Na wa 4 bloggers jare!

I have read with keen interest the comments made on my last post which I have decided to pull down probably because of the hypocrisy hidden in some of the comments and the entire mis-judgement of the 'Monologues'.

I have read worst things on blogville and I don't think I have overstepped my boundaries. It's my blog and like Naijalines said, I can blog on whatever I like.

All I wanted to do was give a voice to 'kini'(as some have labelled it) and imagine what it would sound like if it had a mind of its own. It was all about creativity!

My days on blogville are definitely numbered!

From the Archives ....

I just have a hunch that me and Naijalines would be doing something again together very soon. Even though she hasn't given her consent and doesn't have an idea on what we will be working on yet, I sort of went back to the archives to dig this out. This was actually posted sometime in 2008. The part 1 was on her blog while I was given the rare privilege to have the part 2 on my blog.

This is the Part 2 of the joint post 'Jambite' - posted on Naijalines' blog several weeks back. I must confess that Naijalines has been a great friend,sister,motivator and virtual crush (this started when she started the virtual crush craze on blogville) since my sojourn into blogging began. I must also remind you that Naijalines and I graduated from the same university and same department(great coincidence) but I must also mention that she graduated in the 80s while I graduated sometime in 2007 (Naijalines,I prostrate in deep respect!).
From our contributions, I hope you will be able to appreciate the different periods and time span.


MUSCO
200 level created other ‘levels’ for cousin & I
We joined the league of BQ boys
Though we had to pay through the nose for it
We moved in and everybody thought we were rich guys
But we actually lived like normal guys drinking garri & cooking beans(once in a while)

U.I had become so conservative
Everywhere was silent & deserted after 9pm
Nothing interesting was happening on campus
Triangular life was the way
Class-Hostel-Fellowship
There was no main joint in the whole campus where students could hang out
After 9pm, you were at risk of getting your phone snatched
Security became a big issue

We defiled all odds
Moving around at odd hours wasn’t a big deal for us
The roads leading to female halls Idia & Awo knew us well
Apart from visiting the girls
The English Premiership & Champions League made Awo Hall a delight to visit
After visiting the girls & watching football
We branched at Iya John’s in front of Idia Hall to fill the stomach for dinner
This woman was a jack-of-all food
She sold everything from moi-moi, fried yam, akara, bread to fried meat
The table used for selling became a meeting point for many on campus
Girls were chased & toasted while akara was being sold & bought .

In my last two years in the premier University
I got involved in a relationship that generated a lot of gossip
A lot of friends believed
I was too cool and smooth for the relationship
It didn't work out in the end
I learnt my lessons though.

The club boys made Friday nights interesting with their convoys
Their penchant for lining up their cars in front of Idia & St.Annes added a little bit of life
Never went to a convoy party until after my final exams in U.I
We were still on the move to the party venue at 1a.m
Girl I was supposed to go with
Came to the take-off point with me but ended up
Zooming off in another guy’s car.


NAIJALINES
As a female stalelite, there was only one way out if you wanted a social life.
When bobos ask you if you're a jambite
Better say yes or you're dust
You see...a stalelite is like an adelebo*{1}
You are yesterday's news
So if you really like a toasterYou paro fun ni o*{2}
Then later ti o ba ti gba ti e*{3}
You drop the bombshell...gently

The same thing goes for party invitations
Do not tell guys the 'S' word
If you don't want to become party woodliceA.k.a. unwanted infestation
Lie, lie, lie if you want to go to the 'happening' parties in town.

