African Imperialism: Creative Historians
The Valley of Smoke
By Charlie Malone
Roshaun woke up to the scent of thick smoke filling his nostrils. He sat up quickly and dashed out of his hut to see his sister Erokwoo’s hut engulfed in flames. This was not the first fire that Roshaun’s village had had; just two weeks earlier, a large woven basket that Roshaun’s mother, Nfaye, had made was set ablaze when she placed it next to the cooking fire and a strong wind blew the flames onto the basket. Obfoke, Roshaun’s father, was furious, and he beat Nfaye until parts of her skin turned dark shades of purple. But Obfoke could not blame Erokwoo, for it was the weather to blame. The village was in the peak of the dry season, but this year the temperature was far hotter than any other year that the village had experienced.
Many of the villagers were frantically carrying baskets of water from the nearby river and dumping them onto Erokwoo’s burning hut to put the fire out. But it was not enough. The hut had already collapsed, and everything was reduced to ashes.
“Now what did you do to get yourself into this mess?!” Obfoke asked in a condescending tone.
“Nothing,” Erokwoo stammered as she lifted a charred wooden tree trunk and set it aside, “I lit a fire this morning to cook stew, and then I stepped out to relieve myself, and when I came back my hut it was on fire.” She was crying, and all she could salvage were a few clay pots, a spear, and some food that she was going to use to cook the stew. Erokwoo was very protective of herself and her belongings and what had just happened to her was extremely devastating. She would have to stay with her mother until she built herself a new hut.
After Erokwoo cleaned up the debris of what was once her hut she and Roshaun decided to leave the village for the day to collect new materials for Erokwoo to rebuild with.
“Aren’t you forgetting something?” Erokwoo asked Rosahun as they walked on a sandy pathway out of the village. Roshaun reached down at his waist for what he thought would be his machete. He cursed and kicked the sand with his bare foot. He was always forgetting things, and he hated it more than anything.
“You need your machete if we are to chop down trees for a new hut,” Erokwoo said. She started walking back to the village, and Rosahun followed with his head slouching. When they entered the village Etwe and her twelve-year-old son Owikwi came to greet them.
“Were you two just about to leave?” Etwe asked.
“Yes,” Erokwoo responded, “But Roshaun forgot his machete, so we had to come back.”
“Well when you leave, would you mind bringing Owikwi with you? I want him to spend some time outside the village.” Etwe’s husband died when Owikwi was two from a sickness that caused him to grow cold and then rapidly heat up into an uncomfortable sweat, so it has been very difficult for Etwe to raise Owikwi on her own.
“Sure we’ll bring him along,” Erokwoo said excitedly. Owikwi ran over and hugged Roshaun’s legs. Roshaun let out a sigh, and let Owikwi hug him even though he was not too fond of it. To all the children in the village, Roshaun was a leader, a person that they looked up to. And Roshaun hated it more than he hated forgetting things, for everytime he did something slightly heroic all the children wanted to learn to do that same thing and they would follow Roshaun around wanting him to teach them.
“Come on; let’s go!” Owikwi exclaimed as he ran circles around Roshaun’s feet. The three of them walked off down the valley and into the dense rainforest.
___________________
The end of the dry season was near, nights grew colder and days grew cooler. It had been several weeks since Erokwoo’s new hut had been completed. The rainy season was upon the valley, and the village was preparing its crops. Erokwoo was in her hut cutting yams and making stew for that day’s dinner.
“When will it be done?” Roshaun walked into her hut and sat down next to where she was preparing fufu for that night’s meal.
“Just before sundown,” she replied happily.
“Great!” Roshaun exclaimed. He smiled and walked out of the hut.
Later that day it was time for the ceremony that the village holds weekly. The entire village walked over to a clearing in the jungle covered in sand and dirt. Many of the men from the village carried drums, and many of the women carried large masks and piles of folded grass-woven clothing. All of the spectators gathered in a ring around the circle and waited as village’s dancers got their clothing and masks on. Once the drummers started pounding on their drums the dancers sprung into the middle of the circle and danced to the beat. The audience applauded and cheered as the dancers moved around the ring to rhythm of the drums. Roshaun was one of the drummers and he pounded on it hard to create the loud pulse that the villagers loved. He looked up at dancers and then to the horizon beyond. He gasped and immediately stopped drumming.
