Fear Drowns in the Enigmatic Otamiri River

by Amuchie Victory (Nigeria)

A leap into the unknown Nigeria

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Superstitions had a way of tickling me — as far as I remember . Way back , even when we -my elder and only sister, my younger and only brother ,and myself – had our aunt around on vacations , to tell us bedtime stories. Tales of which I took, most of the time – as fallacies , anyways. Today ,now a college student in my twenties , I had come to realize that the fear of the unknown wasn’t aligned to ageing or growing complete “32” . It’s an integral part of our DNA , an essential part of our survival. Overcoming phobia is only dependent on an intentional desensitization to it – like Engineering math, I had to understand this. “I smell something nice oozing from the kitchen ,” I yelled , jolting into Igwe's room. “Who cooked? Where’s Igwe ?”. Ude – his roomie – smiling and mobile gaming , signaled in the lavatory’s direction , in response to me. “Yo wanna go plunge with us today ? ,” Igwe prattles from behind the toilet's door , in what passes for an informal greeting . “Yeah-yeh,” I replied reluctantly. Igwe is a colleague , pro swimmer and native fisherman of Ihiagwa community in the old Uratta clan – the rescuer of a fremd , who had almost drowned just a month before . But astonishingly , Igwe is slow. We had our deal now since the beginning of the session – I would teach him PDEs – Partial Differential Equations , in exchange that I overcame my worst fear of swimming a river . It’s now six months into the pact ,and I bet I am the slow one – my legs still shudder from nearing its bank . He’s got swift now and attempts correctly 7 of every 10 questions I quiz. If you had guessed , he had talked earlier about plunging in an olympic-size swimming pool at the Nike Lake Resort, Enugu – you would be North Pole farther than the South Pole from being right . It was the falsely dreaded Otamiri River . No one would swim the river by accident – taking its name from Ota Miri , a revered deity which loathes evil and is believed, would drown evil perpetrators / aliens who come to the land . It runs south from the community past about five regions ,where it flows to the Atlantic ocean, its length spanning 30 kilometers. Its raison d'etre – major boundary between the host community, Ihiagwa and surrounding communities . Its surreal purity causatively as drinking water also – one could easily peep its bed , even from an overhead bridge many feet above its surface. Igwe was finally done pinching-a-loaf , and out . Olfaction didn’t fail me either – I was just about having the first lump of the meal I didn’t yell in vain for. “Don’t take those lumps,” Igwe roared , speaking Igbo . “ If you’re still sure about swimming with us ,” he concluded with. I normally would just escort them to the river – I took videos of me and played mobile games, while they had fun diving, taking dares and bets on who could swim faster. He’s probably right about staying light ,and avoiding a paunch – I had a bowl stacked with ‘Akpu’ and my favorite soup 'Edika-ikong' in a plate – a meal renowned for its unrivaled precision in shooting victims into postprandial somnolence . Just maybe I was unsure of what I wanted : unsure of making a leap into the unknown. But I do know one thing for sure , I didn’t want to die from drowning that day! So I try not to look at the meat-pervaded soup , placing the cloche over the coupe bowl. My gosh though, I'm a meatatarian! “why do I've to be tempted this way?,” I had thought. So I ignored my meal, and we took off to the river. Other than take a public shuttle, we biked and got there ten minutes earlier than the former would have taken – I guess the speed worsened my anxiety. Igwe perceived my fears - had him lecture me on misconceptual reasons aliens avoided the river – they believed it had a way of drowning non-indigenes for ritual purposes . Alas! They were all wrong . It’s a very safe location and water to swim – visitors are only advised not to go too deep , cos it’s pretty much swampy down there. Unarguably as well – aliens are unfamiliar with the water as opposed to indigenes who grew swimming and fishing in it , and could grok danger easily and retreat . So I have hope , enlightened that – making a leap into the unknown – was a facaded terror , phobia made me conceive. I plunged in , I am alive , and I wrote this!