ktravula – a travelogue!

Browsing the archives for the Soliloquy category.

Q & A, Again

The traveller attempts to answer some ten more questions that have either been asked him, or have not been asked yet only because the people who had them in their minds were not too confident about sending him the email!

10.

Q: Why did you remove your picture from the “About” page?

A: I had a mood swing! Yes, I have those too, and it is not controlled by the tide of the moon. Sometimes I get tired of seeing my own face online, and a sudden capriciousness overwhelms me to get rid of it. No questions asked. If you would send me your picture, I might send you one of mine too.

Q: Why do you make blog posts almost every day?

A: I don’t know. I really can’t control it. It has become a sort of habit that I can’t easily break. But some times I’m so tired that I can’t write anything at all. At those times, I just go to sleep, but not before a muted apology to the blogging muses of the day wherever they are for not being able to put their energies to better use.

Q: What are you going to do after your Fulbright programme ends in May 2010?

A: I really have no clear idea yet, but my tentative plans include a future academic pusuit either in the United States, or in Europe – whichever takes me first, and (if I don’t get a scholarship) whichever is more affordable. Yes, I am not the son of any Nigerian politician.

Q: What do you miss the most about Nigeria, aside from the food?

A: Aaaaaargh! You have spoilt all the fun by removing food as a choice answer.

Q: Do you really look forward to going back to Nigeria?

A: Because I still have a long time to stay here, I can’t answer this question, yet. Ask me again in a few months. But in private this time, if you want some honesty.

Q: If you’re so bloody smart, why do you blog instead of becoming a newspaper columnist, or at least a more serious author and not just a serial narcissistic exhibitionist of wicked (read beautiful, inspiring, nice, or any other sufficient word) lines?

A: It’s the internet age, and I’m dealing with the dynamics of the medium I’m most adapted to. I do intend to publish a definitive collection of poems, a collection of short stories or even a novel some day (if I get a publishing deal), but my interest is mostly in literary and non-literary translation. This blog is just a way of keeping my brain in shape. By the way, all the stuff in here are copyrighted. You can’t use them elsewhere without my permission, or you might be in hot soup.

Q: What do you think of the recent (in)famous wordfest in the Nigerian print media about the standard of objective review of music albums coming from young people?

A: Erm… I have no more comments on that. When I do, I know where to place them, and they’d get published, hopefully. It’s always a pain to not have a way to occasionally voice one’s opinion to a current issue. Nigeria is the country with the freest news media on the continent, after all. I’m glad for the chance to be able to contribute to current issues from this distance whenever the opportunity presents itself. Within Nigeria, there are other things that make that a very grueling process. On the top of this is electricity (or the lack thereof in regular and stable doses).

Q: What do you have with number 46?

A: I have no idea what you mean. Oh, that! (Giggles). I really don’t know too, but since after the second month when I ended up with forty-six posts, I have decided to try and meet up with that number every subsequent months – just for the fun of it. Let’s see how that plays out.

Q: Mention three of your favourite posts on this blog, and why?

A: I like this the most, because it was short, and it was my first culture shock experience. Then this because, even to me, it was funny. And then I love My First Class, since I had as much fun writing it as I had experiencing it in class. If you ask me tomorrow, I might have a different list. And besides, I think my favourite post is just on the way, not yet published. Ah, I can’t resist pointing to this one too.

Q: Have you met Governor Rod Blagojevich yet?

A: He’s no longer the Governor of Illinois, remember? (Don’t you read the dailies?) I however almost met Governor Partrick Quinn when he came to campus sometimes last week(?) for a University event. I didn’t meet him because first, there was no need to, and secondly, because by the time he was having a town hall meeting addressing students, I was busy dosing off at home after a very stressful day of work at school.

Blog, Writing and Real Life

I did not grow up with computers around me. I am definitely not a first generation internet user. Much of the first creative things I wrote in my life were in long hand on rough sheets of paper, and later on an abandoned typewriter in my father’s lounge. Today there are kids growing up who probably never spent a day without getting on the computer. Whether they are smarter or more efficient than us is beyond me, but I do know that there is some kind of thrill in my current adaptation to a 24hour electronic cycle. The book is dead, I’ve heard, incredulously, and yesterday when I tried to read the current edition of Time magazine in print, I found a certain kind of lazy resistance, and some unexplainable wonder that they still make paper editions of those in this age of the internet. It must be why I spend so much time trying to to finish reading a book of just 300 pages. There’s definitely a sort of taking over by the internet, and I’m surprised to be on the train, considering that my first email address was just ten years ago.

