Truth be told, I didn’t watch the live screening of Whitney Houston’s burial on CNN this past weekend. I did later catch up on some clips the next day. And of all the tributes by various celebrities and family friends, Kevin Costner’s really touched me the most. This is really strange seeing that his flop movie Waterworld really hurt my feelings when I borrowed it from the video club back in the day. He redeemed himself a bit in the flick 3000 Miles to Graceland; but let it be known – MJ is the king.

But jokes aside, I had done my own private mourning on week of her passing. I was grouchy at work, and kept on replaying “The Preacher’s Wife Soundtrack” on my work PC. Even my manager knew to leave me be. At least I wasn’t Facebooking on company time.

To make matters worse, the day after the sad news of her passing broke, I got to work and stumbled into an argument between some of my co-workers. A few of these new school juveniles were comparing Beyonce to Whitney. I laughed in Mbaise Igbo ( trust me it sounds like a Coke counter scrapping the floor). No disrespect to Mama Blue Ivy, but that is like comparing Uncle Ben’s rice to Abakiliki rice (with stones inside). And besides Whitney is the better actress. Haha.

Why was Whitney special? I am not going to bore y’all by spewing what you have probably heard this past weeks about what a talent she was. Okay, sorry, I will actually have to bore you. Whitney could ‘sang’. And I have not gotten my tenses wrong; she could ‘sang’, the way Ron Isley, Mary J Blige and Jill Scott can ‘sang.” I don’t know if any Nigerian artist can ‘sang”; I know a few that can ‘sung’, but I no go name names o. Today is about Whitney.

You see the problem with some of these new singers is that a few hide behind some smokescreen so that you don’t see their talent for what it is. There is choreography, designer clothes, bling bling, auto-tune, top-notch production which masks those with voices that can break glass. How could I forget the new trend of wearing sunglasses. Every artist these days sports a pair in the videos, and when they croon love songs about how a dame has made them kolo, it is hard to believe them. Their body movements and dance routines say one thing, but their eyes tell a lie. No “R &B” or soul artiste should ever wear shades unless they are Aaron Stone, Ray Charles or R-Kelly from back in the day. D’Banj is also excused, but he nor fit sing sef anyway.

Whitney sounded sincere and original. A song like “I will always love you” had the range to appeal to the most heart-broken spinster, as well as the most hardened thug or armed robber. Even my grandmother loved that jam back in the day when she heard it on MTV during the time she came to do omu-ugwo for my baby sis. An I will or-wares ruv yoo…….

Some of these new singing cats just bellow out tunes like they are more concerned about how they come across. Open ya eye make we see whether na apollo dey do you. Abi you know say you dey deceive yourself and shame don catch you.

Is it not amazing when you notice that Whitney never broke into dance. Her voice alone could captivate you. She didn’t need any fancy video by Clarence Peters or Hype Williams to get spins. And when she displayed her magnificent vocal range, she didn’t show us her 32 molars, pre-molars and incissors. Her mouth was barely open, like I nor fit shout sef. An I will or-wares ruv yoo…….

Hers was a pure beauty and elegance. She looked every inch a super-star. She was the kind of entertainer you could take home to mama (not mommma). And actually not have mama scream in disgust and irritation like “This geh done waka well well. Make you find innocent geh marry.” Whitney’s pure unbridled talent took her to fame and fortune – she didn’t need to appear half-naked on the red carpet (Aladdin syndrome) or flash her punani when alighting from a car. Heck, she did not need Brazilian weave, or Twirra (twitter).

Have you seen some Nigerian singers try to hold a note?  A music note, not a bank note. Compare that to the video of “Shoop” where Whitney was doing her mouth like she was chewing hot eba.

What makes Whitney so memorable? I listened to Whitney during the period a girl did turn turn turner with my emotions for the first time in my life. A girl with the code name C.A.N shattered my heart into tiny little pieces. She ripped my heart out of my chest like Goro (Mortal Kombat) and laughed into the sunset. She pulled my heart out of my chest like Apocalypto. I drank many bottles of Calypso, but it was Whitney not alcohol that got me through it. I can recall listening to “Why does it hurt so bad” from the “Waiting To Exhale Soundtrack” while eating yampo in my room in pitch darkness. No, craze had not caught me – NEPA had taken light, and I need to lem.

Whitney’s music inspired. I once listed the lyrics of “I believe in you and me” and put them on a card, and ‘supplied’ it to one chick like that. It worked more than buying her a BB Porsche or a weave. Not that I will ever try that nonsense anyway.

Listen to a jam like “Run To You” off The Bodygaurd Album and see if it would not make you feel like crossing 1000 Obudu Cattle Range mountains and 1 million River Nigers to find love.

That was not the only time Whitney came through for me. I recall also jamming “Until You Come Back” off the “My Love is Your Love” album with a girl I was dating because she loved that tune. When we broke up, I used to think about her a bit whenever I heard that song, and half-wish she would walk through the door. Or the gate. I even instructed our aboki to look out for her incase she came, so she wouldn’t miss me at home. I kept asking the mallam if someone had rung the bell. Well she never did walk through my door again, but Whitney had another correct song to console me with – “It’s Not Right, But Its Okay”. Or as I preferred to call it “Its all good”

And don’t you lot go thinking that Esco is mushy. Men need love too. Sensitive thugs, you all need love. Silent morning, they say a man is not supposed to cry. I hated that jam.

Truth be told, anytime I was having women problems, I kept that shit to myself, and I found music therapeutic. I have the sort of friends who if you tried to tell them about your emotional drama or relationship woes, would laugh in your face. Like you can’t be serious; abeg leave that thing. As my friend Kola once said it, the solution to woman problems is more women.

Personally, why I will miss Whitney Houston so much is that her music was there during many parts of my formative years. I was an 80s baby, but it was the 90s I came into my own, and that was when she was at the peak of her powers.

Whitney_Houston

Everybody has a song that punctuates or is the soundtrack to different times in their lives.

My driver had huge Beyoncé posters on his wall in his room.  He liked Bey so much that he even bought the Nollywood movie “Beyonce and Rihanna” and was disappointed and almost inconsolable when he didn’t see Mama Blue Carter in the movie. Dude, didn’t you see the poster?

One day, I mustered up the courage and time to ask him why he fancied Jay Z’s wife so much/

He said it was because of one of the songs when she had recorded when she was still in Destiny’s Child.

I closed my eyes, as I inquired. Which song, pray tell?

“I go survive o, I go survive o” he sang in answer, smiling. Proud of himself, he continued “Na that song help me when I step on poisonous nail for my village, and my oga come reduce my salary.”

I racked my brain. Was he confusing Destiny’s Child with The Mandators or Tosin Jegede that 80s child star?

Eureka! You wrecker, “Oh you mean, I am a survivor”.

I was just blowing English jare. He had put his own twist on a song that motivated him and made it his own.

So he didn’t like Bey cos of her bootylicious curves or her thunder thighs then? Interesting.

As I end this, my heart goes out to Bobbi Kristina, Whitney’s daughter. May Whitney also rest in peace. This is a woah-Nigerian blog, but she was an honorary Nigerian because we blasted her music, and helped contribute to the millions of records she sold (Alaba or not).

Rest in peace to a great songstress and a unique talent – the late Whitney Houston. 

I leave you with this great tune from The Preacher’s Wife Soundtrack. It is called “You Were Loved.”

As you enjoy, please share your life and music memories with me. Make sure you post a comment if you read this, or I will stop writing posts.  Just joking. But I am serious though. Lol.

