A viewing of District 9

The release of District 9 [1] created a bit of Nigerian angst for all sorts of derogatory references made about my motherland and countrymen, however, I never like to comment about issues and events like this without having read the book, watched the film or verified the sources of the information in the discourse.

This Christmas offered me the opportunity to watch District 9 and really I am surprised about the angst it created.

Realities appearing in films

The subtext of Nigerians creating a scam, feeding on alien flesh in order to gain power and running illegal markets could easily have been taken with a bit or mirth and laughter if we did not take ourselves too seriously and did not always fall to defensive postures when subjected to unmitigated abuse.

Whilst this was a film for global distribution and it might have not helped the presumably dented image of Nigeria and Nigerians, it is not strange that the reality of the animosity between Nigerians and South Africans was depicted in this way.

Just about 2 years ago there were riots in South Africa about aliens, then, it was about nationals of other countries in that country and whilst a majority of Nigerians wherever they are in the world live honest, irreproachable, dignified lives, there are the few who besmirch the name of our great country with nefarious activities that are at best shameful, sometimes utterly despicably criminal and beneath contempt.

Taking ourselves too seriously

We should not allow those few to define the context of the many more, the work of dealing with that begins with individuals families, communities, society and also what our leadership and government who should work to promote in thought, in deed and in verifiable results in Nigeria and abroad images of good conduct, civility and the reduction or absence of corruption.

What I saw in District 9 was not outlandish in any sense, it was interestingly a warped perception of Nigerians and the name of the leader of the criminal Nigerian group bearing a semblance to an erstwhile president did not leave me full of any indignation – there are things his regime could have done to prevent that kind of publicity, but that is beside the point.

If I might add, the language of communication between the so-called Nigerians was not Nigerian to my hearing.

The real District 9

The more critical issue in District 9 has the danger of being missed; which is first the inhumane treatment of minorities or people different from us, the scheming activity of a father-in-law to get rid of his son-in-law because he felt the man was spineless and the willingness to expend human lives in the quest for the profits of biogenetical engineering.

Those in my view affect the whole of humanity and must command the greater attention than the hurt feelings of certain cellophane-skinned Nigerians whose activism against the mentions added to increased curiosity about the film and its seeming box office success.

The ridiculous reactions

The inability of Nigerians to suffer a modicum of self-deprecation or a joke at our expense just made the whole thing ridiculous, the Minister of Information’s intervention with the banning of the film in Nigeria was a publicity coup for Sony.

In the end, there is a part of the Nigerian psyche depicted which was as truthful and it was bitter to accept, there are people who would do anything to attain power, even supernatural power and if aliens would provide that means, there would purveyors of snake-oil remedies that promise such powers.

Sadly, the DVD I watched was bought in Nigeria, whilst the packaging looked like an original product with all the trimmings, it was the first time I could not watch a supposedly internationally released DVD on my system without glitches that jumped scenes, skewed conversation and even froze on my computer.

I would hate to think Nigerians had also bootlegged a DVD that portrayed them in bad light – Now, that would not be funny at all.

Source

[1] District 9 - Wikipedia

Up and about late

My Christmas day was a very slow start, it was probably well into the afternoon before I managed to slip out of bed by which time a number of phone calls and text messages had come through that I did not get to handle because my phone was in vibrate mode having been set to that ay church the day before at the Christmas carol service.

When I did get up my friend was already cooking the beef and tripe but was unsure of what we should have for Christmas lunch.

Rices for choice

There was one for making stew and white rice, the other for making jollof rice and fried plantains. Considering I had put much stock into acquiring ingredients suitable for jollof rice, we went for that and postponed the making of stew till later.

So, there I was in the kitchen, softening the dried barracuda fish cuts in hours of boiling and preparing the seasoning for the jollof rice – my eventual scheme involved first frying the rice and then pouring the cooked vegetables and seasoning into the rice afterwards.

The plantains then went into the electric fryer and within 90 minutes we were done for our Christmas meal which we had to the strains of the gospel of Saint Matthew.

