Place: The Lemp Mansion, St. Louis.
Time: A little past 12 midnight.
Number of accomplices: 5, all human.
No ghosts,
Yet.
Browsing the archives for the Fun category.
or Narratives Around My Childhood, a guest-post by Ibukun Babarinde, a Nigerian published poet, and friend. His first collection of poems is titled Running Splash of Rust, a sort of journeying around Ibadan and its human landscape. He sends this from Wolverhampton, United Kingdom, and he can be found on Facebook. Enjoy.
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One of the questions that troubled my young days was the mystery behind the enthralling view of the top of the rocks that peeped into the sky lines over my home town, Saki. There are many mountains towering into the sky in the town, and all of them stood in different positions. Their view like an alluring drama set, offer different scenes and sights at different time of the day, and also different views throughout the seasons of the year. The most fascinating to me is the morning view of the mountain tops, especially in foggy and hazy weather conditions. The cloud formation on the mountain would literarily make the mountain top look as though it had poked into the heavens.
On sunny afternoons, a clear view of the mountain appears in the brightness of the tropical sun, and the scanty vegetation along the mountain steep would flaunt its greenness and all together a very lovely scene to view.
The most prominent of the mountains is the Asabari, Asabari is believed to be to Saki as what Olumo Rock is to Abeokuta. History had it that the people of Saki had sought refuge in the Asabari in times of war, another rock of equal relevance is the Oloogun rock, but with a singular distinguished attribute, it is only natives of Saki that are allowed to climb the Asabari, while Oloogun accommodates every one.
Other mountains and rocks also exist; Isia, Otun, Aganran, Efun, Sangote, Ayekale, Ofeefe. These rocks sit in places as though they are survey pillars mapping the whole Saki town into quarters.
At different times of the year and season some of the mountains are worshiped, the tradition of the town ascribed some element of deity to the mountains. But to me, every day I worshiped them.
Some Christian sect also do their picnics and some other spiritual gathering on one of the mountains, they had some kind of legacy in a particular mountain called ‘Oke Adagba’ the Baptist missionaries had settled on the mountain side, and left some old college buildings and beautiful premises behind. Every Easter, all Christians in the town would gather on the mountain from morning to evening, in simulation of the Galilee where Jesus met His disciples before he ascended into heavens.
As I moved from one junior class to the other in my early school days, I had a profound preference for chairs by the window side, so that I could view of the mountains any time I wanted to. I had very close view of the Isia rock, and at quite a distance, the view of Adagba rock which has the pinnacle of the first Baptist church towering out of dark of its evening shadow.
By evident reasons, I chose to go to Ayekale Community High School, as though to retrace my ancestry. The school was built in a valley, with the Oloogun rocks on the hind side, Ayekale rocks merging into ofeefe rock, at left and front. The secondary school had a small entry road, steeply and winding, as though folding into a valley. I spent the first two years of my secondary education in this school environment before I was snatched away by the city life.
One of the most fascinating and point of my attachments to this environment is the echo that naturally occurs as a result of reverberations caused by the guardian rocks. Even now, I still remember how the period bells in the school would resound, echoing twice or more, and how the voice of the then school principal, Mr. Afonja would be snatched by the waves hovering over the valley.
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You can find previous guest-posts here. Thank you Ibukun!
When Jolaade read the post she asked “What of my second story? What do you wish for your brother mummy?”.
When I told her what I wish for you, she asked again “You don’t wish to buy any toy for him?”
And much later, “Mummy, if you are just 31 why did you marry somebody?”
She had told me a few weeks back that I am too young to be married!
What manner of 4 and a half year old is this?
This morning, she looked at the wedding picture “Yemi, you didn’t look like this when you had your wedding?”
Me: “How did I look on the wedding day?”
“You look like a princess in the picture, and Leke looks like a prince!”
I spent the last weekend in some bliss which started on Friday with a lunch organized for visiting scholars by my University’s International Programme Office and the International Hospitality Programme. The International Programme Office handles everything that has to do with overseas scholarship and programmes while the International Hospitality Programme is comprised of a group of dedicated Senior Citizens of Edwardsville, some with and some without any academic link to the University, but all with a strong dedication over the years in making international students comfortable. Most of them have been doing it for decades without compensation, and without fail. They provide comfort and succor for students living miles away from home, and give them home away from home. They give counselling, they provide gifts as well as all needed support.
Present at the lunch were new visiting scholars from Albania and Azerbaijan, and a new visitor from the Kenneth Dike Library in Nigeria’s premier University, Francisca Okoroma.
The lunch, and the work of the International Hospitality Programme brings to fore the advantages and need for interdependence and social responsibility. The women and men who parent young students and scholars they’ve never known from parts of the world that they’ve never themselves visited take love, commitment, public service to such a new height. They claim to enjoy the experience, but to the many young ones who have studied in this part of the country over the years and benefited from this group, the dedication of the host parents is nothing short of a blessing. It is one more pleasant advantage of studying in this part of the country.
A guest-post by Jolaade Adesanya
as narrated by Yemi Adesanya
She was extremely excited at the first mention of the request from uncle Kola, to write something for his blog. Then the big question came when it was time to settle down to it “why does he want me to write, mummy?”. “I think he wants to know what you think about different things.” “OK!”. She then began to tell me the different things she’d like him to know about – she loves babies (a neighbor has just delivered a baby girl, she is now a regular visitor to their home), she doesn’t like the school bus (mum/dad should take her to school instead), she doesn’t like yellow buses (they are always driving roughly), she loves her daddy and mummy!, and yes she loves herself, because she loves babies!
What goes on in a 4 yr old girl’s mind is beyond me, mine is always asking difficult questions, questions that leave you wondering if she is not some old woman re-incarnate. The latest question that got me wondering; “if someone is getting married, will they have the wedding in the girls mummy’s church?”.
Her story is as follows:
My name is Jojo, my uncle calls me that.
I love myself, I love my mummy, I love my daddy
I don’t like people driving rough
I like eating fried egg and yam
Mrs Oladimeji is always dozing in the class.
STOP
It was impossible convincing her to write her name, instead of Joojoo, she definitely wants uncle Kola to know the pet name given her by uncle Kunle!
She promised to continue writing this story, but for now, a road marker STOP marks the end.
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Jolaade Adesanya is my lovely four and a half year-old niece, and she writes from Lagos, Nigeria. The first mention of her on this blog was way back in August when I first went to Six Flags. You can read the entry here.
Yemi Adesanya is my accountant sister who works in Lagos and who has been a very lovely, very dependable, and equally a very delightfully mischievous sibling. If you want to find her, head over here. Of course you may have to buy shoes or bags in the process. She sells them in her spare time instead of writing which, as you can see, could as well have been her vocation as well.
Jolaade’s picture courtesy of Chris Ogunlowo.
Let no one ask me why she chose to paint her face when the photo was about to be taken, or whether it is standard procedure for children of this age to paint their faces like that. You will have to figure it out for yourself 😀
Have a nice weekend.