Learning from the Iron Horse

By

Obododimma Oha

I am trying to recall what happened to me more than forty years ago. It was a big lesson that I learned from learning to ride a bicycle. By the way, the bicycle is called "anyịnya ìgwè" (literally, ", iron horse") in local Igbo discourse. I don't know whether it was a simple analogy of the bicycle standing on two legs, just like a horse that stands balanced on four, or a mere thinking that the bicycle was a living being carrying people, just as a horse does.

There was even a story of how warriors from my clan killed a messenger of "Nwa DC" ( the district commissioner) and hanged his bicycle to a tree (the same way that a person would be hanged). I think Chinua Achebe also presented such a story in one of his novels). The stalwarts from our clan actually did it, to show their anger and daring against the colonial invaders. The idea of "oyibo gbara Uri" (the White man shot at Uli people), maybe the first colonial genocide in Alaigbo, came from this incident. Well, our people thought that "anyịnya ìgwè" was a living thing, a kind of horse.

So, in learning to ride a bicycle, I was learning to ride a horse! Imagine. A lesson from a lesson! 

It is mainly a story of what happened. And this was what happened. I had become tired of having people hold the bicycle for me while I pedaled. Obviously, they thought they were helping me, preventing me from falling and hurting myself. But actually they were not helping me. As long as they prevented me from falling, I could not learn to ride. I was rather getting used to this help and did not like it. Did they hold the bicycles while the adults climbed and rode away? I was very much annoyed. 

So, one day, I sneaked away with my father's bicycle. I got to a lonely place and climbed the iron horse. I started pedaling but was admiring my pedaling. I was thinking: Was this not me again? My siblings should come and witness this! Then, it happened. There was one palm tree almost near the center of the snake road. I could have avoided it by moving the handle of the bicycle. But, no. One in admiration of pedaling  won't do that. Until I collided with the palm tree. And came down like a stuffed bag  with the bicycle. Of course, I sustained injuries and was terribly annoyed with  myself. 

But from that moment, I no longer allowed anyone to hold the iron horse for me. Help was over, for an adult that collided with a palm tree had emerged. 

Maybe that adult would not have emerged. Maybe the boy-inside-the-man would still have been waiting for others to hold the iron horse for him. That palm tree did well to block his way. Thanks to the palm tree for holding the Iron horse for him to learn from the lesson. 

When a child, don't we learn to walk on two legs, afraid to fall? Somebody then holds us, partly out of sympathy, partly to help. But we will grow to confront two-legged Ness again! Somebody will come to try to help again. Aren't we forever learning and falling and colliding with palm trees? 

It is better for the learner to get annoyed with self and resolve to ride unaided, even to the bend where  a palm tree waits. 

Experience is always the best teacher, provided we are in a good position to learn. 

Further, we could be our best teachers. Yes, we know our weaknesses and can best deal with them. 

It was also good that I learned from the IRON  horse, not from humans. It was really an iron lesson, hard and painful. No feelings from the iron horse. It even hardly knew me in teaching me.