‘SAINT AMA’

By Kojo Derban

That’s me and my maternal grandmother, Mrs Teresa Ama Ortsema Wilson   born in the Gold Coast in 1906. She was born and had her early education in Kumasi. She was called to her Maker in the year 2000 aged 93.

For most of her life, she lived in Saltpond, a quiet town 20 miles east of Cape Coast. There, everyone knew her as Ma. Saltpond, by the way, is where Kwame Nkrumah launched the Convention People’s Party in a house on Prabew Street, next to the Matadiis (Methodist) church. Permit me to boast – Saltpond has produced a number of illustrious sons of Ghana: Prof. PAV Ansah, a famous writer and nationalist, and Professor Allotey, a NASA consultant and Math genius, and a few more.

 

Ma was married to Master Wilson, a teacher who gave himself the responsibility of searching and hunting down children who refused to go to school. He had in his employ some ‘hard guys’ who would stand on guard around the school to stop deviant kids from escaping class. Some of these kids were forcibly brought to Ma’s home to join her 5 children. So in the 1930s, stubborn kids who were ‘lost’ in Saltpond were often found in Master Wilson’s compound. Needless to say, Ma took care of every one of them as if they were hers. The parents of these children did not complain; after all, Ma was educated. Some parents, envisioning a better life for their children, brought them to live in the Wilson’s household.

 

Ma could do things that not many women of her age could at the time. She could read and write English and Latin and play the church harmonium for the local Catholic Church. I can’t express how devoted to the Catholic faith she was, attending mass every morning 7 days a week and saying the Angelus when the clock struck noon regardless of where she was or who she was speaking to at the time. She’d stop to pull out her 40-year-old Rosary and her tattered Daily Missal, which my younger brother ‘Sweet’ William made a perpetual hobby of mending because she wouldn’t accept a new one.

This Missal was a gift from her son, my uncle Dr. John Baptist Wilson. It was not just a prayer book but a family album. It enclosed everyone’s photo and different notes and letters. It was always by her side. With this, she reminded herself of whom to pray for and when. She was the first intercessor I knew. That’s why I thought she should be canonized as Saint Ama Ortsema of Saltpond.

 

Anyone who knew Ma knew her connection to the heavenly realms; she was almost always at prayer whispering something under her breath all day and, it seemed to me, all night. I shared a room with her when she finally came to Accra to live with us. She was always on her knees when I was going to bed. I found her still on her on her knees when I woke. She prayed to God much more than she spoke to humans.

She played a big role in my conversion to some semblance of a good boy. As you might know, doing things worthy of emulation was not in my make up. In her presence the oppressor nannies Mansa and Esi-Atta, whom my mother had adamantly refused to dismiss, would not dare touch me; neither nor could any aggrieved neighbour whose home I visited. Beside her, I was safe. Her clothes smelled of Mentholatum or Robb which she constantly applied to her skin. I hated the smell, but it was better than getting attacked by those nannies.

 

Having Ma living with us was like living in a convent. She had attended St. Mary’s Convent in Cape Coast in 1925, run by nuns, and trained as a teacher. Cleaning, sewing, knitting and crocheting were her pastimes. She sat in her armchair and knitted beautiful chair backs from yarn. Many of these she preferred to give away rather than sell for profit. Morning prayers, Angelus and night prayers were non-negotiable. When she lived with us, nannies sneaking out to see their boyfriends was out of the question. For us kids, we suffered a painful loss – the pleasure of making ourselves dirty while playing in the sand outside. We’d dirty ourselves so much that Lever Brothers would have our clothes picked up and sent to their London lab for developing more effective soaps. After playing in the rain and getting asthmatic attacks, being covered by her cloth worked better for me than the inhaler.

 

At her behest, I became a mass server or altar boy. She started convincing me to be the first Catholic priest in my family. As young as I was, I knew I’d be booted out of the seminary.

One day, a new item was added to our living room – an upright piano. It once belonged to Mrs Elise Evans-Anfom when she was in Paris in the 1950s. Ma could play hymns on the piano by reading notes converted to the tonic solfa (‘do re me’). She was once a choir mistress and assistant organist for the Saltpond Roman Catholic church back in the days when her eyesight was better. She taught me to read music and play my first notes. For some reason, I found out that I could play any music I heard by ear.

By dragging us to church every day, she got me interested in studying music in the hope that I’d become a church organist one day. My interest in music led to tutorship by Auntie Theresa – daughter of famous composer Philip Gbeho. I was trained to be a pianist at age 9 by Mrs Nartey, a Jamaican lady (who trained the maestro pianist George Francois). I was playing concerts at the British Council at 10. Much to Ma’s disappointment, in my teenage years, I abandoned the classical piano to play secular band music in secondary school.

 

By far her most profound influence on me is her prayer life, which I got accustomed to seeing. I adopted it and I think it steered me well on the good and narrow path altogether. She also had this “let it go” attitude. “It’s not worth it,” was her response to situations where even the Holy Mother herself would agree that I slap someone’s head off in revenge. The “gun to your head” insistence on morning prayer first thing after awaking became default for me.

 

She was an able person and could still bathe herself at 93. To our sorrow, on the 10th of August 2000, she died suddenly with rosary and missal in her hand. That was almost 25 years ago. I believe that she is a Saint in heaven because her prayers are still working for me and still bearing fruit for the entire family.

Continue to rest in perfect peace, dear Ma.