Bitchy in the City

Lagos Island Iced Tea

2008-11-02T01:06:00.004Z

So in a bid to rescue my ailing blog career, I have gone and set up a new blog.

Let's see what happens with this one, shall we?

It's called Lagos Island Iced Tea.

(I should be able to keep it up seeing as all I do in this bloody city is eat, drink and party!)

Xxx

This Little Piggy Went To Market

2008-10-23T23:55:00.004+01:00

I am distinctly more 'rotund' than the last time I blogged. 'Rotund' is probably too much of a euphemism. I am just plain 'corpulent' i.e. F.A.T.

It was to be expected. Not only am I living at home where there is an excellent 24 hour pancake machine in the form of my cook, I am working in a team with the 4 little piggies. We have our own plantain chips supplier for goodness' sake!

I am doomed.

Oh and did I mention that I'm shelling out 120% of my youth corper salary on a personal trainer who comes twice a week, yet I'm STILL putting on weight?

I am really doomed.

I need to get my teeth wired.

Oink!

Blocked!

2008-08-05T19:59:00.002+01:00

I didn't break my resolution! Ok technically I did, but morally I didn't, because I wrote a post, I just didn't publish it. It was a general moan about the weight I have put on over the past few months, and about the relative strangers who had taken it upon their not so tactful selves to point it out to me (not a very engaging read).

I'm suffering from blogger's block. I'm hoping something comes along soon to break this spell!

Let the Healing Begin

2008-07-25T16:49:00.007+01:00

For the second time in my blog career, I have changed my blog's URL. Gone is the awkward and impossible to remember etcetera hyphen etceteroo link, and in its place is the original, the one and the only, bitchyinthecity dot blogspot dot com.

Why did I decide to revert to my original URL? I don't know. Perhaps because I've come full circle? I don't think so. I have claimed to have "come full circle" so many times on this blog now, that I no longer know what "coming full circle" really means!

I am a permanent resident of the good city of Lagos now. It's still such a scary thought, that I have trouble saying it out loud. If you are a personal friend of mine, you could be forgiven for thinking me bonkers on reading that last sentence, as all I have done for the past few months is moan and groan about London, how dreary it is, and about how much happier I would be if I were at home.

If you know me however, you also know that I am somewhat schizophrenic, and that I can be in love with something today and despise it tomorrow. This illness is reflected in the number of websites I possess on the world wide web, the bastard children of many business ideas that I threw my whole being into for a period, and then dumped without so much as a backward glance a few weeks later.

I have begun to worry that this schizophrenia is getting in the way of my progress in all respects. The fear of commitment is what I probably really suffer from. That, and getsboredreallyeasily syndrome. My shoddy treatment of my blog is testament enough to this and I am really getting sick of it.

I'm turning over a new leaf. I intend to blog once a week religiously, regardless of whether or not I have something to say. I'm giving myself a royal kick up the bum which, if it works, could cure me of this unbearable inertia.

Hmmm... I wonder what I'll write about during the week? Oh dear. I can feel the panic already beginning to settle.

The Perfect Way to End a Dull Day - 10 Easy, Quick and Pain-Free Steps

2008-07-04T16:51:00.003+01:00

It’s Friday afternoon and I’m at my desk in an office somewhere in the City of London sipping an icy mojito from a flourescent orange Winnie the Pooh mug.

How did this happen you might ask?

Well... Let’s just say I got bored at work, very bored in fact, and in the middle of an email exchange with an equally bored friend who was also sat at her desk somewhere not too far from me in the City, decided I needed a drink... a nice summery drink with which to lift my ailing spirits.

For the record, I am not an alcoholic... I am just a very bored intern. Yes... that’s right, I’m interning yet again... and no I’m not thrilled about it. (The last time I filled out a form asking for my ‘Occupation’ I came dangerously close to writing ‘Recurring Intern’ on it!)

Today is my last day at the firm and the mojito is my goodbye present to myself. For anyone who finds themselves in a similar predicament, my advice to you would be as follows:
(1) Grab a long coat, your wallet and security pass (or whatever it is you need to get around the building),
(2) Walk stealthily to the department kitchenette, and grab the largest mug you can find and fill it with a little water,
(3) Whilst sipping slowly so as not to attract attention, head for the stairwell so that it looks like you’re headed to another floor rather than outside,
(4) If no one is in the stairwell, empty the mug and wrap the coat around it so that it’s concealed on all sides,
(5) Make for the exit, smiling at the security guards as you walk past,
(6) Head to the bar next door and place your order,
(7) Grab your drink and find a table in the corner,
(8) Unwrap the mug, tip the drink into the empty mug and wrap the coat back around the mug being careful not to spill it,
(9) Walk back into the office building with your head held high,
(10) Sit at your desk, unwrap your purchase and sip on it to your heart’s content.

Have a lovely weekend bloggies! Xxx

The Big Q

2008-06-01T00:40:00.004+01:00

I have a question for the writers and producers of Sex And The City...

What do Big and Carrie do when one of them needs to do a really noisy, gassy poo and the other's wide awake in the next room?

It's just a question... I know they definitely didn't think about that when putting the new movie together, and personally, I think they ought to have given it some thought.

If they're going to make every single one of us compare our real life relationships to Big and Carrie's on-screen romance, the least they could do is toss in a few not-so-glamorous scenes for our viewing pleasure.

Surely there must be days when Big's breath forces Carrie to hold hers for an uncomfortably long period of time whilst they're locked in one of their perfectly choreographed smooches?

As a die-hard fan I would like to know these intimate details of their relationship. I think it's only fair.

Biyi Bandeezy in the Heezy for Sheezy

2008-04-04T06:04:00.004+01:00

Apologies to Biyi Bandele and Farafina (dear Anwuli too!) for this.

