BUHARI'S DISASTER

I want to start by demanding an apology from Mr. Pesident, first for insulting his wife and women all over the world and for misrepresenting Nigeria. He has also put Nigerian men in a bad light and he must apologize for that as well. I did not want to start this post with an unserious tone.  We should treat every decline in our humanity as a disaster.  While we are dealing with so many other disasters, some more dangerous than others, I have to say that there those we can prevent. Like this one.

When I referred to Aisha Buhari’s speech here as a fart, I was thinking in terms of the backwardness in using sentiments to guide political appointments in Nigeria. It has become part of our culture to hire or appoint only people we know, or people that we owe favors to. I thought that her statement made it seem like the presidency, and Nigeria as a whole is there to serve the interests of the Buharis and APC. Now you can argue that in so many ways and we can allow it, but we can talk about that another day.

There are things that cannot be allowed. If the leader of a nation can say that his wife belongs to the kitchen and the other room, I do not know what to think of the majority of us. We cannot excuse this as a joke. We cannot even allow this misrepresentation of our people and the beauty of our values. I know that there is a trend of misogyny that so many people are paying so much money to package as politics. I  am speaking of the regressive orange douche Donald Trump. I get it, Americans are thrilled by his savagery like in Game of Thrones. I will always speak against people like Trump and the embarrassment he is to humanity. But we can be better, we are Nigerians and if our leader makes stupid comments like the one he just did, we must cry out in outrage and not just stop there. He has to be punished in some way for this.

This is more than a political issue. It is a humanitarian issue. Nigeria is already backward in so many ways as it is. We cannot afford to be facing the wrong direction, especially when it comes to issues that we can easily win with. We must be an example for the world to follow. We must stand up as humans and weaken the people that are trying to steal our humanity from us. 

As far as farts go, this is a Hurricane. And if we do not respond to it with the attention it deserves, then I do not think we stand a chance against the other problems we have. We should leave the guy that just farted in the room, and not choke on the stench of his posterior offerings. Forever, we would never forget the guy with the Hurricane fart. And congratulations Trump, you have inspired another leader to join you clan. 

Of Posterior Inconveniences

She knew she had to make a good appearance, so she took her time to dress for it. One thing you could not criticize her for is a lack of effort in making a fashion statement. Her nails, shoes, make-up, jewelry, clothes, her now trending bags, perfume and oh, hair (that would still be covered) were all on fleek. I could never tell how long it took her to get ready but I assume that it was a significant amount of time. She did not disappoint in this, but then again she never does.

But there are things you cannot prepare for. Even as a queen she could never insure herself of this unfortunate occurrence. Farts come from all sorts of assholes, all around the world, rich and poor alike. We all wish it was never a part of us. Judging by face value, it looks as though some people would never fart in their lifetime. But nature’s unhidden secret puts us all on the same level when it comes to farting. So long as you have an asshole, you must fart. Of course some have a talent for it. They are able to control their farts and bring it in when and where they choose. But the majority of us cannot stop a fart from coming, or fart when we want to. What we can do is hide it.

I have an impressive suppression technique that you could use to hide inconvenient farts. First, you breathe in a lot of oxygen, then breathe out slowly at first and then all at once, releasing the gas in the posterior direction. Allow it to ease out of you and cut it off halfway. Repeat this and you would have released the most treacherous fart without making a single noise. And if it smells, nobody will know it came from you, especially if you make effort to look like one of the people that could never fart. Even if they suspect you, they will have sufficient reason to doubt their suspicion and that my friends is how to avoid being caught farting in public.

Unfortunately, our queen did not have these tips. If you are in Aso Rock, please recommend me for one of those appointments, like special adviser to the first lady on special matters. Because I would have told her that nobody would judge her for farting in private. You see we all understand that every human has to get rid of that toxic gas. She won’t even look bad if she had farted in public. I would have advised her against putting a megaphone up her posterior region just before the gas came out. Heck even with all that, it would have looked better if she hadn’t put that much effort into putting out that much gas. Instead she took all the admiration I have been nurturing for her and used it to embarrass her people.

