SAVE THE FEW INFRASTRUCTURES WE STILL HAVE

I was at a friend’s house last week, we were playing FIFA12 on Playstation3 when PHCN struck, it was disappointing as usual but like every other Nigerian out there, it wasn’t a surprising development. So we packed up the game and decided to take a leisurely stroll.

While walking, we kept on highlighting the problems plaguing this nation with PHCN bearing a large chunk of the blame. We ended up going to the railway compound @ Alagomeji, Yaba (We have a mutual friend that stays there); Suddenly, I had a feeling of de’javu.

(I attended Lagos City College, Sabo Yaba in the mid-90s…. After school, we would go to the railway compound to play football (There were some standard footie pitches in the compound, most popular being Loco, we use to walk on the rail lines and play with the gravel scattered all over it. Trains had strategic hours of moving and I remember we use to watch out for the 4pm train, the ear-rending horn & the churning of iron moving in iron *memories*)

Now it’s 2012, here I was again walking on these same rails & the thought flashed before me “These rails are still effective today”, I’m in my mid-late 20s’ and I know these rails were built before I was born, I thought of some signposts we used for target practice (throwing stones) back in the days & I tried to search for them, lo & behold, there they were, still as sturdy as ever. .. A few clicks and the NRC (Nigerian Railway Corporation) Wikipedia page was open on my blackberry, most of these rails were laid back in the 1970s and they are still as sturdy as they were then, even the signposts.

Now this got me thinking, some good people had great plans for this nation. True, the generation before ours failed us but let’s give credit when due. Some people actually had this vision of creating an alternative mode of transportation in the state, routes that encompassed 70% of the state were mapped out and the rails were laid but mismanagement and our usual nonchalance rendered it almost-useless. Nowadays, the traffic on Lagos roads can make a grown man cry, I personally spend like 5-6hrs out of a daily 24hrs on the road stuck in Lagos traffic.

Reading through Wikipedia, I realized the NRC has gone into bankruptcy more than once in the last 20years. This wonderful & effective mode of transportation (You have to see it) is just lying wasted and nobody has seen fit to revive it.

Yes, we don’t have as much as the developed countries but the few we do have are in deplorable conditions due to our inefficiency, our federal universities use to be the pride of Africa but it’s a different story now, mismanagement and lack of vision has taken its negative toll on our schools.(This is talk for another day).

I really hope and pray for this country to take its rightful place as a leading nation, I’m just more skeptical about the people.

Thanks

Did we fail?

#OccupyNigeria is a movement that is rooted on the grounds of oppression, cultivated on the stem of enslavement and finally germinated on the branch of Justice.

Welcome to My world.

"I AM PROUD OF MYSELF" before you start throwing stones, let me tell you the reason; I stood up for what I believed in.
Call it arrogance or petty pride; I believe modesty is not needed in this instance.
I trekked from Yaba to Ojota (Gani Fawehinmi Park) 4 times, 4 TIMES!!!! ...Say what you want to say but for those who really know me, they will tell you that was a great achievement. I didn’t walk because I was getting paid nor did I walk because a war was imminent; I & thousands of Lagos youths walked against oppression, injustice, enslavement, tyranny, the list is endless.
 In the course of the walk I saw the face of most youths, while some were happy to walk the distance because of the mini carnival staged at the end of the journey, others were taking the opportunity to visit friends (because we were virtually under house arrest at this stage) but there was a particular group that walked with conviction that change is imminent.
 Naturally, the average Nigerian is laid back, happy to live a contented & comfortable life, avoids trouble & tolerates the shenanigans of the wasteful government but all that changed on 1st January, 2012 when Mr president decided to test our patience a little more (not knowing we were fed up already).
 We all know the story, the walks, fights, killings, propaganda, lies in high places, more lies in high places, NLC's stand & eventual betrayal, TUC's rise & eventual (I hope perpetual) fall, tenacity of Tunde Bakare, Femi Falana etc , the noisemaking of most celebs, Seun Kuti's smoking skills, AY.com's try @ a comeback, mohits' silence, Eedris' rant, mind boggling displays from some (surely enhanced) youths, GEJ's silence, GEJ's answer, Assassins dressed as soldiers posted on the streets of Lagos etc... Through it all, I was there.
OccupyNigeria opened my eyes to a lot of good & bad things but definitely the worst thing is the nonchalant behaviour of some Nigerian youths, while some foreigners, even celebs (McHammer et al) were urging us on and wishing us luck, some overfed & brainless youths were busy mocking the movement and defending the government's stance. This is for another day.
 Well, I think we did what we could and we were rightly disappointed at the eventual outcome (Fuel price got increased by 50% and the present administration is still ripping us off), some people might think we failed but I know we didn’t because we got the attention of the international media & the world(Aljazeera was all over it),we got the attention of the Nigerian government (They sent the military) and above all, I realised some Nigerians (I, inclusive) could actually stand to say NO to injustice & oppression. Can You?

