Too Small Tola

Tola and Grandmommy cross the lanes of big traffic on the expressway. They walk down busy alleyways where every window opens into a shop and you have to point to what you want. They step over green stinking gutters and squeeze past cars that are crawling along.
It is a long way to Mile 12 Market. But at last they are there! Hundreds of market women shout for people to come and buy their superior goods. Thousands of shoppers scream at the prices of those inferior goods. Tola thinks that Mile 12 Market must be the biggest and busiest place in the whole big and busy city. Grandmommy sighs happily. She loves Mile 12. Tola sighs too.
The long walk has made her tired. “You are small,” Grandmommy says suddenly, “but you are strong, like me.”
Tola looks at Grandmommy in surprise. She had not realized that Grandmommy was small too. But now she sees it is true! Grandmommy is not much taller than her, and that means that Grandmommy is small. Very small. But Tola also knows that Grandmommy is very strong.
Grandmommy can pound enough yams to feed a gathering of the Neighborhood Association. She can carry enough crates of soft drinks for a birthday party. She can even separate the big Ododi brothers when they are fighting. They do not call Grandmommy Mama Mighty for nothing.
And if Grandmommy is that small but that strong, then maybe Tola can be strong too!
Grandmommy buys huge yams. They are rough and dark on the outside and white and smooth on the inside. After Grandmommy boils and pounds them, eating them will be like eating fluffy white clouds.
Tola counts out the money for the yams. Then she counts the change. Grandmommy loads the heavy-heavy yams into Tola’s basket and Tola grunts.
“Too heavy for you?” asks Grandmommy.
“No, Grandmommy,” Tola lies. She is determined to be as strong as Grandmommy.
Grandmommy buys armfuls of leafy green vegetables bursting out of sacks. She buys tiny red chili peppers overflowing from baskets. She buys stiff white stockfish piled into towers. And each time Tola counts out the money. She counts the change. Then Grandmommy loads the goods into Tola’s basket. Lucky for Tola, they are so light she cannot even feel them. Grandmommy buys a big sack of rice from the back of a truck loaded with hundreds of sacks.
Tola counts out the money. She counts the change. Then she looks at the big sack of rice.
Grandmommy chuckles.
“I will help you with this one,” she says.
The rice seller lifts the sack onto Grandmommy’s head. Grandmommy groans.
“Too heavy for you?” Tola is worried. “Not at all,” Grandmommy lies.