Monday 18 July 2011
JOURNALS OF A NIGERIAN UNDERGRADUATE: Episode 5
JOURNALS OF A NIGERIAN UNDERGRADUATE: Episode 5: "JOURNALS OF A NIGERIAN UNDERGRADUATE MIRRIOR MIRROR ON THE WALL Son of A BITCH!!! I woke up yelling. Its 8am and I’m late for my 9a.m class...."
Episode 5
JOURNALS OF A NIGERIAN UNDERGRADUATE
MIRRIOR MIRROR ON THE WALL
Son of A BITCH!!! I woke up yelling. Its 8am and I’m late for my 9a.m class. The cold in this town is so terrible, you intend to wake up by 7am, you do wake up by 6.45 and convince yourself that you can sleep for just 15mins and then wake up by 10a.m (I’m sure it’s happened to all of you so don’t judge me). Well here I am in such a rush, it didn’t occur to me the phrase that woke me up was from one of my roommates yelling “Anya m ahunna fornication”!!!, or why Monday was covered in the sheets with one of our cleaners and Kene my other roommate had his eyes closed in one corner of the room. Nope, my aim was to get to school early and ignore my room drama for now.
Ok I’m good, clean, take home to mama handsome and ready to go. The only thing left is to check myself out in a mirror if everything is proper but I don’t own one so off I go downstairs to the exit where there’s a large size mirror and there he is. The epitome of Narcissism.
Ladies and Gentlemen may I introduce you to WILLIAM. A.K.A SIR WANK-A-LOT (Umm that word your looking at and feeling self righteous about has another dictionary meaning). He comes from a planet of far far away called NARCISM-DOR. When he was born he was so fine the planet was endangered by his fine looks so they put him on a spaceship with only a mirror to contain himself and made him travel many light years to earth where he landed in Nsukka and entered UNN with just a mirror, so he cherished mirrors for the rest of his life.
I’m sorry for diverting but that’s how much this fool loved the mirror. Thiiiees bitch ogles at him self all day long. I mean I go to school, I see him in front of the mirror, I come back he’s there. Changing clothes and just checking him self out. In every outfit you can think of shirts, trousers, underwear (eww)… rain coat? A freaking rai… what kind of self respecting man checks himself out wearing a raincoat? I mean what’s he thinking? Oh I bet I’ll be sexy in the rain too with this fine arse raincoat. It was so bad one day there was a fire and this fool unhooked the mirror (at the exit) so he could see if his facial expressions were still sexy while running for his life. Thiiiieees bitch needed help. I mean serious Dr Phil help, but my class was still more important so advising him wasn’t on my agenda and neither was waiting for him to finish with the mirror so I just peeped from behind and Ok I’m good.
Turning to the exit to take my leave this fool now goes,” Hey, are you not that Nwa Mommy boy”? Everyone around starts laughing again and I get flash backs of registration day I thought I had buried for good. I turn around with the fakest smile I could summon and respond “guy that’s so old, I mean dinosauric old. It’s so old I’ve had worse embarrassments in this school after that one, why bring up old shit”? He laughs and answers, I just dey play, reaches out his hand in a hand shakey friendly gesture, no vex, he says seeming sincere. I’m Will he says , I knew he was trying to make peace but well… I wasn’t. I shake his hand and answer really fast, wow, I thought it was pretty boy wanker. Not hearing very well he asks, what? Responding slower this time, I said wow your shirt has a tweety bird poster (which it actually did). He smiles to him self looking at the mirror, yes it does. Well I have to run I said rushing out, later guy.
I got a front seat in the bus and was still waiting for it to fill up when I heard a female voice say, is there someone in the front there with you? I look through my window and its… OMG its her. The girl from episode one who asked to stand in front of me on the line and got me the stinker name Nwa Mommy. She was still looking her hot self. How I’d love to spend one of these cold nights with her my early mornings wont be sooo HARD. Hellooo!! She says again waking me up from my sweet sick fantasies, can I sit near you? She asks. I manage to stutter out s-s-sure. Moving swiftly and awkwardly I open the door, then stepped out to let her in but just as I was following her, someone faster than me jumps in behind her, sits on my chair, politely says thank you man and shuts the door in front of me. Yeah your guess is very accurate. It was SIR WANK-A-LOT. Bitch arsed WiLLIAM just chanced me saying thank you in the process. I said to him, trying to be a gentleman because of the lady, ”dude that’s my chair”. To my surprise THE LADY now answers, but there’s still one behind as she looks at Jerry’s face in awe of his charm. Stunned by the chancing, I stutter jibberish and sit behind them. The bus fills and starts moving and I’m still quiet wondering what just happened to me. I had literally gone from being in the passengers seat to getting front row tickets to watch the girl of my dreams taken away from me by Wanky W here.