Below are pictures of our walk and actions during the cause, I'm gutted most of them got missing but glad I could still salvage a few.

English??? I'l pass

We'll begin with a box, and the plural is boxes,
But the plural of ox becomes oxen, not oxes.
One fowl is a goose, but two are called geese,
Yet the plural of moose should never be meese.
You may find a lone mouse or a nest full of mice,
Yet the plural of house is houses, not hice.

If the plural of man is always called men,
Why shouldn't the plural of pan be called pen?
If I speak of my foot and show you my feet,
And I give you a boot, would a pair be called beet?
If one is a tooth and a whole set are teeth,
Why shouldn't the plural of booth be called beeth?

Then one may be that, and three would be those,
Yet hat in the plural would never be hose,
And the plural of cat is cats, not cose.
We speak of a brother and also of brethren,
But though we say mother, we never say methren.
Then the masculine pronouns are he, his and him,
But imagine the feminine: she, shis and shim!

Let's face it - English is a crazy language.
There is no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger;
neither apple nor pine in pineapple.
English muffins weren't invented in England .
We take English for granted, but if we explore its paradoxes,
we find that quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square,
and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.

And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing,
grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham?
Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make amends but not one amend.
If you have a bunch of odds and ends and
get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it?

If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught?
If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?
Sometimes I think all the folks who grew up speaking English
should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane.

In what other language do people recite at a play and play at a recital?
We ship by truck but send cargo by ship.
We have noses that run and feet that smell.
We park in a driveway and drive in a parkway.
And how can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same,
while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites?

You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language
in which your house can burn up as it burns down,
in which you fill in a form by filling it out, and
in which an alarm goes off by going on.

And in closing, if Father is Pop, how come Mother's not Mop?

World Against you

"Thoughts on the "WORLD AGAINST THEM type guys?"  Like "they can't get right type guys, ever"

It's difficult for a lot of guys out here to get right because they care more about smoking and drinking than actually "getting right."
  There's nothing wrong with smoking and drinking but some guys dedicate their whole day to doing this shit, day in and day out.  I'm gonna keep it real., take it from a guy who knows...  Smoking too much can mess up ur grind,fools think weed aint shit, and it really aint but it makes you lazy.  It makes you not feel like doing stuff. Even if you hustling,you get high, then you don't feel like answering ur phone, you don't feel like doing this or that.  That stuff messes with ur money.  I've gone through stages where I was high all the time and I have gone through stages where I couldn't smoke and I made a lot more money and got A LOT more accomplished when I couldn't smoke.  Its the weed that is making a lot of these guys "can't get right" and they don't even know it.  Smoke when you already finished doing what you gotta do for that day.>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Piff

Just thot i should share this with you,its not about your vices but how you learn to control it 'cos afterall said and done,u'r still responsible for your actions.