I never really understood the 'discrimination' against stalelites
Except that guys liked fresh blood a.k.a journey just come
You see it was an advantage to guys
Particularly those with the worst reputations
If the girl does not know a boy is 'bad', she may not be on her guard
And so she becomes game a.k.a prey to the hungry lions

I remember Dr (Mrs) Ogunyemi
Our English Prose and Feminism Lecturer
Boy, she was good!
Her passion gave feminism a vibrant following
Boys frowned, girls cheered.
We danced with joy to Elizabeth's strength of character in Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice
We were all too aware of the injustice and oppression in Buchi Emecheta's Second Class Citizen...
so shocking...
Sexism in Nigeria's igbo culture intermingled with racism to become a woman's nightmare in far away England.
To this day, those two books remain staple favourites in my library

I remember Dr Ashaolu
Our English Poetry and African Drama lecturer
Everyone loved his lecturing style, his calm gentle manner
He was also my supervisor for my final thesis
It was a wonderful experience
I did not let him down. I did well.

I remember sharing a room with born again christians in my 3rd year
Actually they were cool once they realised I wasn't the fellowship type
I did my thing, they did theirs
My boyfriend was off to NYSC then
He was 2 years ahead of me
For some reason he thought it would be a good idea for us to take a 'break'
A.k.a. this is my year to sleep around before I come back to you
I did not argue. He had his 'break'.
By the time he came back, someone else was filling in, covering his 'break'
He was livid, I was amused.
"What's the matter?" I asked
"I thought you wanted a break, did you have fun?"
"It wasn't that sort of break", he snapped.
Anyway, he gave me an ultimatum
I broke up with the other guy
We got back together.
In hindsight it was a mistake
Ah...we learn, we learn.
A year later I broke up with Mr Ultimatum
We were meant to travel together to the UK and get married
We didn't make it
Such is life
Many girls had the same experience with 'NYSC break -up strategy'
Boys were so stupid then. Are they still like that now?

Uni experiences do shape and prepare one for the adult world
So much is learnt about oneself and relationships with others
The stalelite says goodbye to teenagehood and hello to full adulthood
Unfortunately, adulthood does not come with an instruction manual
You have to find your way.

Translations - Yoruba to English:
1. Adelebo - Married woman (just 'poetic licence' - no sexism intended or to be inferred)
2. You lie to him
3. Later when he's really into you

Link: www.naijalines.blogspot.com/jambite

Monologues (1)

Most times

They say I control myself

Women believe that once I wake up from slumber

I can hardly think straight

I stay awake till I get what quenches my thirst

It is even believed

I'm moved by what I see

Although I believe it's more of a myth than reality

I still believe I have a mind of my own

Which makes it difficult for my 'owner' to control sometimes

There are times I wonder why I wield so much power

But I'm at peace because I know Heaven brought me to fore for a purpose

Yes! I was definitely part of the creation story or ...

Created for a particular reason

I know certain women purposely provoke me with their dressing

They have woken me up from slumber in public places

They have made my 'owner' send messages to me from the brain

I try to resist most times especially when I had been warned earlier

Somehow, it's just so difficult for me to resist a challenge

I have been put to test so many times

I really wonder what state I would be now if ...

There could be more depending on the reactions I get from this. It's sort of interesting to be able to view things and issues from another perspective. I can't wait to read comments!

I'M Lonely!

The last few days have been hectic for me not necessarily because of school work but because everything is beginning to look so bleak. One of the reasons I think things seem to be going this way is either because I'm homesick or because I'm missing someone so special to me. It gets difficult more and more everyday. This feeling is gradually driving me crazy .....!

The annoying part of all these is the fact that different thoughts are beginning to come to mind on how exactly I can kill some part of the loneliness. I already got into trouble once(woman-wise) and I'm honestly trying to run away from trouble this time.

Guess this is the only place I can push out my feelings and feel a little better.

Do I need help?

D' Banj & 9ice Videos

A quick one ....!

Both D'banj and 9ice came out with new videos this week and I have continually watched the videos over and over to pick my best. My hobby of trying to pick the flaws of naija musical videos just won't let me rest. I must confess I'm a great fan of naija hip-hop music(at least the ones that make sense) but I only try to turn on my critical side for videos where we have the least display of boobs and not too much sexual content.

