Creative Writing-Short Story

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2011 Traces from Whydah Jacqueline Sierra Creative Writing Dr. Pauley Dada Deo Akili-Mali was a strong and powerful man well known in all southwestern Nigeria and the Republic of Benin. He was admired and looked up to by many for his wisdom and powerful gift as a spiritual healer and medicine man. He was born in the Democratic Republic of Congo in the year 1800. He was a big man with an intriguing physique and quite deceiving with his soft spoken words and humble qualities. As a young man he moved to Whydah, a small town in southern Benin, to work the corn and cassava fields. During the fall of the Oyo Empire, he was one of the millions of Africans abducted and sold into slavery. As a young child, I remember the countless hours listening attentively to his story on what took place on that muggy and humid night in Whydah. The African traders came in, raiding the town of Whydah with gunfire vigorously capturing his people and most of his tribe. “Whydah is being attacked by pirate ships!” yelled the town crier, as the drums beat loudly. Horrified with the loud shooting and war raid, Dada Deo ran through the fields of Whydah looking for refuge. “Olorun igbala (“God our savior”)!” he prayed. The people ran to their homes hoping this was just a nightmare. A savage crew of fifty or more white men invaded the streets of Whydah firing their rifles and yelling, “Take the chains and shackles and capture as many as you can!” Dada Deo, horror-strucked by the confusion and uproar, knew this was not a nightmare. He was frightened for his life and softly began to pray in Lucumi, “mojuba olofi, mojuba olorun, mojuba olodumare……...” The people of the town were all in an uproar, they began chanting their prayers and libations paying homage and giving honor to the Supreme Being “Olodumare” (God) pleading for help and for their safety. It was a disturbing

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