cheries Corolle. And if I’d known how cheap she was on Amazon I would have bought her there. It’s too late for that now, but who cares, I found my dream doll. I hope Treasure agrees with me.

I am going to check out the other shops on my list. I’d like to know what else is out there. I may even go back and buy that Asian doll. Like I said, ethnically diverse dolls and books are difficult to find. I’m annoyed that you can’t get a black doll in K-Mart unless perhaps one year the Buyer spots one they like and decides to get it. Perhaps it’s different in the US, where there’s a big Black population, but why should it be so different in Australia?

In the capital cities and increasingly in rural areas, our communities are very ethnically diverse, yet if you look in toy shops or the children’s section in bookshops you’d think we are a white monoculture. I think this is a problem for everyone because it reflects no-one’s reality. Asian, black , Aboriginal, Arabic children can’t get toys that resemble them and their families; white children don’t have toys that resemble their friends and communities. I believe that toys and books must reflect the diversity and reality of children’s lives. They don’t have to be didactic, they should be fun and inclusive – but they must be available and accessible, or we are all perpetuating lies about our society.

A baby for my back

Yesterday Australian African Network (AAN) had their end of year party. It was a great afternoon and apart from the fact that the tinnies all contained soft drink, not beer, it was typically Australian in so many ways. We had a barbie, complete with snags, wilted salads, watermelon, and a man in a hat and a funny apron wielding tongs behind the BBQ. (That was Mohamed, one of the AAN committee members). It was at a sports club in Lakemba, and right beside us all afternoon  a series of cricket teams were playing, all in their whites, but culturally quite diverse. Of course half way through the day a small child stopped the game when she wandered off through the middle of it in single minded pursuit of her ‘boon’ (balloon). It was Treasure, AM’s little (half) sister. The boys all ended up in a big impromptu soccer match, there was a fantastic West African band playing, a raffle, and a few lucky people got to go home with meat trays. We’d seriously over-catered so we packed up the delicous halal beef marinated Liberian style (with peanuts, as it happens) as extra raffle prizes. It was also typically both  Australian and African in being incredibly hot.

I dressed up in my newest Ghanaian dress and jewellry, had a great time dancing and chatting, and when Treasure got worn out from her adventures exploring the farthest reaches of the sports ground, I got to tie her on my back with a length of African cloth I’d brought to cover the tables. I haven’t got to have a baby on my back since carrying her around in Ghana earlier this year, and only recently was reflecting on how much I missed doing it, so it was lovely to get the opportunity. AM had actually vetoed it when we were in Kumasi, because it’s very bad for my knees – she’s three, and really a bit big for it – but he has a serious anti-Africa allergy at the moment (I’m hoping it’s a teenage thing he’ll grow out of) and wasn’t there to stop me. Heheh. It’s such a lovely thing to have a small child securely wrapped onto your back, cosy and relaxed and falling asleep. I didn’t want to take her off when it was time for her to go home.  I am romanticising it of course. It probably doesn’t feel that great when you have to wear the baby all day and weed your farm or carry a head load all day as well.  Or all three.

I used to carry AM on my back when he was small, but it was a bit scary then because I wasn’t used to it. I compromised by putting him in a baby pouch on my back and wrapping the cloth around that. I found it much easier to have him on my back. Western baby pouches and slings are designed for the front of the body, but I found they made simple tasks like buttering toast, or getting small change out of my wallet, quite awkward. Having him on my back gave me a lot more freedom and he liked it too.

Since then I have gained much more experience and am a competent and confident baby-carrier. I have carried all AM’s half-brothers and Treasure when I’ve looked after them as babies, plus friends’ children when I’ve babysat. I find it the easiest way to get little ones to sleep, especially if they’re getting grumpy and want to be carried but you still have to deal with older children.  You just have to become skilled at removing them without waking them up, if you want a rest yourself.

I was speaking to a Somalian couple at the AAN party who told me that it’s very good for my back and that after women give birth, carrying the baby this way is good for getting their stomach muscles back into shape. Well it’s a long time since I gave birth but perhaps this could be the solution for the little tummy tyre I’d like to get rid of. And much more enjoyable than cutting fats out of my diet. Anyone need a baby carried?