Giving Jesus a look in

An interesting difference that started with the nativity story through the ministry of Jesus Christ, there was no way the significance of Christmas would be lost on Christmas day.

Unfortunately, by the time we settled down, the Queen’s speech was over and television was a bit of a drag between those who are fed up with Christmas and those who make Christmas a complete fawning annoyance – forget the religious significance, Jesus nowadays cannot get to blow the candles on His birthday that is if he ever gets invited in.

After a few cups of Smokey Earl Grey tea, it was really time to put our feet up or in my case lie down on the inflatable mattress and watch television through shuttered eyelids.

Of Christmases past

It is a long way from my Christmas days in Lancashire where after dinner my surrogate mum, my dear friend’s mother tries to get us out of the house looking for Sambo the slave who was buried some 200 plus years ago in some windswept wilderness whose grave still gets tended today or plodding in the snow where my wish for the sun is so intense, I cry for warmth.

In truth, my last three Christmases were spent in the sun in Gran Canaria, the memories of being at the beach at Christmas are fond.

As the night drew nigh, my friend suggested we watch his District 9 DVD; there has been much Nigerian angst about the film, it was important I had a good viewing before i comment on the film – this was a good opportunity to do that.

Christmas was quiet, good, fun and wonderful; I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas day too.

New routes to hospital

Christmas Eve saw another visit to the hospital to see the oncologist, usually, I see the oncologist the Friday before the Monday when I go for my chemotherapy sessions.

The bus timetables changed over a week ago and with it the bus routes also changed such that the easy one-changeover trip to the hospital was no more an option.

Now, I had to take the tram and then a 5 minute walk to the hospital, since I no more use crutches, it was not that difficult a trip to make.

My friend of 25 years had arrived the day before to spend Christmas with me and offered to accompany me to the hospital, having company at hospital is always good.

We arrived for my 14:45 appointment some 20 minutes early and eventually got called in by the junior doctor I saw 3 weeks ago.

Not now let off

I thought I would get the promise of being let off chemotherapy, he was quite impressed with the improvement on my feet, all good young but thin skin, looking healed but he wanted a second opinion from the consultant oncologist.

He came in and he also expressed his happiness with the improvements which he attributed to my responding well to the chemotherapy, he then asked how well I tolerated the chemotherapy.

I honestly told him I just felt more tired and sleepy but suffered no other side effects, with that he suggested that I have up to 8 chemotherapy sessions.

Whilst I was quite disappointed the logic was that if one tolerates chemotherapy that well then more should be given rather than less because it makes the treatment presumably more complete. If however, I was hardly tolerating the stuff then there would have been a case for discontinuance.

Meeting the priest

Then I was put in the emergency queue for blood tests which basically had me going through as I submitted my forms to the blood clinic.

After that we went to see the catholic priest who I make a point of visiting on the oncology appointment days but never on the chemotherapy days, he was about, that was good because I had a card and present for him.

We had a lovely talk and then he offered to pray for us all, his prayers were quite deep and very meaningfully aligned with the Scriptures, in fact, my friend and I were quite taken by it all, considering Pentecostals seem to think they have a handle on prayers – one has to give some credit to Catholicism, and I have, the more, since I met this young priest.

Shopping for Christmas

On leaving the hospital, we shopped at a Ghanaian shop for condiments, food and ingredients for Christmas, got some meat from a Halal shop and eventually returned home.

I later went for the Christmas service, which was a bit too funky for my liking, clapping to Christmas carols with guitars and drums in the background are just what my kind of traditional Christmas is about, I suppose, I would be looking for something more sedate next year.

What a day it was.

Christmas cheer for all, I publish part 4 early, enjoy!

The third part of this series Opening the mouth of the Father – Part 3

The opening gambit

Like a surrealist drama the wedding list was coming alive with a reality that was about to hit us in the face like a flipping wet tilapia fish, we were about to be slapped from side to side as if we were in some repetitive motion of turning the other cheek in perpetuity, our pockets had better be deep and be deep enough.