I know it's coming on here soooo late. But folks! I'm in Lagos... AND I have MALARIA yet again!! (Not new malaria... the same friggin one... from the SAME bloody India... which I'm still determined to go back to at least once this year mind you!)

So my forgiveness is required right now from everyone. Lol! Even from the Mister Bloody Fanutastiki himself! :)

P.S. Yes I know I am the luckiest and stupidest dog alive (simultaneously mind you) that you probably know right now.

P.P.S. But shey you understand me a little better for it at least. Not so? Let me know, even if it's just to say you've already met the very famous Mr. Biyi Bandele. He is so unbelievably cool and even Mr. F has the photos to friggin prove it!

P.P.P.S. I haven't even had the time to review his book on this very blog by the way! AND I still think it's so damn amazing, even though I only started AND finished it last week. Okay?

Will try and come back today! But I've gotta go to my very amused/ irritated/ angry doc first!

Tory plenty for this side ooooooh! Xxx

P.P.P.P.S. Okay I tried. The dumb PDF file won't even work. I knew it! I'll come back later.

THE READING IS TOMORROW AT THE BRITISH COUNCIL IN IKOYI IN LAGOS! If you would like to know details for Abuja, Kano etc etceterooo, try Jeremy Weate first and then www.kachifo.com second!

City of Mugus

2008-03-14T13:31:00.003Z

In my hotel, it costs $16 to use the internet for 24 hours (mad), $14 for coffee and orange juice if you buy it in the restaurant (shocking), and $30 if you send for it through room service (outrageous!)

The last time I was in New York City, I had a whale of a time. Everything was so new and so fresh and so exciting. The noise, the stench, the mad folk... it all went down pretty well with me. I was a happy bunny.

Now I find myself easily sparked off and ready to bash a cab driver over the head with my handbag whenever he has the audacity to attempt to keep my change. I have also taken to tipping less than 10% if a waiter's service has been satisfactory, and 10% if it has been good (apparently this is an abomination, it should only ever be 15 and above). I have also refused to tip the many doormen and luggage boys I have encountered, and no there ain't been no $2 on my pillow for the turn down maid either.

You may think I am doing this because I am a cheapscate, but that is only half the truth. I am doing this because I am pissed off. Why does every "service provider" or "facilitator" in this place think it my duty to contribute to his financial wellbeing?

Last time I was here, my friends gave me some long shpeel about waiters etc receiving only the minimum wage and being expected to make it up through tips. Now my question was, and still is, is that my business? Did I sign up (when I queued for 30 mins for one bloody stamp at stinky Newark airport) to any agreement that somehow made me responsible for the shafting of all workers in the "Tri-State Area"?

Yesterday, I had lunch. The bill came --> $55. I put down --> $60.

Waiter (who took bloody ages to do anything, talk less of proffer a smile) goes "You're leaving a $5 tip?" in the frostiest tone ever.

I looked him square in the eye and said "Yes" and then I left, to the backing track of his mumbling and muttering.

I ask you... since when did gratuity become compulsory? If they're going to act like you're breaking the law every single time you decide not to tip, or tip less than what they expect, then WHY call it gratuity at all?

Bitchy is angry.

Period Pains, Blocked Noses & Marriage Proposals

2008-03-06T17:50:00.014Z

I proposed to Mista Fanutastiki yesterday.

And what did he do?

He laughed, gave me a hug and then ignored me.

Now when this happened, I was just a little pissed off. How dare he ignore me, I thought. Should he not be honoured that a super fly chica mohita like me is proposing to his silly self? Instead he laughs it off and says NOTHING?

I began to have flashbacks to all the times in my *cough* youth, when some poor clueless sucker would pour out his feelings of love and deep deep deeeep affection to me (always over the phone, they never seemed to have the balls to do it in person) and then I would respond with a very long and very eery silence (I got a kick out of it you see - yes I'm twisted, and no, I've never been in a mental institution of any kind).

Well I can assure you that it was NOT fun when I received a taste of my own medicine yesterday. In fact, it was mortifying, embarrassing and downright annoying!

Later in the evening, I asked, very calmly and in my super-cool voice "Did I or did I not propose to you this afternoon?" He laughed again, and then changed the topic. A third time I said, actually yelled, "Are you okay? What the hell is your problem? Didn't I ask you to marry me?"

Mista Fanutastiki yelled back (and I quote), "What kind of rubbish proposal was that? Are you well?"

Leaving me... gobsmacked... and just a little peeved.

Fine, he may have had a point or two. Prior to my utterance of the words "Will you marry me?" I had yelled at him for talking too loudly on the phone, freaked out when one of London's dumbest delivery men ever arrived with a massive box that he expected me to go downstairs and then lug all the way back into my flat with my spectacularly muscle-free arms. I had then proceeded to yell at Mr. F for standing around, and then shoved him downstairs to deal with my very heavy package and the box-bearing buffoon. (Seriously though, what is wrong with this city? How can a company accept your payment for a very heavy item, arrive with it and then tell you at the door oh, not at the online checkout counter, that their delivery is to "doorstep only"?)

Anyway by the time Mista Fanutastiki made it back upstairs with the very heavy box, I was sitting on my bed, the bright red insect biting my brain had departed, and I was beginning to blubber... like a baby. In my defence, it had been a very very stressful day. I had contracted the flu overnight, been working on my flat renovation since I got up at 6am whilst sneezing like a monster, I had a job interview coming up at 2 pm, it was already 1 pm, I was running late, I wasn't even prepared for the interview, and oh... (super huge factor)... all this was happening on the most painful strength-sucking day of my period. Sorry I know I'm supposed to say "lady week" but I think that's just ridiculous. Men need to learn to deal with the fact that every single woman on this planet has a week when blood, yes, blood, not red paint or ribena, seeps out of her. They also need to learn that it can make her very cranky and moody and emotional and downright insane as in my case, and that she can get incredibly pissed off at the fact that she is expected to tread on eggshells for no apparent reason by referring to her PERIOD as her "lady week", "time of the month", "red monster", (insert other annoying cover-up metaphor here) even though SHE is the one suffering the pain and discomfort!

