Chicken Run

Life comes at you fast and it does not matter how fast or how strong or how smart you are, one day the penny will drop and it will be you. It would be your turn.

Life comes at you fast and it does not matter how fast or how strong or how smart you are, one day the penny will drop and it will be you. It would be your turn.

It was not always like this, you know. Someone said, it is always the law abiding ones you need to watch out for. He was right. He was referencing me when he said this, but that doesn’t stop him from being right. I was a law abiding one. Maybe that is what started this; my love for the law, for order and stability and a proper and just way of doing things. I paid my taxes, had all my complete papers, paid my bills on time, and never as much as made a turn without signalling first. It did not stop me from being pulled over regularly by the police though. It is Bushiria, and every marginally successful looking young person is a potential criminal until proven otherwise.

May 15, 2021. I remember the date as vividly as anything else in my life. I and my girlfriend has been returning that evening from a party. It was perhaps 5pm, so you can tell, it was not that kind of party. One of her girls has turned twenty-nine and they were celebrating her last year before the big 3-0. We got pulled over at the checkpoint. A routine check, they said. After five minutes of going through my papers and licenses, several times and asking countless questions, the lead officer; a Corporal, by his stripes, leaned closer to me and went:

“So, anything for us, young man?”

Being a law abiding citizen, bribery is one of the things I detest the most. I play my cards straight and follow all the rules so I do not have to pay bribes to get anything done. Now, here was this idiot, demanding one irrespective. To make matters worse, if there is anything I hate more than bribes, it is being patronized. It was there, the way the officer smiled, “young man”, the ugly stains in his teeth, the way he leaned towards me, I wanted to burst.

He noticed my hesitation, mistaking my countenance for contemplation or something and he continued, still smiling that stupid, ugly, ugly grin.

“You know say e easy to put exhibit for inside your moto. Na wetin people dey do, but me dey ask. Make your woman no come start to dey cry.”

And that was the moment I snapped.

It was not the threat to place an unlicensed gun or bullets or drugs in my car, or how it would make my girlfriend feel that changed everything. No. It was nothing like that. It was the thought of how easy it was. How easy it was for a police officer to just plant false evidence and indict an innocent person, forcing them to commit a crime, to bribe. How terrible the police force was that such a thing could happen under their watch, within their ranks, and there was nothing that could be done for it.

So, I snapped.

When I wrenched the AK-47 from his hands, it was on pure instinct. I whirled, allowing my elbow catch him in the face. His nose split open audibly. That I possessed enough strength to do that, that the nerve endings in my elbow suddenly erupted in agony barely registered above my subconscious, I was still moving. I shoved the rifle into the arms of the other officer standing beside me, causing him to drop his gun on the floor. Then holding the barrel of the rifle in both hands, I clubbed both men until the crumpled unconsciously to the ground.

I was not seeing their faces as I hit them. It was not Corporal Baboon or the other fellow, whose name tag or face, I cannot recall even now. I was not seeing those indolent, underpaid louts. I was seeing the system, the faceless men behind it all. The ones who did not pay enough, did not hire enough, did not equip enough, and so forced these men into these despicable acts of criminality. I was deaf to the cries at that moment, deaf to the screams of my girlfriend in the car or the passers-by who raced away in the rapidly emptying street. I did not hear anything, did not see anything, not until I stopped.

“Get in the car,” I said quietly to my girlfriend who was now standing beside me, staring at the bloody mess of flesh on the tarmac, her hands at her sides, her eyes blank, catatonic.

She did not argue as she normally would have. She simply entered into the car. Still gripping the barrel of the rifle, whose butt was slick with blood and what seemed like bits of skin and hair, I entered after her and started the car. Then I remembered, there had been three officers at the checkpoint when I stopped. I could see the last man running down the road.

I gunned the car.

***

Burying the gun was out of the question. I simply threw it in a culvert close to the house. Getting the girlfriend to keep quiet about the thing was another matter entirely. By the time she recovered from her catatonia, she kept babbling, begging and threatening me in turns to stop the car and go back to the police.

“I won’t tell anyone baby. I promise. I would never. Not on my life. But you have to tell the police. You have to turn yourself in.”

She, I buried.