So, we opened the ceremonial table with 20,000 smackers but for the seriousness of the situation at hand; I am getting married, I might well have picked a fight with the chap who took occasion to literally make jokes of the events – I would have liked to be where I could laugh rather than be on the verge of tears.

For all it was worth, I was going to enjoy it as well as I was going to remember it for what it stood for, for all the participants in this bizarre ceremony called a traditional welding ceremony – welded, I meant that, indeed.

Hail to the chief

These settings need a chief to bless the occasion, some moneybag who had earned respectability in the community not so much for duty and stature but for the accumulation of filthy lucre from whatever source that was of no concern to the people who pay tribute and give their untrammeled obeisance.

So, to get this non-descript high chief to the high table a Chief’s Table fee was required, I needed the tough negotiations of the IMF with the persuasion of a Ponzi scheme purveyor on my team like I needed the next breath of air, my people drew skill and inspiration from places beyond our realms of everyday life.

At 25,000 tilapia slaps, the chief deigned to dance to the table with the dignity and grace of the big man who has come to town, the ceremony was beginning to get into gear.

A mute father and mother

Speeches need to be made at these meetings and apart from the MC whose verbal diarrhea was about to be as infectiously painful and debilitating to the extreme, the parents would have a few words about their daughter, not too much would come from mine in those proceedings, as I soon figured.

They called it, Opening the Father’s mouth, and soon after was the Opening of the Mother’s mouth, the smart quip thought about using birth forceps or calipers with the help of jacks and spanners to open the mouth of big daddy and better still, a parental kiss might just be killing two birds with one stone – they would not have it – each negotiation had to be thoroughly exhausted, the intermissions taken up by different kinds of bought entertainment.

Father remained mute until we had received 20,000 tilapia slaps and mother came not too far behind on 18,000 wets, since we fish by the dragnet and harvest by the earthquake shaking of the trees to split their fruit, someone must have assumed we had come by money so easily that we spend better than the gushing of oil from the troubled Delta region.

Some elders for hire

However, the chief and parents were not happy to sit at the table by themselves, the Family elders had to take their places at the table because the precious daughter was about to leave for the home of her most auspicious lover – auspicious should read love struck beyond reason.

A number came forward, about 6 or so and only on the persuasion of 19,600, they probably had other weddings to attend, we needed to make it worth their while being there for the purpose of, well, filling their pockets – our quip who was on the verge of having a knuckle driven at him without regret swore those “hell-ders” were rented – the danger of marrying out of your community means you do not know who is for real. This was no day for Miss Marple and her sharp intellect.

My people were introduced without too much of ceremony, thankfully, we did not have to pay to approach the table, they sat comfortably, maybe a bit uneasily too.

A compound rent it was

Maybe there was some sense in the Family and Compound Women fee, they helped in every way to arrange things, food, decorations and much more, a gratitude fee in the ceremony – no hard feelings; the compound element must have come from the fact that my prospective in-laws were tenants in a multi-tenancy compound, it did not hurt that much when it topped out at 19,000.

The incredulity of the Family and Compound youths however left one utterly exasperated, our quip suggested we were also paying the riff-raff to keep them from misbehaving – it was a stretch to our understanding of traditions but opportunities had been opened for everything including the kitchen sink.

A sibling triviality

They were pacified with the unkindly whack of 17,000, everyone was going to benefit from the marriage of this amazing daughter of the compound it seemed because we parted with another 15,000 smackers for the First son who happened to be 15 and this was apart from lining the pockets of the toddler Brother and Sister with 14,500.

By this time, there was no point having a calculator, our reserves just had to be inexhaustible, we seemed to be up to the challenge at each call but none of it was looking funny at all.

When before, it had been suggested that this relationship had legs, it did have legs but the legs were really for us to run, but we were so deep in it now, we had to see it to the end – nothing else could faze us as the ceremony progressed.

Pension arrangements in the playground

We had to cater for the Father’s Age grade and the Mother’s Age grade as if these people had sworn to each other as kids that when their children were to get married their pensions will be supplemented by the proceeds from the daughters’ marriages and the matter of the dowry was yet to come to the table – it was going to be interesting after all this.