In case you do not have a thing for metaphors, go to this link:

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-37642282?ocid=socialflow_twitter%3FSThisFB

The Learner 02

So I promised to write more about the learner in my next post and my next has taken an awfully long time to come. I can only pray that it is worth the wait for both reader and writer. 

I have been thinking about how bad decisions come about lately because I am about to make a major decision. I woke up one morning of the wait to realize a few things I am going to itemize.

1.  Insufficient information: I once argued with the wrong mindset, to make a point and service the idea of being superior to those around me. The topic was feminism, and somehow I felt the need to share the recent information that I had. It turned out it wasn’t enough to win me the argument. To put it mildly, I got handed my ass by a teenager. But on further consideration, I just got exposed to a new angle on the matter, more information without which I would have been unable to make a good decision on the matter. In my opinion there is an information threshold that is required for good decision making.

2. Lack of Right of Judgement: Reflecting on that argument on feminism, I realize that I had a logically sound mind. Assuming I had sufficient information, I would have still fallen short on the matter if I did not have a strong enough will to do, say or consider the right thing. The problem with this problem is that you have to look deep within yourself to see it. We are often weakened by our own greed, selfishness or even pride among other things to consider the right thing. A lot of times the right things will not favor us, sometimes they will just be the harder options to take, and other times our minds are clouded by external pressures that they exhaust our will power.

3.  Biases: I recently learned that our mind thinks in patterns to process information faster and better. While this might be efficient for us, it has robbed us of the opportunity of questioning and learning new things, especially new people. This has also led to a lot of biases and prejudices that breed bad decisions. I have tried to avoid subscribing to a version of these patterns I call labels that make me see people within the limits of my experience or logical ability. Despite all my effort in being unbiased, I can only be utterly partial by default. Knowing this, I have to rewire myself to constantly open my mind and heart to learning newer patterns instead of reusing old ones so that my decision making process is more dynamic, more specific to every situation and overall more balanced on a case by case basis. This will definitely slow me down and my brain will struggle with me a lot every time I come across new information. But I am not yet willing to give in to my primal nature of processing decisions so I must fight it every chance I get. Only God knows who will win this uphill battle.

I have learned that either one or a mix of any of these three reasons can lead to bad decision making. Of course there are more ways a bad decision could come about, but I write only of lessons I have learned or I remember as I write.

Meet 'The Learner'

So I have not written here for a while and I miss that a lot. There are so many reasons why I have been avoiding this, but I can sum them all up in one word - 'Inadequacy'. What has changed that sent me running back here you ask? Lorrie Moore lend me the words to answer it best: “But that inadequacy, or feeling of inadequacy, never really goes away. You just have to trudge ahead in the rain, regardless.” 

So I have resumed the title of The Learner and that has helped me find the confidence to share my new blog posts. This new wave will have more than my thoughts. I have committed myself to learning everyday and I will be sharing as much of that as I can squeeze into these posts.  I will also be writing shorter posts to ensure that I only post what is important and make it easier for my readers to read.

In my next post, I will be introducing the learner to you. The learner has always been a part of me, and as I am maturing in every possible way, that part of me is becoming more and more relevant.

Write!

I woke up to an alarm that said 'Write'. I immediately felt the impulse to and I have to admit that it is the first time the alarm has worked since I set it some 5/6 months ago. Even though I can guesstimate when I set it, I cannot remember what motivated me to. Was it to hone my writing skills, build on them and improve by writing more random stuff? Or was it to write on my blog that always gets weird people reading from the ends of nowhere. I've always thought of my blog posts as an invitation for an alien abduction but some nosy humans happen to find it. Thankfully, I found a more private blog where I am sure only intelligent life forms can find. The point is not in being understood, but being found. And I think some aliens have found me from a planet far away in my head. They've landed their flying saucers on a rather contoured terrain - my brain, must have been one bumpy landing. Aliens could be that small. Maybe that is the reason why only NASA and some homeless people have interacted with them. Then again, they may not be the only kind that exist. There could be tons of variations that I cannot capture in my universe of a mind. Aha here's a good line.... it may be the reason why I write this: 

'The mind is a mirror into the universe'. 