I borrowed my neighbour’s car, told him I wanted to drop my girl off at the car park. When I got to Zoobadan Garage, I offered to drive her to Zoobadan myself, ostensibly so we could talk. She believed me. I strangled her and buried her body somewhere in the bushes past the Foresamu overpass. Then I returned to Woodgos.

But it was not enough.

I could not help the boiling anger that still coursed through me every time I saw a police checkpoint that week. Every time I saw another group of young people being mistreated by the police on social media, I wanted to burst. How were they not learning? How did the death of three of their officers not strike some fear into them? How come they were still acting with all impunity?

In the evening of the next Saturday, I drove out. It had been a week and as typical, there was no investigation. Not one single image of the incident had been caught on camera. There was no suspect, no real ones anyway. A bunch of people had been grabbed off the street the day after and paraded in front of cameras, beaten, humiliated, and then coerced to pay bribes to get free. In all, it only served to fuel my ire.

So when I drove up to the checkpoint on that lonely road, wearing a snapback cap, shorts, a tank top and gold bracelet son my wrist, I must have looked like the usual soft target. I was the only one at the checkpoint, surrounded by armed police officers. Another one, ripe for the plucking. Another innocent in whose car they would plant marijuana and extort 15,000 Shakira.

I did not give them the chance.

“Young man, please turn off your car and step out of the vehicle.”

I did.

One officer pretended to engage me in a conversation about my papers, while the other one poked his head into the back seat. The third officer was on the other side of the car.

“Ehen! What do we have here?” the one with his head in my car started. “This looks like igb…”

I shoved the door hard as he was bringing out his head from the car. The door jamb cracked against his skull, causing him to yell. At the same moment, I grabbed for the gun of the one in front of me. He was a smaller man than Corporal Baboon, but I did not have quite the element of surprise as I had had before. He did not let go of his gun.

So, while I grappled with him, his colleague writhing on the floor in pain, I heard a crack as the third officer cocked his gun.

Many education psychologists have theorized the veracity of passive learning. Is it possible for someone, like Neo in The Matrix to simply learn a physical skill like fighting, from countless hours of being exposed to it visually? Maybe it isn’t, but there is no better explanation for what happened next.

No explanation for how, I with no formal military or otherwise offensive training, suddenly twisted to put the officer I was grappling with between myself and the third officer with the gun. The sound of the gun shot was loud and jarring. The bullet thudded into the first officer’s back with an audible thwack.

“Yaaai! Fuck!” the last officer screamed.

I kicked off the dying body, sliding back the hammer to cock the rifle in my hands in the same motion, and fired a short burst into the stomach of the last officer before the first officer’s body hit the floor. To finish up, I returned the rifle’s safety and moving deliberately around the car, clubbed each officer in the head till I was certain they were not breathing. I left the back of weed they had been planning on planting in my car on the body of one of the officers and drove home.

***

This time around, I was famous.

I was not alone on the street that day. Twitter user @Ogbosky_JUJU had been walking home, intent on passing the checkpoint while the officers were busy with me when I had exploded into action. Dropping his backpack of school books, with recessed portions where he hid the pills and marijuana he peddled, he hid behind an empty kiosk and made a video.

I woke at 5am the next morning as a celebrity. Social media was agog with the arguments, left wing and right wing arguing about the extremism of the violence, the tie in with the previous incident and the abundant theories as to the legality of it all. Above everything was the question of who I was. It did not take long for me to be identified from the video. It actually took less than 12 hours and it was not done by the police. Certain individuals, skilled at ferreting information for countless twitter wars, had linked all my social media accounts and found my address less than 2 hours after I woke. Then someone mentioned the police handle on the information.

By the time I was walking out of my house at about 8:30am that Sunday morning, I was more than famous. I was infamous. Getting to my car and driving to an ATM sufficiently far, but close enough, took about 20 mins. I had only the basic essentials in the car, two changes of clothes and a toothbrush. I withdrew 300,000 Shakira using two bank cards, then I started driving. I did not know where I was going, but I was determined to go. I would have disappeared. I think I would have but, the police had some help again. My banks divulged my withdrawal information, then my internet service provider my whereabouts. I heard all this on the radio while I drove but by then, it was too late, they were on my heels.

It had taken a week for my life to unravel, to spill everywhere like a bucket made of sieves. I knew I was doomed, doomed as surely as the devil himself. Not only was my story going to be a mess in the telling and retelling, but if I lived long enough for trial, I would be in the worst pains possible. No, damn it.

