Respect is reciprocal

During a party that my family organized recently, I went to collect food from one of the caterers’ tent and told the lady serving to serve me some things. I noticed that she was not cheerful. As she served the Chinese noodles, a strand was dangling at the edge of the plate but she did not adjust it and I did not have the courage to correct her. When her boss saw it some seconds later, she asked ‘what is this rubbish, why are you so daft?’ I was shocked at her insulting tone because it has been long I heard any boss insult a subordinate.
The countenance of the lady became worse than I met it. She was more sluggish and was frowning through out. It was obvious that if she had her way, she would rain abuses on her boss and walk away. In this day and age, people especially those in the market place should know that the easiest way to get the best out of people is to respect them. Evidently, this would not be the first time the lady will suffer verbal abuse from her boss and because of this, she was not getting the best out of her. What the boss did not know is that it’s her own business that will suffer eventually. It means she is using her attitude to ruin her business and in turn, herself.
As for me, if you call me daft, then I will become daft to you. If you call me useless and I become useless to you, please do not complain. I have heard from so many wives that when a wife respects her husband, she can get almost anything from him. I want to believe this applies a little bit to everyone.

I murdered the Fish

On the first day of this year, I was asked to kill some numbers of mud fish (the one that is popularly called cat fish). If you are familiar with the procedure, you will know that this specie is quite slippery and tricky and if one is not careful, the killer is the one that will be the victim, not the fish. This is why people make sure that when they want to kill them, they temporarily disorient them by hitting their heads slightly, then the killer holds the head (with the tail shaking violently) and decapitates it. Failure to hold the head well might reduce the number of fingers you have on your hand. Even after completely severing the head, it still remains alive for a while. Talk about endurance.

So here I was on Jan 1, trying to kill one of the fish, but instead of hitting the fish slightly, I was too hard on it. Because of the hard covering of the head, it did not break but it got a slight dent. All of a sudden, the fish started shaking fiercely, I see them shake all the time but I had never seen anything like that. I knew that it was in serious pain, then it opened its mouth very wide and the whole body swole, it spew out blood and went still and the whole body relaxed. Fish coughing blood? Things like this happen only in nollywood.

I really pitied the fish because I knew I did not kill it, I murdered it. I was a sad sight to watch. The other person with me also felt bad and any other person that saw the scene would have felt that way also.

It then hit me, if we could feel this bad for a fish we were going to eat, how people able to murder fellow human beings without any feeling of compassion. Some of us are very mean to each other, engaging in extreme human torture. Terrorists use a form of brainwashing to recruit mass murderers, I define this type of brainwashing as washing away one’s conscience.

Also, talk about human riot acts, suicide bombings, war without reason and other forms of terrorism. There was the picture that was circulating on facebook showing some people who had just slaughtered a man. They were holding some parts of the body while the main body was just lying there, it was gory. They obviously had no conscience, and when there is no conscience, there can’t be feeling. Hitting or shooting someone and running away is one thing but someone actually staying there, watching and enjoying the scene as he watches a fellow human suffer to death is in sane. I always thought one of the things that differentiates us from animals is conscience, but tell me, how do these people turn to such inhumane creatures?

Blackberry Craze

‘Why didn’t you buy a blackberry? Why didn’t you buy a blackberry?’ Everyone keeps asking me, when they see my Nokia E63 phone. To say that I have been asked this question over 100 times is not an understatement. There’s this expectation everywhere in Lagos now that, once you need a new phone and can afford an expensive one, then you should go for a blackberry.

I am of the opinion that the place where people abuse this device most is the church. Can you imagine that one day, while I was sitting in church during a service, two people, one on my left and another on my right suddenly brought their blackberry and started using it right in the middle of the sermon. Guess what they were doing: yeah, you guessed right, facebooking and chatting. I was really pissed off. So many had been flashing blackberries in my face for a long time and I can’t even escape into my comfort zone while in church? People even put it as their facebook status, ‘facebooking in church’ or something similar to that, it is really shameless.