It is the thought that counts - action is overrated anyway

We are in the season of love. Valentine’s Day is upon us, and its yet again that time of the year when we celebrate the loves in our lives, the sugars in our teas, the fish in our stew, the ones who take our breaths away. It is that time of the year when we celebrate the special sombori.

But Esco is not in the mood for any jagbajantis celebration of love. I prefer to go the other route and talk about those nonsense somboris who make us gnash our teeth, or cringe at their behavior. I want to talk about dangerous women in a man’s life who have caused him pain, grief and almost a certain death. All men have had that sort of woman at least once in their lifetime. I am here to talk about poisonous girls, or ‘angry birds’ as they are known. Seeing that majority of my readers are female, this post would not be popular. Heck, I may only get one or two comments.

I will be handing out this categories of girls, hibiscus flowers that I plucked from my neighbors bushy backyard. Here goes:

• Girls who show you only one side of them, and then flip one day totally throwing you off balance. I once dated a chick who was the epitome of style and grace – to me. All my friends couldn’t stand her. Their nickname for her was ‘madame’ and that was because they said she had a nasty streak in her. Thing was, I couldn’t see it. She took proper care of me. If my car had a problem, she would come get me.  She would drop me off at night and watch me walk across my landlord’s perfectly cut lawn into my BQ, before she sped off. She typed my school project – all 5,000 words of it on her dad’s dusty Fujitsu PC. When she learned that I loved pancakes, she brought me some every morning for a month! Esco was getting fat.

She soon took over every aspect of my life. Esco was getting sprung. Soon, I was giving her my money to hold, and she was giving me pocket money. She was First Bank/ first lady/fair lady. And I was fair game.

But I noticed that other girls were scared shit-less of Madame. When I first started going steady with her, a friend of mine cried begging me not to. I couldn’t understand it. I noticed that my circle of female friends trickled until I was stuck with Madam only. I later found out that most girls were terrified of Madam and her circle of intimidating friends who were a powerful clique in the girl’s hostel. They threatened, and even once beat up another girl who was flirting with one of their fellas. This clique called themselves “The Powerpuff Girls.”

But Madam was very meek and submissive around me. If we had an argument, she would back down, and never raise her voice. Then she would massage my male ego my tenderly urging me: Babe please come to bed.

Soon Madam had Esco wrapped around her finger. Or so she thought.

Then one day, after we had graduated from school, she came to my place to visit me. We chilled in the crib for a bit, then it was evening time. I decided to see her off to get a cab. We strolled to a major street to hail a cab, and stood there trying to look for an empty taxi passing.

Then a cab was passing but it had a man and a woman inside it. Madam then muttered something under her breath, as the cab passed us. The cab had gone down the road, then stopped and now did a U-turn and started coming towards us.

It stopped a few meters from us, and the woman inside jumped out, just as the man she was with was trying to restrain her.

The woman bellowed at Madam in alatika English: “Young girl, repeat that statement you just made now. What was the statement you just said, when we were passing.”

I was perplexed. I looked at Madame, then looked at Alatika, and then looked at Alatika’s bobo who looked like he too was spoiling for a fight.

I was going to try and shield Madame, but she shoved me aside and confronted the woman head-on, eyes-bulging like Segun Arinze: “What did you hear me say? Is your ear blocked.”

In fact Madame was so angry that she had a vein popping on her forehead. You know that vein that sticks out on your forehead when you are sucking a dry orange hard?

Chukwu a julu! Was this my normally calm girlfriend. The two lasses started a hot exchange there, almost coming to blows. I was trying to calm my chick the fuck down, but she wouldn’t listen. She was really cruising for a bruising.. It was becoming like that scene from Jenifa Part 1 where the Gbo-Gbo Bigz Girl crew took on the Runs Girls crew.  People started gathering, including some people from me yard and street, along with okada riders, abokis, maigaurds, neighborhood hangers-on. The whole parole was beginning to smell one kind like badussy (butt+ ——y)

In the heated exchange, the truth came out. Apparently Madame had called the woman an “ashewo” when the cab was passing.  For.no.apparent.reason.You know females are blessed with 50/50 vision and ‘blue-tooth’ ears. The woman had read Madame’s lips (don’t ask me how), as she muttered the words under her breath, and the woman had ‘commanded’ the cab driver to do an ‘automatic 360’.

Now there was more trouble – the woman’s oga was also now spoiling for a fight. With moi.

I was non-committal, like bros, if they sent you, tell them that you didn’t see me. Besides I only fight people whom I can see the top of their head. I cant see yours, so I wont (cant) fight you.

Some of the hangers-on there, managed to diffuse the situation. But me and Madame were never the same again. I had seen the other side of her, she had desperately tried to hide from me, and she probably felt exposed. By the next month, we had decided to cool things off.

Madame, here is your hibiscus flower.

• Girls who refuse to be friends with you because you cannot date them. Mami, some girls eyes de chook now o. This used to be a male problem before. Guys only befriended girls to see if they could sleep with them. In fact I was like that once. I only kept a girl as a platonic friend, only if I wasn’t attracted to her at all. She had to be terribly ugly before I could relax and be chill with her. But I have matured over the years. I realize that not all relationships with members of the fairer sex need be sexual. There are other forms of relations to be had, except the physical, and now I have tons of hot friends, that I have remained cool with on a pure level. They are not that many, but I will get there.

However now, I find that it is girls who have that nasty streak of ‘all or nothing.” I know some girls want to marry or get a steady date quick, but this Oliver Twist behavior has to stop. I once had a female reader contact me directly, and we chatted a bit over a few days. Then she started asking for my photographs and contact details. I warned her if you see Esco, you nor go like am o. I wor wor o.

She begged me to send her a bb picture of myself. I write a blog, so my penmanship represents me. I sent a bb picture of my finger, and she got upset. Soon she got the inclination that I was wanted us to be friends, she cut me off immediately. I felt used. It is not fair o. Here is your hibiscus flower.

• Lasses who have unrealistic expectations of men.

Sometimes, girls, and boys, but since I am talking about girls, then some girls need to ask themselves if they are emotionally mature to date or marry. No I am not asking if they have now sprouted boobs and lumps to be fondled, or if hair has now cascaded their armpits. Marriage is 80% about trust, friendship and perseverance, 15% about romance and 5% about sex. Money and in-law problems have a huge share somewhere there.

Please ladies, chill with your expectations from your significant other this Valentine season. Don’t be mad because you expected a box-card ( I have never understood why they fell trees for this waste of a thing), and your fella gave you miniature card. It is the thought that counts. I personally prefer sending E-cards. They are environmentally friendly, inexpensive, and then most of all I get to choose the wordings. And I am a skilled poet, so I can compose an ode to serenade my love interest.

So what if you wanted White Diamonds by Liz Taylor, and he gave you Malizia Uomo instead?

 I would now have to love you and leave you with an exchange between Richard Pryor’s character “Sugar Ray”  and his girlfriend played by Berlinda Tolbert  in the 1989 Eddie Murphy-produced movie “Harlem Nights.” See what happens when compromise reigns supreme:

Girlfriend:  Are we going to talk about your son all night? Or are you going to make love to me?

Richard Pryor: Why don’t we make love……and talk about my son in the morning?

Girlfriend:  Well…What if we made love all night……and then made love all morning? And all afternoon?

Richard Pryor:  What if we made love real hard for 10 minutes and drop off into a deep coma-like sleep? Meet me halfway.

