THE CHRONICLES OF CEMETERY L.A. JSS – RECLAIMING WHAT THE FORE-BEARS LOST TO THE COLONIAL MASTERS

Lead Author: Gameli Agboada

Guest Authors: Efo Kofi Gavor & Kwasi Adu

Chief Editor: Stephen Baidu

 

Who said Internet Fraud (sakawa) came all of sudden?!!

Look!! Let me tell you something! A miniature of ‘sakawa’ prevailed as far back as AD 1996 in the Cemetery; the only disparity was the medium of correspondence and also, the absence of black magic (juju) in the dealings. Unlike ‘sakawa’, which is considered a social menace, the kind that happened in the Cemetery was based purely on the science and act of persuading the Whiteman to reason with you concerning your petty wants. Lest I forget, boys and girls who went to international schools ‘dadabiciously’ referred to it as ‘Pen Pal’.

 

One cannot exhaust this topic to its entirety without giving the due recognition to great men like Shabo, Dzandu Harry, Prempeh Paul, Kpoh Richard etc.

 

Massa!! The act had its own strategies. To be a master of the game, you could not do without the golden rules…………

 

1. Win the sympathy of your pen pal through some concocted miserable stories; your suffering should even surpass that of Oshin (A character in the 80/90s Japanese television drama series). 
2. Always remember to garnish your letters with some new vocabularies; it demonstrates how brilliant but needy you are.
3. Slide in one or two idiomatic expressions for ‘sheygey’ reasons.
4. Let your pen pal know that you are a devout Christian; for that matter, an aspiring pastor.

 

Here comes a typical example of the power-packed letters that were written in the Cemetery…………. 

                                                                                                Cemetery L.A.

                                                                                               P.o. Box X,

                                                                                              Ho, V/R,

                                                                                             Ghana, West Africa,

                                                                                             Africa, World.

                                                                                21^TH Otober 1996

 

 

The Cabala’s

p.o. box, America

 

Dear Whiteman,

           How are you? I hope you are swimming in the pool of mr. and Mrs. good hef. Whiteman, do you know sometin?, my father is ded. my mother is ded. I am an orphanage. My grandmother is very wikiiid. She assassinated a hen on Christmas but she didn’t give me some. I have not eat for 3 days. Please, i want you to send me shingad, hose, football boot and maontin bike. My jinior brother also is wanted BMX bisekel. If you send me this tins, I will tank you forevermon. God bles you in advans.

        I am also a small pastor in my chech. Please send me plenty bibles so that I can share to everybody so that they will become very good boys and girls in the chech and Sunday school too.

      I will like to stop here because my wikiid grandmother is calling me to borrow fire-chako from the nes house to cook even food (super) and she will not give me mpo.

 

Your’s faithfuly,

  dfadsfad

                                                                                                Churchlife K. Gbagbladza

                                                                                                (Senior on duty, Class 6A)

 

The day was bright and most shirts were looking spruce; it was a Monday morning in the Cemetery. Boys and girls were getting impatient with the headmaster. A unanimous sigh of relief filled the assembly ground as he finally brought his long and unappetizing speech to a conclusion.

 

Shortly afterwards, the post boy climbed the stage with his letter box. ‘Charley, tension be what?’ Expectations were above ground level. I could say with much confidence that, those were the only moments in the Cemetery where boys gave their undivided attention to the stage.

 

Even though I was never called to receive any of those mails, I mysteriously developed a talent; a special talent it was. I could accurately tell the content of an envelope by looking at its shape and colour.  

 

• Abakeh Mesiwotso (Shabo) -----------A catalogue from Cabala’s (A marketer and retailer of hunting, fishing and related outdoor recreation merchandize)

 

• Kpoh Richard----------------A magic handkerchief from India. (This guy was gradually creating an aura of fear and panic around himself)

 

• Agamah Marvelous---------Return to Sender (I guess Shabo mischievously furnished him with a fake Fountain Pen address)

 

• Dzandu Harry----------------A catalogue from Victoria’s Secret (I really found it difficult to understand why boys, at an average age of 12, were requesting catalogues from a retailer of women’s wear, lingerie and beauty products.)

 

• Prempeh Paul----------------Another course from the World Bible School (WBS), Accra, Ghana.

 

• Abakeh Mesiwotso -----------A correspondence on matchbox

 

• Abakeh Mesiwotso-----------A correspondence on a bag of rice from Thailand. (In fact, Shabo’s exploits were becoming too frightening to everybody; it kept us wondering whether or not Ghana was at the verge of war or famine)
• Abakeh Mesiwotso-----------Return to sender (He ordered a loaf of bread from Victoria’s Secret)
• Avenyo Eli-------------------Teamwork Bible course

 

• Gavor Ernest-----------------Teamwork Bible course

 

• Akakpo Nicholas------------A never-ending correspondence on a Walkman (I guess that particular Whiteman was a very stingy one).

 

• Kpoh Richard----------------Another round of correspondence on Bruce Lee’s VHS cassettes (Snake in the monkey shadow, Enter the dragon etc)

 

In the midst of these entire pen pal craze, when the ‘Return to Sender’ phenomena became commonplace, a lucrative business sprang up and Kwasi Adu was at the centre of it. He wrote more refined letters for the Address Owners and charged them for the service rendered.

Hmm! Charley, to be an Address Owner came with its own swagger. The Address books were treated with awesome reverence. You could count yourself blessed if you ever chanced upon a genuine one because it was only their look-alikes that were kept in public in order to confuse snoopy boys. Not even the chief scribe (Kwasi Adu), who provided consultancy services, knew where the mails were going afterwards; he writes the body of the letter and the address owners to the ‘most important’ part.

Address Hunting was another thing that cannot be left unmentioned. To become a renowned hunter in those days, one required highly specialized tutelage under Shabo (The Address Baron). In spite of the fact that Eli and Ernest were seasoned hunters (Tohazie and Sundiata) since class 3, the field of Address Hunting was a novelty to them. (If you have never heard of the exploits of Eli and Ernest, please read a piece entitled, “The Rise and Fall of The Pen Syndicate”)

The most annoying aspect of the business was the emergence of the shameless thievery by some postmen at Ghana Post. They took great delight in stealing Bibles, audio cassettes, VHS cassettes and anything that looked bulky. I had no doubt that this appalling behaviour was the core reason why Akakpo’s walkman never came. ‘Jah fire burn them all!’ We always looked upon the sons and daughters of postmen with great suspicion. Who knows? Even the flashy wristwatch he/she was showing off at school may be the fruit of the labour of a fellow pupil. Eiii charley! We went through turbulent times but survived.

Days went by and the Whiteman got wiser. Business was going down and ‘Return to Sender’ became some people’s middle names. Even simple Bible courses that use to take only a month became life-long courses. I guess you now understand why some deviants in the society had to move a step further into ‘sakawa’ in order to keep the business going.

But beware!!! “For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?” Mark 8:36

Have a lovely day.

 

April 2010