My name is William he says as they gayly stared at each other. She answers, Jessica smiling back at him. He turns around looks at me and says that’s my friend sitting behind his name is umm… I answered Obi. She now goes Oh I know him, is he not that NWA MOMMY dude? They both start laughing. I had to put up a fake laugh myself muttering “Oh their clowning already hahaha, funny people, very funny people. She goes on to explain to him how I got baptised with this awful stigma of a name. Sure I’d like to be a subject in her discussion but not in this manner. The journey that normally took 5mins now seemed to take hours because of their annoying discussion. At the end he got her room number and I got to be called Nwa Mommy the hundredth time. I actually feel like I’m wearing diapers now. William turns to me and says hey, abi you go follow me come go her room tomorrow night. I look at him and start thinking about the balls of this fool. You make fun of me with the girl of my dreams, and now you want me to be your wingman, bast…. He asks again are you coming? I stutter sssure what time? At least I get to see her room and be close to her. She must also have some fine friends. Wouldn’t miss it for the world.
Next morning I woke up in high spirit, to go downstairs and see William in front of the mirror coughing. I don’t feel too good he says, I have a cough. What!? I responded. In actual fact I was happy but I wouldn’t let anything get in the way of seeing the girl of my dreams even though I wasn’t in the drivers seat, so I had to act fast. Well I’ve got…I paused my sentence to notice this dude was watching his facial expression while coughing. Slowly I walk in front of him to block his view of the mirror and he suddenly frowns. Is it this bad? I think to myself. So sad. Anyway I continue talking, well what I meant to say is I have something that can cure the cough by tonight. What? He beamed with interest. Some herbal drugs my mom gave me, I say running up to get them. Handing them to him saying, you’re to take two… he interrupts me saying ha! Nwa Mommy, see as she gave you fine medicine to take care of you. Noticing I didn’t find it the least bit funny, he continues , ehen you were saying I’m to take two…four tablets, I interrupted. William looking surprised, four tablets? Four tablets!? He repeated. Yes four I answered with a stern look on my face. I thought you were going to say two, he was looking sad at this point. No I meant to say four. You’re sure? He asks, I’m certain I answer. He then opens it and takes out a tablet. Aaaaargh!!! He yells. Whats the matter? I ask looking confused, the tablets are big, and they stink. Well no pain no gain, after all no medicine smells good from my knowledge. So he finally swallows them as I turn around and walk away with my contempt smile of mischief.
Now honestly the dosage for that drug was two tablets, but it’s a supplement so a bit more wont hurt him. After all it’ll get him well. Ummm except for one problem though… Will’s (I guess I can call him Will now after saving his life, though I’ll take it away soon)room is next to the mirror and I couldn’t help but notice the plate of beans on his table while blocking his view from the mirror which means beans was for breakfast. The tablets I gave him were Garlic supplements which of course with the normally dosage will leave him GASTRONOMICALLY REDUNDANT. Now that I’ve given him an overdose+beans… that should leave his arse HIGHLY FLAMMABLE by tonight when we go and see Jessica.
Story continues soon.
Episode 4
JOURNALS OF A NIGERIAN UNDERGRADUATE
D.U,I
They used to call them runsmen, hardmen, cultists and to some COWARDS. Every tertiary institution had them, though I heard they’ve reduced drastically. These dudes terrorised schools so much, your folks were more scared of secret cults than the deteriorating standard of education in the schools. For example, tell your folks my hostel is so dirty, mosquitoes are killing me there, infact I’ve had malaria three times in one semester here’s the doctors report, my room mate is a psycho, I have no roof rain pours on me at will, my lecturers favour the girls more than guys and will fail me even though he came to class only 3 times in one semester, the medical centre injected me with a used needle for my malaria shots and the last person they used it for was later diagnosed with HIV. Say anything extreme to them the only answer you’ll get is “but other people are there, manage you have other siblings”. Come home another day and tell them i got to my room last night and saw my 5 room mates all wearing black and... you cant go back to that room Obi infact we are changing your school. We’ll sell all our cars to give you the best education in the US. Ok but they lost someone in their department and were going for a procession which required that they wear black.
What pissed me off more was I was sure if I go toe to toe with most of these cultist, I’m sure to make some bleed but lifes not fair so I’ll be going toe to several massive fists, guns, bottles, knives and I heard they could even toss in a grenade for little ‘ol me. I’ll be toeless and many other body parts less at the end of the day hence be lucky to be dead. With this at the back of my mind, being a coward to these guys seemed like the wisest move. I’ll be Toby without the whip to stay alive. So in my first year I stayed away from anywhere they hung out till some dude’s moved next door.
Without caring about what others felt about them, they went about their business and it was obvious they were different so nobody really asked any questions. Surprisingly, I felt they were cool. Infact I started hanging out there more than in my room. Their room decoration was eccentric like no other room I had seen in that school. They glued a pyramid of empty cigarette packs on the wall that went from the ground to the top then the opposite wall was painted black. They were obvious but I still liked the loud Tupac music and all. Until Karma moved in. Karma stood over six feet with the build of a gladiator. He was a Hitman and was popular for obtaining or extorting civilians at random.
