Introducing the Imperfection series + part 1

I am starting a new series on this blog, called the Imperfection Series, and it would last for five Mondays, beginning from today. I should have done it a long time ago, shortly after the Close Shaves Series, but I was just plain lazy to get on with it. My sins have finally caught up with me.

I find out that the two times I have run series on this blog, readers really enjoyed it, though their were not sequential.

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The Imperfection Series is basically articles on true facts about me that make me scarred and kinda different. Trust me, some of them are just weird. Even though they are somehow, they are part of who I am. But if I came back to the world, I wouldn't pick those kinds of imperfections o.

Anyway, the first one is about the scars I have, due to my accident four years ago, so I wouldn't write much about it. In order word the first episode in this series is the last episode in the Close Shaves series. You can read about it here.

I will continue properly next week. You don't want to miss it.

My Ex and I

We sat together one midnight, reading together. We were in the same department in the faculty of engineering, but he was a year ahead of me. He was tall, light, and handsome. I felt he was one of the finest guys I had ever laid eyes on, I don’t know if he felt the same way about me, cos I was a cute petite girl, with very tomboyish attitude.

We hit it off immediately. He showed interest in me, and I in turn, flashed a very bright green light to him. Before you knew it, we were an item. My mum found out I was in a relationship, she was not happy because he was not Yoruba. She needn’t have bothered her head, the relationship wasn’t going to last anyway.

I started getting tired of him. He loved me too much. He was too in to me. He was too crazy about me. He wished he could hang out with me every day, every second. It irritated me, annoyed me, drove me nuts. I began to pull away, become distant, but tried to cover it up. I didn’t want to break his heart. One midnight reading session, I lied that I wasn’t in the department reading. His roommate saw me, and told me my ex was somewhere around. He was surprised not to see us reading together. I begged his roommate not to tell him he saw me. His roommate told him.

He confronted me. I tried to give him a flimsy excuse, he wasn’t buying it. He knew I wasn’t that much into him anymore. He didn’t know why. I didn’t know why. I mean he was a fine boy. What else could a girl want in uni? Some days later, after a couple of back and forth, he broke up with me. He said he wasn’t interested anymore, he didn’t like me anymore, he had started liking someone else. It was finally over. It lasted just three months. I was sad, I tried to weave the whole thing to look like his fault, but it was my fault. I think I was sadder that he was the one who broke up with me, rather than the fact that the relationship had ended. Whenever anyone asked, I told them he was the one who broke up with me. I played the victim.

We went on holidays. He started missing me, he called once or twice. When we resumed, he asked me out again, and said we should start afresh. I had gotten over him and the break up, so I turned him down. I went home that day, called him up, and gave him a tongue-lashing of his life. How dare he break up with me, put me through all the torment, and then turn around to come back? My position as the victim was finally cemented.

We were just on a ‘hi’ level. When my dad died, he commiserated with me. I knew when he got his first job, and eventually left the country for his masters. We kept in touch from time to time, via email. A few years later, I promised to let him know the next time I was in the UK.

I went to the UK when I was going through a rough patch, and told him I was around. His reply was kinda cold, saying he was in India or so. I got back to Nigeria, and he kept in touch. Few months later, I was back there. We hooked up. He was extremely proud of me, and what I had achieved. I was proud of him and what he had achieved. He was almost done with his PhD, at such a young age. I asked him if he told his girlfriend he was meeting me, to which he affirmed. He took me to a nice Japanese restaurant. I told him about my most recent ex, and what his family put me through. He scolded me for wanting to marry into such a family in the first place. It was a great time with him, and I promised him a nice time whenever he comes to Nigeria.

A year later, he came to Nigeria to apply for a visa to Germany for a job interview. He was such a high flyer. He called me up on my promise. After several clashes in time schedule, we finally fixed the date he was supposed to leave the country. I took him out. He told me of how he proposed to his girlfriend. I took him to the airport, stayed with him till he went through the security check point. His girlfriend called. This time, I didn’t bother asking him if she knew I was with him. Of course, she didn’t know. She would most likely not approve that he hooked up with me in Nigeria. That was the last time I saw him.

The next time he was in Nigeria, it was for his wedding. He invited me… as a friend… all the way to Port Harcourt. Of course, I didn’t go. Even if it were in Lagos, I wouldn’t go. To do what? Who do I know there? He’s the only one I know. I was happy for him. I congratulated him.

My ex and I are really cool friends.

But I knew it was time to end the friendship.

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Abdulsalam

Abdulsalam was just a Hausa guy that used to hang out with his fellow Hausa friends in their kiosk opposite my house. Well, I honestly am not sure if he’s Hausa, but you know that to all westerners, any black skinned guy from the north is automatically Hausa, so he’s Hausa to me. Whenever, I, my brother, or mum, gets to the front of our gate, once we unlock the padlock, he would rush there and open the gate for us, and then lock it. He did this all the time, and we said thank you. It was obvious he wanted something, but we didn’t know what it was, and we were not interested in finding out. Ours was an extremely nuclear family who minded their business, and we intended to keep it that way. Abdulsalam also washed my brother’s cars, and cars of some fellow neighbours packed outside, for a little stipend. There was nothing strange about that.