PLEDGE

I pledge to Nigeria my country...SHUT UP!!!,if you have an idea of what you'r pledging to,you would instantly change your mind.
I'm so dissapointed with my country that I will gladly claim to be a refugee(no offense) or even a wanderer,Nigeria is 50 years old & as the saying goes "A FOOL AT 40 IS A FOOL 4EVA",I guess a fool at 50 will be a fool even beyond eternity...I'm not a sadist nor a pessimist but a realist,I'm also not biased because I claim to be a son of the soil but there's so much suffering & frustration a man can endure before breaking down(ask kinta kunte).
The whole proudly 9ja concept actually makes me laugh ,honestly,looking at whats on ground,we should all be shamefully 9ja....
Lets have a look at what does/doesn't work in 9ja,maybe we'll start flowing on the same frequency.

Problems
1. Governance (worst since I was born)
2. Power & Energy (we've all accepted our fates..NEPA/PHCN siblings)
3. Education (such a pity,even pry schools go on strike nw)
4. Health Care (an average Nigerian is not even aware that he/she's entitled to some sort of health care)
5. Communication (Rip-offs without consciences)
6. Employment (lol)
7. Food (heard most of us live under a dollar per day...ha!!!)
8. Security (no comment..ask d next policeman u see)
9. Transportation (you spend 5 hrs of a working day on the road or even more)
10. Youths (Frustrated beyond measure)
11. Govt. Parastatals  (the bane of the economy)
12. Religious Cohesion (well,I wont go into that)
13. International relations (PH is a no-go area,watch CNN sometimes & u would deny 9ja)
14. Sports (thank God we all have T.Vs)
15. E.T.C

What actually works
1.Still thinking(maybe I'll remember something soon).

I'm sorry if you find this too sordid,I'm not sorry for saying it but sorry for you're still deluded with the proudly 9ja concept,its not by mouth or pasting it on our shirts.
Before I can genuinely say proudly 9ja again,I might be president then......Giant of Africa(joke for ages).

Friends

This simple word (FRIEND)implies a lot depending on how we look at it though we all tend to take it for granted as it is.
Its amazing how we make friends,a total stranger can be your friend in the next minute and a colleague or schoolmate you see everyday might not be a friend because we tend to gravitate towards people we feel comfortable with not giving thought to status,race,religion .......but the fact still remains that real friends are hard to come by.
The mistake we all make is not been able to draw the line in some relationships(thats even if you'v got a line) Associates,Colleagues,Contacts even Connections can be friends but the question is "ARE THEY REAL FRIENDS?" and thanks to facebook & twitter ,total strangers you have never seen nor talked to before now claim to be friends....funny but true!!!.
I personally hold TRUE FRIENDS in high esteem because they are the people who believe in you no matter the circumstance and also those you believe in because its a two way thing.I'm a fun loving person n i meet people on a daily (scratch...*minute) basis,have fun with them,roll with them but I don't call them friends because I've had some bad experiences with so-called friends and naturally, I'm skeptical about letting people get close enough to be called friends.
Friends are people who know more about you than you realize because they've always been there,you can meet a real friend in seconds but it takes time to realize that because there's nothing like friends at first sight(u might be attracted to something bout the person but do u really know that person?).
True friendships are to be valued and nurtured cos consciously or otherwise,you depend on them & would sorely miss them if they are not there,that's why a real friend has the ability to hurt you deeply & you would feel betrayed if u find them wanting.
I give big ups to those friendships that has stood the test of time despite d distance,arguments,broken hearts ..... cos its not easy.
I can still remember how I met some of my friends but the childhood friends I hold as family because its like they've always been there(cant even remember the first meetings but will never forget some crazy stuffs we got into),so I'm saying GRACIAS PPLES 4 being friends.
                                                                              Ciao

Happy New Year

Hey ladies n fellas,just want to wish you a happy 2011,it was a long run through 2010 but to God be the glory,we made it!
  Through Ups & downs,smiles & frowns we survived & i bet you its for a reason,lets pause a minute & think about the reason why you are still alive & she isnt or he isnt;It matters a lot.
   I'l leave you with that to ponder while i do the same.God see us through this year and so many more,have fun.
                             Love Temi