One day I’m in their room minding my business and living ghetto fabulous when Karma goes “ guy, nna men I like this ya watch” in lay mans term means give me your watch you fucking Jew or I’ll kill you. I started pondering to my self, what brought me here in the first place, I should have been reading Political Science 101, now I could fail and loose my watch at thesame time,...SHIT!. Anyway I gave up my watch and after that day, the bully would pass me and flash it at me smiling with contempt, if only he knew what I had in mind for him, ok there was nothing I could do but it doesn’t hurt to wish so just read on.
One evening at about 8.30p.m, I was reading for a test I had to pass by all means when I heard a knock on the door.As I opened the door, Karma staggered in, jumped on my reading table with my books on it and started rolling in pain. Wow, I said. did someone poison him before me? That cant be fair. Karmas eyes were rolling and he was stinking of alcohol. Help me he muttered, abeg help me I dey die. Suddenly I start thinkin of how fast I can dispose of his body it was actually 10p.m by then. I dey die he goes again, the world just dey turn. At this point I yell back “Fool thats because your rolling on my books get off! and surprisingly he jumps off my table like a 4yr old caught red handed doing wrong. It then hit me that this dude was so drunk I could do whatever I liked with him. Suddenly I felt powerful and so help me I was going to bring Karma on Karma. Just to be sure I smacked him in the face and he fell to the floor whining about how his mother would die if he dies so I had to help him. First thing I did was to lay him on the floor in front of his room and draw an FBI chalk line around him on the floor like the one you see in movies and in the middle wrote RIP Karma. Then off to the chemist we went which was two blocks away but this fool kept falling and I kicked him up each time. We got to the chemist and I told the man to sedate Karma with an injection. Karma was still rolling on the chair when I asked him for money to pay the Chemist so pulled out his wallet for me to see this bundle of about N10,000 (then that was big money and N100 was the highest denomination) he must have extorted all day. I snatched the wallet from him and took a little over the cost of my watch which I bought for about N1200. So I took just about N2000...Ok N5000...OK N8000 dont judge me just read on.
When I told Karma he was going to be injected, he broke down like a baby and started muttering Mummy I dont want injection, I smacked him again yelling shut up Bitch! The Chemist reacted and asked why I was treating him badly. I said for DUI. He asked Driving under the influence? I said no disturbing me Under the Influence. That wasn’t enough to convince the Chemist why I treated him badly so I just told him that this was the notorious karma. That did the trick because the chemist added Novalgin to the sedative. Poor Karma was crying like a bitch by the time I took him back to his room where he finally passed out.
By the time I woke up the next morning Karma had packed his things and left the hostel. His room mate told me Karma did a lot of weed and alcohol the previous night and woke up this morning still paranoid only to see the figure of his body drawn in chalk on the floor with Karma RIP written in the middle. That was a warning from his enemies so he had run home for his safety.
The events of the previous night happened really late so nobody knew what I was upto and those who were suspicious didn’t talk because nobody wanted to get involved with karma. Of course I couldn’t share this with anyone but I wish karma could see my face glowing with contempt now.
Ekeocha Nnaemeka
D.U,I
They used to call them runsmen, hardmen, cultists and to some COWARDS. Every tertiary institution had them, though I heard they’ve reduced drastically. These dudes terrorised schools so much, your folks were more scared of secret cults than the deteriorating standard of education in the schools. For example, tell your folks my hostel is so dirty, mosquitoes are killing me there, infact I’ve had malaria three times in one semester here’s the doctors report, my room mate is a psycho, I have no roof rain pours on me at will, my lecturers favour the girls more than guys and will fail me even though he came to class only 3 times in one semester, the medical centre injected me with a used needle for my malaria shots and the last person they used it for was later diagnosed with HIV. Say anything extreme to them the only answer you’ll get is “but other people are there, manage you have other siblings”. Come home another day and tell them i got to my room last night and saw my 5 room mates all wearing black and... you cant go back to that room Obi infact we are changing your school. We’ll sell all our cars to give you the best education in the US. Ok but they lost someone in their department and were going for a procession which required that they wear black.
What pissed me off more was I was sure if I go toe to toe with most of these cultist, I’m sure to make some bleed but lifes not fair so I’ll be going toe to several massive fists, guns, bottles, knives and I heard they could even toss in a grenade for little ‘ol me. I’ll be toeless and many other body parts less at the end of the day hence be lucky to be dead. With this at the back of my mind, being a coward to these guys seemed like the wisest move. I’ll be Toby without the whip to stay alive. So in my first year I stayed away from anywhere they hung out till some dude’s moved next door.