Girlfriend: l’ll give it a shot.

Scene fades….

Happy Valentine’s Day everyone!

Hey everyone, my birthday is in a few days’ time, and here I am up at night thinking about my life story and pondering on my journey so far.

Having a birthday in January as a  kid was always a tough affair; most people are too broke after splurging their life savings on flenjoring during Christmas, and to them, your birthday couldn’t have come at a more inconvenient time financially. So there went your hopes for any presents or “raising’.

And when I was old enough to start dating, some girlfriends would be trying to channel the money they had into buying me a Valentine’s Day gift instead as it was just around the corner, being 2 weeks away, and so my birthday was just a stop gap measure. It’s not fair o.

Truth be told, I have said it many times here, that I never really enjoy the concept of birthdays. To me the glass, sorry the hourglass, is always half empty (no pun intended). I tend to self-assess and I am my worst critic. I am not also a huge fan of the whole birthday song singing thing, and having to unwrap my gift in front of the gift-bearer. One reason is that I don’t ever think I show gratitude enough. I get really thankful for receiving a gift, but I am not sure if the way I have shown it conveys the message enough. For some reason, my heart may want to say “Oh, thank you. This is really wonderful” but my stupid mouth may end up saying “You shouldn’t have; you really shouldn’t have. Mscheeww”

Anyway here I was, up in the middle of the night like winch, staring at my ceiling and watching the ceiling fan swing slower and slower. Then suddenly I had an epiphany – what would I want for my birthday? What birthday present would give Esco a sick smile?

For one, I want a present and not a gift. Confused? There is a difference between present and gift, however subtle. Just like crocodile and alligator, or toad and frog, or groundnut and gra-nut. A present is something you give somebody gratuitously without any ulterior motives, and is usually given on their life anniversary or a really special occasion, for example birthday present. A gift is something you give because you want something in return, or if there is a catch to lure, bait or winch someone eventually. For example, the Trojan Horse was a Greek gift. You give the bride and groom a wedding gift, because you expect to eat all their jollof rice and drink their Chivita juice at the reception. No Item Number 7, no wedding gift. Esco dey school una sha.

So I want a present. And I will take cash or cheques too. Inbox me a “birthday greeting” at woahnigeria@yahoo.com or Twitter (Twirra) @EscoWoah. In reply, I will send you my Zenith and Bank of America accounts. Those living in the UK are not left out either o. I have 2 choices for you – NatWest or Nationwide.

My birthday list (other than naira or pounds or dollar, of course) is:

• I want out government to be more accountable and more visible to the common man. I want to be able to stroll by Aso Rock, point fingers and take pictures with my camera with flowers and pigeons in the background, like the way tourists and punters do in front of Buckingham Palace and the White House
• I want to have a legacy. I want something really epic named after me so that my name can live on through the centuries. I wouldn’t also mind something huge or eternal named after my village in Imo State, just like Pontiac the automobile manufacturer is named after the town of Pontiac where the original designer is from. Weatherford the oil and gas corporation is named after Weatherford a place where oil was discovered. Or maybe like okada motorcycle transport and the town of Okada in Edo State.
•  I want a Sony Vita. It is a handheld gaming device with a touch pad behind, 2 joysticks, an internet browser, WIFI, a back and front facing camera and it is coming out in February. I have always liked Sony products, and almost every electronic device I own in Sony (*hint at Sony for free gifts*). Even when I could not afford Sony back in the day, I would go to Alaba market, and buy Sunny instead.
• I want shoes by Fratelli Rossetti. There is nothing like premium Italian leather, and not some of this synthetic crap sold as leather nowadays. Fratelli shoes speak class but they cost a pretty penny. There is a saying that you can tell a man’s class by his shoes. And I hear that some girls look at a guy’s shoes, when they first meet him because there is a belief that a guy treats women the way he takes care of his shoes. What if he is wearing sandals?

I also want a Hugo Boss 2 button suit with dark lapels. There is nothing like a good suit with a fine cut to present your features as chiseled.  In Nigeria, girls have Body Magic girdles; boys have to make do with a good suit. Suck belle, make shirt fine.

Add Rayban Wayfarer sunglasses to my Hugo Boss Suit and Fratelli slip ons, and I am “ThisDay Style” ready. Now let me just find my phone, so I can text everyone in Lagos to say that I appeared in ThisDay Style. I have finally arrived as a Lagos Big Boy.

• I want Nigeria to remain one. With so much going on in the country recently, the signs are not very good. People want Nigeria to split up but we have not really looked at the ramifications of us breaking into smaller entities. We are like Voltron together, but when we split up into 5 lions, we may have bigger robeasts to contend with.

Imagine this scenario- Nigeria breaks up into smaller nations: Oduduwa Republic (Yoruba), the Democratic Republic of Biafra (Igbo), United Arewa Emirates (Hausa Fulani), United Soviet Niger Delta States (Urhobo, Itshekiri, Kalabari etc.) and the Confederate States of the Middle Belt (Tiv, Idoma etc.)

What are the consequences? For one, smaller nations usually have compulsory national military service or conscriptions to be able to defend their territory, or else they may get chanced by bigger countries. Under this national military service, every adult between 16 and 35 may have to serve in the military and undergo military training in boot camps around the country. Yes that includes you BellaNaija browsing, Brazilian hair fixing, Blackberry Bold stroking fashionistas. Even those ones wey dey fear to do ordinary NYSC orientation, and pay bribes to the commandants and NYSC higher-ups to be able to dodge camp. There would be no escape. Scared yet? Ok o.

If we split, what would become of my degree? I schooled all my life in Lagos and Western Nigeria. Would my degree now be foreign and unacceptable for employment in my new country of Biafra? Would career counselors or HR administrators sneer and say “Enyi, so you got your education in Oduduwa Republic. You need to get another degree from University of Biafra, or no one would employ you.”

I was born in Lagos – and so I am an Oduduwa citizen by birth. Will my new compatriots accuse me of being a closet ofe mmanu, indoctrinated in mgati-ism? I prefer amala to akpu anyday, by the way. No, I am not a traitor. And yeah, owambe parties rock. There I said it, so shoot me.

If we split, what would happen to investments in Lagos, Abuja and Port Harcourt by different ethnicities? Will they be nationalized or appropriated? Fuck that big English – so I won’t be able to enjoy efo riro, kilishi and edika-ikong anymore? Tiwa Savage would now be far away from me, as she would be a foreign national, and so that will dash my dreams of dating her. Anyway sha, I would ‘manage’ Genevieve and Munachi.

Our national teams nko? Okay, Mikel Obi, Kalu Uche, Kanu and Ike Uche are decent footballers, but what about Osaze, Yakubu and Sani Kaita nko? Granted, we will whoop you all at soccer tournaments sha. Our team would be too mad.

But there are other logistic problems if we were to split, and I am worried about Biafra. Who would be our president. I would have rooted for Ekwueme if he was younger, as he looks distinguished and has oratory skills like Obama, but something tells me that we may end up with Pius Anyim instead. And where would the capital be; Owerri could be the Las Vegas of Biafra, but what about the capital? Abakiliki, Enugu, Nkalagu, my home-town (Umu-Esco)?

One last question though, what would be our Independence Year? 1967 or 2012? Or 2000 and never? Ok, just asking.

