Part 4: On perseverance, industry, resilience, self-confidence, self-reliance, resourcefulness, daring, fortitude, and invulnerability

O

One may be diminutive, and one may be bald, but without debt one has not earned ridicule; only one's creditor has grounds to make fun of one.

It is only on the day when the mother's bean fritters do not sell that one knows which child can consume large quantities of corn-meal.

On hearing about pounded yam he girded himself with cooked melon seeds for stew seasoning; on hearing about farm work he threw his cutlass away.

You do not ride a horse by day, you do not ride people by night, and you do not make great exertions to achieve any goal; how could you have a say in saving the world from disaster?

You did not slash the trunk with a cutlass, you did not shoot an arrow at the top of the palm-wine producing palm-tree, you come to the foot of the palm-tree and you raise your open mouth; does it drip all by itself?

“I was just on the verge of speaking my mind”: it only makes one into a coward.

It goes some way “in assuaging hunger”, saliva swallowing during a fast.

You pray to live as long as Olúàṣo, but can you endure the trials of Olúàṣo?

He split the kolanut pod open and also removed the bad among the seeds.

A woman who would marry a formidable man must have an unwavering mind.

A slender woman is the joy of her husband on a day of dancing, but a hefty woman is her husband's joy on the day of yams quartered for planting; after she has totted a hundred yam pieces, she walks smartly “towards the farm” ahead of her husband.

A person's ugliness is the god's doing; the person's lack of clothing is his/her own fault.

The parrot never dies in the grazing field.

A river does not so swell as to be over the head of the fish.

A river whose source one knows does not carry one away.

A river that swells in one's presence does not carry one away.

A magical charm does not work from within its gourdlet.

War does not rage and destroy the home of the Asẹ́yìn.

An army does not see the rear of an(other) army.

In all the twenty years that the cameleon has been in the throes of hunger, its dignified gait has not deserted it.

It is a mighty net that can trip the civet-cat.

The chicken had something to eat before there was corn.

What one plants is what one reaps.

Whatever one sows behind one is what one will return to find.

Whatever one hands to a warrior to look after is what he looks after.

Whatever sent the brown monkey climbing to the top of the thorny acacia tree: unless it sees something even more terrifying it will not climb down.

Whatever caused the pawned worker to stay away from the creditor's farm, when the two come face to face he will have some explaining to do.

The annual egúngún festival is not endless.

The shadow has no fear of the gully.

The shadow lacks substance but it never crashes.

Were it to rain, what would the leper have planted? A leper's palm cannot scoop ten grains of corn.

The rain may beat me, and the rain may beat my statue; the rain cannot wash away my good looks.

The rain provides water for the lazy person; but it does not fetch firewood for the lazy person.

Rain beats the man carrying pounded yams wrapped in leaves, the pounded yams become water-logged; the wife awaits the pounded yams, the husband sleeps on the farm.

Òjó is victimized without recourse; a bully insults him, he goes to hide in the rafters, and his nemesis follows him there.

Rain beats the parrot and the touraco rejoices, thinking that the parrot's tail feather is ruined; the rain only makes the tail feather brighter.

A lazy person's illness is not soon over; the lazy person finds no way out and prepares a fire to warm his head.

The detractor's eyes glow red, but they cannot light a lamp.

“The look on my parent-in-law's face is baleful”; the worst he/she can do is take his/her daughter back.

The Akee apple is never so blighted that one does not find a seed in it.

The Akee apple is never so blighted that it does not eventually split open.

One only tries one's best; heroic deeds do not come easy.

The crab watches after its head with its eyes.

Ten eyes are not like one's own.

“We might see each other again” who sells his dog for twenty cowries and spent the money on pounded yams to eat.

Other people's eyes will not look after matters for one.

Other people's eyes are nothing like one's owń minders of other people's business are few.

The eyes go red but do not go blind; the banana goes brilliant yellow but does not rot; a problem rattles one to one's foundations and lets one go; a problem that rattles one will not kill one.

The eye looks on a filthy sight and does not go blind: “like” one who sustains a succession of sufferings without wasting away.

The lump that attacks the head is shamed, the boil is shamed, and the hardened tissue on the buttocks is shames also.

The suffering that the babaláwo is experiencing is not something that leads to death; the hard times that the babaláwo is going through is one that leads to riches; the vicissitudes that now befall the babaláwo are ones that leave room for taking a bite of kola-nut.

The eyes that have seen gbẹ̀lẹ̀dẹ́ have seen the ultimate in sights.

The eyes that have seen the ocean will not tremble at the sight of the lagoon.

Never a day dawns that the hand does not make a trip to the mouth.

The water lettuce always winds up on the surface of the water; the water-lily always wings up on the surface of the stream.

It is from aloft that the bird sounds off.

One cannot be bedeviled by two hills; if one ascends a hill, one descends a hill.

The giant bush rat turns its back at the place where he has a quarrel; after getting to the market it clamps its hands on its head.

A dog's howling will not kill the moon.

Being widely reputed does not kill the moon; being noised about does not kill the vulture; wherever you please, make a noise about me.

The chicken is good at cultivating only the soil close by the home.

Stone, hit a tree, stone retrace your steps and return to whence you came.

The corpse does not know the cost of the shroud.

A three-year-old corpse of is no longer a newcomer to the grave.

A lazy person's corpse does not merit a coffin.