I was impressed during cross over service when the guy beside me brought out his blackberry and started taking sermon notes. Though I thought it unnecessary but at least, he was not using it to check facebook notifications. It seemed really funny to me because the people that were using pen and paper were faster and more effective than him. Before he concludes a sentence on point on his blackberry, the pastor would have reeled in about 5 more points. I also wondered why in the past, I never saw people take sermon notes with their Sagem, Trium, Nokia 3310… or Nokia N70, even though these phones have the facility to do that.

The truth is that blackberry was created mainly for business purposes, especially for business and career people who are always on the go but must always have access to their clients and mails all the time. But what do we have now? Every Tom, Dick and Harry uses a blackberry, whether they need it or not, even some youths that do not have enough money to cater for themselves must have that blackberry. To say blackberry has snatched the Nokia market in Lagos would be an understatement. The blackberry that the western worlds have used in the past and wasn’t a big deal to them has hit us and we are still trying to find our balance.

Also, have you also noticed that people that use blackberry don’t refer to it as ‘my phone’ but as ‘my blackberry? Or is it not a phone anymore? Madness!

My Best Friend’s Wedding(site)

Hey people, long time. Sorry there has been no post for a while, I’ve been doing some things that made me lose creativity and go blank. Plus where I am now is killing my inspiration. So therefore, this post might sound a bit watery to you. Beware!
A very close friend of mine is getting married soon but what is unusual is that this friend of mine is a very young guy and most guys don’t usually get married at his age.
Well, he sent me the link to his wedding site for me to check out sometime ago. On visiting, I saw something very interesting and shocking. On the how they met segment, he said his ‘wife to be’ was the first person to see his first employment letter (obviously to make the story sound very romantic). My eyebrows rose at this statement immediately because I was actually the first person that saw the so-called letter, I could even remember the salary structure and the excitement on his face.
Lesson: never believe anything you see on these wedding sites, everyone wants their story to sound very nice and they spice it up a bit.
The reason I actually saw the letter first was that he really liked me and was planning to ask me to be his girlfriend. He was trying to make up his mind between me and his fiancée (this, I found out from him about a year later). But he asked me a test question which revealed my lack of interest in a relationship with him and that’s how I got kicked out of his list of options. If it had happened otherwise, I’d have been getting married to my very young friend next week or I’d have broken his heart four years ago thereby losing our friendship. That is to say, I am satisfied with the way things went.
Well, trust me, after seeing the story, I got back to my friend ASAP and asked why he lied, he then said it was a mistake. This was my reply to him:

You have to do one of these

1. Go back to the site and tell the truth, say 'your fiancée is d second person that saw the letter, the first person was ‘@ilola’.

2. You can leave the statement but change the picture and the name to mine, just to preserve the truth. The implication of this is that you will have to marry me on that day.

3. You can leave it that way and let me come and disrupt your wedding day when it gets to the 'how they met' segment.

YOU CHOOSE!!

To say that my friend was scared after reading this would be an understatement. He has always had a knack for taking me serious when I am just joking. I had to calm him down and put his mind at rest. I hope when he sees my face on his wedding day, he won’t start urinating in his trousers!

Something to Lighten you up

Caller: Hello, can I speak to Annie Wan?

Operator: Yes, you can speak to me.

Caller: No, I want to speak to Annie Wan!

Operator: Yes I understand you want to speak to anyone. You can speak to me. Who is this?

Caller: I’m Sam Wan. And I need to talk to Annie Wan! It’s urgent.

Operator: I know you are someone and you want to talk to anyone! But what’s this urgent matter about?

Caller: Well… just tell my sister Annie Wan that our brother Noe Wan was involved in an accident. Noe Wan got injured and now Noe Wan is being sent to the hospital. Right now, Avery Wan is on his way to the hospital.