I appear to have digressed, but in the middle of my crying and wailing ("I'm not going to my interview!", "I'm too sick!", "I hate my life!", "The world is over!") Mista Fanutastiki held me, and hugged me, and allowed me to cry for as long as I needed to. (If the shoe was on the other foot, I would probably have slapped him and yelled at him to get a grip.) Then he sat me upright, told me he was going to help me sort things out and that I was going to be just fine at my interview, and then said (the magic words) "You need to eat. What do you want me to get you?"

He left the room and the only thing I could think to say (actually yell, because he'd gone to the kitchen) was "Will you (sneeze, cough, sniff) marry meeeeee?"

Lucky for me though, he didn't say yes. I am in no position to get married anytime soon - I don't even have a car, a decent savings account or a National Insurance number!

But it would've been nice if he had at least played along and said yes, and had allowed me to believe that he wanted to marry me. When I told him this last night, he said, "The only reason you want me to marry you is so that I can be your butler."

So... A word of advice to any young chica looking to blurt out the big question? Wait for him to come to you, and when he does, laugh it off and leave the room, make him wait, make him ask again until he is forced to yell "OI! DID YOU NOT HEAR ME? I SAID MARRY ME, YOU FREAK!"

Mista Fanutastiki may not know it yet but that is sooooo the treatment he is going to get if he ever does propose. I am certainly not asking him a fourth time, that's for sure!

[Feel free to share your own embarrassing, or mushy, proposal stories at this juncture. Or to lament and side with me on the PERIOD (still yelling it) point I raised earlier.]

The Long Overdue Moan About... My Hair!

2008-02-29T10:29:00.006Z

I went to the hair salon in the ghetto yesterday - the one in which Feline (of Smackdown vs Raw fame) reigns supreme. Feline wasn't there, but another equally feisty Jamaican fatty was, and she provided many a blog-worthy moment. So many in fact that it would be far too tedious to sift through my memory in order to select the most worthy of the blog-worthy.

On a more general note though, what is it about hairdressers in London? Is it because we (black women that is) entrust them with our most prized possessions that the city allows them (on a regular basis) to get away with murder and daylight robbery? Obviously in the ghetto there is no robbery of which to speak, but in posher parts (to which I have been known to take my silly useless head on many an occasion) it is bloody ridiculous! £180 for -N-8,000's worth of hair work! (You do the maths... Ridiculous!)

And do they treat us like royalty? Like the precious (life-giving) gems that we are? NO! They keep us waiting (even when we have appointments), argue with us when we want certain combinations that will take longer to produce (but for which we are ready to pay), and leave us fuming, pissed off, teary and scuttling under the cover of darkness for fear of being seen with the monstrosities they have sealed tight onto our heads.

It is all too much! And in the midst of it all, they have the audacity to be so intimidating!

I've come to discover that a male hairdresser is often the best solution to the problem. He will not shirk you off onto some lesser-trained assistant in the salon, fight with his co-workers over your aching head, scream at you in incomprehensible patois for no apparent reason, or walk out and refuse to do your hair because his choice of tv channel or radio station has been ignored by the rest of the workforce.

Unfortunately though he is only to be found on the (again, RIDICULOUS) posh side of life, he has been known to mess up and leave you teary, and he WILL keep you waiting. At one such posh palace on Wednesday I noticed that the lady to my left (with half a head of braids) was relatively ignored, right from when I arrived, to when I left. I decided that she had to be a self-employed billionaire or a cushy kept-woman, from the calm, unperturbed manner in which she accepted such crap treatment. She sat reading her novel and said nothing to nobody, waiting patiently for her favourite demi-God to find the time to work his magic on her kinky locks.

Why she was willing to sit so patiently, I will never know. What I will say though is that women like her are the reason why hairdressers in this country are such bloody divas, and they are the reason why hairdressers think we have nothing better to do than pass entire days (working days too mind you) in their company. So please, if you are a black women living in or around the London area, kindly huff and puff with impatience during your next visit to "Chez Enrique". It will remind Enrique and all the other little "maestros" in the establishment that your time is precious, even IF you are unemployed, and with nowhere really to go, like Bitchy ;P

Ta! Xxx

New Dawn, New Day, Shut Up and Give Me a J.O.B.

2008-01-29T23:20:00.000Z

I am a looking for a new job. The process has not been as easy as I thought it would be. Not even close! Now I find myself wondering how much the chubby middle-aged women boogieing and doing pointless sign language at the bottom right corner of the screen on 'The Box' get per hour.

I don't think it would be too embarrassing a job. How many people watch 'The Box' for music videos after 11pm anyway? It's only us unemployed folk! But in all sincerity, I really must ask -> What is wrong with those signing women on 'The Box'? Why are they all fat (sorry, chubby)? And why do they all wear tight clothing that sticks to the folds in their tummies? Why do they feel the need to dance so stupidly along to hip hop songs whilst they sign away? And why do they come onscreen only after 11pm? Do people with hearing difficulties only watch music channels after 11pm? Why aren't there young, hot chics and guys in tight clothing jiving on screen and signing with glee at 2pm in the afternoon?

Is Bitchy the only person in London who cares about the welfare of the audibly-challenged?

Sorry about this. I'm sure you were expecting a much more upbeat post, especially as I've been uber lazy this last month. What have I been doing? Well first I was in Lagos, recovering from what turned out to be a very manic and super scary case of malaria. I ended up in hospital on New Year's Eve and New Year's Day. What fun, ey? After that, I was forced to take things slow, not just because the doctor ordered it, but also because I could barely keep up with my grandma! I was so tired out by the illness, that I could do nothing but eat, sleep and moan on the phone to Mr. Fanutastiki who absconded to the UK as soon as the worst was over.