• Finally, rewind to a good few years back. It was my birthday, and I was seriously dulling in my school apartment with a couple of my friends. We were drinking garri without groundnut ( a travesty), when some-one asked a question “Esco, if a genie appeared and granted you a choice out of 2 wishes as your birthday present. Either become a citizen of any country of your choice, or take 20 million naira cash here and now, and remain in Nigeria. Which would you choose?”

That provoked a lively debate. Ol boy, any of those is an upgrade on drinking garri on my life anniversary date. So which do I choose? Visa Lottery or Cash Lotto?  One thing is for sure – I would rather be a lion in the jungle than a cat in the city. I would rather be a crocodile in the bush, than a lizard on a Lagos fence with broken bottles. I would rather be an IBB in Minna, or an OBJ at Ota than a GEJ in Aso Rock. Or whatever that means.

With the number of people that were seen at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport trying to ‘escape’ Nigeria on the week of the nationwide strike last 2 weeks, Visa Lottery may be king. But 20 million naira nor be joke o. Although rent in Lekki phase one for one year plus the agency fees will put a big hole in that amount, leaving just enough for ‘suffering and smiling.”

So what would you choose, and where would you go? And don’t forget my present. Or gift.

Happy birthday to me…..

Birthdays was the worst days/

Now we sip champagne, when we thirsty/

Notorious BIG (Juicy, 1994)

_______________________________________________________

Hello Andrew

I got your email, and I won’t lie, while it nearly drew tears to my eyes, I can’t still help but implore you to be upbeat. Let me tell my story and you may begin to see why.

After you left, I spent a month at home before I headed to school to start first semester year one. I stayed in a school hostel, in a room with boys and men. It was a mixed bag of cultures, personalities and temperaments. For one, we had Walata who had been in the school system since 19-whenever, and had more extras than Panadol. He bullied everyone in the room, and fed fat of his room-mates’ resources. The room had about 12 inhabitants and this is outside the hordes of squatters who came and went as they pleased. I returned back from’jacking’ late one night to see a squatter I had never laid my eyes on before laying on my mattress, and he even had his shoes on. The chap was every angry that I disturbed his sleep.

Then one of my room-mates brought a table fan because the room was stuff, as bunks placed in front of windows were impeding cross-ventilation. Walata would wake up, while the guy was sleeping and face the fan’s rotation to himself. The guy had to ‘abandon’ the fan for Wally.

Then I had a room-mate who was klepto-maniac. This guy stole everything he owned. We were grateful that he saw the room’s occupants as his family, and he admittedly said one day that one does not steal from family, so we were temporarily safe at least. However the pessimist in me, continued to carry all my money in my socks rather than leave anything to chance; I mean, Klepto could always change his mind, yeah?

It was in school that I saw the social divides of society become apparent. That’s why university is called that, it is a ‘universe –city’. I saw guys, children of moneyed men in government with money to blow, who cruised around in some really smart cars, chasing easy girls and staying in expensive apartments in town. I know a lass whose dad was an ex-minister who lived permanently in a hotel, where the daily room charge was 3 grand. Do the math – that’s almost 100k per month.

I have seen the other side of the divide. There were guys who were from impoverish backgrounds where everyone in their village had contributed their widow’s mite to enable them come to school. Some of these guys were really brilliant – in fact one graduated with a first class in political science. There are first class talents in Nigeria who cannot afford school fees, yet our government is wasting resources buying Toyota Camry as official cars for themselves and awarding themselves estacodes for ‘official’ trips. Shameful.

I had a room-mate so poor that he spent holidays in school, living in one of the dirtier school hostels. I have had people come to borrow bathing soap, toilet roll etc. A guy one used my deodorant roll-on while I was looking away. He just went into my locker and grabbed it. I had to ‘dash’ it to him, because his armpit hair was all over the roll-ball. I hid my toothbrush after that!

After I graduated, I served under the NYSC program – that one is another story on its own. Finding a job after service was a big wahala. The few jobs that there are have impossible conditions attached to them – most be younger than 23 at graduation, but must have done NYSC,  must have 2.1 with 5 years’ experience. The fact that the job is advertised in a daily doesn’t mean it really exists – it may be a scam by ‘recruiting agencies’ who ask you to pay them for the opportunity to get you a job that pays you. Confused already? I was.

Then there are job ads that are there just to fulfill all righteous and tick legal or compliance requirements. There are major multinationals in Nigeria where jobs are ‘preserved’ for the wards and kids of higer-ups who are still rounding up their degrees abroad. There was this case in a major oil producing corporation on the Island in Lagos,  where a desk and computer and position was put on freeze for 2 years, pending the time, one of the senior executive’s niece would start and finish her degree in London. That position was advertised annually and candidates would risk life and limb, and waste scarce resources travelling to Lagos to interview for the ‘phantom’ position.

Then there was the degree discrimination in the job market. Foreign degree candidates are a dime a dozen now, so what chances do Naija degree holders stand. I mean, I attended OAU right? That used to be top of the pyramid. At my last interview, I was ghosted over someone who had attended London Met. It is now so competitive that some companies actually look for foreign degree holders and will use your resume to line their bins or make paper planes if they see ‘made in Nigeria’ anywhere.

However your connections are everything in Nigeria. Consider this equation: “ connections” + “Nigerian degree from Ogun State University”  > degree from Harvard or Cambridge.

And the general socio-economic situation in the country is a shambles. People are living like zombies, walking with dead eyes stares and no hope for the future, while leadership at the top has failed. Nigeria’s north and south are like two different countries – a tale of 2 cities. It is not uncommon for a newspaper report to show a mass killing or bombing of a church in Gombe, while the next column would feature fun-seekers posing for the red carpet at the latest event in Victoria Island Lagos. It is just like having your own personal Netflix or Movie Magic channel – page one (Gombe) features Terminator 4 or War of the Worlds, while page 2 (Lagos) is Sex and the City or Confessions of a Shopaholic. Meanwhile Eastern Nigeria’s own (pages 3) is Wall Street: Moni Never Sleeps.

You complained about discrimination abroad based on your skin color. What about ethnic discrimination? Your skin is your skin, but that’s because your nation is an abomination.

You said you have been following recent political events, the strikes and fall outs from fuel subsidy removal. It is all well and good following the events from the safe haven of your British exile, but it is real in the field. Countless people have lost their lives, and our president just sits there regurgitating semantics. I remember the hit 1995 movie “The Usual Suspects” starring Kevin Spacey. There was something said in that movie that is now infamous “The greatest trick the devil ever pulled is convincing the world that he didn’t exist.”

Anyone who believes that the devil does not exist is either a JJC or hasn’t been to Nigeria. There is a wicked cabal in this country whose tentacles are like a hydra around Nigeria’s oil wealth. The word ‘cabal’ is almost an anagram of cannibal. Just take away ‘nni’ from cannibal, you have the word ‘cabal’.  ‘Nni’ is an Igbo word for food. These secret group are blood-suckers.

Fast forward, I was at one of these Occupy Nigeria rally things in Lagos two weeks ago, and I thought that I had walked into the wrong gathering. It was like being at a fashion show, like New York fashion week or at Ascot in England. Many people were dressed to the nines, and a few were even chatting  away on their phones, or taking ‘facebook-worthy’ pics with friends and celebs.

Occupy everywhere

Some people were carrying ‘placards’ with the words “David (Mark) and Jonathan out.” Some were fist pumping and singing solidarity songs.

We thought it was all fun, until suddenly bullets start flying everywhere as trigger happy policemen  started busting shots into the air to disperse the crowd.

PISHAUN! PISHAUN!! PISHAUN!!!

