But not so Paloma, Angel and Sula’s granny. Bannange! She is very experienced with the cane. Like she went to school for special lessons. So much that the kids are terrified when she asks a question about why this wasn't done, and why that was not washed. The caning can happen at any time of the day- morning, noon, evening, night.
The kids are the permanent fixtures in their gran’s house. There are others who come over for a weekend or during the school holiday, but these ones are always there. They go to one of the local schools on the kaalo. The others are treated like little kings and queens. The only ones you hear being constantly threatened are the three musketeers- Paloma, Angel and Sula.
One time they were sleeping when she arrived after a long day. The power was off so the poor things had retired for the night. She knocked about 30 times, going from the back door to the front, to the windows, to the walls.
“Sula!! Sula!! Naye this child. Oba he’s not there! Paloma! Angel! I swear abaana bano can sleep!”
She marched back to the front and pounded on their bedroom window. Then she noticed a light. “Ho! These kids left the candle burning!! She mumbled some swear words and charged for the door with a stone. “Bam! Bam!! Hammer! Hammer!!”
The morgue suddenly came alive. “Wanji Jjaja!” someone replied.
“Jjangu ogulewo olugyi! Kalabe! Mwebaka ki bwemutyo? Nakonkonye dda nga temuwulira! N’genda kuba sabula kale!”
Grandmother was livid. She delivered on her promise with much gusto and the yelps and cries carried far into the night.
Another time Paloma got the thrashing of her life when she made the daring "mistake" when she for a few minutes, she abandoned the sigiri she had been instructed to light, to go and laugh with the neighbor’s kids. “Palooomaaaaa!”
You could think the woman was having a heart attack.
“Come here, you miserable child, I am going to beat you so hard today!”
And for sure, Paloma received about 10 of the best. It sounded like a really hard rubber slipper amid the screams of "I won't do it again!"
As for Sula, I think he can write a fat book on the canes he has received in this his short life.
I think their mothers watched a lot of bi-Filipinos. Not with those names.
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