Toto is a brand of luxury toilet ware. I find it funny that school children used to scribble “toto is good for boys and girls” on public school toilet walls. Public school toilets were anything but fancy.

Toto is also the name of an American rock band formed in the 70s. This is quite appropriate since scrawling “toto is good for boys & girls” on buildings was a sign of rebellion.

What is neither funny nor appropriate however is the fact that none of the children who proclaimed the wonders of the vagina were likely to have had any sex education. Chale sex education in Ghana is terrible.

At home we are taught that using the actual names of our reproductive organs was naughty and so we referred to them with weird sounds like “piscololo”, “kokoi” or “down there”. Woe betide you if you were overheard whispering ‘penis’ or ‘vagina’. That meant you were a ‘spoilt child’ and your punishment was to receive a ginger enema.

It wasn’t much better in school. The class syllable made no provision for sex education. The highlight of sex ed was to hear a Social Studies teacher say something suggestive sounding so that the entire class could burst out with “’eeeiii sir” while the girls giggled nervously. There were many euphemisms and innuendo but nothing informative.

Inevitably our sexual education was gained through furtive whispers with older siblings who had gone away to boarding school, fumbling in classroom cupboards or under desks, or sadly by being abused by an older neighbour.

Toto may be good for boys and girls but your mum would rather die than talk to you about why it is good. For her, and many older Ghanaians, the fear is that teaching young people about sex will make them sexually immoral yet they do not realize that the better informed we are the better our odds of making sound decisions.

Teaching your kids doesn't spoil them, ignorance does. Like my friend said bad parenting is worse than peer pressure. Educate young people in your care about their bodies, what they can do with them and the consequences of their actions. Then maybe, just maybe, they wouldn't have to be vulgar about their preferences.