The Palm-wine Carrying Ceremony: Story by SFN

Palm-wine Carrying Ceremony

In august,oleka visit Pa-James and his family,he came with his father,two uncles and his elder brother nnanna who had a typing school and his best friend Kalu,that arrived in a taxi with a jars of palm wine,kola nuts,some cartons of beer and one bottle of whisky. All the people were introduced to Pa-James and his family,Adanne's brother Ifeanyi ran out and borrowed chairs from their neighbors,soon everybody sat down.

Oleka's father spoke first,he said that his son had seen something in pa-James family and he had brought other members of his family to see this thing too. Pa-James in traditional way,pretended that he did not know what oleka's father is talking about,he asked,what is this 'thing' you have seen in my family that has brought you all this way?''

Oleka's uncle then spoke, describing the things that they had come to see, Pa-James went out and brought Adanne,the people broke in joyous laughter,adanne sat down and was introduced to members of oleka's family, the bottle of whisky was give to Pa-James,the kola nuts were broken into pieces and given to all the people present, the jars of sweet palm-wine were drunk.

Adanne was asked to drink a little from a glass of palm-wine and give the rest to oleka,her mother has told her to do this if she liked oleka and wanted to be his wife,adanne drank from the glass and gave the rest to oleka,everybody smile and clapped for them.

A few weeks later,both families met again to agree on the bride price to be paid on adanne, on the day,one of adanne's uncles got up and sang her praises,beauty,manners,education and her learning of typing and shorthand,everybody clapped for her.

Adanne's uncle presented three sticks each about three inches long to oleka's father, each stick meant ten thousand naira (10,000). Members of oleka's family went outside to talk, when they came back, they didn't speak a word. One of them gave adanne's uncle one stick, that is, ten thousand naira.

Adanne's uncle raised up the stick to the family and returned it quickly, oleka's family went outside again and then gave one and a half sticks to adanne's uncle, he took the sticks and passed them to his family, they paid eleven thousand naira, they would pay the rest of the money later.

Once the bride price was paid,the elders in the two families announced that oleka and adanne were husband and wife

Source: SFN