Without caring about what others felt about them, they went about their business and it was obvious they were different so nobody really asked any questions. Surprisingly, I felt they were cool. Infact I started hanging out there more than in my room. Their room decoration was eccentric like no other room I had seen in that school. They glued a pyramid of empty cigarette packs on the wall that went from the ground to the top then the opposite wall was painted black. They were obvious but I still liked the loud Tupac music and all. Until Karma moved in. Karma stood over six feet with the build of a gladiator. He was a Hitman and was popular for obtaining or extorting civilians at random.
One day I’m in their room minding my business and living ghetto fabulous when Karma goes “ guy, nna men I like this ya watch” in lay mans term means give me your watch you fucking Jew or I’ll kill you. I started pondering to my self, what brought me here in the first place, I should have been reading Political Science 101, now I could fail and loose my watch at thesame time,...SHIT!. Anyway I gave up my watch and after that day, the bully would pass me and flash it at me smiling with contempt, if only he knew what I had in mind for him, ok there was nothing I could do but it doesn’t hurt to wish so just read on.
One evening at about 8.30p.m, I was reading for a test I had to pass by all means when I heard a knock on the door.As I opened the door, Karma staggered in, jumped on my reading table with my books on it and started rolling in pain. Wow, I said. did someone poison him before me? That cant be fair. Karmas eyes were rolling and he was stinking of alcohol. Help me he muttered, abeg help me I dey die. Suddenly I start thinkin of how fast I can dispose of his body it was actually 10p.m by then. I dey die he goes again, the world just dey turn. At this point I yell back “Fool thats because your rolling on my books get off! and surprisingly he jumps off my table like a 4yr old caught red handed doing wrong. It then hit me that this dude was so drunk I could do whatever I liked with him. Suddenly I felt powerful and so help me I was going to bring Karma on Karma. Just to be sure I smacked him in the face and he fell to the floor whining about how his mother would die if he dies so I had to help him. First thing I did was to lay him on the floor in front of his room and draw an FBI chalk line around him on the floor like the one you see in movies and in the middle wrote RIP Karma. Then off to the chemist we went which was two blocks away but this fool kept falling and I kicked him up each time. We got to the chemist and I told the man to sedate Karma with an injection. Karma was still rolling on the chair when I asked him for money to pay the Chemist so pulled out his wallet for me to see this bundle of about N10,000 (then that was big money and N100 was the highest denomination) he must have extorted all day. I snatched the wallet from him and took a little over the cost of my watch which I bought for about N1200. So I took just about N2000...Ok N5000...OK N8000 dont judge me just read on.
When I told Karma he was going to be injected, he broke down like a baby and started muttering Mummy I dont want injection, I smacked him again yelling shut up Bitch! The Chemist reacted and asked why I was treating him badly. I said for DUI. He asked Driving under the influence? I said no disturbing me Under the Influence. That wasn’t enough to convince the Chemist why I treated him badly so I just told him that this was the notorious karma. That did the trick because the chemist added Novalgin to the sedative. Poor Karma was crying like a bitch by the time I took him back to his room where he finally passed out.
By the time I woke up the next morning Karma had packed his things and left the hostel. His room mate told me Karma did a lot of weed and alcohol the previous night and woke up this morning still paranoid only to see the figure of his body drawn in chalk on the floor with Karma RIP written in the middle. That was a warning from his enemies so he had run home for his safety.
The events of the previous night happened really late so nobody knew what I was upto and those who were suspicious didn’t talk because nobody wanted to get involved with karma. Of course I couldn’t share this with anyone but I wish karma could see my face glowing with contempt now.
Ekeocha Nnaemeka
Episode 3
JOURNALS OF A NIGERIAN UNDERGRADUATE
FIGHT NIGHT.
It was two months into my first semester, I was getting to know new people, adapting to the new village Nsukka environment and oh Monday my psycho room mate had entered the dreaded third stage of his cycle where he becomes the stingy, psycho, vulture, vermin, hyena, phil collins loving sociopath. ( yeah seriously, Phil Collins was the only musician he was familiar with). Luckily I had two new roommates to share my situation with though I could still do with a whole football team because this fool Monday was insatiable with giving trouble.
My new room mates were Charles and Kene. Charles was a stray who Monday made believe he was generous enough to let him squat in our room. Unknown to Charles Monday had a straw to suck the life out of whatever the poor boy had to offer. Kene on the other hand was sent in by the school authorities and Monday decided to argue with the school authority that they were not allowed to send someone to our room. Seriously? where does he get the balls to make such a stupid arse argument? I mean the legal amount of people allowed in a room was three, the authorities just sent the third person and some where in his skull this argument can be won. That day I made up my mind this fool had to be a
Crack baby.
At this point he had issues with everyone. His room mates, people on our floor, his class mates, his church brothers, even cultists. Whom I prayed would kill him but they didn’t see him as worth it. You see the bastard had convinced everyone he was crazy so he was just seen as the village idiot. Now my room mates and I would have to poison him... OK that's just having happy thoughts but the problem was how to get rid of his body. Give me a moment to think.....