See the way the crowd scattered like the Tower of Babylon. People were picking race left, right and center. Valuables were left behind, and there were shouts and shrieks all around. Someone behind me fell, I think. Key word – I think, because fear no let me turn around check am. Accidental discharge is no crime in Nigeria.

I ran for my dear life, and ducked behind an abandoned scrap danfo bus. I started checking my chest and limbs to see if I was hit.

I looked up and saw pandemonium everywhere. People had jumped into gutters, some girls were crying as they ran in fear. A mother had abandoned her 5 year old. A hawker had thrown his tray of Gala  onto the side curb and fled behind  a bush.

After some minutes, I noticed that the policemen had moved on in their van, so I stood up, dusted myself and picked up 2 Gala from the floor, opened one, took a bite and started the long journey home.

Last week I returned back to my base in Kano, where I work in the statistics office of a non-governmental association. Kano has started to erupt in little pockets of violence, echoing the past events in Gombe, Bauchi and Borno States. My stay here is beginning to feel like a bad episode of The Blair Witch Project. Where I stay, is a cluster of living quarters, housing many Southerner, mostly Christians, and I am beginning to feel watched. I try to make sure my BB is charged to have internet service so I  don’t feel alone even when I am not speaking to friends and family from Lagos on the phone. My Starcomms flash drive for my internet service is a bit erratic anyway. Lately I can feel funny aggressive stares from the aboki who sells small goods in a stall in front of my building. When I went over 2 days ago to buy some packets of Indomie, he hissed and looked at me in an unfriendly manner, as he fiddled with the dial knob on his small transistor radio. The radio was blaring some announcements in a language that I am not sure is Hausa.

It is now about past 1 in the night here, and I feel so lonely and afraid, I must say. Last night, I barely slept as I heard gunshots and screaming in the background. The next morning, the newspaper headlines announced “30 traders maimed and killed at market square by Boko Haram fundamentalists.”

Tonight I can hear the loud report of bomb explosions and mortar fire echoing in the background. Kano, the great city of the groundnut pyramids appears to have gone nuts.

Oh my God, what is that? I can hear screams and chants coming closer and closer. That is my neighbor’s voice and I can hear his wife pleading in Igbo with some invaders chanting holy war songs.

Help! Andrew, please help me!!! They are at my door!!!!!

My country shitted on me/

She wants to get rid of me/

Cause of the things I’ve seen/

Cause of the things I’ve seen/

Nas (My Country, 2001)

Who can remember that social commentary on emigration in the early 80s? The one where a frustrated twenty-something year old character called Andrew lamented about how fed up he was with the standard of living in Nigeria, the inflation rate and the crippling effect of Buhari-economics? The year was 1984 and Nigeria’s neck was under the bootstraps of Generals Buhari and Idiagbon’s WAI policy, a brutal national orientation toward orderliness and discipline in national life.  It was post oil boom Nigeria, and the petro-dollars were drying up. Funny enough as bad as it seemed then, these leaders were messiahs compared to today’s lot.

Andrew  wanted to ‘check out’ was convinced otherwise by another character in the short film, who encouraged him to remain in Nigeria and contribute his quota to nation building. In any case, moving and travelling abroad in early 80s Nigeria wasn’t a rave, so no long thing.  That ad became now encapsulates the struggle of the common man to escape out of this country for greener pastures in obodo oyibo to this present day.

What you don’t know is – that the story didn’t end there. Esco had exclusive access to the script which is based on a true story. As usual the names have been switched up to protect the innocent, but the story had been kept true to its roots to edu-tain you (educate + entertain). Seat back, relax, get your popcorn (or guguru & epa) and a hanky too (you will need it, trust):

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Andrew decided to stay behind in Nigeria after receiving advice from pro-Naija optimists. He secured a state scholarship, and attended UNIBEN where he graduated and was lucky to start work with one of those older generation tally-numba banks.  He also got married and had a son who he named Andrew Junior. Andrew Junior attended one of the Federal Government Colleges for his secondary education. He became very good friends with a classmate of his, a chap named Bamidele. They were inseparable friends from Form One till SS3, hanging out also during the holidays as well. Their folks became close friends too due to their strong friendship.  Everyone who knew them remarked that Bamidele and Andrew Jnr were tighter than giraffe pussy.

Andrew’s dad wanted his son to pursue the dreams he never had, and decided to send him abroad for his university education. Andrew Junior got admitted into Brunel University, United Kingdom to major in Finance. Bamidele had no such luck; his folks were civil servants and he was quickly ushered to write Jamb. He scored 250 and got admitted to OAU. This was circa

On the day Andrew was leaving for Great Britain, Bami escorted him to the airport along with Andrew’s folks. Soon it was time for Andrew to board, and Bami was almost crying more than Andrew’s mum sef.  He even almost followed Andrew into the departure hall, and kept on waving long after the Andrew’s aircraft had taken off into the clouds. Like na wa o, so Andrew has indeed gone to Jand…

His thoughts were interrupted by the bark of an airport immigration officer “Abeg local champion, dress for one side, make better passenger wey wan travel pass.Ehen, oyibo, open ya box, make I inspect am. Wetin you go carry dash me for this ya luggage? Chei! Na wetin be all this one? You dey still carry chin-chin and cashew nut go London? Dem no get am boku for there? Haba, you go leave this one for me o. And this your body spray sef….”

____________________________________________________________________________________

Dami and Andrew kept in touch for a while, but after a while everybody had to answer their papa name. Phone numbers got lost, and they just got caught up with the struggles of their respective lives. In fact they didn’t hear from each other for almost 4 years, until one day Andrew saw Dami tagged in a picture on facebook. He sent Dami a message, and Dami sent a reply

This is  the story of 2 young Nigerian males experiencing life in 2 different countries. One in the diaspora, and the other as a prisoner in  his own country which is no longer at ease. This story is told from the excerpts of the emails exchanged:

Andrew’s email:

Hello Dami,

It was great to see you on facebook again. Social networks work wonders eh? Its been a long minute. Life in England can be a tough lonely existence. When I first moved here from Nigeria, I was staying in my aunt’s crampy place somewhere in the Streatham area of London. She was a nurse and worked long alternating day and night shifts, so it could get some quiet and boring at times especially when I first came because my school had not resumed. In my first week, I got so homesick, that I came out on the balcony of the 7^th floor council flat and shouted my greeting “Good morning, my neighbours!”

My oyibo neighbors looked out of their windows wearily and drew their shutters blind. An old woman walking her poodle in the park downstairs, looked at me with disdain. I think someone must have called the authorities because the next day, TV license officials came knocking, and busted me for not paying. My aunt wasn’t in so, I had to cough up the fine or risk being arrested. I didn’t tell my aunt because she would be furious that I opened the door at all to outsiders. I had to swallow the 250 buck fee from my pocket money,

I have not been back to Nigeria since I left! I watch AIT news and follow Linda Ikeji and Bella naija  to keep up with news. I also have Sahara Reporters bookmarked on my PC, and I visit the Nigeria stand every year at the Nottinghill carnival to eat Obalende suya and jollof rice and socialize with my compatriots. Does NEPA still take light? Stupid question right? Do trees grow in a forest? Does Obasanjo like pounded yam? Does Banky W wear face cap? Right now I am doing a Master’s degree in Communications. I don’t even know why I am doing it because it is my second post graduate degree. The truth is that I am tired of reading or going to school just to be able to stay abroad legally. My next plan is to start a PHD program  in Canada – University of Toronto. Then I would come and do another PHD in Yankee . By then I should have arranged papers somehow.

