The dirty dishes

Many children in the average Ghanaian houshold cannot escape house chores; some of which includes sweeping the compound, fetching water from the community vantage tap, sending the refuse to its respective dump, doing dishes, cleaning the hen coop, going into the bush with a cutlass and a jute sack to look for and cut grass for the goats' feeding, doing the laundry, among others; Or at least those were most of my chores as a child. 

However, the chore I dreaded doing the most was to wash the dirty dishes.

Being the perfectionist that I was as a child, cleaning the dishes would mean that I would have to spend a lot of time scraping and rinsing.

Anytime I heard my mother call out my name to go and do the dishes, my fragile heart would skip a beat. I could sometimes shed a bucket of tears before beginning the process of doing the dishes. We didn't have a sink, so I usually used basins. Other times I would spend an awful amount of time wallowing and dreading of the thoughts of doing dishes before grabbing a bucket to fetch water.

I must have been between the ages of 8 to 10, when one unfortunate day, mom decided to prepare an insane amount of food for whatever reason I wasn't sure of, even up till date. It resulted in lots of dirty dishes. She asked me to wash them when I got home fom school. I sat on a kitchen stool by the dirty dishes on the front porch of the house. I began my wallowing in sadness routine before washing dirty dishes as usual. When mother saw me in that state, she scolded me to woman up and get the dishes washed. The sound and pitch of the scold pierced through my heart and broke me into to tears.

My father was arriving from work. Still clothed in his camouflage uniform, he hurried to me and asked why I was crying. I told him the dishes were too much and I didn't even know where to start from. He smiled and drew a kitchen stool and sat by me. He consoled me and said that i should not worry; he assured me, that he was going to teach me an easy technique to wash many dishes effortlessly. He also said that he was going to help me to wash the ones i had to wash. 

He removed his shiny army boots and slipped his feet into a flip flop. I fetched water from the barrel and he washed while I rinsed; at the while, he explained the approach/technique I needed to be able to wash lots of dirty dishes effortlessly. 

My mother spotted us from the window and got furious. She kept scolding at us; but more especially at my dad. Her main concern was that he was spoiling me. "Kwabena Yeboah mempe nea woye no.(Kwabena Yeboah, I don't like what you're doing). Gyae na mentete me ba!. (Leave the child rearing to me). Obaa na otete Obaa! (A woman rears a woman)." among other exclamations. 

My father kept a grin on his face and told me not to worry. I always thought my mother was terrifying once provoked and her scolds scared me sometimes; but my father kept mute with smiles on his face. Maybe I learned how to keep calm in difficult situations from him. 

FYI, this writing is not about dirty dishes. It is a recapture of a snippet of the amazing father my father has been to myself and my sisters.

I still use daddy's dirty dishes wash technique till date. The technique he taught me was that, I was not supposed to look at washing dishes as a chore or a death sentence, but rather, a regular life activity. 

He told me, that bowls and plates got dirty because we ate, and we had to eat because everyone gets hungry and makes or buy food. He also made me understand that if I left dishes unwashed, It'll breed germs and the whole family would get sick and suffer. Happy father's day dad. Thanks for being the only man who understands how my head and heart functions. I love you so much.