Anyway back to the story, Monday was a tyrant with no respect for other peoples property. I could be walking in our school faculty and see someone walking towards me from far and I’d be like, oh no someone else has the same shirt with me in this faculty and I’ve not yet worn mine damn! Then I look up to know who this is, then the face starts getting clearer with an annoying familiar smile. Then Monday stammers to me, a-a-aaabi the shhirt fine for my body? The bastard. This went on in our room and when warned not to touch our stuff , this fool would tell us, I-I-I deyy seeee you as my jjjunior brrother. Yeah this was easy for him because he had nothing you’d want to wear without catching an expensive disease since he took his bath on only very special occasions or you could just get stoned for wearing such ugly shirts. Monday even took his rubbish out side. He could go out, borrow stuff from other neighbours and of course sometimes without telling them (which in other cultures except Monday’s is called stealing). There was a day one of my neighbours stood at our door and saw his electric cooker almost in ruins just by the door. he opened the door slightly and asked how it got there since he hadn’t seen it in over three weeks. I told him I dont cook so he should ask Monday who was taking a kings nap then. The conversation went as thus.
Neighbour: Monday! na you use my cooker like this?
Monday: Abeg, cloooose my door ou-ou-outside dey smell.
That was the end of that discussion. The neighbour kept complaining and Monday just rolled over and slept of. This guy had to be kept on check as soon as possible because not even cooked food was safe any more. Kene could cook leave the room to buy water and come back to meet Monday eating his food telling him thiiss rice sweet oh. This boy you sabii ccook oh.
One day I got to the room late after female rejection from female hostels. I was hungry and it was really late cause canteens were closed. All I had was garri in my bag. When I checked my bag it was not there then I asked Charles and the usual suspects name came up. Then I felt my fuse pop. Charles told me to cool off but that was not an option cause I had already heard Monday’s voice approaching the door. I walked straight up to open it for him to see that annoying smile. I slapped his face so hard I looked at my palm and saw his smile glued to it. By now the neighbours had started running out to seperate the brawl. We spent the night in seperate rooms that night, I would like to believe it was because I was kicking his arse good but it was actually for my safety. I was sleeping in the opposite room from mine and all through the night I could hear Monday yell, First year slap meeeee!!! Aaaaargh!!!!, I dey seeee bloooddd!!!!!!, (its funny how he’s not stuttering now) this dude was gesticulating like Hulk Hogan when he’s coming up from the ground. (seriously).Everyone was scared he would stab me in my sleep.
The next morning I went out and came back to see Monday wandering around on the lawn so I took the chance to straighten out things with him. Monday, I said smiling at him and keeping a safe distance. He looks at me with vengeance in his eyes and says Ooooobi, Ooooobi, you youuu insult meeeee? You wey I seee asss myyy juniourr brother slaa slaaa slaaaap meeee. Holding myself from laughing, I apologise to him and he goes on and on about his battles at Warri. I-I-I dey fight well well before oh, I-I-If you seee my back you go seee mark mark mark wey them tchuk me bottle. I then ask, but if you were such a warrior you wouldn’t be that tchuked (even though all I could see were mosquito bite marks) but he didn’t get the joke and luckily he didn’t take offence either.
We made peace and for the rest of the semester he didn’t touch anything that belonged to me. Kene and Charles were the victims now. I had come out victorious in this or so I thought. That fight only helped in diminishing what was left of my rep. I had gone from Nwa mummy to hungry boy. I was fighting to stop this psycho from terrorizing us but to everyone else, it was for a few cups of garri. There’s no satisfying these people. Life’s a bitch!
Ekeocha Nnaemeka
FIGHT NIGHT.
It was two months into my first semester, I was getting to know new people, adapting to the new village Nsukka environment and oh Monday my psycho room mate had entered the dreaded third stage of his cycle where he becomes the stingy, psycho, vulture, vermin, hyena, phil collins loving sociopath. ( yeah seriously, Phil Collins was the only musician he was familiar with). Luckily I had two new roommates to share my situation with though I could still do with a whole football team because this fool Monday was insatiable with giving trouble.
My new room mates were Charles and Kene. Charles was a stray who Monday made believe he was generous enough to let him squat in our room. Unknown to Charles Monday had a straw to suck the life out of whatever the poor boy had to offer. Kene on the other hand was sent in by the school authorities and Monday decided to argue with the school authority that they were not allowed to send someone to our room. Seriously? where does he get the balls to make such a stupid arse argument? I mean the legal amount of people allowed in a room was three, the authorities just sent the third person and some where in his skull this argument can be won. That day I made up my mind this fool had to be a
Crack baby.
At this point he had issues with everyone. His room mates, people on our floor, his class mates, his church brothers, even cultists. Whom I prayed would kill him but they didn’t see him as worth it. You see the bastard had convinced everyone he was crazy so he was just seen as the village idiot. Now my room mates and I would have to poison him... OK that's just having happy thoughts but the problem was how to get rid of his body. Give me a moment to think.....
