UKWU UDARA TREE – Horror Stories told about ukwu udara treeh
Welcome to my page. Today, I will go storytelling. Something actually triggered it anyway. I saw a search query this morning on my site’s stat that reads: “horror stories told about ukwu udara tree”.
This query reminded me of so many stories told about Ukwu uda tree both by my mother, grandmother, and the ones I witnessed while growing up. Some of these stories are told by some authors in their books.
To start with, ukwu udara is the Igbo word for udara tree. It is the tree that bears the popular children-friendly fruits known as bush berry or African Star Apple in the English Language. It is called Udara in Igbo dialect and Agbalimo in the Yoruba language.
This tree is always flocked by the children when it has ripe fruits on it. It drops or falls by itself when it ripens. In the olden days, it is taboo to pluck the fruits of this tree with hands or sticks. No matter how low the branches are to the ground, people must wait for the fruits to drop on the ground by themselves before picking them. But that was then, not now anymore.
However, there are tales and myths that ghosts and spirits live in Udara tree. This makes this tree to be lonely and deserted most of the time. Children who go to look or search for the fruits go in groups or in pairs.
I was a village girl. I was groomed in the rural area by Granny. So, any stories I told here are direct or indirect experiences on udara tree.
Horror Stories told about ukwu udara tree
Many people have told how they saw ghosts or dead village people under Udara tree. I have also heard a story about how Ogbanje children meet to have meetings under the tree.
I know a girl in my village. Her name is Kambili. The story had it that her mother got her from ukwu udara tree.
How?
It was told that Kambili belonged to Ogbanje world. So, she had been born severally somewhere but she kept dying.
Her current mother said whenever she was going to the market (Eke Market), she always saw Kambili peeping at her and laughing at her. As at that time, she had no child.
The woman would keep her basket and go see if she was seeing double. But when she got to the Udara tree, she would not see her again.
It repeated like 3 times. She couldn’t take the daylight vision, so she confided in her husband who was a pagan then.
He told her the child peeping at her was a spirit who wants to come into a family to live and didn’t know which family to come in. She advised her to always buy Akara each time she was returning from the market and drop at Udara tree.
She did as her husband said. One day, she didn’t see the child spirit on her way to the market. She was worried. But while returning, she still Akara as usual and dropped the exact spot.
As she got home, she discovered her hut was opened. She was surprised, knowing she lived alone and her husband hardly entered her hut unless by an invitation.
She went in to check her bag of money and she fainted. What happened? She saw the same child spirit this time around on her bed.
When she regained consciousness, it was confirmed hse was running a fever. But it was a good fever (pregnancy symptoms). She was pregnant. That was how Kambili came.
I was not told this story; I know Kambili and I grew up in the village with her. She was a beautiful and fair girl. Everybody in the village believed that her mother lured her into her house with gifts from ukwu udala.
My mother told me Kambili’s mother later went to the ukwu udara tree and perform sacrifices for kambili’s spirit siblings. By doing so, they would not come to trick her back to the land of the dead.
Azuka’s Story
Kambili’s story is not the only story told or heard about ukwu udara tree. We were warned not to go alone to udara tree at mid-day (12 noon to 3p).
At this time, it was said that evil spirits or angry dead spirits are lurking around the udara tree, having meetings. Apart from this time, midnights and wee hours of the night are dangerous times to visit udara tree.
Personally, I haven’t seen any ghosts at ukwu udara tree but I have heard ghost experiences at the wee hours of the day. I have heard my head swollen as if it would burst when I visited Udara tree alone.
My grandmother ran home one day panting like mother deer. When we asked her what was after her, she said she saw our neighbor who was buried weeks ago at ukwu udara tree on her farm. She said she saw plucking ugu leaves from her farm.
They saw face to face and the dead woman threw her face away while my grandmother took her heel. After narrating this, my grandfather told her to go and thank her God she came home alive.
“Aka m di ocha (my hands are clean)”. I heard my grandmother muttered and raised her both hands to the sky.
Before I end this story, I will tell you another horror story about ukwu udara tree. My agemate went to ukwu udara tree to pick some berry when the breeze started blowing but came home crippled and dumb.
Yes, his name was Azuka (may his soul rest in peace). According to his mother, Azuka returned from school in the afternoon and the wind came immediately.
If you grew up in the village, you would bear witness that wind and breeze are the major things that cause fruits to fall massively from the trees. So, this was the time children troop to the trees; to pack udara fruits to their satisfaction.
Meanwhile, when Azuka was leaving the house for udara, his mother asked him to wait for his siblings to return from school so they would go together because it was still an odd time to visit ukwu udara.
But Azuka would not hear. He went alone. Only God and Azuka knew what he saw and what happened to him.
He was brought home as a cripple to his mother by other children who came in groups in search of udara fruit. They said they saw him sitting under udara tree. When they called him, he didn’t respond.
The news later told that Azuka’s mother took her son to a native medicine man for a solution but she got none. She was told her son met a deadly spirit at the ukwu udara who collected his legs, ears, and speech for an unknown mission.
He later advised them to return Azuka under the udara tree peradventure, the spirit might have returned from the mission and want to return what it borrowed from humans.
However, this and all other efforts to make Azuka normal again didn’t work. Azuka lived as a cripple, deaf and dumb for years, and died.
