"Mummy! Mummy!! Our cultural day is taking place next week." Ken shouted in excitement as he rushed to his room to drop his schoolbag before searching for me within the house.
"Mummy, where are you?"
"I am in the kitchen." I responded.
He met me dishing out the family lunch.
"Mummy, our cultural day is next week," he repeated himself.
"Why are you so unusually excited about this cultural day to the point that you couldn't greet properly before talking about your school's event?"
"I am sorry mummy. Good afternoon mum."
"Take this food to the dining table." I turned to give him a plate of food only to meet him waiting to deliver a newsletter from school to me.
I dropped the food and collected the newsletter. I opened the letter to glance through the contents and the main information was to inform me that the school would be having their cultural day the following Tuesday.
As part of the events to make the day colorful, there would be an Apapa cooking competition among the students. A consent letter was demanded from me if I would be permitting my son to participate in the competition.
"Your school is organizing an Apapa cooking competition. That's lovely. Is that why you are so overwhelmed with excitement?"
"Yes mum. I have registered my name to participate but we were asked to give you this letter to get approval from you. Please, I want to participate mum."
"Chef Ken. Let's go and have our lunch. We will discuss your cooking competition later."
Within me, I kept wondering what would have triggered Ken's interest in participating in Apapa cooking competition. Apapa is made from means in a traditional way and it ranks top of the list of indigenous food of our people. I was not surprised when it was chosen for such a cultural event. However, Ken had only prepared Apapa once and it was filled with many mistakes from too much salt to uneven mixture of the paste.
We were having our meal when the horn of Mike's car announces his arrival at the gate.
Ken dropped his spoon and ran outside to welcome his father. Mike had earlier closed from work and went to Mary's school to pick her. A few minutes later the trio of Ken, Mary and their father walked in with Mary laughing uncontrollably.
"So, you want to participate in a cooking competition?" Mary asked again with demeaning laughter.
"Daddy, tell Mary to mind her business ooo. I am not talking to her." Ken was angry at the mockery from her sister.
"Mary, stop that. You people should allow me to rest before bringing your troubles." Mike warned the duo.
Mike and Mary entered their rooms to shower and joined us in the dining room. Mike barely took his seat when Ken picked the newsletter from where I left it in the kitchen and handed it over to his father.
Mike read it and waved it aside. He didn't expect a male child to participate in a cooking competition.
"I will get you new cultural wear." Mike remarked as he dropped the letter.
"Thank you dad. I want to participate in the cooking competition too." Ken responded.
"Cooking competition for you? That's a woman thing. Common!!!"
"That's not correct, dear." I interrupted their conversation.
"You won't be with this boy forever. When he gets to the University, won't he be cooking by himself?" I asked.
"He will be ordering food. I am working because of them. My boy doesn't need to suffer doing women's things in the name of food preparation.
"Whatever the two of you like, you do. I will provide you ita anebira, our cultural wear that will present you as a bonafide son of the soil." Mike concluded.
"I will continue to say this; cooking isn't for any gender. Let's train this boy on the basic requirements of running a home. He is willing to learn. In fact Ken, get prepared, I will write a consent letter for you to deliver to your teacher. You will participate in the competition."
Ken was very happy. "I will prove someone wrong," he turned to Mary's position and whispered.
It was on Friday and the cultural day was the following Tuesday. Preparation of Apapa consists of simple steps. The only thing that is technical in the process is the ratio of the ingredients to add in order to get a perfect taste.
I sat him down the following morning being Saturday to teach him the process again.
"The mistake with the first and last time that you cooked Apapa was the quantity of seasonings, oil and water that you added to the paste and also the uneven mixture to get a uniform texture."
At this point, he sought permission to get a book and pen to jot down the process which I obliged.
"Let's work with 10 cups of beans," I continued. "After soaking your beans for about 30 minutes, you will wash it and add about ten pieces of atarodo pepper. Cut about four of an average sized onion into it and blend them together with crayfish to get a paste. Mix the paste thoroughly with water, seasoning and red oil." I showed him the quantity of each mentioned ingredient.
"This is followed by sharing them into fresh Avi Apapa, properly folding it and cooking for about an hour or less."
Avi Apapa is a broad leaf used in the preparation of Apapa.
In the evening, I decided to cook Apapa for our dinner in order to experiment the process. We both followed his jottings and the resulting Apapa was superb.
By Sunday morning, I told Ken to prepare Apapa independently.
When Mike and Mary got wind that we were preparing Apapa, they protested against eating Apapa again after eating the same the previous day.
"We will cook another food for them." I assured Ken to go on with his cooking.
He did and the result was even better than the one we prepared together.
"We are good to go!!!!" I shouted when I tasted the Apapa. I hugged my boy for a job well done.
We arranged all the needed materials before the D-Day. We arrived at the school at the scheduled time and a few minutes later, the competition being the first in the line of activities to mark the cultural day started.
There were six contestants and all but Ken were females.
The contestants were called out to man their individual cooking spots. They were given two hours each to start the cooking and present their food to the judges who were seated opposite the cooking stage.
As they were doing the cooking, I was video recording my boy just like other parents were covering their wards. They were cheered up by the school band who were stationed at a side to keep everyone entertained.
Before the given time was exhausted, all the contestants had presented their foods to the judges. Ken was the fourth person to present his food.
Each person in the order of the presentation was called to explain briefly the process involved in preparing the food. After the speech, the judges would dish a small quantity of the food to have a taste. In front of each of the five members of the judges was a scoresheet in which they recorded the score of each participant.
The judges came together after the sixth contestant gave her speech to find the average of the scores awarded to each of the contestants.
All the parents and other audience were apprehensively waiting for the result. It was at this point that Mike joined us in the arena.
"It's time to declare the winner of this tightly contested competition." One of the judges stood up to declare the results.
He started from the rear by announcing the third position followed by the second.
"And the first position goes to Ken Mike," the winner was declared.
Ken jumped on me to hug me. Mike and Mary couldn't hide their joy for seeing Ken being called to the podium to receive his prize.
The chairman of the occasion used the opportunity to preach to other parents to draw some lessons from me and my husband for not making the art of cooking the exclusive job of female children.
Mike and I were called to the podium among all the parents for special recognition.
When we were taking a group picture, I whispered to Mike's ears; "Aren't you proud of this result and recognition? No one asked whether you supported this or not. We took the glory together."
"This experience has changed my orientation." He responded as we all smiled at the camera.