Disclaimer

  • Violence is never the answer
  • This is clearly a work of fiction. Any resemblance to persons living or dead, as well as places or systems existing is purely coincidental.
  • Learn, please.

The Sound of Thoughts

I decided to start from first principle and thought about thoughts today. Now, if thoughts are initially non-existent, before the thinker starts to think and then, suddenly they crowd the brain in activity, it means they can be generated and they can be turned off.

If thoughts are generated, it means they require specific instructions to exist, particular conduits to pass through et cetera. Which means, blocking those conduits can limit thoughts, same as designing new conduits can change the flow of thoughts.

If thoughts elicit a response, in electrical activity which has previously been detected by scientists, but which we can reason by the consideration of how they are generated: by signals of neurons and snapping synapses, then they can be measured as any electrical activity.

If it can be measured, it can be read and interpreted.

Thoughts are generated by the thinker and understood by the thinker, intimating a particular method of generation, conduction and interpretation. If methods exist internally, they can be replicated externally. Artificial methods of interpreting thoughts can be designed.

Now, is it possible to read minds? Is it possible to hear the sound of thoughts?

We begin with generation and conduction. Structural design of a typical brain; generator, conductor and interpreter of thoughts, is uniform in any regard. However, some brains record a higher level of thought generation and interpretation than others, indicating a higher level of conduction. Meaning that conversely, some brains exist with structural elements which are unused, pathways available for conduction but due to limited generation, cannot be utilised to proper interpretation too.

Those brains should be able to serve as conduits for external electrical activity. Should be able to read other minds.

Patching the measured signals of an existing, normally functioning brain activity into another brain, limited in activity should allow conduction and eventual interpretation by the less utilised brain. Should. Since the structures exist.

This can also be actualised by taking a full functioning brain of an individual in a complete drug induced dreamless sleep. The limited brain activity of a full functioning brain, should allow for conduction and interpretation of external activity.

It is possible to hear the sound of thoughts.

Disclaimer

  • I don’t have a jar of harvested brains in my
  • This is completely theoretical.

God bless Nigeria.

Simeon

Watching the light leave their eyes never did it for Simeon. It wasn’t the dying that he enjoyed. It wasn’t the dying that kept him up at night, tossing and turning, unable to sleep until he went out and killed. It wasn’t the dying. It was the death.

To slice a knife across a neck, to feel the sharp blade slide across furrows and furrows of skin, biting in and then deeper, while the blood spurted out. To hold the person as they struggled, bound and helpless against his iron strength, to feel the fierceness of the struggle intensify and then wane into stuttering tremors. Those were minor pleasure, tidbits and freebies, enough to please a lesser man, but pale when compared with his actual desire. The bare foreplay, the teasing at the proper finale. It didn’t compare, not to the death.

The finality of it all, fascinated Simeon. To end a life. The knowledge that only a few minutes ago, this heart was beating, pulsing life through a body that leapt and laughed and loved and had a family. To end all that. It was the power of God. To hold a heart, bloody and lifeless, stuck through with tiny splinters of bone from a crushed rib. To feel it still warm as it grew cold, and to know that only a few minutes ago, it had given life. It made him flush hot and cold all over.

The little girl on the side of the dark street, her pink pinafore swaying in the late evening breeze as she waited for him before she crossed the road, one hand clutching a basin of pineapple cuts wrapped in transparent nylon.

“Go on,” he motioned with his hand. Accompanying the action with two short blasts from his car horn.

The girl smiled gratefully, stepping onto the empty street.

Simeon took his foot off the brake and stepped down on the throttle.

The car hit the small body with a dull thud, pushing it forward and under the grille of the Mercedes. The basin of pineapple cuts banged against the bonnet, rolling off and out of the way, spilling out in careless array. 16 inch wheels, treads as wide as 225mm, rolled over the stunned body, crushing its tiny ribs, splintering it to pieces that exploded into the thoracic cavity, and killing the girl instantly. Simeon slammed on the brakes again. Switching the gear into reverse, he turned the steering wheel, rolling again over the dead body, crushing pelvis and arm. It flipped and flopped all over the road, a dusty brown thing that used to be pink.

The sun went behind the row of houses in the distance, the last light reflecting briefly off plastic wrapped pineapple cuts, strewn across the road.