Roshaun could not believe what he saw. A small caravan of people was marching toward the village. Roshaun sat up and put his hand to his brow to get a better look. The people he saw were men, but they were unlike any person he had ever seen before. Their skin was a pale white and they had hair protruding from their face and chin. Heaps of reflective and shiny clothing hung from their bodies. They were riding large animals with long legs and long faces. Villagers around him were gawking at the men; as they came closer, the villagers could hear them talking in an unfamiliar tongue. When they reached the village, they dismounted their animals and started unloading bunches cloth sacks, stocks of wood and metal. In an instant, the men had set up big cloth huts that would easily accommodate five.
One of the men who wore the most clothing was ordering all the rest of them around. The villagers watched them and saw their efficiency in what they were doing. Obfoke, thinking of them as very hospitable people, ran into his hut and walked out carrying a large plate of fresh fruit. He walked up to the man who seemed to be the leader and offered him the fruit. The man looked at the fruit, snorted, and slapped the plate out of Obfoke’s hands knocking the fruits into the sand. Obfoke stared at the white man in disgust. The white man laughed and walked off towards his fellow people.
That night, none of the villagers slept; each of the families of the village sat huddled outside their huts watching the white men’s huts. Some of the men stood in front of their huts holding the long wood and shiny stocks that the villagers saw being unloaded from the tall beasts. A few of the tents had an orange ominous glow inside of them.
“Is it fire inside their huts?” Owikwi asked his mother as he sat in her lap while she clutched him in her arms, “Why don’t they burn down like Erokwoo’s hut?”
“I’m not sure little one” Etwe held Owikwi tighter.
All of Roshaun’s family sat outside of Obfoke’s hut huddled together, except for Obfoke. He sat a few paces away from his family with his back to them, he was still pondering why the white man had not accepted the fruit and knocked it out of his hands and into the dirt. Was this the first time that the white men had encountered villagers like us? Obfoke thought to himself, for the white man must have had some assumption that the fruit was deficient for him.
“Obfoke why won’t you come join us?” Nfaye asked longingly. Obfoke continued to stare angrily at the white men’s huts. Nfaye sighed and left him alone for she did not want to disturb him in his thought.
The night lasted forever, and in the morning the villagers were still on high alert watching the white men. As the sun rose and the air warmed, the white men started to file out of their tents. Some of them were wielding the long wooden and shiny stocks, and a few were holding dark clasps that made a clingy sound when they moved. The villagers stood up next to their huts starring at the white men.
The white men then proceeded to come into the village and started grabbing the villagers and forcing them into separate groups. In turn the villagers panicked and tried to evade capture. Noise and confusion erupted in the village as the villagers ran in all directions, and the white men reacted by growing angry and becoming more aggressive than before.
“Ahhhhhgh!” Erokwoo yelled as she was pinned down on the ground by one of the white men. Struggling she reached for the machete at her waist, curled her fingers around the handle, and in one fluid motion swung the machete around and pierced it into the man’s head. She shoved him off of her and ran to help the other villagers. As she ran, another white man standing near Roshaun saw her and raised the long metal stock he held in his arms. As he did, a sound so loud and so strong echoed across the entire valley. Roshaun’s ears were ringing, and an unfamiliar smoky smell filled his nostrils. Nfaye let out a scream of horror. Erokwoo lay on the ground with blood spewing from her chest; the orange dirt around her body turned a dark brown color as many other loud blasts went off and any villager that moved was killed. Roshaun was on his knees with tears running down his face and in complete shock. He knew that if he went at the white man that killed Erokwoo, he would be killed himself.
The remaining villagers that did not struggle and or try to evade capture were locked up in the dark clasps. They felt heavy on Roshaun’s arms. Each pair of clasps were linked together by string of dark loops making it so the villagers were connected to each other in a line.
Once all the villagers were captured, a couple of the white men carrying torches went on to set all of the huts on fire. The villagers watched from a distance as their entire lives, everything they had in the world was reduced to ashes.
The sun’s light hit the smoke from the smoldering village lighting up the entire valley. To the white men, it was a beautiful sight, but to the villagers it was a torment of agony and torture. The clasps dark around Roshaun’s wrists were chafing his skin causing them to bleed. He looked behind him and saw the same thing happening to the other villagers. The white man in front of him yelled in his foreign language and yanked on the chain jolting the line of villagers forward.