Right now, I’m going through a phase, a certain self-examination for the purpose of blogging, wondering whether it ever replaces the need for books and publishing. What’s the line between real life and a blog that is known and tied to the writer? In ideal situations, I should send my poems first to journals and literary magazines rather than publish them by myself on the blog, right? However I’ve observed a certain sense of impatience in myself that may have conditioned a different way of behaviour that has me publishing them here first of all before I show them to publishers, asking whether they want them in their journals. Most of them say NO, of course, citing the fact that I’d already published them online in some form. I blame my e-conditioned impulsiveness to have absolute control on the when and the how. There is no other way to explain the fact that I never get the urge to write anything most times until I’ve signed into WordPress, clicked on “New Post”, and having a blank post page staring at me. A few years ago, it was a blank page in Microsoft Word that elicits that kind of mental stimulation. It was the same kind of electronically conditioned inspiration that I used to get while staring at the rusty typewriter on my father’s lounge. The question then is, what will I do with the bubbly impatience that never let go of me as soon as I complete a piece of work that makes me happy but which I can’t show to anyone? It is a morbid fear of losing it, I guess, or having something happen to me before the work makes it to the public that mostly takes my hand to the “publish” button, and I’m satisfied. I found a similar kind of paranoia in a writer William Boyd who I heard admit in a recent Youtube video tour of his writing space to having always kept his manuscripts in the refrigerator because they were safer there, at least from fire in the event of an outbreak.

For my paranoia, I can only hope to write so much more, and (ah-ha!) seek an American publisher. Maybe the blog might help in that ambitious quest. Gone were the days when the pleasure was in jotting on scrap notebooks and book margins. These days, the inspiration comes from an e-blank page and the rasping of my Dell laptop keys. I can’t complain.

PS: My first electronically published short story will be published in an anthology of short stories from Africa entitled “African Roar” and published by Lion Press UK in January 2010. Considering that it will now be in a book form for the first time, I won’t be putting up a link to the full work online here, as much as I wish to do so right now. Ask me for the rationale, and I’ll say it’s the dynamics of the new media. (Or what do you think, Ivor?)

On Mail, Books and Names

Here are my preliminary observations on George Carlin’s famous book, Brain Droppings which I received today: It’s written in a way that makes each of the eccentric, penetrating and irreverent observations of the author very accessible on demand. I’ve just opened randomly to page 122, and here’s what I see under the title, NAME IT AS IT IS:

“The words Fire Department make it sound that they’re the ones starting the fires, doesn’t it? It should be called the “Extinguishing Department.” We don’t call the police the “Crime Department.” Also, the “Bomb Squad” sounds like a terrorist gang. The same is true for wrinkle cream. Doesn’t it sound like it causes wrinkles? And why would a doctor prescribe pain pills? I already have pain! I need relief pills!”

Classic Carlin! There are very many other topics and short sub-headings of this kind in the book where George Carlin takes on the many issues on religion, language, and almost everything under the sun. The comedian always had a fascinating take on the English language particularly, and its many inherent contradictions as a critical part of his act, which made me believe that if only he had talent for playwriting instead, he might have become another George Bernard Shaw who – being also Irish – also pushed the boundaries of acceptability, questioned dogmas and poked fun at the use of language.

These new books from Amazon are going to be my new companions for the next couple of days, rather than the very many stations on American television. On that, I should say that I’ve never had so many stations to choose from whenever I sit down idly in the living room to watch television. A few other books littering my room at the moment are Larry King’s My Remarkable Journey, Nancy Friday’s Woman on Top, Cormac McCarthy’s The Road, Igoni Barett’s From the Cave of Rotten Teeth, Kurt Vonnegut’s Bluebeard, VS Naipaul’s Miguel Street and The Mystic Masseur, and Chimamanda Adichie’s Purple Hibiscus which I never seemed to be able to read beyond the first page, quite unexplainably (little wonder that her Half of A Yellow Sun is my favourite of her works.)

I’ve always loved receiving packages in the mail, especially ones with my name on them – even if it’s not correctly spelt. When I got one today from UPS, the dispatcher looked at my last name again, she remarked, “How on earth do you pronounce your last name?” Then she went online immediately afterwards, and recorded my name as OLATABUSUN! Well, I should have paid more attention to her uncomfortable whimper while I tried to pronounce it to her! No, I won’t be changing the spelling of my last name anytime soon. Not before the Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger changes his; and his name is longer than mine.