Similar to this: Ruki’s Desire

The act of killing the body lying across the still empty road in front of his car had no effect on him. Nothing. His heart did not suddenly lift, his breath did not catch. Stepping out of the car, his palms sweaty, his breath only now beginning to come quickly, he walked to the mangled body, tiny trickles of blood already beginning to stream out all the orifices and bruises on the splotchy skin.

He stood over it. Kicked at her. It didn’t move. It felt like soft stone. She was dead. Gloriously and completely dead. Hot steam hit his eyes, filling them instantly with tears. A short moan escaped his lips. A wet patch spread on his trousers.

It wasn’t the dying that did it for him. It wasn’t the dying that sated him when he was tense and unable to sleep. It was death. It was becoming God.

He picked up a wrap of pineapple cuts as he walked back to the car, dusting the sand off.

Disclaimer

  • I do not think GOD finds killing or death fascinating. I think only crazy people do.

Day 11: Your current relationship

The way people don dey gather dey wait for this one. Hehe. The attention on every single letter; every phrase perused and re-perused. What are the secrets? What is he hiding? Plug that wire in the socket and bring the bucket of cold water and the towel.

Ha! I’m in a happy relationship. Free me.

See link to other posts here

Beautiful, smart, really, really intelligent and then sexy in a completely wholesome way. If you thought I didn’t deserve that, I don’t blame you. I just thank God and her exes.

We met in the likeliest of ways actually. She thought I was a cad and I was amused by her. If you know one whit about relationships, then you’ll know that’s the number one recipe for falling head over heels.

Cold windy morning and I’m sitting outside the house with my 14 year old son. We are both swaddled in blankets, clutching hot mugs of tea, watching the leaves fall off the trees. I turn to him, voice low but clear: “Find a woman that doesn’t like you, then love her.”

To coin a phrase, “It’s a thin line”, and it’s easy to slip right over to the other side.

When we started dating, it was a whirlwind of emotions. Lots of stomping feet and folded arms and “Just you get out of my life!”. Lmao. Someone that’s completely besotted right now. Someones. I meant someones. Sorry.

Our emotional connection has grown over time. Each opportunity to learn, forging and then lashing, a new cord around our bodies and spirits, bringing us closer together in better accord.

Of course there are terrible days, when communication fails and tempers rise and you almost start to question yourself and all of your decisions. But those days are fewer and the way back is smoother.

“My son,” I continue on that windy day, placing my mug back on the dark ring formed on the wooden stool between us. “Never lose an opportunity to extol your woman”.

I’ve learned plenty from this girl: how to be calm, how to trust, how to comfort, how to be kind, how to pack. Hehe. And for the first time really, I may actually be content.

Disclaimer

  • This woman can work as a Yaba tout. So excellent at packing.

Day 10: A fruit you dislike

I think it’s already pretty established that I like food. Give me a bunch of most fruits, and I’ll devour it. I’ll keep munching till it’s an empty tray and I’m winking at you because you’re my best friend.

Oranges, bananas, apples, pineapples and mangoes, toss any into the mix and watch me perform a magic trick. Cherries, pawpaws, limes and lemons and grapefruits may not be favourites, but I’ll eat them if I have to. Because fruits are healthy. However, there are some fruits you wouldn’t catch me rushing to eat and the soursop is king in that regard.

See link to previous posts here

First of all, do a Google search on the soursop. The first thing that pops out is, this fruit is of unknown origins. Unknown origins! What manner of…?! What other evidence do you need that this is a product of the evility of the Satan? It’s green, it’s scaly, and the insides look as healthy as three days vomit.

Soursop has been touted as a cure for cancer. Just like snake oil, everybody touts the ugliest thing in the yard as the cure for everything. Not surprising. It is scaly like a pineapple, smells a bit like strawberries, the insides are like a mashed banana, and it’s tasteless. It’s practically a cancer of all the fruits. Ugh.

In our family house, we’ve got about three trees of soursop. Hanging at every corner of the house, the only reason I’ve not cut them down is, I’m pretty convinced they work excellently as a demon repellant. I mean, what demon would fly into a compound with soursop in every corner? I just felt a hades-y shudder. Yes, I’m right.