Operator: Look, if no one was injured and no one was sent to the hospital, then the accident isn’t an urgent matter! You may find this hilarious but I don’t have time for this!

Caller: You are so rude! Who are you?

Operator: I’m Saw Ree.

Caller: Yes! You should be sorry. Now give me your name!

Operator: That’s what I said. I’m Saw Ree…

Caller: Oh… God!!

If you don't like the Story, Change it!

I am someone that hates stories and movies with sad endings. They have a way of making me feel really bad. I am of the opinion that a lot of tragic events occur in reality and I should be able to use books and movies as a means of escape to fantasy. A fiction, no matter how good the story line is, shouldn’t remind me of how bad the state of the world is, reality should do that, even if the story is sad, the end should be happy (just my opinion).I am referring to books like Tess of D’Urbervilles and films like million dollar baby and The girl next door (the 2007 film not 2004 film).
I realized that since I can’t pick a good movie or book and predict whether it’s a tragedy or not just by looking at the title, I run the risk of encountering such stories. Last week, I watched a movie titled ‘Drag me to hell’. The movie went well till the very end. I was so pissed and then, I made up my mind and said to myself ‘Nice story but I don’t like the end, I don’t care about what the writer thinks, I am going to rewrite the last scene’. And then, I took a mental ink and paper and did some editing. The writer had his final story and I had mine, we were both contented. I did not have to accept his story since it was going to ruin my night but I could not negate the fact that the story was already in my head.

This write-up is not about films and books, not even about story writers. After all, they are just being creative in their own way. This write up is about the real world. When we don’t like the way some things are going in our lives, we can change the story. We can always take active stance against some things, even demanding drastic actions sometimes. I am also talking to myself. If you think your life is charting a course you are not comfortable with, you can change the story. If you feel you are getting outdated, get a certification, improve yourself in different ways. If you feel you are in a relationship that’s going anywhere, get out. Take perfect control of your life, pick a pen and paper and change the story and don’t let the ‘writer of destiny’ dictate how your life is going to play out. There are only 2 beings in control of your life. Number one, God and number two, You. Don’t give that control to any circumstance or past event that might be taking hold of your life, don’t even give it to anyone whom you might think has a strong influence on your destiny. Don’t let anyone tell you the way your life ought to go, what course to study, whom to marry, what career path to follow. Take full responsibility for your life, do the writing and acting, and if you don’t like the story at any point, change it! That way, you alone will have power over how interesting your life is going to be.

CNN, BBC, etc. ARE NOT BEING FAIR TO NIGERIA

How many times have you seen a nice seen a nice picture or video of Nigeria on BBC or CNN? Apart from that Zenith bank advert (which was paid for), hardly ever. These people have a way of making this country look worse than it really is.
The first wake-up call I got was about 10 years ago, I saw an American cartoon (the likes of voltron) on a Nigerian station. I can’t remember the story line but I think the hero was supposed to go and catch a villain hiding in Lagos. This is how Lagos was depicted, a place filled with cows and nomads moving them cows with stick. I was so dumbfounded, I have lived my entire life in Lagos and I’ve never seen even a stray cow on the road. The only place cows are found are in the meat market where they are sold.
I don’t know if you readers have noticed this short footage that has been running on CNN IODesk for about 3 weeks now, it says that “Talking about Breast cancer in Nigeria is considered a taboo”! What? Am I the only one that is seeing something wrong here? I’m sorry, but I think CNN should get their facts right before broadcasting such lies about us. I’ve been hearing about Breast cancer and its dangers since I was 11 years old, I have even been taught how to do self examination of Breast cancer, I’ve heard so much about breast cancer for over 10 years that it is beginning to sound like a broken record. What about Rhythm 93.7 fm that keeps on drumming the breast cancer message before and after every news reading? So what does CNN mean about that statement? I don’t know if there is a particular village in Nigeria where talking about it is a taboo, but when you start referring to the whole nation, it shows how wrong CNN can be at times.
There is also this footage on the same CNN IODesk that talks about over 300,000 people in Nigeria dying of malaria every year. I really don’t know how many people die but the painful part is that in this particular footage, they ‘implied’ that we cut leaves from trees and burn them in order to keep the mosquitoes away! Again, I don’t care if some people do that, but why didn’t CNN mention that we use insecticides, mosquito nets, mosquito coils and other sensible preventive measures that we use here in Nigeria? Why did they have to depict our efforts in such a negative way? Accompanying this footage was a horribly looking man who couldn’t speak English burning something strange. Whenever CNN and BBC want to talk about us, they go to the very remote Nigerian villages I have never seen or heard about to get pictures and videos and they depict it as Nigeria. I read BBC online a lot and I have never seen a good picture of Nigeria or Nigerians. Aren’t they being myopic that way? They don’t show pictures of places like Port Harcourt, Kano, Ibadan, Lagos, etc and if they do, they’ll pick Ajegunle and depict it as Lagos, leaving places like Omole, Victoria island, VGC, Ajah and co out to rot. Did they ever talk about the things Governor Fashola did? Did they ever show footages of his beautiful works? No, all they show is what they want the rest of the world to believe about Nigeria. And how do they depict her citizens? Let’s not even begin to talk about that.
Well, it is not their fault. After all, we are the ones who are still running to their countries instead of staying to develop our own. I know our leaders have failed us but they don’t have to make our situation look worse than it actually is.

