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twins were right. Perhaps something terrible had happened to Aunt Kiki and they weren’t telling me. And now I was being forced to go on some trip to who knows where. Everything was going wrong. My Prophecies of Doom are always right, and this one was only heading in one direction. Aunt Kiki, even when she was really sick, has always been the kindest person I know.
    My only hope was that my parents would for once stand up to her and refuse to let me go on this suicide mission. That hope faded fast. She met Mum in the garden and announced her plan. I could hear because I have 20/20 hearing, just like her. Also, in this particular instance my window was open and Mum was just outside it, by the rose bushes.
    “Chiti is coming with me for a little picnic on Saturday,” Nokokulu announced. If she ever, by mistake, calls me Fred, she certainly never does it in front of Mum. According to her it was all Mum’s fault that we got the names Fred and Joseph, and Dad was soft in the head to have allowed it. Joseph’s second name is Chola, but Nokokulu just calls him “boy”. (She calls me that sometimes as well.) None of his names suit him, she says. Imagine if we were all like her and called people whatever name we thought suited them? She’d be called a few things she wouldn’t like, I can tell you that.
    “Did you ask Chiti?” Mum said.
    “Ha! All this asking. He’s a small boy. He doesn’t get asked – he gets told.”
    “You know, Nokokulu,” Mum said, almost whispering, “you shouldn’t be so bossy with the boys. If you were less bossy, maybe they’d like you a bit more.”
    It was as if, after all these years, Mum still didn’t know who she was dealing with.
    “Bossy? What kind of a word is that? We don’t have that word in ChiBemba, especially not for great-grandmothers talking to their great-grandchildren. Small children need to listen. If they don’t listen, they won’t learn. What is the use of me being on this earth for nearly one hundred years then not passing on what I have learnt to the ones that follow in my footsteps? Maybe where you come from things are different. Yes, they are of my blood, but this doesn’t mean I must spoil them. No, no, no. Not me. I’m different from you English.”
    “We each have our own ways,” said Mum, in her giving-up voice.
    “And our own ways are not always good. Look at my own precious girl: she thought she was too big to listen. Look what happened to her.”
    Nokokulu was going on about my grandmother again. Although it’s funny to think of her as a grandmother when she was only sixteen when she died.
    “I understand, Nokokulu.” Mum had not only given up but was now feeling sorry for her. “It’s very sad. You’re right.”
    Right
, Mum? About what? About a woman who’s been dead for ever or about telling us what to do whether we like it or not?
    Sometimes I despair of my mum.
    “You have strong hands for the garden, Sarah,” said the witch, changing the subject very successfully. That was as close to a kind word as she was ever going to give my mother.
    “Thank you,” said Mum.
    “Maybe,” continued Nokokulu, never wanting to finish on a good note in case somebody might start thinking well of her, “maybe when you are older you will get sense and instead of planting useless bushes and flowers you will start growing vegetables.”

BULL - BOO
The Baobab That Fell Over
    After Sister had told us the story about Bukoko the Little Tick Child I looked up Ng’ombe Ilede. Sister was right about one thing: it is also called The Place of the Sleeping Cow or The Place of the Cow Who Lies Down, because of a baobab tree that fell over but carried on growing. In some ways it does look like a sleeping cow (no one has decided yet whether this is a normal cow or an elephant cow) but in other ways it looks like a strange human trying to do sit-ups.
    I suppose Sister was also right about another thing: it is an ancient burial ground, so the pretend body of Bukoko