I could have returned to Nigeria ages ago, but there is an endless cycle of bills to pay – credit cards, school loans etc. And I just started paying mortgage on a property. Besides there isn’t much left for me in Nigeria – did you hear that my dad was let go by the bank in the last banking shake-up by Sanusi? I hear  he stays at home all day in a shimi, reading newspapers and shaking his fist in frustration. My mum said that he has removed food subsidy at home. He is now regretting not leaving in the early 80s. Somebody told him to try registering with one of those Canadian immigration agencies. But what does Montreal, Calgary and Vancouver hold for a 50 something year old ex-banker from Nigeria?

Bros, jand done tire me. I remember that the office I was working with once sent me to work on a project for a few months in one small, backward town in Lancashire, Northern England. Ol boy, dem no get African store for there, so I nearly died of hunger and boredom. One day I was so desperate to eat swallows, that I bought a last minute train ticket to London, went to an African store on Kilburn, demolished 4 wraps of pounded yam, slept in a bed and breakfast, and took a train back to my base the next morning.

I am fed up with all the discrimination that comes with living in another man’s land. Call me paranoid or over-sensitive but it is there in the funny stares you get when you present your green Naija passport at Heathrow, and are ‘randomly’ selected to step aside for a full strip search. Don’t drop the soap!

It is there in the way security gaurds and loss prevention agents shadow your every move when you enter an upscale joint. Or even when you are seated in a full bus, and some people would rather stand for hours than share a seat with you. It is etched on faces which show slight disappointment when you work in for a job interview. No amount doing ogboju by ‘anglicizing’ your name will erode discrimination. I know Nigerians abroad who have ‘formulated’ English sounding names out of their native names. Olanike became ‘Nicky’. Chikamara put ‘Kammy’ on his resume and official ID documents. Oghenerukevwe warned all her fellow Nigerians at her office in Manchester that they should only call her ‘Rukky.”  A girl named ‘Ifunanya’ threw a fit and caused a ruckus in my school’s records office because they had the gall to put her full name on her official transcripts when she had insisted that she be called ‘Nani’ from now on. Why would someone want to share the same name as a Michael Jackson-lite footballer at Man U?

It is no difference in the work environment. My friend Sheri a Nigerian girl who has been working at my office for more than 8 years, has been promoted down and side-ways but never upwards. The company policy calls in a promotion freeze, but we know it is wash wash because they recently hired a man from outside and made him her manager, and he knows diddly squat about the business. Promotion squeeze ke? It should be termed ‘lateral  career confinement’ or ‘work winch’

The situation got me fed up, and I called Ikenna our ex-schoolmate who is in Yankee. Remember him from secondary school. Well, he now lives and works in Houston, Texas, having done his university there too. He told me some home truths which a frank oyibo friend of his had told him in confidence: “Dude, racism is everywhere and forms part of the fabric of Western society. In early American history, the China-man built the railroad; the Indians helped the pilgrims. But in return, the pilgrims and their decendants annihilated generations of Indians and forced them into reservations.”

Ikenna said that what he heard next took the wind out of him: “Your situation is even worse, and it is not just the colour of your skin. You are the bottom of the social pyramid in this country. You are lower than a nigga; you are a Black African.”

I know Nigerians here doing well who are still complaining, because they would rather live in Nigeria if they had the chance.  Then there are those also living from hand to mouth, doing temping jobs just to be able to keep out the cold winter and fuel the stomach. These jobs (jabs) pay near minimum wage about 6 bucks an hour). Nothing beats earning a proper salary in your own country and temping jobs where you earn a wage, have a way of killing one’s spirit once you do them long term. The wages of sin is death – the sin of wages is an emotional death.

Successive Nigerian governments have let us down, and it seems that the post oil-boom generation (Generation Y-Not) would have to pick this country up as our parents’ generation has run the country aground. I was in Yankee on an exchange program, when Obama was elected into office, and people of all colors, though especially African-Americans were rejoicing all around me over the election of a first black president. Me, I was praying and hoping that Nigeria would elected the first decent president in the next elections.

My guy, I am tired of venting about living abroad, because most Nigerians would give an arm and a leg to come here, and they would abuse the hell out of me if they heard me complain. Even my dad warned me to “stay there!” when I spoke to him on the phone about entertaining the thoughts of returning back. My mum said that if I was feeling homesick, she would send me “Nigerian movies, new music by Wiz-kid, Skales, Duncan Mighty and Davido, and some foodstuff like crayfish, dry pepper, Indomie, egusi, ogbono seeds when next somebody was coming to London.

I have been following current events in Nigeria with the fuel subsidy wahala, the bombings and the violence. Na wa o. I was even at the Occupy Rally at the Nigerian embassy, but I couldn’t stay long because my boss ordered me back to work.

We are all Nigerians when push comes to shove,

One love

Watch the birdie....

SALUTE ME

What are the worst vices affecting Nigerian society today? Squalor, poverty, illiteracy, perversion or even its brother-in law – corruption? Most people would argue that corruption is the greatest of them all.

What does corruption stem from? Why has this cankerworm, tapeworm, earthworm, eroded every facet of our national life. It all has to do with our flawed reward system.

Corruption exists because treasury looters and crooked people are celebrated because they have cash to burn. In England, a corrupt public officer would be stared at, pointed out and maybe even spat on in the streets. In Nigeria, he would be called to the high table at a function, and politely asked his choice of liquor.

In Jand and Yankee, the names of ex-sex offenders (people who have either been convicted of rape, sexual harassment  or sleeping with under-age persons) would be put in a Sexual Offenders List, and they would be prevented in living in certain areas (especially near schools, daycares and nurseries), and the public would have access to their records. In some cases, if they embarked on a bus, someone may stand up to avoid having to share a seat with them.

In Nigeria, a sex offender could move to Abuja or another state, get connections or a government contract and get nominated to become a State Commissioner or Special Adviser.

Only in Nigeria can an ex-con become a president or senator, or an ex 419-er own a bank. Our system seems to encourage people to do whatever is necessary to stack paper, and the rewards are uncountable – recognition, fame, chieftaincy titles, streets named after you, honorary degrees from dodgy state universities,  your name being toasted to by a juju musician at an owambe and your pick of cream aristo girls.

There was a lot of brouhaha late last year when Chinua Achebe declined to receive a national award from President GEJ. A lot of people were a bit miffed with the manner in which our national awards have been cheaply dished out to men of questionable characters and achievements who have done nothing to uplift this nation. Sometimes some of the recepients are serving public office holders, who happily accept the award, use it as a paper-holder on their office table, and proceed to award themselves and their cronies contracts, misappropriating public funds.

And I wondered to myself, a national award should be the highest form of reward for excellence giving to a citizen. Look at the United Kingdom for example – Sir Alex Ferguson (manager of Manchester United) was not knighted till 1999, a whole 13 years after he joined the club, and only after he had won a historic treble of trophies. The year before, he had won his 5 Premiership title, but Mama Charlie had not yet deemed it right to knight him.

David Beckham, soccer star, actor, perfumer, icon, poster-boy is not even yet a knight of the realm. The Queen’s honor roll is only reserved for distinguished personalities, not pudgy bankers who have not paid their workers for the past 2 months, or who pimp female markets to secure lucrative accounts. It is not for half-assed civil servants who flood their ministries with only their blood relations and party members.

