I’m growing bald. My mum nearly
wept when she noticed it for the first time. The countenance she wore that late
afternoon when I visited her was one of a fallen crest. “Oh! Abranti3 f3f3w ‘na w’apempem ‘repa yi aa” she asked
rhetorically in Fante, in a tone signifying
shock. To wit, “a handsome young man like you is growing bald?” I expertly
brushed that conversation aside with hard laughter, asking for something to eat
instead - but that was a façade. Behind the laughter was a really sad young man
who contemplated wearing a ‘sakora’
(completely bald) hairstyle as a result of the hair loss, but the shape of my head ruled
that out. An Indian hemp-induced ‘afro’ hairstyle was also out of the question
for a young man cutting his teeth in the corporate world. I cried within me on
my way home that day.