By Charlie Malone
Roshaun woke up to the scent of thick smoke filling his nostrils. He sat up quickly and dashed out of his hut to see his sister Erokwoo’s hut engulfed in flames. This was not the first fire that Roshaun’s village had had; just two weeks earlier, a large woven basket that Roshaun’s mother, Nfaye, had made was set ablaze when she placed it next to the cooking fire and a strong wind blew the flames onto the basket. Obfoke, Roshaun’s father, was furious, and he beat Nfaye until parts of her skin turned dark shades of purple. But Obfoke could not blame Erokwoo, for it was the weather to blame. The village was in the peak of the dry season, but this year the temperature was far hotter than any other year that the village had experienced.
Many of the villagers were frantically carrying baskets of water from the nearby river and dumping them onto Erokwoo’s burning hut to put the fire out. But it was not enough. The hut had already collapsed, and everything was reduced to ashes.
“Now what did you do to get yourself into this mess?!” Obfoke asked in a condescending tone.
“Nothing,” Erokwoo stammered as she lifted a charred wooden tree trunk and set it aside, “I lit a fire this morning to cook stew, and then I stepped out to relieve myself, and when I came back my hut it was on fire.” She was crying, and all she could salvage were a few clay pots, a spear, and some food that she was going to use to cook the stew. Erokwoo was very protective of herself and her belongings and what had just happened to her was extremely devastating. She would have to stay with her mother until she built herself a new hut.
After Erokwoo cleaned up the debris of what was once her hut she and Roshaun decided to leave the village for the day to collect new materials for Erokwoo to rebuild with.
“Aren’t you forgetting something?” Erokwoo asked Rosahun as they walked on a sandy pathway out of the village. Roshaun reached down at his waist for what he thought would be his machete. He cursed and kicked the sand with his bare foot. He was always forgetting things, and he hated it more than anything.
“You need your machete if we are to chop down trees for a new hut,” Erokwoo said. She started walking back to the village, and Rosahun followed with his head slouching. When they entered the village Etwe and her twelve-year-old son Owikwi came to greet them.
“Were you two just about to leave?” Etwe asked.
“Yes,” Erokwoo responded, “But Roshaun forgot his machete, so we had to come back.”
“Well when you leave, would you mind bringing Owikwi with you? I want him to spend some time outside the village.” Etwe’s husband died when Owikwi was two from a sickness that caused him to grow cold and then rapidly heat up into an uncomfortable sweat, so it has been very difficult for Etwe to raise Owikwi on her own.
“Sure we’ll bring him along,” Erokwoo said excitedly. Owikwi ran over and hugged Roshaun’s legs. Roshaun let out a sigh, and let Owikwi hug him even though he was not too fond of it. To all the children in the village, Roshaun was a leader, a person that they looked up to. And Roshaun hated it more than he hated forgetting things, for everytime he did something slightly heroic all the children wanted to learn to do that same thing and they would follow Roshaun around wanting him to teach them.
“Come on; let’s go!” Owikwi exclaimed as he ran circles around Roshaun’s feet. The three of them walked off down the valley and into the dense rainforest.
___________________
The end of the dry season was near, nights grew colder and days grew cooler. It had been several weeks since Erokwoo’s new hut had been completed. The rainy season was upon the valley, and the village was preparing its crops. Erokwoo was in her hut cutting yams and making stew for that day’s dinner.
“When will it be done?” Roshaun walked into her hut and sat down next to where she was preparing fufu for that night’s meal.
“Just before sundown,” she replied happily.
“Great!” Roshaun exclaimed. He smiled and walked out of the hut.
Later that day it was time for the ceremony that the village holds weekly. The entire village walked over to a clearing in the jungle covered in sand and dirt. Many of the men from the village carried drums, and many of the women carried large masks and piles of folded grass-woven clothing. All of the spectators gathered in a ring around the circle and waited as village’s dancers got their clothing and masks on. Once the drummers started pounding on their drums the dancers sprung into the middle of the circle and danced to the beat. The audience applauded and cheered as the dancers moved around the ring to rhythm of the drums. Roshaun was one of the drummers and he pounded on it hard to create the loud pulse that the villagers loved. He looked up at dancers and then to the horizon beyond. He gasped and immediately stopped drumming.