Anyway back to the story, Monday was a tyrant with no respect for other peoples property. I could be walking in our school faculty and see someone walking towards me from far and I’d be like, oh no someone else has the same shirt with me in this faculty and I’ve not yet worn mine damn! Then I look up to know who this is, then the face starts getting clearer with an annoying familiar smile. Then Monday stammers to me, a-a-aaabi the shhirt fine for my body? The bastard. This went on in our room and when warned not to touch our stuff , this fool would tell us, I-I-I deyy seeee you as my jjjunior brrother. Yeah this was easy for him because he had nothing you’d want to wear without catching an expensive disease since he took his bath on only very special occasions or you could just get stoned for wearing such ugly shirts. Monday even took his rubbish out side. He could go out, borrow stuff from other neighbours and of course sometimes without telling them (which in other cultures except Monday’s is called stealing). There was a day one of my neighbours stood at our door and saw his electric cooker almost in ruins just by the door. he opened the door slightly and asked how it got there since he hadn’t seen it in over three weeks. I told him I dont cook so he should ask Monday who was taking a kings nap then. The conversation went as thus.
Neighbour: Monday! na you use my cooker like this?
Monday: Abeg, cloooose my door ou-ou-outside dey smell.
That was the end of that discussion. The neighbour kept complaining and Monday just rolled over and slept of. This guy had to be kept on check as soon as possible because not even cooked food was safe any more. Kene could cook leave the room to buy water and come back to meet Monday eating his food telling him thiiss rice sweet oh. This boy you sabii ccook oh.
One day I got to the room late after female rejection from female hostels. I was hungry and it was really late cause canteens were closed. All I had was garri in my bag. When I checked my bag it was not there then I asked Charles and the usual suspects name came up. Then I felt my fuse pop. Charles told me to cool off but that was not an option cause I had already heard Monday’s voice approaching the door. I walked straight up to open it for him to see that annoying smile. I slapped his face so hard I looked at my palm and saw his smile glued to it. By now the neighbours had started running out to seperate the brawl. We spent the night in seperate rooms that night, I would like to believe it was because I was kicking his arse good but it was actually for my safety. I was sleeping in the opposite room from mine and all through the night I could hear Monday yell, First year slap meeeee!!! Aaaaargh!!!!, I dey seeee bloooddd!!!!!!, (its funny how he’s not stuttering now) this dude was gesticulating like Hulk Hogan when he’s coming up from the ground. (seriously).Everyone was scared he would stab me in my sleep.
The next morning I went out and came back to see Monday wandering around on the lawn so I took the chance to straighten out things with him. Monday, I said smiling at him and keeping a safe distance. He looks at me with vengeance in his eyes and says Ooooobi, Ooooobi, you youuu insult meeeee? You wey I seee asss myyy juniourr brother slaa slaaa slaaaap meeee. Holding myself from laughing, I apologise to him and he goes on and on about his battles at Warri. I-I-I dey fight well well before oh, I-I-If you seee my back you go seee mark mark mark wey them tchuk me bottle. I then ask, but if you were such a warrior you wouldn’t be that tchuked (even though all I could see were mosquito bite marks) but he didn’t get the joke and luckily he didn’t take offence either.
We made peace and for the rest of the semester he didn’t touch anything that belonged to me. Kene and Charles were the victims now. I had come out victorious in this or so I thought. That fight only helped in diminishing what was left of my rep. I had gone from Nwa mummy to hungry boy. I was fighting to stop this psycho from terrorizing us but to everyone else, it was for a few cups of garri. There’s no satisfying these people. Life’s a bitch!
Ekeocha Nnaemeka
Episode 2
JOURNALS OF A NIGERIAN UNDERGRADUATE
ACCOMMODATION.
If you’ve schooled in a Nigerian University, then accommodation problems wouldn’t be new to you. Men Federal/State schools are so overpopulated while private schools...so gay. Gaining admission to my school was hard enough, then you get in to find out your gateman at home has better living conditions than you. Being a freshman/jambite as we would call it, you are entitled to free accomodation but as good as that sounds, you’re being set up for the worse.
There are more dangers to this than benefits. Fine you are saved from the hassle of running around for accommodation but your also fixed in a room with total strangers. I mean you are either with a religious fanatic, a psycho cultist killer, village idiot, aristrocrat wannabe or a regular nice guy. Well I had the aristrocrat wannabe and regular nice guy but they came in later that first semester. Unfortunately I started the semester with the religious fanatic and psycho village idiot blended in one person. Infact Monday should have his name in the Warri idiots Hall of Fame. This Warri boy succeeded in giving me a bad impression of all Warri people. I know this is wrong but Monday did this to me not you so blame him.
I met this psycho the moment I stepped into my room. As my roommate, he looked so calm like he couldn’t harm the air a fly would soar through but this guy would send the human race into extinction to get his way. I mean I walk into this room and not even the bulb was working. This dude has been living here for three days and had done nothing about the place. I smelt doom right there and then. So I fixed up the place with my money and this ungreatful peasant doesnt thank me but starts lecturing me on how I’d have decorated the place.