Next came the weekend when I decided to give up (finally, do I hear you say?) the training contract offer I moaned about many a time last year. I said "bye bye" to the hugely successful, massively massive corporate law firm just over 2 weeks ago (8 weeks before the job was due to begin), and did a series of liberation dances in the mirror. (Picture me skipping and pirouetting, singing, then croaking, "I'm free! Free of the Rat Race! Whoopee!")

All this of course was until the "Oh oh what I am going to do now? I'm UN.EM.PLOYED in every sense of the word! CRAP!!" phase hit. This 3rd phase (as I'm sure you expect) brought on many a panic attack, many a crying spell and many a bout of gloom.

Now I am in phase 4 --> "So what if you're unemployed? You are Oluwabitchyola, the one, the only, you reign supreme. Can't nobody take your pride, can't nobody hold you down, oh no, you're gonna keep on mooooving. Yeah baby." So whilst Mr. Fanutastiki eats the lemon cake that my unemployed arse paid for, and fends off clients begging him for work, I sit on the computer next to him in his office googling and researching like a rabbit on Red Bull!

I will get a job soon, be it legal (the kind where you leave the office at 6.30pm and not the kind where you leave at 5am for the same pay) or funky (anyone with a hookup at Conde Nast or The National Magazine Company do holler.)

Till then, I may be silent on this blog, or I may be noisy and whingey as usual, who knows? 2008 was supposed to be a year of regular, fastidious blogging. So far it has brought with it illness, uncertainty and a rather funny (and very blog-worthy) visit to the National Youth Service Corps office in Abuja. Yes, you read right, if Bitchy doesn't get her act together soon, her cute little nyash is going to be encased in those disgusting turd-tinged nylon trousers frog-jumping from one end of the Lagos NYSC camp to the other. Teeheehee! 2008 promises to be an adventure, doesn't it! Xxx

Mista Fanutastiki & Me

2007-12-31T02:29:00.001Z

Apologies are in order.

I have been sick (malaria plus flu plus basic body crash as a result of the incessant traveling). And I am in Lagos, as are a number of the (few) people in this world that I would give an arm and/ or a leg for. It was also my mother's birthday (think embarassing and downright hilarious karaoke party planned by yours truly), Christmas day, and my birthday (3 days ago. Yes, do feel free to sing "Happy Birthday" to me in your mind!) in the space of one week.

Before the year is up though, I want to blog about something. And have only just been hit by what feels to me like the best way to blog about the issue that I have now decided I am ready to blog about (in as discreet and non tongue-twisting a manner as is wise of course).

One thing I have never done, in my year and 4 months as a blogger, is share a work of fiction (however small) that is mine i.e. that I wrote, and then edited, and then ripped, and then re-wrote. And tonight, I have decided to copy and paste a small section from an as yet unfinished short story that I churned out sometime in the summer this year.

If you know me personally, or have been a regular (of sorts) on my blog, you will know that for a long time I thought being a writer of fiction, that is, adult, contemporary, cultural, and more specifically Nigerian, fiction, was the only way to go. Why? Because it is the form of literature that I connect best with, that inspires me the most, and that is able to (literally) blow my mind when it is done right. (You can see my 'A Nigerian, Afropolitan, African Brit' post if you're curious.)

But this year, I discovered (slowly and painfully) that, though fiction is where my heart is (and probably always will be), it is not the form of literary expression that comes easiest to me. In fact, you could say that, because I love (and desire to be) an afficionado of fiction (pardon the poor pun), it is the one area of expression via the written word that I find excruciatingly painful whenever I (after a long and tedious process of gearing myself up) decide to dive into it.

Before I go on and on (as I am always wont to do), I will stop myself from going into a detailed breakdown of the excerpt below's history. I will not talk about the (now abandoned) short story it was supposed to be a part of. Neither will I tell you about the day I forced myself to hack at it to the point where I felt (for the first time ever in my life) ready and content enough to read it aloud to a room full of talented (and inspiring) writers, at the head of which sat Chimamanda Adichie (whose 'Half of a Yellow Sun' was one of the above-described works that did (seriously) blow my mind). I know some of you will probably disagree with what I have just said, and whilst you are very much welcome to, [please insert Paris Hilton voice here] whaaaat ever!)

What I will however say about this excerpt is that I am putting it on my blog because I have finally met my own real life Mista Fanutastiki. And whilst he has nothing whatsoever in common (aside from his 'fabulousity', in my eyes) with the Mista Fanutastiki of the piece below, I wanted and (in a weird way) needed to put this scene up here. Perhaps because it will help him get to grips with how I feel about him (even though he knows it, because he literally does blow my mind, my heart and my everything)? Perhaps because it will help him understand why this razzo has gone from calling him "Mr. Fantastic" (in those cheesy moments) to calling him "Mista Fanutastiki" all the damn time (even in public!!)? And perhaps because in some weird way, it could potentially force me (especially as the New Year approaches) to grab hold of this talent I know I possess, but am as yet at a loss as to how best to turn into a fruitful, satisfying and seriously lucrative (kerrching!) career.

In exchange for this however, I must ask that you, as always, let me know exactly what your thoughts are (be honest, be brutal) about the blurb below. Perhaps I am a sicko, but because I truly am my own worst enemy, there is nothing I revel in more than a word or sentence of (constructive) criticism that points my attention to something that I hadn't even noticed in myself! :) I really do live for such moments.

Have a fantastic and blessed New Year everyone! And I'll be seeing you in 2008.

Yours,

B. Xxxx

---

Still Without A Title, Or A Home, Or Even A Short Story To Call Its Own

At the centre of the hall, the bride was being plastered with filthy naira notes. Her groom danced beside her, sweating profusely, enduring similar torture.