My family on the other hand absolutely enjoy the fruit. You should see them on evenings, munching the bloody things, with such satisfaction their faces. When you’re eating jazz and you don’t know. At least they don’t eat the seeds.

The seeds have been shown to contain a neurotoxin that’s been linked to a variant of the Parkinson’s disease and other neurological malfunctions. See the thing here.

Do I need say any more? I’m not a fan of the soursop or the graviola or whatever moniker this charlatan fruit is going under. But that’s my opinion. What about you?

Disclaimer

  • I’m not stopping anyone from eating soursop. Please, indulge in whatever delights you, cocaine and all. YOLO.

Day 9: Ageism

Being one of the youngest in every group I’ve ever been in, professional, academic or fraternal, I feel really competent to comment on ageism, the effects and how I manage it.

See link to previous posts here

Ageism basically is the discrimination against people based on their ages. Usually, it’s used in respect to older people, who are discriminated in society due to their feebleness, etc. It’s the measure that comes in effect when employers restrict older people from applying for certain roles, and/or restrict them from promotion at certain times.

But ageism can also be about youth

Ageism can also be discrimination against young people, in terms of immaturity. Discrimination that prevents their voices from being heard, that negates their voting rights etc. In some climes, such as mine, this particular form of ageism is more common. Mostly because the demographic in power is usually old, and thus ageist discrimination tends to flow from that direction. That’s why the Nigerian government proposed a bill in 2011 that openly eliminates discrimination based on age when employing, but would never consider appointing a pre-30 year old into political office or even allow such contest a democratic election. In the US, the Age Discrimination Act protects people who are above 40 years. Does shit all for people who are below 40 years though.

18 year olds pay tax however.

Ageism was fostered by older people

In my opinion, older people created ageism. Older people, after decades of facing inabilities, internalising inefficiency and ageist discrimination, turn around to foster that same discrimination on the generations that follow. It is the classic, you should be punished, because I was, whippersnapper!

Another reason why Canada is my dream country; there’s no mandatory retirement age in Canada and even when below 17 years, you’re allowed to work provided you’re not needed at school. Once you’re 17, go work, employee.

Ageism could be intentional or unintentional. I myself realise I have often fallen to the temptation of unintentional ageism. I worry when I see older people alone, so certain they cannot cater to themselves. I snort when I see old men driving, certain they are terrible (why the hell do they drive so slow?). I expect older people not to be tech savvy or know the differences between Netflix and cable TV. It’s to be expected.

After years of being exposed to ageism in varying facets, it’s only expected that it rubs off.

So what do I do?

See people as people

I see people as people. It helps that movies (movies influence me, dammit!) have shown me people like Sylvester Stallone and Tom Cruise, run quarter miles at speeds I cannot even hope of, despite being decades and decades older than me. It also helps that in the groups I’ve worked or studied with, I’ve seen older people who exhibit same or higher levels of intelligence, commitment and vitality as I have. It helps me to see them simply as people. Fellow members of a unit, with flaws and strengths, whose abilities and disabilities stem from their own peculiarities and not as a simple result of their age. This is how I cope with ageism, this is how I push back on my own ageist tendencies.

Disclaimer

  • It’s shameful, and humbling to find I have discriminatory tendencies. Damn.
  • Movies really do influence me much.

Day 8: Artists and Charlatans

As a lover of art, it’s difficult to put an opinion like this in writing and even attempt to make it creative. I’ll rather gush and lambast in a gathering, over beer, with pieces of suya flying out my mouth and waving a chicken leg above my head to buttress my point. Because in one breath, I exalt a writer, his piece of work, efforts and talent, and in another I condemn one, completely and entirely.

Skipping Day 7, because no tattoos.

Yet.

See link to previous posts here

I’ve loved a number of books over time. Fantasy books like the Raven’s Shadow series by Anthony Ryan, Mistborn series by Brandon Sanderson. Mafioso books by Puzo. Spy thrillers by Ludlum, and then late-1990s Cussler. I’ve disliked a few books too; that lord awful Blood and Bone thing by Tomi Adeyemi, that barely lets me past the first chapter, and then all of the rip-offs that are Nnedi Okoroafor’s bestsellers.

The Parsifal Mosaic by Ludlum is one of my favourite books of all time. To start with, it’s the story of a black operations engineer, (read: spy/assassin) who worked for the US State Department and retires after supervising a mission in which his fiancée is shown to be a traitor and is killed before his eyes.
Drama. Passion. Pain. Violence.

