FGM – The Aftermath (4)

FGM – The Aftermath (4)

**Who is Jioni?**

Meanwhile Jioni walked away from the scene of the accident and made it slowly to the Ngoma hills, some kilometres from the school.
Painfully she climbed to the top of the mountain, each step reminding her of the painful past. She needed to be alone and revisit the cause of all her troubles.
She reached the top of the mountain but the cool breeze could not calm her troubled spirit. The voices in her head grew louder and louder making her want to run away from the same place that she had been a victim of female circumcision three years back.
She found a rock and sat down remembering every single detail about the forced circumcision. How her aunt, her mother’s sister, had dragged her to the forest to join the initiates so that she, Jioni, could become a decent woman and not shamelessly sleep around with men. Her mum would not have done that to her and Jioni knew it. But where was mum?
She remembered the circumciser, an old woman wearing a mask and using the same blade on all the fifty or so girls who had been there. She remembered asking for her mother over and over again but the circumciser s had gone ahead and performed the ritual, calling her a big coward.
It was the last time that Jioni had really cried. No pain would make her cry again, none whatsoever.
The nights had been terrible, waking up in the middle, seeing the circumciser coming for her, the blade coming to slit her throat.
Jioni sat for a very long time and she did not realize that it was getting dark. She walked down from the mountain and slowly made her way home only to find her furious aunt waiting for her. Jioni had the keys to the house, but she did not know that her aunt was coming back so soon. She never announced when she was coming or leaving.
“Which men have you been sleeping with?” she asked as she raised her hand to strike Jioni. The slap landed on Jioni’s face as she replied softly.
“No man, aunty!” Jioni replied respectfully, knowing the line of questioning employed by the aunt each time she came back.
“Where are you from this time of the evening?” she asked again as she opened the door and went straight to sit on the bed, which Jioni was never permitted to sit on or sleep in.
“I had gone for a walk in the mountains. I have been having problems at school with some of the children. They call me a witch and laugh at me because I have AIDS,” Jioni replied.
The unsympathetic aunt just coldly replied, “But you have AIDS, so why should it bother you at all?” Jioni kept quiet, she never argued or talked back at adults. She had long learnt that it was important to hide your feelings.
The aunt snorted at Jioni’s silence and then the lecture began. “You are just like your mother who abandoned you when you were hardly two years old. She ran away to the big cities to look for big money but we all know what she is doing there. Works at night in the streets.”
Ironically, it was through these lectures that Jioni had been able to piece together her past.
Jioni’s mother had delivered her only child at the age of 15, while still a schoolgirl. After dropping out of school, she had gone to live with her much older sister, a businesswoman in Kitale town.
Jioni sometimes wondered about her father. Who was he and why did he desert Jioni and her mother? Was he a handsome and caring man or was he like some of the drunkards she occasionally met at the shopping centre? Would he recognize her if he saw her? Was he thinking about her wherever he was? Too many questions she really wanted to ask him.
Once Jioni had asked her aunt who her father was. The reply was a rude, “Go ask your mother, she was there when you were being conceived!”
One day Jioni’s mum had just disappeared leaving Jioni with the neighbours. She had just gone, no goodbye, no note.
Jioni’s aunt had come from her businesses only to find Jioni playing outside the house with other children. The aunt had known that this would happen one day, but she had thought that Jioni would accompany her mother when the time came.
So Jioni grew up staying with the aunt and going through the turmoil of daily life, shifting centres and schools until now that she was twelve and was at Rural Urban Primary School.

*********

It was Friday and the school had assembly and flag-raising day. Jioni still had no school uniform; though she tried to look her decent best by wearing the cleanest dress she could get hold of. She settled for her brown khaki.
Jioni walked to school, other children passing her and not having the time or heart to talk to her, the evil one-eyed girl.
Going to school had become a routine for Jioni, no fun, or enjoyment, just there to pass time. She could not remember the last time she had a close friend. Life had become lonely, but she had become used to it.
Jioni walked to the assembly point, waiting for the school bell to ring and signal the start of her first ever assembly at the new school. She noticed groups of children huddled together talking in hushed tones. Even the teachers seemed to be engrossed in some talk, which Jioni guessed was all about Mr. Kuria’s accident.
The bell rang and all students and teachers moved to their respective positions. Jioni was lost, so she moved closest to where some of her classmates were. There were very few children from her class and as expected the moment she moved towards them, they moved away, leaving her alone.
The school settled down and the head teacher took charge of the assembly. There was the hoisting of the flag, followed by the singing of the national anthem and the pledge. Then came the announcements.
The head teacher cleared his throat, “We have some disturbing news about one of our teachers and his relative. Mr. Kuria, the class teacher of 7P, was involved in a serious bicycle accident yesterday. He fractured his left shoulder and had a few bruises on his body. His cousin who was riding at the back of the bike, is still unconscious at the District Hospital.”
Most students already knew about the accident but hearing it afresh from the headteacher made it look twice as bad and serious. They gasped.
The headteacher continued, “In Mr. Kuria’s absence, Miss Mutura will take charge of the class.” The few members of the class who were at the assembly did not look pleased at this news, especially the girls who thought Miss Mutura disliked girls.
Further announcements were made but the school hardly paid any attention to them, their minds preoccupied with the accident. The assembly ended.
Jioni joined the students streaming towards class making sure that she also kept her distance from them. They reached the classroom and that is when Jioni realized that nearly all the boys in the class were absent. The class was half full.
Miss Mutura was not sure what to do, but she managed to convince the few girls to enter class. They all sat in front, leaving Jioni to remain at the back. They also wanted to maintain their distance.

……to be continued.

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