Gele and aso oke-decked bodies, gyrated and towered over them. Men in their white, crease-free agbadas. Buxom women readjusting their red and gold, or blue and gold, aso ebi (that indicated whether they were with the bride’s or the groom’s family). Their faces, plump with good food, champagne, London’s Dry Gin, betrayed their complete oblivion to the sweat trickling down their necks, mingling with coral beads, gold, and diamond necklaces.

Loud drumming and music, courtesy of Ibadan’s finest Fuji band, filled the room. Onstage, the self-acclaimed Fuji Fantastics shimmered in silver shirts and tight black trousers, the drummer and saxophonist sported crew cuts and sunglasses, the guitarists, an array of Afros, of varying heights and widths.

The lead singer, resplendent in a white waistcoat and matching trousers, bellowed into the microphone. “Wo n pe mi, Mista Fanutastiki. Patty people, I say, Gerron Down! Oyaaaa! Jo fun mi!”

His back-up singers wriggled their waists and hips in short silver dresses, the sparkling tassels on their wrists flaying in time with their long black hair.

“Jo, jo, jo…” came their reply.

Ceiling fans, swiped lethargically through the air, displacing balloon bouquets and streamers, doing little to quell the damp on the foreheads and underarms.

The room was like an oven, already preheated. Poised, to brown a chicken.

---

You may, at this juncture, feel free to rain a tirade of insults on me (for making all that noise, or for being a lazy bugger), because it really and truly does end here ;) Xxx

Oh My Goodness, I Can't Think Of A Title! This Has Never Ever Happened Before!

2007-12-12T14:44:00.000Z

I have been doing something that I rarely do, but which I enjoy immensely whenever I get the chance to do it. I have been reading my old posts. Posts which were written not too long ago, but which were generally (heck, always) conditioned and influenced by whatever I was going through at the time.

It's been a long while since I wrote a post like 'Boys Can't Cry' which got all my favourite blog people thinking and talking and sharing their own experiences, and doing what I love them for --> eventually changing my perspective. I have been feeling for a while now that my style as a blogger has changed. I couldn't quite put my finger on what it was, but today I think I have. Hardly any of the posts I've put up since the summer have been thought-provoking. Why? Because I began to keep my thoughts to myself, without really realising it. And even though I was still giving a lot away about my life and the way I live it, I was merely retelling events without really providing any insight into them, into how they affected me, or how they changed me. With my old posts, I always gave some insight into my personal perspective. Even when I was strong-headed, as with 'Boys Can't Cry' and when I was remorseful and humbled, as with 'Boys Can't Cry Part Deux'. (Can I just add that I am an equal opportunities employer on the boo hoo front these days?)

I can't say for certain why it is that I stopped sharing the part of my personality that (before you accuse me of bragging, scrutinise the evidence abeg) was easier to connect with and more popular than the part I currently focus on right now (my sense of humour and my ability to laugh at absolutely everything that happens to me). Perhaps I thought I was giving away too much and that it was dangerous? Well it was a bit. I learned that lesson very hard and very fast when I saw the impact my addiction to the "self sharing" opportunities provided by my blog had on the relationship I was in at the time. Perhaps I also haven't really been allowing myself to mull over my emotions, thoughts and perspectives of late, as I was wont to do in the past? I have found recently that whenever I sit down to blog, I can't help but throw all the personal bits out the window. Literally! Like with my posts on India and on France, there were so many thoughtful observations I wanted to make (and share) but just never did. It was like I just couldn't bring myself to get personal, and I didn't know why!

When I sat down to write the previous post, I actually wanted to talk about how impressed I was with India, how moved and inspired I was to see a country with such a similar history to ours forging ahead with the full effort and support of its people. I wanted to talk about all the things I learned about Hinduism and the impact that's had on my personal approach to Christianity, the immense respect I have for this much-ignored faith (well in the West anyway) which is probably primarily responsible for the huge sense of morality that pervades every single Hindu and the way he lives his life. This by the way I really believe is so closely connected with the fundamental differences that I noted between Nigerians and Indians. There is a strong strong sense of right and wrong in India, which we have completely lost in Nigeria. I felt safe when I was there, in a way that I would never have thought possible given its status as a 'developing country', and in a way that I so desperately crave to in Nigeria. This is not to say that Indian tour guides do not use their sway with tourists to extract extortionate sums by way of commission from shop sellers, or that there is no corruption in India. Far from it! But there is a difference between their (mental and moral) corruption and ours, and I don't know if I have been able to put my finger on just why that is, not since I came back, and definitely not now in this post.

India has so many of the problems we have! We (Nigerians) often feel cool about the fact that we have 250 ethnic groups or whatever the figure is. We often use this as an excuse when talking about the leaps and advances made by our neighbours in Ghana for example. But our differences are nothing when compared to the differences (ethnic groups, kingdoms, languages, religions) that prevail in India. And just as we are, Indians are VERY much victims of the colonial experience. In fact, in my opinion (shoot it down if you will, you're more than welcome to because I am no professor) they were changed and affected a hell of a lot more than we were. Walking around the Colaba and Fort areas alone in Mumbai, was enough to convince me of this. I would look up at the top of a beautiful beautiful Victorian building like Bombay University or whatever it's called, which could easily be planted amongst the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge, and would stand out only because of its exotic Mughal features and little else! And I would feel like I was in England, but in a dirty, rundown, faded and unkempt England that had brown rather than pale people running all over the place. The architectural and other (now rundown) remnants of their colonial era are still very much a reminder of just how strong a presence the British had in India. Imagine how angry, repressed and altered they must have been! Fine, this applies especially to Mumbai and not at all to areas like Udaipur (that were never touched by the British), but it made me think!