New Lessons

A few minutes ago, I concluded a chat with a French student in this University (on a different but similar international programme) who told me that I had done the abominable by putting my red wine in the refrigerator. “If you were in France,” she said, “you’d be thrown out of the country by now!” Oh, the French!

Checking my post mailbox this morning, I found an envelope postmarked from Pennsylvania. Since I wasn’t expecting anything so soon, I was surprised to discover in it Wole Soyinka’s Collected Plays 2. I had indeed ordered it a few days earlier from Amazon alongside books by George Carlin and William Shatner. That was fast delivery! The book wasn’t new, but it was in very good condition. Back in Nigeria, Amazon was never my friend since I didn’t have a credit card, and they won’t ship goods to Nigeria anyway. The book contained The Lion and the Jewel, Kongi’s Harvest, The Trials of Brother Jero, Jero’s Metamorphosis and Madmen and Specialists, that last one being an all-time favourite.

Today we saw the Chimamanda Adichie TED video talk in class for the first time. As I remarked to a Nigerian friend afterwards, the video was lovely, but in the end it wasn’t spectacular. I think I must have expected too much a response from the students, although in the end, I’m sure they were able to understand and appreciate Ms Adichie’s valid points in a way that they found interesting, and in a way to which they could relate. My own initial response to the talk, which was pride and exhilaration the first time I saw it, was – as I realize it now – because I’m Nigerian and, seeing her speak to such an international audience filled me with such pride. Why it did so, I can’t explain now. She hasn’t said anything new, but she has used many new ways to illustrate it. And that’s always a good thing.

Later in class, as I was about to receive a usb flash disk from a student who wanted to submit her Yoruba audio recording assignment, I felt an electric spark when I collected the disk. I was alarmed, until the other students told me it’s normal, calling it a “static” current. (Wikipedia calls it “the buildup of electric charge on the surface of objects” which is either bled “off to ground or are quickly neutralized by a discharge”). A few minutes later when I gave the flash disk back to her, it happened again just as our hands made contact, and I “freaked out”, to use American colloquial expression of shock and disbelief. That was one thing I have never experienced before, but I have no doubt that it exists, perhaps even in Nigeria, and all over the world, but I’ve never heard any personal stories. According to a few more people that I’ve asked, this is a rather common phenomenon in America which comes into play when one of the contact persons has spent much time making bodily friction with the floor with their feet or body, they are indeed capable of conducting electricity. I find that strange. I’m surely not touching anyone again soon. Time to go back to receiving assignments through email.

I miss home!

A Food With No Name

Whenever I sit and stare at an empty page like tonight, my mind wanders to the the many things I could be blogging about besides the adventures of class and teaching. Earlier today I tried without luck to write a poem about the foods I eat with names I can’t pronounce. I failed. The reason for that, in my opinion, is that I was hungry. I had the image I wanted to portray in my head, but my stomach hurt a little from not having eating in the morning so I couldn’t get my words out in the particular order of my choice. Feeling deflated, I went out and got myself some really nice microwave-ready food which was ready to eat in less than ten minutes. But by the time I got well fed and satiated, the muse had left. I was left only with desires of different kind so I went into Facebook to stare at pictures instead. When poet Maya Angelou came to SIUe in early October, one of the poems she read was called The Health-Food Diner, a satirical response to a particular occasion when she was stopped from smoking in a public restaurant. In the absence of a own lyrical response to my particular situation at the moment, I will leave you with Maya Angelou’s words. It’s certainly one of her funniest poems.

The Health-Food Diner

No sprouted wheat and soya shoots
And Brussels in a cake,
Carrot straw and spinach raw,
(Today, I need a steak).

Not thick brown rice and rice pilaw
Or mushrooms creamed on toast,
Turnips mashed and parsnips hashed,
(I'm dreaming of a roast).

Health-food folks around the world
Are thinned by anxious zeal,
They look for help in seafood kelp
(I count on breaded veal).

No smoking signs, raw mustard greens,
Zucchini by the ton,
Uncooked kale and bodies frail
Are sure to make me run

to

Loins of pork and chicken thighs
And standing rib, so prime,
Pork chops brown and fresh ground round
(I crave them all the time).

Irish stews and boiled corned beef
and hot dogs by the scores,
or any place that saves a space
For smoking carnivores.

	-- Maya Angelou

Culled from http://www.cs.rice.edu/~ssiyer/minstrels/poems/383.html

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