If Beckham were a Nigerian, he would have been award more titles than his passport book could bear – Chief Otunba Nze Sir Architect David Beckham, GON, MFR, GCON, MFON.

And it is because people who have wealth, rather than those who are committed to selfless national service that are accorded recognition, it makes people want to lie, cheat and steal for glory. There are more award ceremonies conducted in Nigeria than there are credible recipients. There are  a gazillion award ceremonies to honor musicians and entertainers, including the ones who are encouraging us to party and be merry while Nigeria is burning around us. It seems Nigerians were in danger of becoming Emperor Nero who played the harp while Rome was up in flames around him. There are award ceremonies to honor bankers and banks, even though not a single bank in Nigeria is capable of giving the common man a loan unless he has a C of O for land in Ikoyi, 3 gaurantors who must be senators and commissioners, and he agrees to sign away his life with the shylock interest rates. EFCC may even be engaged by the bank as a ‘signatory’ to the loan agreement. You are what EFCC says you are.

In Nigeria, there are award ceremonies for event planners, though I have not gone to a single event which has not had African time computed into the start time. I have even been to a wedding, where the groom came late, and had to be fined by the bride’s family. The bride, was just relieved that he had shown up at all; she had been sweating buckets, and had almost eaten her bouquet in anxiety, thinking that her fella had abandoned her at the altar.

There are award ceremonies to honor brands in Nigeria, even though Indomie noodles has been in Nigeria for more than a decade, and is in every home’s dinner table in the country but the price has never dropped. Multichoice also does brisk business here, but you still have to pay for the decoder and dish, a practice which is obsolete among the major cable companies in the world. But why?

We have award ceremonies to honor politicians and state governors of the year – usually available to the highest bidder (paid from the treasury).

And sometimes parents and relatives are also to blame for coercing their kids or wards to crime or steal money. Even in the villages and rural areas, there are mothers who warn their sons leaving for city not to come back without riches, no matter the cost. And it is the same in the cities as well.

I remember someone complaining to me about his mother some years back. This was circa the summer of 1996, just after the Summer Olympics in Atlanta. The guy’s mum kept on ‘yabbing’ him:”  See what your fellow man is doing. Kanu just won the football gold medal for his country and would receive millions of naira and parcels of land from Abacha. Meanwhile you are here, sitting at home and consuming 15 wraps of eba every day. You are a disgrace! You wont go out and hustle like your fellow man”

And this guy replied his mum” But mummy, Kanu is 20 years old (his football age in 1996), so we are not mates. I am only 16, and I am waiting for Jamb results.”

His mum didn’t want to hear that one o. This boy was later caught trying to steal high power drills  and equipment from a neighbors warehouse. He was lucky there was fuel scarcity around that time, because they had already put a tire round his neck.

That policeman who asks for a bribe, or that immigration officer at the airport who begs you to tip him or risk being stripped searched for contraband, does so out of greed. But he also does so because by the time he accumulates all the 20 and 50 naira notes he has received for the week,  the tidy sum becomes a pretty penny, and he can go to his community and enjoy being a local champion. Nobody would question how a cop ends up being able to buy beer for everyone at the beer palour. It is just classified that he is doing ‘runs’.

It is time we took our values back. Point out that dodgy millionaire whose generator looks like a small nuclear plant to EFCC and Egbesu Boys. High-jack that loot stealing ex- governor when you see his convoy in traffic, and seize one of the keys of the cars – it is rightfully yours, as it was bought by money stolen from our commonwealth. Watch out for his security orderly though.

Interrupt that wedding between that oil baron son and the cabal member’s daughter, when the pastor/bishop asks “if there is anybody who thinks that this wedding should not go on, speak now or forever hold your peace.” Put up your hands and scream “This wedding should not go on. This Civic Center wedding has been bankrolled with stolen oil subsidy money.  The bride’s wedding gown was bought with bribe money received in a Ghana Must Go bag on the floor of the Senate. The catering was done by the same cabal who claim that they spend over N1 billion on food in Aso Rock. I submit that this illicit union should be prevented forthwith, and the food and cake should be distributed to Ijewere Motherless Babies Home. Thank you”

THE POUNDED YAM AND PURE WATER AWARDS 2011

2011 has drawn to a close, and it is time to announce the first Annual Pounded Yam and Pure Water Awards 2011 (APYPW), also known as the Poundos. The manner of handing out this awards shall  be systematic. I shall list my favourite things (or persons) and they shall receive a Poundo (a wrap of pounded yam, and a plate of soup of their choice). The losers shall receive a satchet of pure water manufactured in a dirty Ajegunle workshop with H20 from a mossy well.

3 GBOSAS

1. What a year 2011 was. Nigerian entertainment got exported as a premium product while we imported refined petroleum.  People complain that Nigerian youngsters are not militant enough like our Arab cousins. Maybe it is true, but no-one can deny that their ingenuity, business saavy and resilience are the shining spots illuminating Nigerian positively to the world. And by youth, I am referring to those between the age group of 17 and 35 doing positive things and creating instead of taking from the system.

There are some that say people in their 30s should not be classified as youths, but there are actresses/actors or those in entertainment and businesses who claim their official age as 30 even though they are really in their 40s. So I want to capture those who are doing us proud with their accomplishments.

The one who grew up watching Kiddie Vision 101 on TV, but now have to contend with a government with no vision. The entertainers and those in the fashion industry, and those in business creating jobs and opportunities for the economy deserve a pat on the back, and their promise to us that they wouldn’t rest on their oars.

I won’t mention any names.

2. I am loving so many things right now – Cole Haan patent loafers, watching Katt Williams show while eating pepper-soup (the combination has me suffering and smiling), Chicken and Bacon Pressata (a delicious sandwich made with flaky flat bread and toasted with cheese,  any kind of food with a sprinking of suya pepper, the black actress Paula Patton in Mission Impossible 4 (Esco has a crush), button up shirts with stripes. In fact I am loving life in general. Life is good!

I am also feeling new Nigerian music videos. I really liked Wiz Kid’s Pakuramo – Funke Akindele made that video, but the cameos by other artists or entertainers, and the tones and concept used made that video worth watching again and again. By the way shout out to Whiskey (Wiz Kid)- the song itself could grace any dance-floor on planet earth. The intro especially was awesome.

Skale’s Mukulu was a good one as well. But side note, isn’t anyone else also alarmed at the manner girls shake their nubile bodies in our music videos these days. Dem nor wan marry?

You no try

Mondiots

1. Boko Haram killed more people than hunger and disease for the first time in Nigeria while our lame duck government cowered. They affected the social and economic life in Abuja, the seat of the Nigerian government, and many people lost their lives in Abuja, the North and even Sapele recently. Boko Haram deserve a big fat pure water (with car battery water inside).

2. Lekki a high-brow area was hit with the low-blow of tolling.  VGC is now officially the most expensive area in the world. You not only pay for the land, but also for the priviIege to go visit it.  I think its time for me to go back to my village. I go plant cocoa, I go plant cassava; even though na yam. I dey go back to my village. I refer you to my hit article Pump Pump and the Scramble for Lekki.  It has had over 47001 hits alone since publication. Nuff’ said. Fuck LCC by the way.

3.  The price of pure water finally defied Adam Smith’s and Keynesian economic theories and rose to N10.00 for the first time (not liquid contents only sha). Our award for losers just got more expensive, but I am not happy about it. The price of pure water, and food in general, deserves a pure water award.