They respectively won that jackpot with a pot of 26,000 and 15,500, it would seem the women get sold in marriages and still get the little end of the compensations that come at the ceremonies.

Why did we not find the literary tome on the marriage practices of the Andoni and just give this a completely wide berth – but as we were resolute, love conquers all, it would conquer this and leave us somewhere – a place difficult to imagine as one weathers this maelstrom of the certainly certifiable.

The Mother’s Labs left us flummoxed, nobody bothered to ask where the test tubes and cultures were, we flush away our doubts with a cool 15,500 and all our cards were now on the table and everyone ready to show hands.

Knock down the door, gently

The ceremony was in full swing in asking the hand of our beauty, our beloved, our prospective wife and partner who through this ceremony was fast becoming converted into a purchase, a possession with a ranking that could legally make her a slave but love, only love conquers all – we would live through this and tell the stories with great laughter and jollity at subsequent family reunions – this ceremony would return to the family in about 20 years – the parents were made for a great fortune through the giving away of their daughters, barring changes to this custom or tradition.

When the time to came to bring the bride out of the confines of the family home to be joined to her bridegroom we had come to the epoch of the ceremony, it would reach an unprecedented crescendo that would make the faint-hearted faint – someone had better have the smelling salts handy.

It was called Knocking on the family door – this would present a number of decoys before we have the real deal, our lady of the day, the joy of our bosom and the one to whom the whispers would mean the whole world.

You cannot imagine the number that opened that family door.

To be continued …

Tired of the squabbles

He really tires of being caught in the middle of squabbles that might be significant to those involved but really just about stress him out unnecessarily.

Here he was trying to allay the concerns and feelings of his parents about his health which had suffered a crisis but now had reached a miraculous turn-around.

Then, when he was in hospital, there was that situation when his father was eventually informed of the truth of the circumstances just as he was preparing for some major celebration, his mother however was kept in the dark, for all sorts of reasons.

Consideration driving purpose

One of such reasons was, these people are now in their retirement years, they run around enough being concerned about the welfare of their children and grandchildren, obviously, the last thing anyone would want to introduce into that situation was the news of a child being very ill in some foreign hospital where they had no immediate access.

The father however was informed because he asked a direct question that put the answer beyond feigning anything else, one just has to be truthful in those circumstances, the mother, on the other hand lives in some religious institution involved in activities that makes Old Testament repentance look like kindergarten playschool.

God have mercy

To impose that news would have taken it into the stratosphere of the incredulous, he thought, at least, along with his siblings.

When his mother finally found out, it was the warpath paved with weapons for the ultimate assault, God have mercy, God have mercy, God have mercy on those who stood in the way, God have mercy, indeed.

So, armed with the news of confirmed medical developments, he sent a short text message to the phones of his mother and his father at just about that same time.

This should be news for all

His mother then called to warn that this type of news should not be broadcast; he is fed up with it all, prescriptions from abroad with the conveyance of fearful import along with all sorts of modes of amelioration – give him a break, I say, give him a big break, thank you.

Surely, such news of recovery should be broadcast to all, well, even the narrator cannot see the reason to keep it quiet since many already knew the situation.

At the end of the day, whatever is going on there should be sorted out there, they who are abroad have enough going on here to be so bothered about these seemingly external factors of conflict, feuding and passionate dislike, he pleads, let me not be your battleground.

His father had called earlier, was thankful for the recovery and prayed that both health and welfare be restored along with all the loses that came about due to the illness – that was definitely more edifying and easy on the ears.

None will take credit

The fallout is interesting, they both sent him medicaments, traditional and herbal with their different acclaimed potencies and those things lay in their bags just before either party claims that their thing brought about the source of good news.

Not one will take credit regardless of the efficaciousness of these things all because the poison of conflict leaves one lacking in any confidence in these things – he just does not want any of that on his mind.

Meanwhile, one fasts for weeks, the other prays in the witching hours, all for the good but where do these prayers go if at least for once between yourselves before you think of your son you cannot be friends or trust each other?

The question lingers, but no one wants to be caught in the middle of feuds.