another evening in the new neighbourhood.

I am on my way to our new place, tiny and small. I am happy to be leaving work and heading home. The neighbourhood is nice, people are friendly, cigarettes are around the corner and the area is quiet and relaxed. Once I arrive I know Zitner will be there and we will sit and talk about work and laugh about nonsense. Till then the day presses heavily on my shoulders. Sweat glues my legs together beneath my impractical poly skirt.
I stop by the egg sandwich man on the corner. Usually women here make egg sandwiches by the roadside but this gentleman is an anomaly. The egg man. “Two egg,” I say. “Tea bread two thousand.” I’ve been nauseated all day by the heat and a weekend illness that I thought was malaria but really wasn’t. This is the first thing I’ve eaten all day. I stand anxiously shifting side to side, my stomach gnawing.

Suddenly a roly poly Ghanaian boy stands beside me. His face is big, round and rubbery and his shirt bulges out with squishy fat. The old me used to be surprised when I saw chubby people here.
“So I’m being hunted,” he says suddenly, staring straight ahead. “Hunters come. They follow me every where. Everywhere I go, I get chop.”
I’m having trouble understanding him through the accent – something that hasn’t happened for awhile. Also, he speaks too low for me to hear. Also, I suspect he is feeding me a bit of a yarn. “Sorry?” I say, leaning closer.

He repeats himself and goes on. “I’m from Liberia, you know,” he says.

“No kidding,” I say. People like to tell you where they’re from, or ask you where you’re from, and it makes you tired sometimes. But I know some Liberans from the refugee camp and my interest is mildly piqued. I give him the opening since Charles Taylor’s trial is happening right now.

“So what do you think about your former president being on trial?” I ask.

The following conversation occurs:

“I don’t care about politics. Everywhere I go I get chop.”
Me: “Who’s chopping you?”
“The military. They cut my face.They think I’m a murderer.”
At this point, I start having fun. “Well aren’t you?”
“No,” he says. “Well, maybe.”

Everyone around us, including the egg man, customers of the egg man, and people just hanging around laugh heartily at this point. I sigh, smile ruefully and stand there as generally happens in these situations. Eventually everyone else stops laughing except the fat boy, who throws his head back and brays at the night sky of a million stars. Everyone then sits awkwardly in silence while he keeps laughing. I wonder if he is a known insane person that everyone knows to be wary of….except for me.

“My family, they’re from Cote D’Ivoire,” he says as the laughter subsides.
“Oh yeah?” I say, wishing the egg man would hurry up.
“Yeah,” he says. “My dad’s from Canada.”
“No shit.”
“And I’m from Liberia. The navy, they chop me. The army, they think I’m murderer. The police always harass me.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m not a murderer.”
“You sure?”

The egg sandwich is at last ready. I pay the egg man. The fat boy looks at me and asks the question that this entire conversation has led up to.

“Can you dash me small?” he asks. “I want sandwich too.”
Because of the creativity and intensity of his approach, I give him one Ghana cedi. “Thank you,” he says. Then he looks at me.
“I’m going to come home with you!” he says.
Oh dear Christ.
I start simultaneously backing away while also yelling.
“No, no no. You’re getting a sandwich. GO GET THE SANDWICH.”

The fat boy starts following me anyway. Then, three things happen – the egg man grabs him and starts yelling in Twi, the boy stumbles and drops the money I gave him, and a woman also stands up and begins yelling.

Amidst the yelling, the Twi, and the dust that flies up as their feet shuffle in the dirt, I make a retreat into the night. In my head, I dub my new friend "Captain Squish" and wonder when I will next have to be running away from him.