4.  Fuel subsidy was finally removed. There have been various economic theories about the pros and cons of removing fuel subsidy. Apparently, it is supposed to stimulate competition among fuel producers and create an incentive for lowering prices, as opposed to subsidy and a price fix by government. But the fear is the Nigerian factor, where for some reason, the prices of items never ever go down, so N141 may the cheapest fuel will ever be. What goes up and never comes down? Age used to be the answer. Prices of goods in Nigeria may be the more correct one.

Besides we have a weak regulator in the PPPRA so how will collusion among illegal price cartels be monitored or curbed. Two or three or 10,000 beer drinking CEO Alhajis and Chiefs may meet in a hotel in Abuja and agree to peg fuel at N200 a litre, and promise to co-operate with each other, instead of competing to drive the prices down. And who would stop them?

Regulation in Nigeria has always been non-existent. I mean this is a country where crooks have been mixing kerosene with aviation fuel, and selling them to airlines. No wonder some of our airlines engines rattle and rumble like Molues. I have been in a domestic airplane where the aircraft’s shock absorbers were not working at all. The plane ‘fell’ from the sky, and landed with a huge thud that shook all the passengers. Some people screamed “Blood of Jesus”, while a few who had been pretending to read newspapers started screaming for their lives.  Some unfastened their seat belts and switched on the phones, and started making emergency calls to their family “Darling, our plane just crash-landed. Please just in case, make sure you send Felix my assistant to go and collect that cheque from Chief Akpanjo.”

Thank goodness these airline people no longer served refreshment but sold it instead. As I didn’t buy, thankfully there was no watery hot tea/coffee to spill all over me from the impact of landing.

So despite the pleas of the people, the government under Pa Jona went on with the subsidy removal. What is it about Aso Rock that makes our leaders turn to brutes. You see a meek and homely looking politician, but immediately he tastes power, he turns into a monster. It is like this scene from the movie “Waiting to Exhale”. Watch from 1.06 on the video, and just imagine that the guy is Pa Jona (or any top government official) and Whitney Houston is Nigeria. Immediately the government official discovers how sweet the perks of power is, he turns into a raging uncontrollable lunatic.

syz9P-waiting-to-exhale-movie-my-body-needs-this

My Body Needs This Scene from Waiting to Exhale Movie (1995) | MOVIECLIPS.

Receive the last Pure Water award! Gba!

Flashing lights....

Happy New Year y’all! Glad we all made it to 2012! Your tracks could have been stopped in any other year, but you are in 2012! To God be the Glory!

Its funny how we take it for granted sometimes that we are in a New Year. The year 2012 itself sounds so futuristic, like a year one would have seen in one of those Sci-Fi movies to denote some cutting edge future where man became half-machine, cars were flying saucers and a robot wiped your ass for you after taking a dump in the toilet. A futuristic world where energy was produced from some kind of atomic water, solving all the world’s energy needs, so PHCN was but a bad memory. A future where people bought shuttle tickets to visit Mars, Venus and other planets, so taking pictures of your trip to Jand and Yankee and posting them on Facebook was as laughable and ordinary as it is now of posting a photo of you posing because you crossed Lagos’s border into another state.

A year where fuel subsidy would be like a bad joke, because fossil fuel was obsolete and petroleum was only used to make pomade, okwuma  and KY Jelly. 2012 would be so far ahead that toll-gates would be damn near impossible. We would be using rockets and jets to propel ourselves on inter-galactic highways in the air, and air is free, right? And it needs no maintenance or any long-term concessions to build. Eat your heart out LCC; I am fast and free.

2000 used to seem that futuristic when I was a kid growing up in the 80s. In fact people like Prince 2000, the Nigerian entertainment anchor who added the year to his name, did so to make it look like he was so ahead of his time. He was – but that was because he also wore sequined shine shine jackets with huge shoulder pads, sported a juiced up Jeri Curl perm with enough oil to fry akara for a small village, and hype the crowd by encouraging it to strike him (Hit Me! Hit Me! Hit Me!). Prince would be kicking himself now, whenever he looks at his name.

And who can remember that 80s movie whose poster featured an army commando carrying the hugest gun ever seen? The movie was supposed to best its competitors Rambo and Commando in the action movies genre. To make sure it did that, it was also given a futuristic, out of this world name: Equalizer 2000.

So we are now in 2012, I am in the mood for merry making, because I made it “back to the future.”

So how were your Christmas and New Year celebrations? Was Santa good to you? If you don’t believe in Santa, what about your sugar daddy? Was he good to you? Even if Santa wasn’t good to you,  at least Boko Haram wasn’t bad to you. That is worthy of praise to the Most High.

There lies the problem with Nigerians sometimes. We either over-count our blessings, focusing on the mundane, ahead of what should really matter; or we do not count them at all. A few days after Xmas, I was chatting with a friend of mine via BB, and I asked him how his Xmas had gone, and he replied “Terrible.”

So I inquired further “Terrible? What happened? You didn’t eat jollof rice, fried chicken and drink minerals at your folks place? Or you didn’t receive a hampa (hamper) from one of your clients? What made it terrible?”

He really couldn’t explain.

I said “ You are alive, and you can piss unassisted – that has to count for something.”

As my pastor used to say (don’t worry, I am not one to quote pastors as the sole authorities on wisdom),  it is a privilege and not a right that when you sleep, you wake up the next morning. Urinating without a dialysis is a blessing, not a right. Being able to walk and talk is not promised to anyone. These are blessings from God. And you don’t know what you have till it’s gone.

Any spirit of non-enjoyment disturbing or hampering (not Xmas  gift hamper o) your joy, I countermand and rescind it (or them) forthwith. Say Amen!

During a class, a teacher of mine some years back opined  that most Nigerians go around grumbling: I want millions and billions in the bank. I want a gigantic house with 20 en suite rooms in Old Ikoyi.  I want the phone numbers of all the top models, fresh girls and red carpet fashionistas in Lagos and Abuja, so that they could visit me for booty calls and ride me all night. I also desire all the LV and Channel bags I can carry in the crux of my elbow, and enough Brazilian weave to put She-Ra to shame. I desire 4 smart phones so that I could be on all the networks – Airtel, Glo, Etisalat and MTN, and never have to switch sim-cards between one phone when any network starts its connection ogbanje. Why was my dad a sucker, who didn’t leave an inheritance for me?

The teacher continued: “Try being sick and you will notice that health is more important than wealth, and your only pre-occupation would be how to get better. All those paper-making plans would pale in comparison.”

With that, the teacher suddenly looked up, and caught a late-comer student trying to sneak into the class from one of the back doors. He exclaimed “Get out of my class, you big fool! In fact what is your name? Ajayi Bembem? Okay you have minus 20 marks from your total to pass this course.”

By the way, that was my Philosophy lecturer.

In 2012, pay a visit to any Nigerian hospital, especially the ones in less high-brow areas. You would eat your heart out, after you have cried it out. That bridge you drive over, barely stopping except in traffic, you need to pay a visit to shanties under it, and see how poorly some people live in this unequal country. Sometime one needs to see how it is on the other side, so that you can get some perspective and be thankful for this New Year.

2012 is a new beginning, and gives us 2012 reasons to pursue our dreams 2012 per cent. So help us, God.

Happy New Year, my fellow Woah-Nigerians.

Say goodbye to the brainwashed/
Say goodbye to the young kids who are not smart/
Say hello to the one world…/
Say hello to the sky, something’s out there watching you and I/
..I might be old fashioned, stuck in my ways/
But nothing make me more happier than seeing today/

Nas (New World, 1999)

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