IT’S NOT FUNNY

I just got off my facebook page and i must say, i am really really really pissed,what is the problem you might ask,well while moving around,i decided to go to my cousin’s wall,you see he has this video of a lady Rita, by name, that was in the KOKO MANSION reality show,this video which i believe a lot of Nigerians have seen,shows when she was being asked a question and her response,if you have watched it, you would know, that was no response, but words just plucked and strung together with no sensible meaning to make a sentence.My kid sister had told me about it last year,but i had not seen the video,i finally got to see it when i moved to Milan,to say i was disgusted would be making light of my reaction that day,i kind of forgot about it till i came across it on my cousin’s wall,i just decided to read the few comment people had made about it and that was when i got really pissed,in generality they all found it funny,don’t get me wrong i enjoy a funny joke and laugh at all things funny but at times we should draw the line on what is funny and what is embarrassing.

I am made to understand that she is an undergraduate, meaning she has gone through primary and secondary education and still cannot string her words correctly,do we realise that thinking that this is funny we actually let people who are not Nigerians thinks this is how we all are.Just before you say i am self conceited let me just tell of an experience i had on my third day in Milan.

I had just arrived and was trying get my paper work done and trying to register at school and as you know Italians don’t speak English,so when you see someone who speaks it,it’s like a life line has been thrown out to you.I needed to get a phone and a phone line quickly,so i was directed by the school where to buy both,on getting there ,i was browsing through their collection and trying to make a decision, at the same time wondering how i would communicate to the shop assistant when i finally make it,out of the corner of my eyes i noticed a young African guy and his white friend staring at me.I  am used to such things so was non pulsed,the African walked up and asked if i was from Senegal which i answered no(once you are above 6ft and you are black you must be from Senegal,that’s the way it is in Milan).He told me he is from Ghana and i was like thank God one English speaking brother,he has lived in Milan most of his life so he knows the language,so he basically turned to my interpreter ,as the shop assistants were trying to get my order,we got talking about a lot of things,then out of the blues he just dropped a bombshell ‘You know you speak good English for a Nigerian’ and I'm like, what did you say? he then went on to tell me about meeting and knowing Nigerian that don’t speak English  very well and that basically all we speak is pidgin.I then took my time to educate him that Nigerian speak good English but that to majority of us the pidgin English is like a melting pot as Nigeria is a very large and diverse nation with a lot of languages,the pidgin kind of brings everything together,i also him told that i was not the exception but the rule,i said as long as you have gone through primary and secondary education then you should speak  English well.

You can then imagine my horror and disgust when i came across the said video and some of us find it funny,really should we? Have we gotten to the stage as a nation where an undergraduate speaks like that and we find it funny instead of being embarrassed and this video i believe was shown on international TV,we should learn how to project positive things about our country,don’t allow others think it is only those that school abroad that speak well and i am not talking about having an American or British accent.My point is we really need to re-evaluate the things we let out as a nation to the outside world and most importantly the things we should take a positive stand on.

There i have said my mind maybe i can now calm down.

That’s a first,two post in one day.See you later

CIAO

THE HAND OF GOD

As I sit down in my room,facing my laptop and shedding tears(i seem to be doing that a lot since i moved to Milan) I ask myself,girl what is wrong with you.My family tell me i cry at the slightest thing,notice i did not say provocation,but i would say i see myself as the girl who is hardly touched by emotion,what others would normally jump up about,i would just say ‘Ok what’s next.But maybe there is some truth in what they say or maybe i have a dual personality,but why was i crying.

I believe you must have been following the story of the Chilean miners who had been trapped underground when their mine collapsed ,I first came across the story when they just found out they were still alive,and then i read that they might be in there up till the Christmas season,normally the first thing that came to my mind was how would i feel if i was one of them in there and secondly if i was a close family member.Then I read they were drilling a tunnel to get to them ,at this point i decided i was not going to follow the story anymore,reason being that i was getting too attached to it and having watched so many American movies  in which some rescue attempts have not ended so well,i just wanted to save myself the emotional stress.That was not going to happen as long as I switched on my laptop and logged on to the internet,I just seemed to run into the story,so i would say i was unconsciously following the story by just reading the headlines.Then I saw the headline that the digging had been completed and they were putting a shaft in to try in get them out by Wednesday (usually i am very thorough when i talk about something but you can see from my bad reporting that i was really trying not to follow the story) I was like thank God. Now comes the hard part,you know the part in films where the rescue is going on fine and then something just goes wrong and someone dies,yes that part,well i just said a short prayer for them and really did not think about it.

I said I was not going to read about it again,till I could see they were all out safely,but alas I logged on and there was this headline on yahoo news ’CHILEAN MINERS TASTE FREEDOM AFTER MONTHS IN HELL’,I quickly clicked on it to read,as i entered the site, a link came up ‘click to watch video’ I said to myself,girl you don’t need to cry now so don’t watch just read,half way through reading I was in tears  and that brings me to the topic of today’s blog.

A particular miner after being pulled out made a statement ‘I have been with God and with the devil.I fought between the two.I seized the hand of God,it was the best hand.I always knew God would get us out of there’ This is from Yahoo News UK&IRELAND.Those words set me off,God’s hand is the best,when it seems that all is lost ,when it seems that you can’t just move forward or back,when you are in that dark tunnel,when it seems that help is so far away,when it seems that your existence is in the hands of mere mortals,when your mind rages with thoughts of ‘what if’,when you are not sure of what the next day brings,when you just can’t hold on much longer,when you have two hands reaching out to you,one says give up,after all, what good will it do if you hope and the other says ,what good will it do if you do.

Faith and hope are what keeps and oils us in our trying times,but most importantly it is who we decide to put our trust in and total dependence on that guides us through those times,that miner could have chosen the path of least resistance and given up instead he chose the part of hope and faith in God,10 weeks underground is no joke,a lot of sneaky thoughts will enter your mind and you start to question the very existence of everything,I cried because God was speaking to me,NO SITUATION IS TOO HARD TO FIX.When i remember how their story started and the doubts i had for them,i just thank God that someone in there decided to seize the right hand and i intend to do just that.

SEIZE THE RIGHT HAND’THE HAND OF GOD’

CIAO