The African Child: Coming to America

By Anthony Baah

The book African child tells a story about an African born child who struggled right from his infancy, but through perseverance and hard work has become successful and continues his living not in his native country but in a foreign land. His life has been undulating and meandering. He went through a lot; there are turns in which the boy realizes his dreams and successes after dedicating his life to continued improvement. To grow and become the best, one has to work harder on it.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Sep 30, 2016
• ISBN: 9781483590233

Book preview

•   Prologue

Part I

Life as it Began in a Small African Country

The greater enemy of tomorrow’s success is today’s success.

—Rick Warren

Chapter One

Life Begins on Kitchen Floor

In the ’50s, a prominent cocoa farmer Kwame Boasiako and his wife Amah Durowa lived in a small cottage popularly known as Bosumponso in a far corner of an African country. Although not well educated, the couple was very popular in Bosumponso and the surrounding area because of the wealth they attained from working extremely hard on their cocoa plantation

They had two pretty daughters from Amah’s previous marriage. Kwame and Amah dreamed that someday they would have a baby boy as their first child together and were delighted when Amah became pregnant.

The two lived in a huge house in the middle of the plantation. Kwame worked most of the time on the farm while Amah helped with work in the house. When Amah was pregnant, she stayed with the two girls while Kwame worked constantly on the farm.

Around noon one Friday Kwame was working on the farm. Amah was walking slowly with an empty bucket in her right hand to fetch rain water from a barrel in the corner across from the kitchen, suddenly she let out a piercing scream. Kwame! Kwame… she continued screaming over and over, again and again.

Amah’s water had broken and she felt the child was on his way. In a few minutes, right by the barrel, the baby was already out and crying loudly.

Kwame, possibly sensing what was happening in the house, decided to take a break and came home to find both his wife and the baby boy on the floor with blood all over the area.

Kwame cleaned his wife and child with joy and a smile on his face. He asked a neighbor to do the necessary work on the child while Amah rested in the bedroom. The child was named Kofi. In this particular West African country, formally known as Gold Coast and now Ghana, there are many tribes. One of the tribes is popularly known as Akan. In this tribe, a newly born baby carries the name of the day of the week he/she is born. (See table 1.1 below).

Table 1.1: The Akan tribe - child born and named after a day of the week

Kwame and Amah later had two girls. Kofi got his surname from one of his uncles, Kofi Antwan, a brother of Kwame Boasiako.

In Bosumponso, life started to become a little harder after Kwame married two other women. There was no machinery so most men were compelled to take on more than one wife to help in the farming venture.

Imagine a single home with all the wives and Amah’s five children: chaos. Wives were arguing and children were running around. Kwame was constantly settling disputes.

Amah being the oldest wife could not handle the pressure from these younger wives and so she decided to call it quits and took all her children and went to live with her relatives in another city—Wamanafo farther away from Bosumponso (At that time no courts were involved in marriage breakups). Imagine how life was with five children without a father and Amah handling them all by herself in a town she had not lived since she was a young lady.

Kwame made several attempts to get Amah back but she was determined to start a new life with her children; she wanted nothing to do with Kwame. Amah would not even allow him to get in touch with the children despite the fact that she was having difficulty making ends meet.

Chapter Two

Mother Raises Children Alone

Kofi Antwan was five years old living with his mother and four sisters. He had skinny legs, a protruding stomach and liked to eat. He was the one Amah favored; his sisters were jealous.

When Kofi was old enough to go to school, he had help whenever he needed it from his older sisters. Between six and seven Kofi was becoming spoiled because of Amah’s pampering.

Amah would wake up Kofi every morning so he could prepare and go to school. One day he told her, Mama, I am not going to school today.

He would not go to school if Amah would not buy him a soccer ball. He put his school uniform on a stone and smashed it into pieces to keep from going to school. All attempts to convince him to go to school failed. Amah was troubled and did not know what to do with him; his sisters blamed his actions on his mother.

Life was becoming tougher for Amah with the children at Wamanafo and so she decided to start farming and selling farm produce so she could take care of the children. There was congestion and poverty in the household.

Amah was a strong woman who worked hard so she could care for the children by herself. Kofi was the only problem; she was worried about him and thought she needed a man to help her care for the boy. But she had decided not to marry again—once bitten twice shy.

Kofi wanted to go see his father but Amah would not allow it. He would do so many bad things that he thought he could provoke his mother so that she would send him back to his father.

Amah was determined not to return to Kwame.

Behavior Causes Problems

Days went by when most neighbors were constantly telling Amah about her son’s bad behavior. Kofi befriended some very bad boys—disturbing the neighborhood. One day he ended up in juvenile detention after stealing coconuts with friends. This prompted Amah to find a male caretaker for him. He was finally sent away to live with his uncle in a nearby city in the same region.

The uncle at that time was a sergeant in the worker’s brigade; he was a strict disciplinarian and made the boy’s life miserable. His discipline and strictness changed the boy drastically. He grew very thin; neighbors thought that the uncle wasn’t feeding him well enough and was physically abusing him.

When Amah had not seen her son in a year she decided to pay him a surprise visit after she heard the news about the unsuitable situation at the uncle’s home. When she saw him, tears started rolling down her cheeks and she asked what was going on. The uncle was at work while his wife and Kofi were at home. Kofi explained the situation and asked his mother to take him back quickly.

Amah regretted her harsh decision and decided to take Kofi with her back to Wamanafo. Everyone who saw the boy asked, What has happened to you? Kofi, his sisters and Amah refused to explain. Kofi had become very submissive and believed in himself and did very well in school.

He Joins the Mighty Sparks Band

When Kofi joined the Mighty Sparks Band in the neighborhood he was dressed as a girl and sang and danced in most of the band’s concerts or plays. The band consisted of about eight boys and performed at most occasions in the city and even traveled to perform in nearby towns and villages.

(This continued until he attended the secondary school when he left the band because he wanted to concentrate on his studies.)

Children Receive Baptism

Kofi and his sisters were now true churchgoers and started taking religious studies and soon received baptism in the Catholic Church. He took Antoni from Anthony as his Christian name; his full name was Antoni Kofi Antwan, which he used everywhere he attended school in the country. He was once able to convince his mother to go stay with his father, who allegedly asked him to live with his aunt, one of the father’s sisters in Akumadan, a city near Bosumponso.

Kofi continued his primary education in Akumadan until he was twelve years old and later lived with his old sister in Kumasi in the Ashanti Region of Ghana. His sister was studying in a vocational institution and was living with relatives. His sister graduated and later opened up her own tailoring business in Sunyani in the Brong Ahafo Region of Ghana. Kofi continued his middle and high school education in Kumasi until he attended secondary school.

Boy Joins African Youth Command (AYC)

Kofi, who everyone now called Antoni, decided to use his father’s last name, therefore he was popularly known in school as Antoni Boasiako. He joined a youth organization known as African Youth Command (AYC) when he visited his sister in Sunyani. Kofi’s life changed; he became very serious, well behaved and patriotic. AYC was established by then President of Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah of the Convention People’s Party (CPP). Kofi’s organization supported CPP’s ideology.

Kofi learned the pledge of allegiance and the national anthem of the country. He was given a special AYC uniform and wore that anytime there was an event. He had the opportunity to travel to various places in the country, especially when the president or any dignitary of the CPP party was there.

He actively participated in communal labor, served the community by distributing goods and providing services to the poor and did well in school. As a result of his hard work in school, he passed the common entrance examination to go to secondary school. Kofi continued his secondary school education while he was still AYC member and continued to do

Reviews for The African Child

[Hagar Hagar · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

So wonderful story and I thought it was in my home village