Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria

Ibibio is the home language of most families in Akwa Ibom, and its close relatives Annang and Efik are understood across the state. It is a tonal language with five tones, so the same letters can mean different things when said with a different melody. Learn the words below by ear from a relative if you can; the written form is only half the lesson.

Greetings

Counting from one to ten

Notice the pattern: six is itio-kiet ("five and one"), eight is itia-ita ("five and three"), and nine is usuk-kiet ("one short", on the way to ten). Twenty is edip.

Mini practice

• In the morning, greet a grandparent with Amesiere, and a room full of aunties with Emesiere.
• When someone gives you food, say Sosongo.
• Count ten periwinkles or ten oranges out loud: kiet, iba, ita, inaang, ition…

Notes on spelling: Ibibio writing varies. You may see "Mesiere" without the first letter, "Sòsòngò" or "Sòsòñò" with tone marks, "keed" or "ked" for one, and "inañ" for four. Plural forms begin with E- instead of A-. Greetings are cross-checked between the Wikivoyage Ibibio phrasebook and the SpeakIbibio course; numbers between Omniglot and Wikivoyage. Annang, Oro and Ekid speakers say some of these words differently, so a relative's version is always right for your family.

Ubong was nine, and he had flown all the way from Houston to visit his uncle in Oron, a town by the wide brown water where the Cross River meets the sea.

On the first morning, Uncle Edet took him down to the waterside. Long wooden boats rocked by the shore. Women were sorting baskets of crayfish and periwinkles, the little snails that go into the soup. Beyond the boats, the dark green mangrove trees stood on their tiptoe roots in the water.

"Today," said Uncle Edet, "I want to show you your grandfathers."

Ubong frowned. "But Grandpa lives in Houston with us. And Grandpa's dad died before I was born."

"Come," said Uncle Edet. "You will see."

They walked to a long, low building with a sign: Oron Museum. Inside it was cool and quiet. And all along the walls stood wooden people.

Some were tall, some were short. Some had round faces and some had long beards carved into the wood. Some held things in their hands. Their wood was dark and smooth, and cracked in places, like the skin of a very old person's hand.

"These are the Ekpu," said Uncle Edet softly. "Long, long ago, when an important elder of Oron died, a carver made a figure like this to remember him. The family kept it, so that the children and the grandchildren would not forget who he was."

Ubong walked slowly along the row. One figure had a little round cap. Another had a big belly and a kind face. He found himself smiling at it.

"Are there lots of them?"

"Once there were hundreds, about eight hundred, brought together here. But many were lost long ago, during a hard time in Nigeria. The ones you see are the ones that stayed."

Ubong stopped in front of a figure with a long chin and serious eyes. "He looks a bit like Grandpa," he said.

Uncle Edet laughed. "Maybe he is family. Maybe not. But that is the point. These carvers were saying: this person mattered. Remember him."

On the walk back, Ubong was quiet. At last he said, "Uncle, nobody carved a statue for Great-Grandpa."

"No. But we can still remember him. Do you know his name?"

Ubong shook his head. He felt a little sad that he did not.

That evening, after a big bowl of soup with periwinkles, Uncle Edet brought out an old photograph. A tall man in a white shirt stood beside a fishing boat. "Your great-grandfather, Okon," he said. "He fished these waters every day. He could tell when rain was coming just by looking at the river."

Ubong took a pencil and paper. He did not have wood or a carving knife, so he drew. He drew a tall man with a long chin and serious eyes, standing by a boat, with the mangroves behind him. Underneath he wrote, very carefully: OKON, FISHERMAN OF ORON.

When he flew home to Houston, he stuck the drawing on the fridge. Every time Grandpa saw it, he told another story about his father. And so Okon of Oron kept living, in pencil, in a kitchen far across the sea.

A name that is spoken does not die.

Original story for AllAboutAfrica. Ask your child: what is the name of one of your great-grandparents, and what do you know about them?

In Ikot Ekpene, the Raffia City, there lived a girl called Idara. Her name means joy, and she was always in a hurry.

Idara's grandmother, Mma Affiong, was a weaver. Every morning she sat on a low stool under the mango tree with a bundle of pale raffia beside her. Raffia comes from the raffia palm. The long, thin strips are dried in the sun until they are soft and strong, and then clever hands weave them into baskets, mats, hats and even chairs.

"Grandma," said Idara one morning, "teach me to make a basket. I want to sell it at the market on Saturday."

Mma Affiong smiled. "Saturday is four days away. A good basket takes patience."

"I am very fast," said Idara.

"That," said her grandmother, "is what worries me."

She showed Idara how to begin: three strands crossed like a star, then a fourth strand going over and under, over and under, round and round. Idara watched for two minutes. Then she grabbed a handful of raffia and began.

Over, under, over, under. Her fingers flew. By lunchtime she had the bottom of a basket. By evening, the sides were rising. She did not stop to pull each strand tight. She did not stop to check that the rows were straight. Once, a strand slipped out of place and stuck out like a little tail. Idara looked at it, shrugged, and kept going.

"Pull that one back in," said Mma Affiong quietly.

"It's only one," said Idara. "Nobody will notice."

By Friday night, Idara had a whole basket. It was a little lopsided, but it was hers. She put it by the door, ready for the market.

On Saturday morning she filled it with oranges to show how useful it was, and lifted it up proudly.

Pop. The little tail of raffia pulled free. Then the strand next to it slid loose. Then the next, and the next, and the whole side of the basket opened like a mouth, and the oranges rolled out across the yard, bumping into the chickens.

Idara sat down on the step and cried.

Mma Affiong came and sat beside her. She picked up the basket and turned it over in her hands.

"Do you see where it began?" she asked, pointing to the place where the little tail had been. "One loose strand does not stay alone. It tells the strand beside it that it is all right to be loose too."

Idara sniffed. "So I have to start again?"

"No. We will undo it to the place where it was good, and weave from there. And this time, we pull each strand tight before the next one."

So they did. It was slower. Much slower. At each row Mma Affiong said, "Pull," and Idara pulled, until the raffia sang a tiny squeak against her fingers. It took a whole extra week. Idara missed that Saturday's market.

But when the basket was finished, it was round and firm and even. Mma Affiong filled it with oranges and swung it high, and not one strand moved.

The next Saturday, a lady at the market picked up Idara's basket, pressed its sides, turned it over and nodded. "Who taught you to weave like this?" she asked.

Idara pointed at her grandmother and grinned.

That evening, under the mango tree, Mma Affiong said the words she always said when a basket was done well:

A basket is only as strong as its loosest strand.

Original story for AllAboutAfrica. Ask your child: is there something you rushed that you could do again more carefully?