Interview with Rukaya Usman

Bio: Rukaya Usman lives with her elderly mother in a modest house her late father bought, selling oranges and bananas on a table in front. She was born in Kumasi to parents who came from Bawku, but spent a hard childhood working in Liberia for a distant relation. She learned some English there, but is more comfortable speaking Twi.

We Give Everyone the Same Respect

Description: My uncle was in Liberia. I went there; someone took me from my father and took me to live there. I was getting to fifteen years old before I came back.

English Translation of Twi Interview
My parents
[00:15:5] I was born right here in Kumasi.  My father's name was Bawa Usman.  My mother's name was Hasana Yakoa.  My father was born after twins.  My mother was also a twin, one girl and one boy.  When they were little, that one died.  They came right here to Kumasi from Burkina.  When they came, you would walk all the way from the North, and you would bring cattle along.  So when they arrived, they decided to stay on in Kumasi.  So from here, he went to marry my mother in Bawku and brought her here [00:59:0]

He worked at PNT.  There were jobs there where you worked for so many years, and you went on pension.  He also worked at the Cocoa Marketing Board.  Then he went back to work as a soldier, a senior soldier, and got a pension.  We were nine children, nine, two boys and four girls.  [1:24:5]

My work in Liberia
Me, I was born in Kumasi, but I didn't grow up here.  My uncle was in Liberia.  I went there; someone took me from my father and took me to live there.  I was getting to fifteen years old before I came back.  The war was starting and I came back.
GC: What were you doing there in Liberia?

I went to live with a lady there and worked.  I sold things in a beer bar, someone's' beer bar, and we also ran a poultry farm, and picked cocoa and we sold liquor.  So when I grew up a little, my father said they should bring me back.  And they brought me back.
[2:09:6]

When I got back, my mother and father were not well.  My father had retired on pension, he was at home, I mean, there was nothing there. So I started trading, little by little.  I sold and earned a little money.  My father bought a sewing machine and told me to go learn to sew.  I went to learn sewing for about four to six years, but when I finished there was no helper to help me open my shop.  There was no money.  I had a machine, but if I opened a shop, there was no money.  Papa had no money.  So it made me give that up.   I stopped that and I started up on my own with cooking rice. I sold it little by little, and I mean, I looked after myself a little.  Then I and started to sell oranges and bananas and right now, that's what I sell.  [2:11:0]

Kept Out of School
It seems to me that because of money I couldn't go to school properly.  My father was retired.
GC: I thought you went to school long ago.
I only went to school for a little while.  The lady who I went to live with, she didn't let me go to school. Her child that took me there, we did too much work, really.  I couldn't attend school.  If I went for a week, maybe Monday to Wednesday, I wouldn't go again.
Only work, we only worked.  And at that time, my rather, well, you know that Northerners we don't like the drink business.  So they told my father that I was selling liquor.  That's why my father said, let's bring her back to Ghana.  They brought me back. [3:56:0]

My life now---our house
Then my father passed away last year.  He left behind me and my mother, and my brothers and sisters that live there now.  Our house is our father's own house, some quarters that he bought.  And my brother says that he himself will build an extension on to it little by little.  So selling the oranges and bananas just brings me a little to buy food to eat.  Besides, I am not married and I have no children, so I get by.  My next younger sister's child is living with me.   The father died and they had had four children together.  All of them came to our house and all of us raised the children.  [4:50:0]

Marriage
I have never married.
GC: Excuse me, but how old are you?
I am thirty-nine years old now.
GC: I thought that here in Ghana everyone married.
Yes, everyone marries, but as for me, it never happened.
GC: Did your father not want it?
He did want it, but it began when he only wanted me to marry someone from our hometown.  He didn't want us to marry into a different tribe.  Then he left it that he only wanted us to marry a Muslim.  That's what he wanted.  But all of the daughters have married, except for me.  I'm the only one left unmarried.  Of the five brothers, only one has married.  The other ones have not married. [5:45:0]

Ethnicity [5:53:5]
Our actual hometown is Gambaga, in the Bawku area. It is in Mamprusi.  Our father was fifty-fifty, half Mossi and half Mamprusi.  Our mother was Busanga, do you know that tribe? 
GC: I never did. So Bawku is your town. [6:23:4]

Trading [6:36]
Now I buy and sell just a little.  Between at first and now, the market got spoiled.   We aren't buying well. 
GC: Even bananas?
They aren't buying well. At first, I would buy a lot and it would get finished quickly. Now the market is spoiled.  I just buy a little bit, and add a little to the price, and just get a little money to buy food to eat.
GC: So where do you sell them?
Just over there, on a table in front of our own house.
GC: And where do you get them?
I go get them at the market, at Kejetia.  People bring them from the villages and they sell their things, and I buy.
7:25]
If I am going, they come with them on Mondays and Thursdays. I have to be there early in the morning, by 6 o'clock, and they come, and we buy.  We discuss the price and then we buy from them.  We pack them up and bring them to the house by truck and we sell them. [7:45]…

Customers
[8:01] Our customers, some come from the village and bring them to us.
GC: Do they come to look for you in the market?
I go there and meet them; I go and wait for them.  When they come, then I go to meet them and I buy.  Every week I go and buy from them. [8:36]

Problems [8:41]
There are a lot of problems.  Often people are not buying, they don't have money.  It has made things so that I hadn't got work, and I don't have money that I could take and start a new kind of work. I don't have anyone to help me.   If I had some support, that's the thing, if only God is protecting me, and his eye falls on me, then he will help me a little.  Of all the problems that is the one that bothers me.  [9:02] [9:18]
If I could add some, I could get enough to buy food to eat.  If that doesn't happen, I will stop working.  In my trade, if I buy goods with about five or ten thousand to work with, then I can take some and buy food. [9:34]

[10:07] The work that looks good to me is something like building a little store, and sold cloth and these veils.  That's what I would like to do, but I don't have money, I don't have any helper, that's why I am still selling oranges and bananas. [10:16]

Neighbors [10:39]
It is a family house.  My father's house.  That's why only me, my mother and my brothers and sisters live there.  All of us are Muslims.  [10:47]

[10:56] We and Christians live together.  The houses around there, they are all Christians.  Muslims live here and there one by one.   Everything is fine between us and the Christians.  We are all fine.  The Christians are fine with us.  If somebody is moving out, we go and say goodbye to them.  They also, if someone of us is moving, they will come and say goodbye to us.  We all are fine. We give everyone the same respect.  We don't like to fight, we don't do anything.  We are just one people.  We don't have any quarrels at all.  [11:32]