Roshaun could not believe what he saw. A small caravan of people was marching toward the village. Roshaun sat up and put his hand to his brow to get a better look. The people he saw were men, but they were unlike any person he had ever seen before. Their skin was a pale white and they had hair protruding from their face and chin. Heaps of reflective and shiny clothing hung from their bodies. They were riding large animals with long legs and long faces. Villagers around him were gawking at the men; as they came closer, the villagers could hear them talking in an unfamiliar tongue. When they reached the village, they dismounted their animals and started unloading bunches cloth sacks, stocks of wood and metal. In an instant, the men had set up big cloth huts that would easily accommodate five.
One of the men who wore the most clothing was ordering all the rest of them around. The villagers watched them and saw their efficiency in what they were doing. Obfoke, thinking of them as very hospitable people, ran into his hut and walked out carrying a large plate of fresh fruit. He walked up to the man who seemed to be the leader and offered him the fruit. The man looked at the fruit, snorted, and slapped the plate out of Obfoke’s hands knocking the fruits into the sand. Obfoke stared at the white man in disgust. The white man laughed and walked off towards his fellow people.
That night, none of the villagers slept; each of the families of the village sat huddled outside their huts watching the white men’s huts. Some of the men stood in front of their huts holding the long wood and shiny stocks that the villagers saw being unloaded from the tall beasts. A few of the tents had an orange ominous glow inside of them.
“Is it fire inside their huts?” Owikwi asked his mother as he sat in her lap while she clutched him in her arms, “Why don’t they burn down like Erokwoo’s hut?”
“I’m not sure little one” Etwe held Owikwi tighter.
All of Roshaun’s family sat outside of Obfoke’s hut huddled together, except for Obfoke. He sat a few paces away from his family with his back to them, he was still pondering why the white man had not accepted the fruit and knocked it out of his hands and into the dirt. Was this the first time that the white men had encountered villagers like us? Obfoke thought to himself, for the white man must have had some assumption that the fruit was deficient for him.
“Obfoke why won’t you come join us?” Nfaye asked longingly. Obfoke continued to stare angrily at the white men’s huts. Nfaye sighed and left him alone for she did not want to disturb him in his thought.
The night lasted forever, and in the morning the villagers were still on high alert watching the white men. As the sun rose and the air warmed, the white men started to file out of their tents. Some of them were wielding the long wooden and shiny stocks, and a few were holding dark clasps that made a clingy sound when they moved. The villagers stood up next to their huts starring at the white men.
The white men then proceeded to come into the village and started grabbing the villagers and forcing them into separate groups. In turn the villagers panicked and tried to evade capture. Noise and confusion erupted in the village as the villagers ran in all directions, and the white men reacted by growing angry and becoming more aggressive than before.
“Ahhhhhgh!” Erokwoo yelled as she was pinned down on the ground by one of the white men. Struggling she reached for the machete at her waist, curled her fingers around the handle, and in one fluid motion swung the machete around and pierced it into the man’s head. She shoved him off of her and ran to help the other villagers. As she ran, another white man standing near Roshaun saw her and raised the long metal stock he held in his arms. As he did, a sound so loud and so strong echoed across the entire valley. Roshaun’s ears were ringing, and an unfamiliar smoky smell filled his nostrils. Nfaye let out a scream of horror. Erokwoo lay on the ground with blood spewing from her chest; the orange dirt around her body turned a dark brown color as many other loud blasts went off and any villager that moved was killed. Roshaun was on his knees with tears running down his face and in complete shock. He knew that if he went at the white man that killed Erokwoo, he would be killed himself.
The remaining villagers that did not struggle and or try to evade capture were locked up in the dark clasps. They felt heavy on Roshaun’s arms. Each pair of clasps were linked together by string of dark loops making it so the villagers were connected to each other in a line.
Once all the villagers were captured, a couple of the white men carrying torches went on to set all of the huts on fire. The villagers watched from a distance as their entire lives, everything they had in the world was reduced to ashes.