Perfect People

I hate ‘perfect’ people! And this is why I say so, they have a way of making people like me look bad, incapable, inadequate, etc. Anytime I come across a nice, accommodating, always smiling, friendly, ‘never do wrong’, etc. person, I cringe. It always seems to me that the person just makes my weakness obvious.
I have this aunt that stayed with us for about a year. She was perceived to be very hardworking. She woke up every morning to clean a very large part of the house, she always made me look lazy and my mum always fell for it. Anytime my mum saw her working, it would suddenly occur to her as to what a horribly lazy child she had in me. Never mind the fact that I am the first girl and started washing my clothes and plates at the age of five, and since then I did a lot of house chores and still do till date. My ‘perfect’ aunt will wake up by 6.30 am and start cleaning an already clean house and then my mum will wake up and start shouting at me, 'the lazy daughter'. I’d just be looking soberly but inside of me, I really couldn’t be bothered, if she wants to work, let her work, I didn’t care. The day she crossed the line from perfection to eye service was when she carried out a duty reserved for me. I used to clean my mum’s bathroom every Saturday after washing my clothes and cleaning my portion of the house. That day, I woke up a bit late and before I could finish my earlier chores, she had gone to the bathroom and cleaned it. I was perplexed, since she knew that it was my duty and my mum was going to shout at me. As expected my mum complained about me, 'the lazy daughter'. I later told my grandmother about it because it was obvious she was trying to steal my mum’s affection from me (as if that is possible) and she wanted to be getting a lot of things from her.
It would happen that after my ‘perfect’ aunt left our house to her husband’s, it did not take 2 weeks before an issue developed between her and my mum which resulted in her shunning my mum showing her true colour. Who did my mum whine and complain to? Well, me, 'the lazy daughter'.
Time after time, I meet people that after spending like 4 weeks with them, you still cannot find any weakness in them, I mean no single one. If you want to find, you’d have to spend a lot of months with them. I compare them to people like me that before encountering our strengths, you’d have noticed all our weaknesses but after then, you find countless strengths. I know many of my weaknesses and sometimes I wish I could pretend in order to cover them up for a while, but I just can’t. You see why I hate ‘perfect’ people? They know how to be accepted anywhere, by anyone, under any circumstances. They know how to fix plastic smiles. They are hardly sad, bored or angry. they know how TO PRETEND. And believe me, there are a lot of perfect people in this world. I run away from them as much as I can because they always make me look bad. I know my weaknesses, you don’t have to make it obvious. Thank You!