Yikpa is one of the Ewe Villages created after the all the EWE fled the harsh and wicked chief Agokoli in the Notse kingdom. All the kingdom was surrounded by a big and strong wall in order to prevent any one from fleeing the authority of the chief. But the EWE managed to escape the kingdom. They started pouring their used waters against the wall day after day until that part of the wall became weak and they could break through and escape. They escaped walking backward to confuse Agokoli’s soliers who would try to follow their step marks and catch them. They were then able to get away. As tehy were walking some decided to stay at the location they loved and tehy settled there while the others kept on walking until tehy at their turn found a convenient area to settle. The people from Yikpa kept walking until they probably found the location called KESEBAME (the valley of the monkeys. Maybe there were alot of monkeys in that valley at the time.) and settled there. When the Ashanti kingdom located in the central part of the actual GHANA declared war trying to conquer territoties, they tried to conquer EWE territoties. The people from Yikpa fled to hide in the valley surrounded by mountains where Yikpa actually is. After the Ashanti war, they liked their new place and their fetish also told them to stay at that location. And they stayed where Yikpa actually is, a beautiful place with great landscape and amazing views, “the place where you go and never want to leave”(Yikpa).
Agbessi
The creation of Yikpa Dafo
At some time in the history of Yikpa there were only two Yikpas: Yikpa-Dzigbe where the Chief is located and Yikpa-Anyigbe. At some time in late 1900 s, there were problems and disputes between two groups of families in Yikpa Anyigbe. As my mom told me, her family was one of the ones that taught they were being mistreated by the other group. Her family(DUMENU) and the other friend families decided to move and create a new and better village for themselves and where they will feel in peace. At the time she was just a young teenage girl. There’s a tradition of moving houses in Yikpa which consists of holding the top of the house with strong sticks tied up to it and with a lot of people move the whole top of the house until they reached the new location. There they will only have to build new wall under the top and then have a new strong house. It was a team effort and all the strong young people of the village were called by the chief to participate in such moving. They all helped do this kind of moving. My mom told me that she and her sisters, brothers, friends along with my grand father Vincent Dumenu and other families proceeded that way to move the houses they had at Yikpa-Anyigbe to their new location which they called Dafo which in EWE means “we are out of that”. She told me that as they were moving they were singing “Miawo mi de afo le eme, Miawo mi de afo le eme” ( We are out of that we are out of there).
That was the birth of Yikpa-Dafor where today are the police station and border control officers and the Yikpa market. There she told me her brother Pascal Apelete Dumenu was the first baby to be born in Yikpa-Dafor. My uncle Pascal is now between 35 and 40 years old and my mom is 56. It means Yikpa Dafor is only four decades old.
(To be continued)
Agbessi
DETIEDE, la fete qui unit les trois Yikpas!
DETIEDE literalement traduit veut dire “le palmier qui porte comme fruit d’autres palmiers”.
C’est le nom de cette fete annuelle qui reunit les trois villages de Yikpa (Yikpa-Dzigbe, Yikpa-Anyigbe et Yikpa-Dafo) toutes les annees dans un de ces villages. Cette fete a ete nomme apres un palmier qui portait d’autres palmiers!! miraculeux n’est-ce pas? Et bien ce palmier se trouve ou se trouvait quelque part entre les villages de Dzigbe et Anyigbe. Je me rappelle quand j’etais petit et que cette fete rassemblait tous les ressortissants de Yikpa pendant les grandes vacances, on allait tous visiter ce palmier miraculeux et c’etait vraiment une grande fete. Chaque annee l’un des trois villages et ses ressortissants preparent et organisent cette celebration a tour de role. C’etait l’occasion pour tous de retrouver, pour les gens qui vivent a Yikpa de retrouver leurs freres et soeurs qui vivent dans les villes et autres villages du Togo et du Ghana et aussi pour ces ressortissants des trois villages de Yikpa de se connaitre entre eux et de se rejouir ensemble et de discuter de l’avenir de Yikpa et de comment faire pour developer Yikpa. Pour nous les enfants et les jeunes, c’etait bien l’occasion de nous rejouir dans notre village natal la ou sont ne nos parents et grand-parents. A un certain moment cette fete avait cesse pour des problemes dans le comite organisateur. Mais il y a quelques annees, je pense a partir des annees 2000, les gens de Yikpa se sont encore reuni et ont renoue avec la tradition de cette fete. C’est la celebration de la riche culture, de la tradition, et de l’union des trois villages de Yikpa. Desormais c’est dans les conges de Paques que cette fete est desormais celebre. D’habitude le village qui a le tour forme un comite organisateur qui s’occupe de l’organisation, et quelques jours avant le jour de fete se passe une reunionde development pour jauger les idees et petits projets de developement pour Yikpa. Ensuite le jour de fete meme (d’habitude le jour de Paques) c’est la rejouissance populaire et le lendemain le lundi de Paques c’est le jour de la cascade. Tous vont se rejouir et se baigner dans a l’une des cascades de Yikpa, celle de Akpalabo, celle de Agumatsatodzi, ou celle de Agumatsa du cote de Wli (Ghana).
Agbessi
Laura Wendell and the Library of Yikpa
In the 1990’s American Peace Corps sent a girl named Laura to this village in the middle of mountains to help the villagers build fish ponds since the village had a lot of rivers around it. After helping couple people build fishponds, she found that the real need of people of Yikpa didn’t seem to be fish ponds butbooks. Books to help its young population get a good and stronger education, books to help the non-alphabetized adult population get an education, books to help develop Yikpa. She decided with the help of the Peace Corps and her contacts and the help of the people of yikpa to build a Library. The boutique of Norbert Adewuho was first the place where the books mostly written in French were placed. I remember I was 14 and was in 9th grade and me and my family went to Yikpa because there was a long general strike in all Togo at the time. Laura launched a reading contest which I loved and will never forget because it strengthen my ability and desire to read. The first 5 young students who would have read the most books were going to get a prize. Each time you get a book from Fo Norbert he would mark down the date and the title of the book you rented and when you brought it back he would make sure you really read it by asking you pertinent questions about the contents of the book after you made him an oral resume. There was really no way you could not read the books. I rented a lot of books annd really enjoyed reading them. I read books of 500 pages in three days partly because the books were interesting and also because there was not much to do in Yikpa at the time apart from going to farm some specific days of the week . Each day of the week was named. There was “Agble te gbe” (first day of farm), Agble vea gbe (second day of farm), agble susoe gbe(last day of farm), then there was “Afene vigbe”(first day of rest) and “Afene gagbe” (big day or second day of rest) and so on.
The end of the contest was when Laura was getting ready to leave Yikpa. There was a big gathering with a lot of celebrations. All the village was gathered on the primary school’s compound. It was a big day for us because Laura who had already become a member of our community was going to leave and also it was the day of the results and prizes of the reading contest. I was so happy to be called at the fifth place of the reading contest. I received prizes which I kept for a long time.
Later on they built athe library and put the books on shelves in it. It was wonderful. This library is really a great heritage Laura left us in Yikpa. It’s part of Yikpa and Yikpa’s history.
Agbessi