Walking
up from the field, the illustrious Mammy Market was set in a small,
uppermost north-east corner
of the camp. It had little less than one score canopies spread out in
all directions, including
centre. I think most people went there primarily for food, I know I
did and the majority of
traders there sold food, and drink. From protein-rich sandwiches, to
egusi with gummy semo-vita, spicy,
gleamy barbecue, and stripy, 'exotic' ofada right up to my personal
camp favourite, pounded yam
and divine ambrosia soup. If you had money to spend, food was not an
issue. But if you had to rely
solely on camp kitchen food which was not infrequently 'flavoured'
with charcoal, other times just
wood...you deserve a formal NYSC salute. The 'hearty cheers way'. I
should also add, that Mammy
also contained an impressive number of nameless make-shift night
clubs.
But I
knew little of the pleasures the mysteriously named market offered
that day, after all it was only
my first. After an adequate tranquil meal, I returned to my room
well before sunset, just in time
for the short drama to unfold. All of my roommates had arrived by
now, or at least enough of them
to validate the swift 'election'. A tubby, rather dark, friendly guy
walked into the room carrying
his baggage and inquired who the room leader was as he settled into
his bed. We looked at him
with amused smiles,"Room leader? Who cares about that. We don't
have one". He seemed relieved. "From
today, make una they call me Firstborn", he casually declared.
The room erupted into laughter.
"Firstborn?!" I found it hilarious too but by the time the
laughter ceased, Firstborn was the
informal leader of the room. He had no power or responsibilities but
that was to come.
Before
night fell, from my vantage top bunk facing the entrace, I watched
another heavily built corper
howbeit taller, stroll through the double wooden doors. One thing led
to another till he was named,
just guess :"Last-born". If Firstborn was black, Lastborn
was white-complexioned. He
also gave a succinct, moving one-line speech. Something about us
roommates looking after him since
he was the Lastborn of the room. Imagine! I am not exaggerating. If
"Terminator" were a Nollywood
movie, Lastborn's physique would make him perfect for the lead,
eponymous role that Arnold Schwarzenegger played. But this was merely
the start of countless episodes of room politics and comedy, some of
which, as you will see I unintentionally became entangled with.
I
slept late, woke early, way before I heard what I and some of my pals
called,'the trumpet sound' a daily, peculiar bugle call. I hustled
maybe as far as a kilometer before I found bath water. For most of
the first week, this continued and we learned the cause. "Rain
had fallen days before, and they were still drying the electric
cables in the sun " or so we were told.
Later,
I had to go to the field for 'parade practice'. Basically, there were
several circles of corpers with soldiers in the middle of each
teaching the fresh 'otondos' how to march. Camp can obviously not
mould you into a soldier but they will try their very best to instill
'discipline' into you. Unfortunately for us, as far as they were
concerned, discipline is the process of testing for the roasting
point of the human brain under the sun while screaming one
unintelligible phrase or the other, and raising your legs at precise
intervals for hours. Now I was in a circle, under the hot sun,
sweating profusely and shouting "Left-right, left-right, left-right!" I couldn't have felt more foolish. My friend, Christopher was right
beside me also trying to learn the motions, and in intense
discomfort. So, Christopher made a mistake, I did too. The tall,
brown-skinned, soldier with a loud mouth marched up to us, and
without warning extended his long stick to bestow a solid, brutal
thump on Christopher's head. "You dis goat!". It resounded and
each of us in the circle briefly stopped marching to stare in shock,
especially me. I was next in line. When he looked at me, I kept my
face level and waited. Christopher was gingerly rubbing his sore head
without a word of complaint. My own response would be quite
different, but he did not hit me. He returned to the center of the
circle. I observed his departure from the narrow slits that were my
rage infused eyes. "Is this what camp will be about?”
"Did
we complete degrees just so we could be unjustly oppressed and
imprisoned by violent men for three weeks? "As I pondered on such
thoughts, contemplating the “nysc problem” and how I would
survive it... practice was called off. We were dismissed. I dialed
Tanya's number repeatedly, without success. Maybe camp would have
gone differently, if I had reached her.
P.S : This continues next week, on Saturday. I think I'm almost done covering basic background stuff and the story can move a lot faster now.
I have updated the comment system! It's easier now. You can sign in using ur fb, twitter, or google(including blogger) credentials to leave comments. I think the easiest way is to use the 'D' icon and register with disqus by entering a name/nickname and your email. Disqus is a platform for comments used by many popular websites, including CNN so if you create an account now, you can use it elsewhere. Whichever you choose, be sure to click the 'subscribe via email' link ,just below, so you get notifications of any replies to your comments. Thanks!...see you next week.
I have updated the comment system! It's easier now. You can sign in using ur fb, twitter, or google(including blogger) credentials to leave comments. I think the easiest way is to use the 'D' icon and register with disqus by entering a name/nickname and your email. Disqus is a platform for comments used by many popular websites, including CNN so if you create an account now, you can use it elsewhere. Whichever you choose, be sure to click the 'subscribe via email' link ,just below, so you get notifications of any replies to your comments. Thanks!...see you next week.
Entertaining and fun filled,the protagonist once again goes on a life changing journey
ReplyDeleteThanks, bro. 'Life-changing journey'? hahahaa, guess we'll have to see.
ReplyDeletehmmmm.....nice and funny....i'll b waiting for nxt week
ReplyDeleteI will not disappoint you! got a terrific plot...my only fear is coping with a word limit of about 750
ReplyDelete1st born n last born, I rememba dose two...
ReplyDeletehahahahahaha.
Last born got posted 2 some SKUL in d heart of osogbo.
Oh, n he neva lost an ounce of flesh Lyk most of us did during dose 1st few months @ osogbo... I wonder aw e did it
hahaha :)
ReplyDelete