The sun’s light hit the smoke from the smoldering village lighting up the entire valley. To the white men, it was a beautiful sight, but to the villagers it was a torment of agony and torture. The clasps dark around Roshaun’s wrists were chafing his skin causing them to bleed. He looked behind him and saw the same thing happening to the other villagers. The white man in front of him yelled in his foreign language and yanked on the chain jolting the line of villagers forward.
Project Reflection
The project "African Imperialism: Creative Historians" was a project in which we chose a country in Africa, did extensive historical research on it, and wrote a story and created an art piece that reflected our story. Through my research, I studied specific events that occurred in the early 1500s and throughout the time periods of African slave trade. This inspired me to write my story about an event that has great relevance to slave trade in certain parts of Africa, for my story specifically in northern Cameroon. I also researched daily village life and what early Cameroonians ate, what kind of clothes they wore, what kind of rituals/ceremonies they performed, and many other bits and pieces that would relate to their culture in general. I incorporated all of this into the first half of my story to set the mood of what was going on, and in the second I incorporated all my researched details on early European explorers and African slave trade.
I feel that my story has a very strong plot where rising action, climax, and falling action are clearly shown. This, in my mind, really helps to drive my story and make it very strong. “…A sound so loud and so strong echoed across the entire valley. Roshaun’s ears were ringing, and an unfamiliar smoky smell filled his nostrils. Nfaye let out a scream of horror. Erokwoo lay on the ground with blood spewing from her chest; the orange dirt around her body turned a dark brown color as many other loud blasts went off and any villager that moved was killed. Roshaun was on his knees with tears running down his face and in complete shock. He knew that if he went at the white man that killed Erokwoo, he would be killed himself.” This quote I feel is a very strong part of my story and reflects the plot in a very unique way.
My story's weakness is definitely historical integration, this is also shown in my creative historians research. I did not do very well on my research and it reflected the amount of historic content in my story. "All of the spectators gathered in a ring around the circle and waited as village’s dancers got their clothing and masks on. Once the drummers started pounding on their drums the dancers sprung into the middle of the circle and danced to the beat. The audience applauded and cheered as the dancers moved around the ring to rhythm of the drums. Roshaun was one of the drummers and he pounded on it hard to create the loud pulse that the villagers loved." This quote was just randomly thrown into my story as a blank filler and it doesn't really have a true historic element.
A big substantial revision I made my story was the element of character in my story. At first each of my characters traits and personalities were pretty vague and hard to understand, so I went back through story and digested what each character said to formulate an idea of what they are like. My second big revision was the time of the big events of my story. I carefully read through my major events of the plot and I moved some stuff around (moved a part from the begging to the end, made literary connections, etc.) to make my story flow better and have a stronger storyline.
I feel that my story has a very strong plot where rising action, climax, and falling action are clearly shown. This, in my mind, really helps to drive my story and make it very strong. “…A sound so loud and so strong echoed across the entire valley. Roshaun’s ears were ringing, and an unfamiliar smoky smell filled his nostrils. Nfaye let out a scream of horror. Erokwoo lay on the ground with blood spewing from her chest; the orange dirt around her body turned a dark brown color as many other loud blasts went off and any villager that moved was killed. Roshaun was on his knees with tears running down his face and in complete shock. He knew that if he went at the white man that killed Erokwoo, he would be killed himself.” This quote I feel is a very strong part of my story and reflects the plot in a very unique way.
My story's weakness is definitely historical integration, this is also shown in my creative historians research. I did not do very well on my research and it reflected the amount of historic content in my story. "All of the spectators gathered in a ring around the circle and waited as village’s dancers got their clothing and masks on. Once the drummers started pounding on their drums the dancers sprung into the middle of the circle and danced to the beat. The audience applauded and cheered as the dancers moved around the ring to rhythm of the drums. Roshaun was one of the drummers and he pounded on it hard to create the loud pulse that the villagers loved." This quote was just randomly thrown into my story as a blank filler and it doesn't really have a true historic element.
A big substantial revision I made my story was the element of character in my story. At first each of my characters traits and personalities were pretty vague and hard to understand, so I went back through story and digested what each character said to formulate an idea of what they are like. My second big revision was the time of the big events of my story. I carefully read through my major events of the plot and I moved some stuff around (moved a part from the begging to the end, made literary connections, etc.) to make my story flow better and have a stronger storyline.