As per D'banj's video (Fall in Love) despite the general acceptance of the video just because he kissed Mrs D'banj( ah ... dem never marry nw), I absolutely feel there's still something missing in the video. My first critic of the video stems from the opening scene where D'banj's first few words after coming out of the shower were in 'broken' English ... haba! It just made him look so 'razz' beside Genevieve. I also wonder when naija artistes will learn to come up with a video almost immediately after a song is released because doing a video almost immediately with the song gives it a better hype than doing the video a year later. They should learn from Olu Maintain's 'Yahooze' video and 9ice's 'Gongo- Aso'. The videos never lived up to expectation because they came out almost a year after the songs were released. If they had been released almost simultaneously with the songs, they would have been generally accepted or too much flaws with the videos wouldn't have been seen.

9ice's 'No be Mistake' video seems to be rocking my heart. Though it had some element of 'copycat' from other videos at the beginning, it pulled the strings after that till the end. The photographer character added something different to the usual party scenes we are already used to in naija videos. Big ups to 9ice for doing this video not too far from when the song was released. I'm sure he learnt a big lesson from the 'Gongo -Aso' video.

'No be Mistake' say I don turn Naija musical video critic.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EL5jRXT-ZhA&NR=1

My Thoughts ....

I'm definitely getting tired of young Nigerians trying to put the blame of everything on government. Fine, we all know that our government have been hopeless over the years but the fact remains that every of us has contributed to making Nigeria have the same kind of re-cycled leaders. Since I was born in the early 80s, Nigeria has gone from bad to worse. We haven't had a leader that has done anything spectacular in making things better for the country. All we have had so far are just politicians who take joy in killing each other and enriching their pockets. With all these, I still believe Nigeria isn't a failed state yet.

Presently, the young generation has started speaking out with one voice against bad governance but it seems and obvious that the marches to Aso Rock and other places will never be enough. The politicians already know who will be the next President of our great country. I'm sure they even have the next political landscape agenda for Nigeria in the next 20 years figured out. Even if we youths cry out and march till tomorrow, it may never amount to giving us good leaders.

This has been raging inside my head as a solution ... it may sound stupid but I think it makes a lot of sense. The young generation should start a political party and give proper opposition to the political parties. Let people like Fela Durotoye and other notable names in his category be put forward as the presidential candidates, even if he doesn't win, to a large extent the old politicians will know that the young generation means business!

The marches will never be enough because that won't change anything!

..... just wondering - why can't I ever leave my thoughts in my head?!

'Welcome to Lagos' - My take!

I must confess that I was bitter and still a little bit bitter when the 'Welcome to Lagos' documentary on BBC2 preview came up on my TV screen. The first question I asked and I believe all Nigerians should ask is -'who gave the BBC crew visa to enter the country and shoot the documentary?'. I'm so sure the BBC would have requested for visas to enter the country and would also have brought in their equipment and gadgets for the shoot/documentary, so questions should have been asked by the Nigeria officials about their mission and what exactly they had come to Nigeria to do. This absolutely calls for concern because the UK Border officials would never have allowed NTA to come and shoot the 'slum-side' of the UK. If they won't allow us to do this in their country, why should we allow them to come over to Nigeria and show our bad side to the whole world? BBC should run documentaries on successful people in Nigeria too instead of going about looking for 'Naija' dump-sites!

The beauty of the documentary stems for the fact that the characters of the documentary played a prominent role through their narration even though their was still a voice-over. I felt proud to be a Nigerian because despite the fact that the government would never provide for its citizens, we will do anything(the right-way) to carve a niche for ourselves even if it means making a living out of a dump- site!

Special thanks to BBC for making the whole world realise that Nigerians would always notice a gap in any business through which profit can be made.

NTA and other TV stations in Nigeria should take a cue from this on how proper documentaries can done instead of making documentaries that normally lures one to sleep(NTA please take note!)

N.B: Had to do this post in a rush, I've got loads of essays to write and I just had to put this up before it flies away from my head. Please, bear with me if this post is full of errors because I won't be proof-reading!