The owner of the eyes will not neglect them and watch foreign matter lodge in them.

The rich person will not give his/her money to a poor person to spend.

The rich person is an expert at trading.

The Olúmọ of the Ègbá territory is impossible to carry.

A stagnant pool cannot carry off a cow.

It is the water that is spilled; the water gourd is not broken.

There is water in the long-necked calabash.

The water from a new spring will not cover a gourd to the top.

Water drags the sand about, and yet water lacks hands and lacks legs.

“It will all end some time today”: a lazy person's motto in a fight.

Today, “I am leaving”; tomorrow, “I am leaving,” prevents the sorjourner from planting awùsá.

Today, a communal project; tomorrow group work on a somebody's farm; other people's work prevents one from doing one's own.

Detractors of others have no pestles; their mouths are their pestles.

It is he who has copper ornaments who must procure oranges; whoever has brass ornaments must procure the herb awẹdẹ.

The habitual debtor is already dead; except that he ha not yet been buried.

The Ṣàngó worshipper knows not whose ground corn he is spilling.

The owner of a habit will not go on a journey and leave his habit at home; when he goes he takes his habit along with him.

The person who does the trading is in the sun; the person who spends the money is in the shade.

The owner of the yams makes yam pottage out of the yams; the person who eats the yam scrapings off the peels is shamed.

The head that wears a cloth cap strives to wear a velvet cap; the one that wears a velvet cap strives to become a king.

It is while at work that a clock dies.

A head is never so heavy that the owner cannot carry it.

A huge head does not go completely bald.

Other people's heads will not carry one's load for one.

There is no god that comes to the aid of shiftless people; only one's arms aid one.

A crossroads where three roads meet is not afraid of sacrificial offerings.

Night time is a farmer's time to stretch the back.

The sun has not risen directly above the head; working hands cannot cease their toil.

The sun does not beat you, the rain does not beat you, and yet you say you are engaged in a gainful pursuit.

The industrious person is the enemy of the shiftless person.

The laborer is in the sun; the person who will reap the fruit is in the shade.

The farmer's hunger lasts only three months.

A machete's trade does not kill the machet; a hoe's trade does not cause problems for the hoe.

Wealth does not know who is the elder; it makes a senior of the younger person.

Money has no lineage; except for the person who will not work.

The trade that one will pursue and that will make one prosper does not leave scars on one.

Merchandise that one buys with money, one earns money for.

The trade one will pursue is the one one protects; Òjí scratches his body with a razor.

Other people's money is what the masquerader spends.

The white man is the past master of trading; money is the guarantee of fashionableness.

The white man sells merchandise with the name brand still attached; the Ègùn person sells cloth still in its bundle.

49. Àkàrà and ẹ̀kọ are meals that most often go together.  [Back to text]

50. Palm-tees are tapped for wine by hacking off some of the leaves to expose the pulp at their base, and then punching a hole in the pulp from which the liquid drips into a container tied to the tree.  [Back to text]

51. Olúàṣo was a king (Aláàfin) of Ọ̀yọ́ reputed to have lived for 320 years and to have sired 1,460 children (Johnson 158).  [Back to text]

52. Asẹ́yìn is the title of the chief of Ìsẹ́yìn, a town north of Ọyọ́  [Back to text]

53. The point of lighting a fire to warm his head is obscure. The other possibility, dáná ori (meaning “offer a feast of corn meal”) would suggest a laughable endeavor, since ori (ẹ̀kọ) is not a particularly popular meal. Another possibility, equally problematic, is dáná òrí (“make fire using shea butter as fuel,” or “make fire for shea butter)”.  [Back to text]

54. “Ojú ò fẹ́rakù” is an expression people use on parting from one another; it means, literally; “Our eyes are not giving up the sight of one another.”  [Back to text]

55. Gbẹ̀lẹ̀dẹ́ is probably a corruption of Gẹ̀lẹ̀dẹ́, a women's secret cult, since there is no word like gbẹ̀lẹ̀dẹ̀, as far as I know, in current Yoruba.  [Back to text]

56. Ojú oró is Pistia Stratiotes (Arcideae); and Òṣíbàtà is Nymphaea Lotus. (Abraham 463; 491.)  [Back to text]

57. The fight here refers to the circumstances in which the bush rat is captured. After hunters kill a giant bush rat they gut it and affix it to a stake, the stake running the length of its body, through the head, and, finally, through the fore-limbs which are clasped together above the rodent's head. A common gesture people visited by misfortune use is clamping their head in their hands.  [Back to text]

58. Olúmọ is an imposing inselberg in near Abẹ́òkúta.  [Back to text]

59. Ọ̀wẹ̀ and àro are traditional arrangements through which a group of people take turns working together on one another's projects.  [Back to text]

60. Awùsá is a creeper that yields fruits known locally as walnuts.  [Back to text]

61. The proverb refers to the materials needed for cleaning the metals.  [Back to text]

62. The preparation of ẹ̀bẹ (or àṣáró) leaves no yam remnant on the peels for a parasite to take advantage of; roasting and later peeling yams on the other hand, for example, would leave something for such a parasite.)  [Back to text]

63. The favorite spots for leaving sacrifices are crossroads, especially the confluence of three roads.  [Back to text]

64. The period between harvests (of some crop or another) is seldom more than three months.  [Back to text]