Everything was wrong with this guy, there was no good etiquette in him, I mean I think this dude was allergic to the term. For instance one day I left my keys inside and took a stroll to come back and see the door locked and I’m in boxer shorts and Tshirt. I now take a bike/okada to find him. A normal human being would say oh sorry men here’s my key. He on the other hand stutters and tells me w w w why you no carry your key? No no no do am again. Son of a Bitch! if not for me you wouldn’t even have a key. This nuisance reads aloud to himself. I mean seriously. When he’s reading at night you hear him yelling at the top of his voice and after each sentence he yells YES! Like that term confirms that he has comprehended the sentence. Let me break this down for you. Imagine reading this passage aloud at night to yourself and after each sentence you yell YES! Imagine me waking up at night hearing “Double coincidence of want... YES!” (can you believe someone with this brain is a second year economics major). This psycho comes in at night one day and decides he wants to cook at 1a.m. I mean as if that wasn’t bad enough he decides he’ll cook there in the room. I said Dude whats this? its late and why would you want to cook in the room? The fool answers, I I I no go chop again? That was it. We argued about it all night till he finished cooking. Little did I know this was his cool and calm self. I was in for more psycho drama.
As days passed I found out Monday passes through a cycle in every semester. It starts with the Calm Stingy Person I’ve just talked about. The second is the Stingy Religious Fanatic. The last stage comes when we are close to the end of the semester and people become dry of supplies, he now becomes the stingy psycho vulture vermin hyena behaving selfish cockroach. The latter, trust me you dont want to experience.
Going into the Stingy religious fanatic part, Monday would become born again at the middle of the semester. His Deeper life brothers would come every early morning to knock on our door for him to follow up with their early morning devotion. Monday would drag himself out with sleep in his eyes. Did I mention this dude was also allergic to water. I mean taking his bath once a week was good for him so bathing in the morning wasn’t a problem. I didn’t buy the whole born again facade. This fool actually preached to me one day. I laughed my arse off. You know the type of laughter that makes it obvious you’re spiting the person, I kicked it up a few notches. He then told me hell is real and I told him he should send me a postcard whenever he gets there.
Soon as Monday ran out of money and his brothers won’t help him out he discarded all of them. They (his brothers) came and knocked one early morning for their normal devotion when Monday just had sex the previous day. Monday stood up, opened the door, and yelled at his brothers, (stuttering)”A-aaaaaaabiii person no fit sleep again? Mmmak make una leave me make I sleep” . He slams the door behind him and with no remorse goes to sleep. That was the last I saw of his brothers, at least for that semester.
Towards the end of the semester, we had the aristrocat wannabe Charles, and the nice guy Kene Join us. Then the last monstrous stage of Monday comes out.
Cont next edition.
Ekeocha Nnaemeka
Saturday 9 July 2011
REGISTRATION
1999 was a significant year in my life. After three years of sweating it out with pre-university exams I had finally gotten admission into the University of Nigeria Nsukka. High school wasn’t fun for me because it was an all boys military school so I was very excited about the real world where there were boys and girls and more girls. Infact there were 10 female hostels and 4 male hostels so this was heaven for me.
I was set out to make a great impression of myself as a freshman’s (or Jambite in Nigeria) first day on campus. They just had to notice there was a new bad guy in town. To my upmost dismay my plans were crushed when my over loving mother decided she must follow me to campus on my first day. Oh crap this cannot be happening to me.
Even Lecturers children dont bring their parents to campus, why me mom?
She smiles and answers, I heard theres a rush and I have contacts that can make things easier for you.
Easier for me? I say with disbelief, let me suffer like the rest of them now, this is my first day in campus and you want to hold my hand and take me to school like I’m in kindergarten. Please mom you can’t do this to me.
Don’t be silly, she answers reaching for my cheeks and pulling gently. You should be grateful you have a caring loving mom like me unlike those cultists that their parents never showed them love.
Mom, interrupting her, right now I wish you could hate me , dont worry I wont be a psycho cultist killer you’ve already done a great job raising me.
Are you ashamed of me she ask’s with her piercing blackmailing eyes.
Yes! I yell , if that would stop you from following me. Might as well breast feed me when we get there.
She smiles and says dont worry I’ve got lunch packed come on Obi lets go before we miss our flight.
Hi, my name is Obinwanne Chukwu and I’m reaching you live from University of Nigeria Nsukka. (UNN).It’s my first day in college and I’ve already made history as the first Freshman to bring his Mom for registration. The History department has already put me in their books.This definitely wasn’t my idea of getting noticed but my mom was doing a good job at getting us all the attention I didn’t need. I’m totally screwed because she just can’t remain concealed for long.
