A Drummer's Testament
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How Dagbamba behave toward strangerrs; being a stranger and traveling; the benefits of traveling; bad things that can happen to strangers; how a stranger should behave with the people
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Contents outline and links by paragraph
Introduction
- 1. Benefits of traveling: experience
- 2. traveling is good; traveler gains experience and knowledge, knows more than someone who hasn’t traveled
- 3. traveling shows you your standard
Traveling and death; traveling and life
- 4. traveling compared to death
- 5. explanation of the comparison
- 6. a traveler has no identity; a traveler can die
- 7. living and dying compared to traveling in the world
- 8. the good traveling is to where you know people; not like death
- 9. newborn babies have the name “stranger”; everyone is a stranger or traveler in the world
How being a stranger is bad
- 10. traveler should not have expectations
- 11. traveler can unknowingly stay in a house with bad people
- 12. strangers are warned about dangerous places or things in a town, but not about which people are bad
- 13. strangers and townspeople do not talk about other people to one another
- 14. a stranger and townspeople will be watching one another
- 15. stranger will learn about a town before leaning about the house where he stays
- 16. a stranger does not know the town he visits
- 17. a stranger can lose his wife to a townsperson
- 18. a stranger can stay in a bad person’s house
- 19. a stranger should watch his householder’s character or will face difficulties
- 20. a good stranger can defend a bad householder
- 21. a bad stranger’s acts can cause a problem for a householder
- 22. a stranger needs to be watchful; importance of luck
How strangers are good
- 23. it is good to stay some days in a town; the townspeople will not know him
- 24. if stay some days, stranger will get to know the town
- 25. a person cannot hide his character
- 26. townspeople who see that a stranger is good can give a wife
- 27. a good stranger receives unexpected gifts and benefits
- 28. a stranger can get respect he does not get in his home
- 29. a learned stranger can give benefits to a town
- 30. a stranger can come to know more about a town
- 31. how John has come to Dagbon to learn
How a stranger should live with the townspeople
- 32. how a stranger should try to fit in with the ways of a town
- 33. the stranger should eat the local food
- 34. the stranger should know that people will be studying him
- 35. a stranger should not be proud; should have patience and respect
- 36. a stranger should greet people
- 37. if a stranger does not greet people, people will not look after him
- 38. if a stranger greets the townspeople, they will help him
- 39. a stranger should accompany the townspeople, but should not enter their quarrels
- 40. a stranger should bring gifts and greet
- 41. how John gives gifts to old people
- 42. give gifts to children, or food
- 43. a good stranger will get benefit in return
Conclusion
- 44. end of talk on strangers
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Proverbs and Sayings
A child who travels is wiser than the father.
A person who climbs a tree will see something that a person who is sitting down will never see.
If you want to watch the way of death, you should travel and leave your room and not put someone to stay in your room.
God takes one town's prince and turns him to be another town's slave.
They only show the bad ways of a town; they don't show the bad people of a town.
To be a stranger is like the night.
To be a stranger, you are in darkness.
A tall stranger follows a short townsperson.
“Had I known“ is always at last.
A person will not leave his character.
What can you give a person and he will leave his character and not show it to you?
A stranger is a stranger, but character is not a stranger.
“Get and taste”: that is when you will know whether you will be satisfied.
Good character can give you something big.
They say you cannot do anything; nothing has ever come to you.
If you were dancing a dance in your town, and you get to another town and they are dancing another dance, you should leave your town's dance and dance their dance.
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Dagbani words and other search terms
- Names and people
- Melissa (Pearson)
- Nadav (Serling)
- Sampaga (Sampaɣa)
- Sandoo
- Stuart (Bluestone)
- Suliman (Eric Rucker)
- Miscellaneous terms
- Dagbani
- cedis
- kooshe
- maalam
- sana
- townsperson
- Towns and places
- Dagbon
- Nanton
- Cultural groups
- Dagbamba, Dagbana
- Frafra
- Gurunsi
- Mossi