Posts tagged Ibadan

Chronicles of a bored and tired girl || Same Same Same

Life Diary Non-Fiction 14 Comments

Same people, same routine, same environment.
21 May 2018
16:33

I’m a bit on a low. I guess I am tired. Tired of University. In need of a fresh perspective to life. Away from the boring routine.
I’m starting to think I should get myself out of the pressure.

Beware of generating pressure instead of impact.
-Bishop oyedepo

If the academic calendar were run smoothly, I would be going to Law school this November but that isn’t possible any more. The school year wouldn’t be over by then. My mates and I are going next year.
For a while that worried me so much (my thoughts: I want to stop schooling already. Why would I go to law school next year, then still be there into 2020?!) and I whined. I just had to tell myself to snap out of it. How easy is it for us to dwell on the not-so-positives? Sometimes the circumstances aren’t negative, they simply clash with our ideas of utopia.
Staying in UI since 2013( actually 2013 session but we resumed in 2014 due to strikes) is bound to take its toll someday. Same people. Same environment. Same routine.
I’ll explain.
Same people.
No offence to all my loved ones. You guys know you’re the absolute best. It may not show on my face everyday but I’m a sucker for good friendship and when I get attached, I get attached. I love you guys.
But help! Lol. I need fresh perspectives behind fresh faces. Just help. I guess I’m starting to realize (took me so long eh) that I’m not a social person.
My friend Chizaram in the past six months or so has gone for two international conferences and rubbed minds with other law students, lawyers and important people. Thats amidst other adventures I know she has had outside of that. Your home girl on the other hand… Now, were I to have been at those conferences, I strongly doubt I would have made friends as easily as she did(I mean I’ve seen pictures. Lol. how do you get to take a dozen care free pictures with not one, not two, not five people in the space of a week for each of the conferences).
I’m not afraid of introductions or initiating conversations, no. Its just that small talks don’t cut it for me. Big talks do. And you just have to appreciate that not everyone is capable of having big talks. So there goes my meeting lots of people!

Same environment.
If I were to be a loose talker, I’d have started this part with: oh shoot me. Lol. I didn’t say that though. It’s the same places over and over again. I only gave you my three types of mornings right? I didn’t give you a breakdown of my day.
Its predictably uninteresting.
That’s not to say I don’t do any interesting things but I guess I have more interesting moments from what I read or watch on my phone and laptop than where I go. That has to change, or what do you say?
I’ve stayed in a private hostel since 200 level and it’s the same feel. The same room. The same curtains. The same type of table and wardrobe! The same entrance.
Left to me, I would have added spice to my personal apartment; Introduced plants, bought new wall art, switched up the arrangement to become airy and minimalist.
But, it isn’t left to me.
Same faculty. Same Chapel of the resurrection(where my fellowship holds services), same hostel.
Same routine.
I think I’ve pretty much explained this already.
What next?
I would say okay, every Friday or Saturday, I’ll go with a friend to some new place in town, but *weeps*, that’s money. A lot of money. Because the new places that I have in mind are high-end places. Every weekend?
You see now guys, you see why I’m tired? Why I’ll like to get called to the bar, work and earn?
Okay, this is a positive post so we’re cool.
??It just feels good to let that off my chest.

If you have suggestions, let me know o. Or if its an all expense paid trip to some high-end place, I’m also interested. On a serious note, that’s why you guys rock. You’re a different world for me. Thank you for constantly reading what I write. My pen owes you.

“Readers are not sheep, and not every pen tempts them.”

-Vlamdir Nabokov
(A quote you should know if you’ve visited my about me page).
Flowers and newness,
Debby.

Bodija – Moniya

Fiction 14 Comments


He looks into her purse as she opens it to bring out her transport fare. He sees about four thousand naira,all neatly lined up by the side of the purse.
She holds the thirty naira she has just pulled out, in her hand, and draws her shopping basket nearer to herself. The shopping basket is made of the same straw material used for mats. Inside the basket, he sees eggs, plantain, grinded pepper on the surface.
“excuse me please. Will he pass in front of UI to get to Moniya?”
It’s the last micro second before it becomes obvious he was distracted, when he catches what she said.
” yes” he croakes. He had not expected her to talk to him. This happens to him all the time; responding in unplanned situations, but responding in a voice not much distinct from that of a frog. He is self-conscious.
She still sits uncomfortably in the bus, very upright. In her defence she is apparently the only one of her social class in there.
It is a small and crowded bus plying the route of bodija market to Moniya in Ibadan.
Theirs is the last row in the bus. He sits at the extreme left, she follows and then there is a Fulani man by her right, followed by an Alhaja.
Others in the bus are significantly older and poorer.
The small phone in Ire’s pocket vibrates and makes him jerk his leg suddenly. He pulls out the phone to see it is a beep from his younger brother
“flasher of life” he mumbles under his breath and remembers he has to hurry up his activities to be in church later in the afternoon. He hisses.
“Mo ki gbo gbo yin ninu oko yii kaaro l’oruko Oluwa ”
He is stunned. It’s the UI student speaking.
” o se pataki ki onikaluku wa ye igbe aye wa wo nitori  pe. .. “
Her Yoruba is faulty, that should be excuse number 1. They’re also fast approaching UI gate, excuse number 2. By reason of logic there is no reason for her to preach but then she is preaching.
She is.
When the bus gets to park in front of UI, she rushes to complete a faulty statement, then wedges her way out of the bus after paying her fare.
The Alhaja with the yellow scarf at the extreme right hisses after she leaves but Ire knows the Alhaja couldn’t have hissed while the girl was in the bus. There was something compelling about her unjustified courage that made her message worth listening to.
When Ire gets home later that morning with the items he bought at bodija market, he knows he has a motivation to go to church.
He needs what the girl with the shopping basket and purse lined with one thousand naira notes has: the shameless courage fueled by her God.