After a while, Abdulsalam couldn’t take it anymore. He had been throwing bait at us, and we weren’t biting. He approached my brother, and directly made his request. He wanted to be our gateman. The thing is, we didn’t need a gateman. We were fully grown, and all had keys to the house. We could open the gate by ourselves, and we didn’t have so many numerous visitors that we would have to be opening the gate for 100 times a day. But Abdulsalam was wise. He knew we had a gateman’s apartment, and he was badly in need of a place of his own. I’m sure he saw it as a mansion, compared to him squatting in the kiosk with about 5 other friends of his. The gateman’s apartment has been used as a poultry house, dirt house, thrash house, store, ram and goat house, and every other thing apart from a gateman’s house. Abdulsalam knew this, and he was gunning for the kill.

So he and my brother reached an agreement. He would man the gate, wash all the cars, care for the flowers, and sweep the compound. He would in turn, get his accommodation and a monthly salary. He would not be allowed to have the keys to the house. He was to leave the house shortly after my mum and brother leave, go about his business, and return when everyone returned. Did I mention that Abdulsalam was also a shoemaker? Yes he is, a wise guy with multiple streams of income, no matter how meagre. So I saw Abdulsalam in the compound one day. I asked him what he was doing inside, and he told me about the agreement between him, my mum, and my brother. And that is how Abdulsalam became our gateman by force.

The thing is Abdulsalam does not wash my car often. I work from home weekdays, and resume other jobs on weekends. Abdulsalam knows this, I know this, and we are both fine that my car gets the least priority. Another thing is Abdusalam is not so security conscious. Whenever he gets back in the evening, the gate should be bolted, rather than locked, cos Abdulsalam is there to man it. But sometimes, he’s nowhere to be found, and the gate is wide ajar. One time, I got home almost 12 midnight, and the gate was not locked, or even bolted. Abdulsalam had slept off in the compound, and he didn’t hear me come in. it was not until I actually drove in, that he jumped up. Of course, I reported all these lapses to my brother, concerning his ‘staff’. He is getting better now, but there’s still so much to be done concerning his security ‘expertise’.

One day, I was smelling strange things in the house. I investigated, and realised Abdulsalam didn’t go about his daily business. He has invited one of his friend in, were burning hausa incense. I accosted him, and he said it was perfume that he wanted his room to be scented. Inside me, I was mad, but I gently told him not to burn strange incense in the house. It smelt really foul and was choking the whole house. I reported to my brother, who was mad about the fact that he breached the agreement and didn’t leave the house after they all did, invited someone over, and was burning strange thing.

Whenever he does something wrong, and you tell him, he would start kneeling down, begging, saying “Sorry, ma, I no go do am again” over and over again. The whole scene is just a sight to behold that one just shakes one’s head.

Last week, I went to buy eggs at another kiosk opposite my house. Abdulsalam was at the kiosk, talking to the owner. He had a burning cigarette in his right hand. Immediately I told the woman to give me egg, he heard me, and threw the cigarette away, right in my presence. I asked him why he was hiding and pretending. I guess he’s an idiot who thinks I am an idiot. Does he think I don’t know he smokes like a chimney? Doesn’t he know he reeks of cigarette fumes every Sunday and Saturday morning, when I tell him to quickly clean my car, because I need to rush out? Doesn’t he know his extremely red eyes give him away when he is high on something? Or is it his brash statements I know he would have never had the guts to make on a normal day?

Abdulsalam set up a shoemaker shop in front of the house without permission. He constituted a nuisance. He used an umbrella of mine I had been looking for, for a about two weeks. I collected my umbrella, and told him to take his make-shift shop down. I reported to my mum and brother who were away at work. He didn’t want to take his shop down, he kept lying about different thing, shouted, begged, lied. In the end, it got a bit messy, he said he was leaving, and boasted about he had done ‘security’ in four different places. He packed his load and plates along with my mum’s fabreware knife, which I collected when I saw. He packed his bed, along with my chill and relax banner he was using as a bedsheet, which I had warned him never to do when I first saw him. Before I knew the banner was missing, it was six days after Abdulsalam had left.

Something to Note: I just added that last paragraph this morning. The first edition of this story didn't end like this, cos Abdulsalam was still with us when I wrote this article. I ended it with "This guy, Abdulsalam, is just a case. But still, we would accommodate him… with caution, though. He means no harm." But I guess he rewrote his own story.

Random musings of an overwhelmed multitasker

There are many times when I can hardly wait for Monday to arrive cos I know one of my 20 scheduled interesting blog posts will appear, people will love it, enjoy it, and comment on it, and I will be a star writer of blogsville.

There are other times I pray for Mondays not to come becasue I basically have nothing to write. Life is overwhelming, I can't think, so many struggles associated with being an adult, trying to make ends meet, and maintaining a certain standard of living. The whole head just blocks, and creative juices stop flowing. And that is where I am at right now.

It is at times like this that I pull stuff from my archives, and just post. But still, it doesn't get the real job done. The work of connecting to you followers on the same level you do on a normal day. Followers can see through these things, you know? They can tell when we are not really investing in writing something specially for them, when we are just throwing content at them. It shows in the number of comments that follow.

At this point, I need God to come through for me. I have so much work to do. Too many people I am leading, too many committees I am handling, too many tasks to complete, that I can hardly find time to live life as it should be lived. I just wish people won't drop the ball, so I don't have to start policing anyone. If God doesn't help me between now and December, I am done for.

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I have never worked in my life, like I have done in this year if 2014, and trust me when I say I work hard on a normal day. I can't wait to just take a break from all these, and just take a vacation. I didn't even have one this summer, but Christmas shall not pass me by.

This is probably the 'randomest' post I have ever written. I just didn't want to leave this space blank, or pull another article from my archives.

I'm out. Back to the ups and downs of all the work waiting for me.