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In Bamako, she had also met the other Ali, the French- speaking dutiful son. Perhaps Ali became a little more concrete for her as a being once she had met his father, his ‘mother’ and the other people from his past. Later she began to wonder whether it was the Bamako trip. It was almost like before she had got married the first time and had had a child.Įsi did not know exactly when the change started taking place in her. After she had installed the computer in her house, she virtually worked all the time. He had helped her buy a small personal computer - for which it was agreed that she would pay the equivalent of its price in local currency to his mother when she arrived home. Then on one of her trips abroad she had met a cousin who did her a great favour.
#Ata chapter 28 free#
But there was no doubt at all that she enjoyed the fact that she was free to attend all the conferences, workshops, seminars and symposia on her schedule, whether they were held inside the country or outside. Of course, when she thought of her daughter, she felt a little bad too.
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Now she had almost lost the harassed feeling that had attacked her every late afternoon of every working day: that she had to hurry home, or to the market or the shops to buy something, or do something in connection with her role as a mother, a wife and a home-maker. Of course all this was different from how things had been in the past. Like not only being able to be present at nearly all the important office meetings, but also sitting attentively through them and fully participating. She also had more time to give to other aspects of her job. She enjoyed working with figures - co-ordinating them, correlating and graphing. It was at this time that she confirmed what she had suspected about herself all along: she not only enjoyed the job she was doing, but she actually enjoyed working. She could concentrate on her job, and even occasionally bring work home. In that sense she was extremely free and extremely contented. In fact, he was hardly ever near her at all.
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Ali was not on her back every one of every twenty-four hours of every day. In all, her basic hopes for marrying a man like Ali had been fulfilled. It was now nearly a year since Esi remarried, and she was settled into her new life. So how about cooking me one of your specialities?įade in the end-of-day sounds of the city and its traffic: yes, do fade them in: especially when you are in doubt. ‘Oh, definitely, I shall come straight from work. ‘Because it’s never possible for me to breeze through your place for five minutes… please? ‘Darling, it’s not like you to be unreasonable … Just jump into bed to try and recover from my jet-lag … I … well… eh … actually I am going straight home to wash out all this travel dirt. Includes an explanation of the system of zoning and measurement used.‘Okay, if you can wait for a couple of minutes I could drop you home.
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