His psyche is torn apart in typical Ludlum fashion, and he embarks on a road to rediscovery before he takes on a position in a university as professor of history. While touring his old haunts, cities he had never seen in the daylight, cities in which he had masterminded assasinations, blackmailed bureaucrats, but this time as a tourist, he happens on his supposed dead girlfriend at a busy train station in Rome. A trapdoor to a whirlwind of turmoil is opened and he is tossed back into the world he had left, as he chases after her, chases after those who set them up, upending a chess game initiated by a mad genius strategist codenamed Parsifal, hell-bent on showing the world the hubris behind giving too much power to one person.

The action in Parsifal is explosive, every chapter has stakes higher than the last. You are driven to experience the protagonist; Mikhail Havlicek’s, turmoil, to feel the stress that erupts from his childhood trauma carrying suicide packs on the streets of Prague in the old Nazi occupied Czechoslovakia. To feel that stress repeat itself as he races against time to piece together the mosaic and save his sanity, the life of his fiancée and the mind of his priyatel and mentor.

Everything written by Nnedi Okoroafor is plagiarism, as far as I can recall. Finely crafted sentences, able to fool plagiarism checkers, but basic rewordings of any of a hundred different fantasy novels.

Disclaimer

  • I have nothing against Nnedi. I think she’s a brilliant content developer.

Day 6: Fascinations

I had to check the dictionary, and then because I wasn’t satisfied, check Google for the meaning of fascination before writing this. And good thing I did, because my initial subject of interest was Muhammed Buhari, self-acclaimed leader of Nigeria’s Republic, (self-acclaimed because he supervised and then won a completely corrupt and undemocratic election). But then, I found out fascination doesn’t mean, amazement and stupefaction, because, bless me Jesus, that man leaves me amazed and stupefied with each turn. It actually means admire. So well, I don’t admire Buhari.

See link to previous post here

I admire Mrs Adebowale. Oh, it’s not for the usual stuff: lifegiver, caregiver, constant source of comfort and support and succour. That counts utmostly, but isn’t the focus of this piece. It’s for the one major talent that every parent must learn and then, somehow pass on; it’s for her ability to always seem as though she has everything under control.

Here’s the rub.

I am an adult now, I have responsibilities that choke my responsibilities on a daily basis. I understand how there is a pressure to seem as though everything is under control, even though I’m practically living paycheck to paycheck. On most Saturdays, I look as though everything is alright, everything under control, every harness checked, every letter properly crossed and dotted. But somewhere on Thursday, by about 5:42pm, I am in shambles, struggling to keep every stitch from coming loose, grasping at straws and then pulling on threads, thoughts flying every whichever, basically at odds with myself. It’s barely visible to those afar, but pretty clear to all who are close and familial that I’m stretching at seams. It’s de rigeur, every adult faces it. This woman, though keeps it together, every day of the bloody week. Every week.

She’s strong. Stronger than most people I know, psychologically and physically. She once pinned down a 30 plus year old man who wanted to beat me up, and then talked him into silence. She’s brilliant, one of the most analytical minds I’ve ever seen put problem to the thought mill. She will grind out a workable solution of most problems, be they rock or mountain, without even formal education of that subject matter.

She inspires me to go further, to do more, with all that I have. She is the voice, often behind my ear, telling me not to worry, and to make the best of every situation. She taught me how to delay gratification, a philosophy that rules most of my daily decisions, that has made me a harder worker than I would have been.

Mrs Adebowale fascinates me.

Disclaimer

  • That fascinate doesn’t mean amaze has really set me back, questioning all the conversations I’ve ever had.

Day 5: Abodes

Considering the fact that I’ve been in only four countries (including my birth country) this shouldn’t be a hard sell. There are lots and lots of countries I would live, though I haven’t ever visited them. However, the place that immediately jumps to mind at this moment is Austria.

See link to previous challenge post here

I have never visited Austria, and I’ll love to.

Austria, the home of music, of elegant waltzes and operatic concerts. What’s not to love? I want to visit Austria for the music. I want to see the opera in Vienna. To sit in a booth, elegant in my black tie, spying through my glass and oohing and aahing, at the twirls of the dancers and the oh-so-earth-shattering vocals of the singer.