In a lot of the traveling I have been doing, I haven't just been meeting Italians, and stuffing my face, and fending off mosquitos. I have been learning. Learning so much about myself and thinking so much about my country. Making comparisons all the damn time, pissing people off with my incessant observations, and becoming more and more determined to connect better with the place that I call home and with its many many MANY problems. And it has been amazing!

Gosh! This wasn't supposed to be this long. I had planned to stop 3 paragraphs ago with a sentence or two promising to make the effort to share more of myself. Blogging just hasn't been the same for a long while and I have been feeling very dissatisfied and disconnected. But I'm just glad I have finally begun to work out what was missing. Now this doesn't mean you'll be getting any insights into topics like the amazing, wonderful person I have recently let into my life in a way that I am not yet able to define (apologies to any nosy parkers). But I am definitely going to try and give more of me. Xxx

Coconuts, Cows, Mosquitoes & Geckos

2007-12-08T10:58:00.000Z

Each time I had the urge to blog, it was impossible to get to a computer, or to get to one with an internet connection at least. In India, there was so much to tell, but no bloody internet anywhere, and even when there was internet, I was charged an arm and a leg for it and would have been foolish to do anything other than check my email and spy on friends on facebook. The problem now though is that I possess the memory of a gold fish, and have been in hibernation for the last 3 days doing nothing but watching Friends and Frasier re-runs and my X-Factor (Go Rhydian!) recordings over and over again, so my recollection of events might be somewhat... ummm... warped.

One thing I remember wanting to talk about was the "animal situation" in India. As one who hails from the tropics, I am not unfamiliar with mosquitoes, neither am I unfamiliar with a sighting or two of goats or cows in allegedly 'urban' areas. What I am unfamiliar with though, is fearless animals, animals who don't give a shit (or a rat's ass) about humans. Mosquitoes that dive nose-first into your eyes when you are wide awake and staring right at them, dogs that attempt to cross the road without looking left or right, goats that refuse to heed to a driver's loud horns, crows that steal food from restaurant tables in broad daylight, pigeons that quench their thirst in swimming pools, and cows that do whatever the hell they want whenever they bloody well want to. The cows were unbelievable! Not only did they take strolls on busy roads in city centres, they took up prime car-space on the motorway. And on narrow country roads, they wouldn't budge, not even when they were hit by the hard, metal body of a car. Slowly, we grew accustomed to the following sounds: car door + cow trunk (oomp), car door + cow horn (boonp), and car door + cow snout (donk): neither of which was very pleasant.

In Kerala, farm animals were not as prevalent, perhaps because fish, crab and lobsters ruled the streets in that region. Oh and coconuts too! Kera La means "land of coconuts" and my goodness there were coconut trees everywhere! I was about 10 the last time I drank from a coconut - my brother and I begged our mallam to climb one of the trees in our backyard. He hacked at it with his huge dagger/sword thing, we stuck 2 straws in it, and after one or two slurps, our time was up. In Kerala though, coconuts are different. It took me TWO HOURS (slurp, pause, slurp, gasp, slurp, hold stomach to stop the swishing, slurp) to drain the coconut I was given, and after that I decided I was done. My struggle with the coconut was on a houseboat in the middle of nowhere, and I had nothing else to do, which was why I kept it up.

Gosh... the houseboat!! Yet another thing I wanted to talk about.

To get to the houseboat, we drove from Kochi to Alleppey, and into a yard with very exotic-looking bamboo houseboats. Within 5 minutes, our luggage was on board and we were off. The crew introduced themselves - there were 3, the driver, the engine-master, and the chef (who was skinny - that we took as a good sign). We were out in open water, on the backwaters of Alleppey, and it was beautiful, breathtaking in fact. There was nothing around but water, it was completely silent. I made a note in the sacred 'Where To Go On Honeymoon' notepad that I keep in my (insane) mind, (and am ashamed to say make regular amendments to). 15 minutes later though, 'Houseboat on the Backwaters of Alleppey' was scrubbed right off the list! There was nothing to do on the bloody boat! There was no way I could get online (duh!), the 3 books I had brought on board were non-fiction (dull), in French (I wasn't in the mood), and in pre-1890 French (hello?) and I was starting to freak out. Zozo on the other hand was ensconced in 'The God of Small Things' and I was kicking myself for having recommended it to her, as she had subsequently lost all interest in speaking to me. So I sat there, on the boat, watching the beautiful lake and the beautiful birds and the beautiful multi-coloured dragonflies go by, sipping my coconut and twiddling my thumbs.

We pulled into a narrow stream for lunch, I bargained with 2 fishermen who rowed up to the boat to sell langoustines, we set sail again, and then the SUN came out. By evening, I was blacker than night (the boat was shaded so I don't get how it happened), my allergies had kicked in (I am either allergic to nature/ water/ natural water because they showed up unannounced 2 days before when we swam under a waterfall in Kochi) and there were mosquitoes and geckos everywhere. It was incredible! The sun went down, we sat in the armchairs, and one by one, mosquitoes appeared, and as they did, so did the geckos. The highlight was when a gecko lost its balance mid tongue-stretch, and dropped onto Zozo's chair, which sent her flying and screaming and brought all of our 3-man crew running to apprehend the danger. Once dinner was over though (think sweaty, sticky, harassed Bitchy eating the most delicious langoustines ever with a drippy drippy nose! Yuck! Yum! Yuck!) we locked ourselves in our bedroom where thankfully we had air-conditioning, and then shivered all night long (because the sheets were too thin).

I should write a movie script about my time in India - it would put Ben Stiller and Will Ferrell to shame! It was so bloody funny! I'm afraid my re-telling of it hasn't painted quite as funny a picture as I would've liked. I want to write about Mumbai next, but I am going to stop here because this post is already very long and very dull. I seem to have lost my blogger's mojo!

Crap! Xxx

P.S. Both photographs are mine. I am no longer a pilferer (I don't think this word exists) of images from google!