I’m playing a game right now called avoid your mom. Some of you might have heard of it. In this game you keep a safe distance from her so she can see you but no one will know she’s with you. Keeping this up was really difficult especially because she knows my name and can yell it out at anytime and she knows how to draw attention to herself. Right now she’s having an argument with some dudes sitting behind me on how Tupac may still be alive, I knew I shouldn’t have left all those magazines lying around.
I’m standing in a long tight queue where its hard to move and everybody is rubbing against each other in the hot Nigerian sun when this hot chic walks up to me and asks if she could stand in front of me thereby jumping the queue.My mind starts running an analysis.. hmm this girls backside was like a shelf. I mean you could place a book on it and read it without the book falling off. The point here is, if she gets in front of me in this tight line we’ll surely get compressed together . I then swallowed hard and without thinking about the vicious impatient people behind me I say why not? you may enter. Immediately she stepped in some punk from behind yells Hey! Would you go back? I turn around and see him walking towards the girl but as I gear up to confront him, my mom steps up between us and asks
Yes? Can I help you ? What has my son done to you?
At that point all eyes were on me and someone on the line yells NWA MUMMY!!! Meaning mummy’s baby in Igbo. Like that people around that vicinity picked it up and started yellin thesame thing with laughter everywhere. I felt like I was in a stdium and a high capacity crowd was yelling at me me. At that moment I started praying seriously for a tsunami to take me away or better still my mom.
I made sure she left that day after collecting my key from the hostel porter. As I walked to my room alone thankfully I recounted what a disaster the day had been. No thanks to my overzealous mom I had to work extra hard to build my rep in this school and I have four years to achieve it. Finally I’m at my room phew need to rest as I try to open the door a sudden stench hits me. Wait whats that, oh crap my room is next to the toilet.
I was set out to make a great impression of myself as a freshman’s (or Jambite in Nigeria) first day on campus. They just had to notice there was a new bad guy in town. To my upmost dismay my plans were crushed when my over loving mother decided she must follow me to campus on my first day. Oh crap this cannot be happening to me.
Even Lecturers children dont bring their parents to campus, why me mom?
She smiles and answers, I heard theres a rush and I have contacts that can make things easier for you.
Easier for me? I say with disbelief, let me suffer like the rest of them now, this is my first day in campus and you want to hold my hand and take me to school like I’m in kindergarten. Please mom you can’t do this to me.
Don’t be silly, she answers reaching for my cheeks and pulling gently. You should be grateful you have a caring loving mom like me unlike those cultists that their parents never showed them love.
Mom, interrupting her, right now I wish you could hate me , dont worry I wont be a psycho cultist killer you’ve already done a great job raising me.
Are you ashamed of me she ask’s with her piercing blackmailing eyes.
Yes! I yell , if that would stop you from following me. Might as well breast feed me when we get there.
She smiles and says dont worry I’ve got lunch packed come on Obi lets go before we miss our flight.
Hi, my name is Obinwanne Chukwu and I’m reaching you live from University of Nigeria Nsukka. (UNN).It’s my first day in college and I’ve already made history as the first Freshman to bring his Mom for registration. The History department has already put me in their books.This definitely wasn’t my idea of getting noticed but my mom was doing a good job at getting us all the attention I didn’t need. I’m totally screwed because she just can’t remain concealed for long.
I’m playing a game right now called avoid your mom. Some of you might have heard of it. In this game you keep a safe distance from her so she can see you but no one will know she’s with you. Keeping this up was really difficult especially because she knows my name and can yell it out at anytime and she knows how to draw attention to herself. Right now she’s having an argument with some dudes sitting behind me on how Tupac may still be alive, I knew I shouldn’t have left all those magazines lying around.
I’m standing in a long tight queue where its hard to move and everybody is rubbing against each other in the hot Nigerian sun when this hot chic walks up to me and asks if she could stand in front of me thereby jumping the queue.My mind starts running an analysis.. hmm this girls backside was like a shelf. I mean you could place a book on it and read it without the book falling off. The point here is, if she gets in front of me in this tight line we’ll surely get compressed together . I then swallowed hard and without thinking about the vicious impatient people behind me I say why not? you may enter. Immediately she stepped in some punk from behind yells Hey! Would you go back? I turn around and see him walking towards the girl but as I gear up to confront him, my mom steps up between us and asks
Yes? Can I help you ? What has my son done to you?
At that point all eyes were on me and someone on the line yells NWA MUMMY!!! Meaning mummy’s baby in Igbo. Like that people around that vicinity picked it up and started yellin thesame thing with laughter everywhere. I felt like I was in a stdium and a high capacity crowd was yelling at me me. At that moment I started praying seriously for a tsunami to take me away or better still my mom.
I made sure she left that day after collecting my key from the hostel porter. As I walked to my room alone thankfully I recounted what a disaster the day had been. No thanks to my overzealous mom I had to work extra hard to build my rep in this school and I have four years to achieve it. Finally I’m at my room phew need to rest as I try to open the door a sudden stench hits me. Wait whats that, oh crap my room is next to the toilet.
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