I want to stroll along the streets of her cities, over thin bridges made of stone, crossing placid water. I want to hear the cries of gulls and other birds, to throw bread in the water, and then duck behind a hedge to dodge the Bundepolizei.

I want to eat at a streetside cafe near the Danube. To order fifteen different types of schnitzel and wash down with beer seasoned with gruit and thick with so much yeast. I want to eat icecream while watching a street artist strum a zither down the street.

I want to visit a convent near the Austrian Alps, to stare over the mountains and pretend I can hear the sound of music. I want to run up and down a meadow, searching for edelweiss, and throw my hands all around and scream “I have confidence!”.

I want to ski. Not in an indoor rink, but over the mountain slopes, to be dressed all in white, dark goggles on my eyes, and pretend I am James Bond, on the run from abominable snowmen sent by SMERSH.

I haven’t visited Austria, except in my dreams, but I intend to.

Disclaimer

  • I often pretend I’m Bond while zipping in a Camry around the hairpin bends of Milliken hill.

Day 4: 10 simple facts about you

So, here I am, sitting pretty, Darjeeling and someone decides why not prop up my narcissism just a little bit with this challenge? Exce-what? Excellent.

But simply because I am too narcissistic to believe myself anything else but humble, here’s me modifying the title to 10 simple facts about myself.

For a link to the previous post on this challenge, see here

10 simple facts.

• I like food.

Sure, I’ve got favourites, everybody does (pounded yam and ogbolo, etc. etc.) but, food generally, general food, I go wack am. Your boy dey finish pot, go ask dem.

• I can cook.

It’s not even a brag. I, this man, whips up a mean anything. See, guy, knowing how to cook different from say you sabi cook one particular thing.

Me, sabi cook. Give me the recipe, I go run am.

Using pidgin English obviously because the emphasis must be made.

• I love driving.

Driving is one of my favourite things. Give me a fast car with a great engine and (take out the Nigerian police and) I’ll tour the world. I love the wide spaces and scenery, the sight of life flashing past at top speed, adrenaline pumping in my veins and a tingling in my feet. I love driving.

• I like to dance.

Hehe.
If you’ve ever seen me dance, thunder fire you for the image you’re laughing at. You’re mad. But really, I love dancing. Can barely dance past moving my waist in all the gyro-directions but, damn, I love to dance.

• I hate injections.

This here is the major reason why it’s impossible for me to do cocaine. It’s so major, it comes after my very excellent upbringing and family training. Give me all the tablets of this world, and I’ll swallow them. I’ll push them up my butt if I have to, but by Jove’s Casablanca Casino, I would not take a needle up any part of my body if I can help it.

• I don’t like doing fun alone.

This here is probably why I haven’t visited more countries than I have. Also why I haven’t had as much adventure as I constantly dream. I don’t have fun when I do it alone. I want to travel with others, to run up cliffs, to swim oceans and skydive. The fun is always in the companionship, all that communalism, than in the activity.

• I love minimalist design.

Or at least, what I think minimalism is. My house is themed in two tones, and that perhaps defines everything. It’s probably a gift, my ability to put little together to define much more.

• I value comfort over wealth.

In the diamond-water paradox, I will choose water every day of the bloody week. In my books, there is less honour, less value, in winning it all, with nothing to show; no peace, no joy, no time to enjoy it. Not the current rave but, give me enjoyment everytime.

• I Iove rock music.

Got addicted it after reading a christian book about the dangers of rock music. Actually. Book about rock music groupies losing their souls after being swayed by the music of a demon-slave rocker, and all I picked from it was, “Can I listen to some of this stuff?”. Hehe. I don’t know but the stirring vocals and oft-clashing instruments express me more than most else.

• I prefer no-name brands to fakes.

I hate wearing or using fakes. Give me a no-name brand anyday, or at worst, a barely known brand, than a fake. Maybe it’s because I have a pretty strong sense of originality, or maybe it’s just secondary school and all those days watching people teased for wearing Seun John from P-Diddy. I prefer people getting their due, for what they did, let them receive. Don’t steal ideas, don’t plagiarise.

Phew. Okay, so there they are. 10 simple facts about me. What do you think?

Disclaimer

• I wrote (have been writing) this with my phone. Where the typos appear, forgive and notify.

• I really am a humble person.

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