Dr Fixit (311 - 320)

 311

When he moved back to his seat and sat down,

'Tieh', Mrs Bearit wrote on the board. The sound 

she guided us to make, meaning to sit.

The next was 'Sang'ah' - to walk with the feet

portrays the word. Then she wrote, 'Tang.'

When we said it with her, some added: 'Uhtang'

and Mrs Bearit smiled and we all burst

out laughing. She said to us: 'Yes, of course,

I know that's what most of you do at home,

saying this, asking that. "Tang" isn't for talk alone.'


312

'Tang 'Uhtang' means someone talks too much.

'Tang ikor' means someone speaks and such 

a person (based on their mood) is angry,

loquacious or learning to talk, if a baby.

'Tang' (the second meaning) connotes to pick

or carry pieces of furniture or stick,

showing the bits of that thing are many.

'Tang mkpor' is to pick things in the laundry,

shop or dump. 'Tang hefeah' is to gather 

firewood and there's a song quite popular 


313

in Antish with a catchy refrain,

'Tang mkporokho.' When the rain

of love stops being a drizzle 

but transforms to a downpour and the middle 

is too hot for the spouses to meet,

someone would turn certainly their feet 

towards the door with their belongings 

(mkporokho) - this act our star was singing.

We gobbled up what our teacher 

taught us and being the era


314

of pen pals, we were getting grounded 

in a technique that'd enable us if we posted

(I knew students in Class One and Two 

in Secondary Schools, day students and boarders, who

had pen friends and communicate 

by crafting letters and for months would wait

for the replies. I had been told some students 

had left Antburg and got trained 

in universities near their pen friends' abodes) -

yes, to do an artistic and erudite notes


315

that our friends in Cricketia or Birdom 

would receive and willingly abandon 

their homes and hop across the borders 

to dwell in Antburg as tourists. Our teachers 

knew this and so were moulding us

so we'd represent the entire clan as

good ambassadors from our handwriting 

to speech and appearance while teaching 

they emphasized wholesome comportment 

within and outside our clan. 'Great treatment 


316

'you'd get like a walk on red carpets

if you could around any place 

properly find your way and not end up

in someone's bedroom as you failed to stop

at the sign that showed the parlour 

for you couldn't read and savour -

I mean, understand the words on a plaque 

but if you grasp the message as nothing is opaque 

because whatever word you look at

you can decipher, then you're the lad


317

'or lass great men and women would want 

to work with. That's why you're here so you won't 

digress from that direction as we hone your skills 

wherever your talent lies as the fields 

you'd choose from are quite wide, from arts

to the science.' Our next lesson was Maths.

Mrs Bearit dusted off the marks she made

to teach us Antish and then did paste

some new marks far up the chalkboard,

crossed them and then we were taught,


318

after a spelling session, the pronunciation 

was 'Hebat' - which the translation 

would be 'counting' in English. She made

a stroke to represent one and then placed

two strokes together to show two, then three strokes 

to stand for three; four strokes she wrote 

for four and five strokes for five and drew

a circle around the last batch. Mrs Bearit threw

the chalk down on the duster on the table 

and asked us count with her and the figure applicable,


319

the pointer nudged. 'Ket' is one; 'Heba'

is two; 'Heta' is three (I remembered 

I had rubber seeds in my bag and fetched them

to use as counters); 'Henang' was the name

for four and 'Heteon'  was five. Mrs Bearit

raised an arm up, spreading out the five digits

of her hand. She told us her hand

had a set of five fingers hence the band

or circle she put around the five strokes.

'Hetu ket' were the words she wrote 


320

under the banded five strokes -

'hetu' meaning a bundle. We took notes

with our memories and recited the phrase.

Mrs Bearit turned from the board to face 

the class and asked how many pupils had

their counters with them. Half had stacked 

kernels, rubber seeds and bundles of sticks

in their bags and boxes; while half didn't. She fixed

everyone the next day should have their counters 

with them, ranging from bottle covers


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