Stella Gaitano Translated into English By Asha El-Said

6 - Kosti
Stella Gaitano
Translated by: Asha Musa

Teresa is dead worried; fear and pain occupy her heart. She has suddenly become a foreigner from a different country. The insecurity of being in the middle of this electrified atmosphere laden by grief, anger, and joy is filling her. The Country is now divided into two. Announcements of residence and medical services closures are everywhere. Public harassment and abuse are noticeable in the streets; some asking them to depart, others begging them to stay! Emotional pressures from all sides. They made the decision to return to the South.
It was as if worry and fear were a poison intoxicating her body! Even the foetus she was carrying in her womb increased its kicking from all this tension. It kicked like a donkey or crumbled like a wave in her side or else it would plant a foot in her thigh like an arrow disabling her movements with weight and pain.
They sold their house cheaply and bought more furniture, a generator, bags, sacks, and boxes to pack their belongings. Teresa reupholstered the mattresses and hired a blacksmith to mend the broken beds and tables. The neighbours helped her to pack the clothes and utensils. In a few days all their belongings were shrouded in sacks!
A huge truck shrieked at the gate signalling departure. Teresa’s heart pounded and her feet went limp. The neighbours wailed while she moved around moaning and helping the kids collect their things and tidy them up. Young men in the neighbourhood carried the luggage one by one as if they were carrying corpses to their graves. Hearts burnt!
She took the last farewells from her neighbours silently and left them in the now desolate house that no longer resembled her home. This is the house that witnessed the births of all her children, saw their first steps as toddlers, and heard them uttering their first words. This is the house that knew exactly where each baby’s naval and baby teeth were buried. It saw all their happy and some of their sad events. It sheltered them at the time of poverty and hunger. It was loyal to their familial affairs. A house so intimate like a lot of homes: two rooms and two verandas criss-crossing, a kitchen in one corner open to a Rakooba (an overhead bower-hut of hey and straws) that looked like a hat. Under the rakooba perched two dewy brick coloured water casks with large drop-plates under them for the chicken, cat, and migrating birds to drink.
Teresa’s rakooba witnessed a lot of coffee gatherings, gossiping, and share distributing from the small group’s savings fund. The courtyard is spread with red sand and decorated with colourful plants like cactus and a bougainvillea near the door peeping secretly at the street like a shy adolescent girl. The ivy (lablab) is wounding up the wooden staffs covering the rakooba with green leaves and dreamy violet flowers.

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