I will not venture to explain further as most quotes are like that. Perhaps I will try to capture it more elaborately in a more extended effort. But I shall move on to other matters. Now that I think of it again, I am inclined to arrive at a less weirder explanation for that alarm. I could have set that alarm to commit to 1 hour of writing everyday as a moderately successful author once advised me. I don't know why I should take that advice seeing as I have no intentions of moderating my success when it comes. But I guess you take what you are given. Speaking of the success that I imagine myself having, I have been trying to write a book since I remember enjoying writing. I have tried a zombie apocalypse version of the Jos crisis (a rather mediocre plot that has suffered overuse), an espionage version of same (I am still into this idea) and a 'How I did it' story of my success as it is happening. None of this made it up to a chapter, although I have writing enough excerpts some 50 page long. But I think I will stay here and invite more aliens seeing as none of those hideous ideas can take me where I want to go. Now where to post it is the problem. I am drawn to think that the more targeted my posts are, the more my chances of being ignored by the most advanced aliens. They wouldn't want to contact the to-be abducted with the best alien PR. No I imagine the recruiter is looking for the most out of this world, yet normal individual on earth. So I will pretend to post it on my blog and sound as human as possible as I write every line. That makes me a more harder find, increases the thrill for the recruiter and may haps even bring me front of the line for the right abduction.

The Bride, The Miaden and The Girl

The young bride struggles to please. That is all she can hope to do, and she prays to find the strength to fuel this struggle. This part of the deed is not easy, she is never going to get used to this. She thought it would be happiness ever after and beyond once the wedding was over and all her plans went accordingly. Now all her plans went accordingly and the wedding is over but all she could do to latch on to happiness is struggle to please his family. Before now, her happiness dwelt on her ability to shut down the expectations of others including her family who were all against her marrying a boy that is far from where they are used to. If only they knew how far away from what they are used to she has gone. Now she finds herself trying hard to be accepted into a family she barely knows and play into an alien culture. Will they ever allow her to be herself or will they tie her down to their norms and traditions? Will he explain to them that she is different and stand behind her to make sure they accept her or will he demand that she does as they expect and take away her identity? 

The young maiden knows she is wanted but not wanted as badly as she wants to be wanted. She walked this road looking for this thing that is standing in front of her. Now that she has found it in this man, she can't seem to let herself have it, have him. She knows she cannot have him all at once, but she is troubled that she may not have him at all. To her, he is like a pearl that is better stared at from a distance than worn on one's neck for others to see. She saw him beckoning from a distance to her soul, he seemed a bit reluctant though. To her he seems to be covering up his desire although it shows in different ways. He mentioned it once but retreated the second she showed her own reluctance. But she can't fight this desire that is aggressively rising from her insides. It's a good thing that reality helps her keep it in check. She does not know how far the outlook that reality has framed up for her will last because she has leaped away from it a thousand times in a world that is parallel to this one. This world that mirrors visions from our soul's ideals. She might be crazy to think this but that leap has made her wish that both worlds will collide at some point and she won't have to travel between worlds to find a more perfect perfection. 

The little girl giggles recklessly. She has never been told of a world where her giggles could attract evil to her, yet she lives in one. She is shielded by the purity of her father's cruel kindness to her. His softness to her can only be matched by his brutal approach towards anything at all that threatens her. She is his precious gem and he controls who he shares her beauty with. The world is wired to destroy her innocence and steal her giggle away from her, from him in fact. It puts her on a path that makes her the direct target of every attempt at stamping out innocence and replacing it with fear. The sad part is she will struggle to have a mind of her own, one that reacts to the many threats she faces. She would not be accepted traditionally because tradition has been designed to reject her albeit when she is being used by it. She is going to be beautiful but only in the way that she is expected to be. She is going to be happy, but only as happy as the world allows her to be. 

Which Bag Will You Put Your Money In?