The Phoenix

2007-12-06T20:34:00.000Z

Farafina is pleased to announce a reading tour by award winning writer, Chika Unigwe, author of The Phoenix.

The readings will be at:

Jazzhole, Awolowo Road, Ikoyi, Lagos (Saturday, 8 December 2007 at 5pm)

Quintessence, Falomo Shopping Centre, Ikoyi, Lagos (Friday, 14 December 2007 at 5pm)

Bookworm Bookstore, Victoria Island, Lagos (Saturday, 15 December 2007 at 5pm)

Cafe Salamander, Aminu Kano Cresent, Abuja (Tuesday, 18th December 2007 at 4pm)

Admission is free so there's no excuse. Go! Click on the flyer below in case I got any of the details wrong. Xxx

Tiger Tales From Rajasthan

2007-11-26T11:26:00.000Z

The life of a globetrotter is not a piece of cake. I am tired, heck, I am bloody exhausted. Racing around Rajasthan and its neighbouring states for 10 days straight was great in the beginning (even though Delhi was dullsville, and the Taj Mahal was beautiful but disappointingly hollow). Safari in Rathambore however, was the highlight. Briefly (yeah right), it's a mountain reserve that houses a family of 5 Bengal tigers and millions and billions of deer, antelope, kingfishers and owls. Our first 4-hour round in the safari jeep produced dozens of photos of the millions and billions of deer, antelope, kingfishers and owls. By the end of it, I was seriously irritated. I was freezing (we had declined the offer of a blanket at 2pm in the afternoon, when we set off with the sun blazing down on our ears, necks and backs), I was covered in dust, and I needed to pee. Zozo on the other hand, was on a high from all the great pictures she got of spotted deer, samba deer yak yak yak. We got back to our "luxury tent" (which would have been fine had the temperature not dropped to 6 degrees celsius that night - who thinks about thermal underwear when packing for a trip to India? Not Bitchy, that's who!) And then they dropped the bomb - that we would have to go on safari again the next day, at 6AM. I was so irritated I wanted to shoot someone.

The night came, iced our butts right, and then left, and we found ourselves setting off (long before the crack of dawn mind you), back down the same stretch of mountain where we had seen nothing but millions and billions of deer, antelope, kingfishers and owls the evening before. At that hour, even the deer had pissed off and moved elsewhere. We drove around for hours and hours, I came dangerously close to killing someone, and then our guide stopped to show us a tiger paw print on the dirt road. "Woo bloody hoo" was my response, as the day before, we'd seen print after print that led nowhere but to more deer and more owls. Zozo and I had even become convinced that the Ranthambore staff had a huge tiger-paw stamp that they went about with when no one was looking, so as to keep gullible visitors like the lady sitting behind us in our jeep (who prided herself on being the owner of 15 cats) excited. So anyway, we saw the print, the guide and driver put on their excited faces and we begun the wild chase for the umpteenth time. An hour later, things began to slow down again, and I fell asleep with my eyes wide open. Next thing I knew we sped up a clear stretch of the mountain, and they stopped the car. And then the guide pointed down at a haze of orange and black that was so far away I had to go from optical into digital zoom to get a shot. The strange thing is, that even that tiny glimpse of tiger-behind was exhilarating. But then it was so far away! We were at the top of a mountain on one side, and it was at the foot of the mountain opposite, which was separated from ours by a river! The tiger too was camera shy and kept stopping behind huge trees! It was exhilarating, but it was frustrating.

As I soon found out though, the guides at Ranthambore were not in fact phoneys, they really did know what they were doing. Our guide jumped back in the car when it looked like the tiger had had enough of us, and told the driver to speed off in the same direction that the tiger was headed. I didn't think this was going to go anywhere. The tiger was so far away. We sped back down the mountain, came to a clearing which was level with where the tiger was, and stopped. Across the massive river, the guide had a much better view of the tiger, but then I couldn't see it because Zozo's big head kept getting in the way, and we weren't allowed to get out of the car in case any of the other tigers were close by and/or were hungry.

So I sat in the car, we all sat. The guide told us to be dead quiet, and we obeyed. The next thing I heard was "he's coming this way", and before I had time to react, the most incredible animal I have ever seen in my life was walking out of the river and was standing right in front of me. Okay, not right in front of me, but he was barely 2 metres from our jeep! And he was so beautiful, so incredibly beautiful that none of us said a word. No one moved, no one blinked, all we did was take picture after picture after picture of this gynormous tiger that we had at first thought was camera shy, but which then swam across the river to get his moment in the spotlight. It was phenomenal. I was speechless. (And I'm not even an animal-enthusiast. The bulky British guy sitting behind us cried!) The tiger walked past the front of our car, and then carried on into the forest. The whole thing must have lasted about 3 minutes, but the feeling of awe didn't leave us for days, not even when a dog lunged at my foot and almost bit me in Jaipur, and not even when a bigger, scarier dog chased Zozo in Udaipur several days later. (That's a lie, we completely forgot about the tiger at both those moments - I even phoned the hotel staff and threatened them with a law suit. Okay that's a lie too, I phoned them and told them to lock the dog up which they kinda forgot to do, and then I got our travel agent who was a 'big boss man' to tell them off.)

We are now in Kochi (in Kerala) and have left Rajasthan behind - thank goodness! After Ranthambore it was palace after fort after fort after palace in Jaipur, Deogarh and Udaipur. And it was HOT too! Hotter than Lagos. Possibly even hotter than Dubai (during the 5 minutes that I walked from the plane to the airport in June en route to Beijing). We saw several temples too - the most beautiful being in Ranathkpur between Deogarh and Udaipur. Unfortunately I have no pictures of that amazing temple as by the time we were seeing it, we were so sick of taking our shoes off and getting our feet dirty just to see holy walls covered in pigeon shit, that we declined to pay the 200 rupees for a camera ticket, expecting to be out of the temple within 5 minutes. What a mistake that was, we were there for an hour! But I do have a picture of the tiger, and this I believe, is going to be the first ever photo of my own that I have displayed on my blog in the year and however many months that I have had it, so please cherish the moment.

