Yaboh Donaldia Emmanuella Koumassou 

ESL 100 CE 

October 10, 2021 

Essay 2, second draft 

Topic: From Nigeria to Benin because of war 

 

My Ethnic Roots 

I have lived away from my real root country for many years. I still cannot believe I am half-Nigerian and half-Beninese. I have always qualified myself as a complete and real daughter of Benin, but I have realized lately that I am not. My great-grandfather, my father's grandfather was from Oyo, Nigeria. He came with his wife to Benin in 1906 because of the war that was happening in Nigeria, so I am a Nigerian born in Benin. He took the risk of leaving his hometown, leaving the  family house, and losing communication with his family for his safety. Thus, until now, none of my family members in Benin knows anything about our ethnic roots and our family still in Nigeria. My great-grandfather also took another wife in Benin, and that act had created a conflict between his first wife and the second one.That conflict has affected my family for more than a hundred years. My great-grandparents did not make a mistake by running away from the war to survive, but that decision affected the whole family and the generations that followed. 

My great-grandparents had lost every contact with the family members still in Nigeria. I mean, the rest of the family, my great- grandparent siblings, decided to stay in Nigeria no matter what, so the family split in two. In that period, it was not common for anybody to have a landline and my great-grandparents had none. Therefore, it was difficult to maintain relationships and communication between both sides of the family. Even though the war in Nigeria ended many years ago, my great-grandparents could not call the family just to make sure that they were still alive and doing well. Also, they were the only ones that knew the way to go back to their hometown. When my great-grandparents were still alive, they had not told anybody how to access the village, so the generation that followed their death had no idea how to contact the family to announce the news. My family was just living in Benin as their home country.  

In addition, I do not know anything about the cultures, or the home languages of Nigeria. Every part of the country has its own culture and its own language, and in Oyo, people speak English and Yoruba. I am supposed to know those languages since my childhood, but I don’t know them. Right now, I am already learning English, and I wish I could know how to speak Yoruba too. However, no one taught me how to speak it. Unfortunately, even my parents know nothing about the language we were supposed to know, so instead of speaking English and Yoruba with my parents, I speak French and Fon-my dialect from Benin, with them. The culture in Benin is the only one that my family and I have learned and have practiced all those years. If eventually there were a way for my family and me to go for the first time to our village in Nigeria, it might be difficult to familiarize ourselves with the new culture, just because we were not used to it.  

Moreover, there has never been peace, or unity between the children of my great-grandfather. My great-grandfather came to Benin with his first wife, and then he married another wife after spending a few years in Benin. Unfortunately, the first one was not happy about it. My family is Christian, and like some Christians in Benin, my great-grandfather chose to get a second wife according to the tradition. It was at that moment that a conflict has started between the two wives, so the children from both sides took over when they grew up. Until 2021, some of my uncles and aunties do not speak to each other because of that old conflict. Also, some of the grandchildren like me do not know each other or have not met yet. I always pray for a united family, but this situation has really affected the whole family and me. I wish my family could come together as one. 

 The war that happened at that time in Nigeria had made so many people run away from the country, and that was the case with my family. Since my great grandparents left Nigeria for Benin, the connection between the family members has been broken and the Nigeria culture has been lost. I wish I could know better about my ethnic roots. Besides, there is no connection or union between my family members since my great-grandfather took another wife in Benin after his first wife. All I want for my family is more unity and joy, but I am still unsure of how to achieve that.