First of all, I am not proud of this post. Actually that is only mostly true because the only reason why I wouldn't want to sound like this is the same reason why most Nigerians jump into politics. See I am scared that someone someday may do a background check on me just when I am about to get that life-changing government contract signed, and I would loose it because of my colorful pen. But I think I can live with that while there are other ways of hammering in Nigeria (There is still a chance that that background check might not happen in any case.) So I am taking a break from being a conscious and serious Nigerian who uses everything he's got in an optimistic philosophy of making his life Nigeria better. The long and short of this is that I just want to be real for one post. 

So as many as about 70 million people are going to sacrifice their time to have their voices heard through their votes and they will soon find out this meaning of Democracy:

"Democracy: "The state of affairs in which you consent to having your pocket picked, and elect the best man to do it". Benjamin Lichtenberg

My version of this thought is more positive than Benji's own. It goes:

"Democracy: The state of affairs in which you hand over your money to the best dancer and you let him manage control how he uses it".

Let me explain, the state has oil money resources and these are managed by individuals we elect. Even though we are all entitled to all these resources, for the sake of order, we elect a few to control manage it. It is a way of owning something without having control over it, just the way artistes sign their copyright to the label for their "own good".  So in essence, 'ballot in the box' = 'money in the bag' (just so we are clear, state resources).

I should really end here but I have not gotten to the fun part yet, that is the Nigerian situation. Somehow the choices of most Nigerians lie between two bags, so welcome to the fun part.

The Scumbag

Mstcheeeew! All these idiots be acting like my feelings don't matter. whether you like it or not, they do, even moreso since I have been in every other conversation these past few months. So I guess we both agree I am popular. Popular enough to tell you this: like your fathers before you, most of you are suffering. And like them you think it is people like me that cause it. Your Father! If not for people like me, you will not even have a country sef. Some people think because they are younger than me, or more educated, they can talk nonsense. They should continue and we'll see who they'll come begging for a slice of the national cake from, after this election. I have already told them to arrange themselves very well or they will continue in their poverty. Thankfully sha, some sharp guys have  tried and they are now wearing my colors. Other idiots are going for that douche bag. Do you even know what a douche bag is? Let me tell you. It means: a contemptible or despicable person. Do you know what voting for a douche makes you? You better vote for me, oh because you don't want to know the answer to that last question. I might be mean, but I am not as low serving as that douche you keep disturbing people about. Just so you know, I am not a magician, I can't cure NEPA's epilepsy (you no get babalawo for ya village?) And all these boys looking for job, no be all of una go get am oh (lazy people! See how your mates are hustling in Lagos and you are begging government to do something for you). But I can sha promise you this, I will have smarter excuses than your celebrated douche bag if you vote for me.

The Douche bag

Is it my fault that Nigeria is the way it is? Did I invent corruption? These nonsense Nigerians will hustle and manage to travel to yankee and when they see that America is better than Nigeria they will start yabbing me as if na me dey take light for NEPA. Upon all the insults they pile on me, I am still the GSOTNC (Grand Shearer Of The National Cake), what's left of it anyways. They will insult me on Newspaper and online then after I send one of my boys with a tiny piece of the cake, they will change topic and start talking about Autistic children. See, me I am not against my fellow Nigerians because I still need their votes to win this election. If I don't win, nobody will hire me because... well I owe you no explanations. The person I dey fear na that Scumbag that is eyeing my job. Bros, I know you have been waiting in line, but no be for my head you go hammer oh. Just go relax, if na the cake you want, I fit arrange am for you na. But you sef dey vex oh. See yab wey you yab me.... As if a Scumbag is more righteous than a Douchebag. Why people come dey campaign for you sef? make you learn from your mates na. You know any 70 year old looking for the most difficult Job in Africa? Make you pity your children na. E for dey easier make you even go school (or maybe not, because we both know why you didn't go in the first place, hehe). Oya slow down, I go settle you after Saturday. You know say I be your boy na. 

This Saturday, the majority of Nigerians will be left with two choices where they can drop the currency for their socio-economic development. If you are a Nigerian, will you put your money in a douche bag or a scumbag? If you are not Nigerian, who do you think is worth your suffering, the douche or the scum?