Yours,

Bitchindini Xxx

Click on the image to see it in all its glory

Hot Child in the City

2007-11-17T12:31:00.001Z

Ok so I'm in Delhi, and so far there has been only one monkey.

Hurrah!

But... Remember Rukks? The friend I mention once in a while? The girl with the warped fashion sense who used to leave really mean comments on here? The first friend to tell the truth about that skank-ass weave I had done by Feline in Smackdown vs Raw? and moaned about in Pants On Fire?

Well... Rukks has a blog now! Yaay! Please read it, it'll make you laugh. And whilst I was not too pleased about her blatant THEFT of my name concept, I decided to go ahead and do the "good friend" thing anyway.

www.sickerfaint.blogspot.com

Mosquitos, Monkeys and Me

2007-11-15T12:36:00.000Z

The conversation in the post below was not at all a scene from the rom com that some of you have now conjured up on my behalf. It was in fact very embarassing, and then very awkward, and then downright hilarious.

After the Italiano's question (i.e. where I left off) I burst out laughing. I laughed my head off, he burst out laughing too and then we carried on with our silly conversation.

Did he mean what he said and did I then ruin it by laughing my head off? I don't think so.

Did I want him to mean what he said? No I did not. As you may have spotted by now, I am a brat. I want what I can not have, and then when it begins to look like I am about to get it, I stop wanting it. Obviously the above isn't always true, but this time, I am ashamed to say, it was.

I'm terribly sorry if my post was misleading ;) You should know never to get excited by anything that comes out of my mouth/ fingers. I am a joker! I thought that much was obvious. If you feel lost/ cheated/ confused, I apologise. But I will make up for it with the juicy (try hilarious) posts that I'm sure will follow in the next few days. I am off to Delhi tonight, from where I will be traveling around Rajasthan and then Kerala for 3 weeks.

I refused my GP's offer of anti-malaria medication on the premise that I am Nigerian and thus naturally immune (don't ask how she accepted that bullcrap). I have recently discovered however that the mosquitos in India are not at all the same as the weasly bugs flying around in Lagos. They are muscly. And I am worried.

I also received a video clip (see below) from a friend reminding me of the news story I heard about (but ignored) whilst in Paris - apparently Delhi has been overrun by wild monkeys which have been harrassing and terrorising the local population for ages now.

Doesn't this promise to be a fun trip?

L'Italien, Un Serveur et Des Cheveux Faux

2007-11-07T15:09:00.001Z

In as brief a manner as possible (yeah right), I am going to tell two different stories.

The first, is about how I came to discover what the problem was with the Italian.

And the second, is about how the Italian came to discover that my silky long locks are not in fact mine.

On Saturday, several hours after my darling E-Weezy hopped off the Eurostar and after we stuffed ourselves silly, I got a call from the Italiano inviting us to dinner with him and some other Italianos who were in Paris visiting him. E-Weezy and I arrived at the restaurant in Montparnasse (that was such an unnecessary detail wasn't it?) a little late, as per usual. After a somewhat lukewarm (try frosty) reception from the other Italianos who looked mighty shocked to have two dark-skinned senoritas descend unannounced upon their dinner party, we sat down and the outrageous flirting with Oga P began. I did all the right things, I tossed my hair left and right, fiddled with my fingers, batted the eyelids... the works! I believe E-Weezy even took notes on her blackberry. It was a masterclass in flirting, of the sort only to be witnessed once per lifetime.

Half way through dinner (which I thought was going very well) I noticed that the Italiano's hand (he was sitting across from me) was under the table. I then noticed that the girl sitting to his right (across from E-Weezy who was sitting to my left) also had her hand under the table. Now, even though I have never ever been good at statistics, it was pretty damn obvious (without having to crane or stretch my neck) that there was absolutely no way their hands could be where they were, and not be touching.

At that, the evening took a turn for the worse, I lost my appetite, and E-Weezy was forced to listen to me moan and groan for an extensive period when we got back (slightly earlier than planned) to mine.

The second story I am going to tell played itself out in front of my very perplexed eyes not too long, a mere three hours ago in fact.

After 2 days of ignoring the Italian, trying my hardest not to flirt or laugh at his stupid jokes, I was forced to spend the afternoon alone with him today as the other girl in our class left yesterday. We went to the brasserie round the corner (because he is in love with their sausages), argued over whether to sit inside or outside (no prizes for guessing where I wanted to sit) and then ended up sitting outside. The waiter, who is very friendly (surprising for Paris isn't it?) bounded over, and began to chat to us. He moved the heater closer to us because I moaned to him about the cold. And then, he turned to me and said (in French) "Your hair will be okay, yes?"

I froze. After a sneaky glance at Oga P (who was looking very confused), I somehow found my voice and said, with as big a smile as I could manage, thinking that would silence him - "Yes it'll be fine, thank you".

But NO he wasn't done.

"So they are extensions yes?" he said next, with a huge grin on his face. I can't remember now what the word for extensions is in French, but I assure you that it was not a word that the Italiano knew.

Again I glanced at him, again the perplexed look.

"Yes" I said.

The waiter continued, "Oh I can't wait to tell my friend. She is black like you, but from Senegal, and she pays so much for her hair from Brazil. I can never tell that it's fake. Where is yours from? Brazil too?"

"No, California" I said.

And thus the conversation continued, ending only after I had explained to the waiter, Oga P and all the other patrons in the establishment, the differences between human and synthetic hair, and Brazilian and American hair, and my reasons for choosing to go with American rather than Brazilian hair.

The waiter eventually left, I thought for a split second that a heart attack was on the ascent, but then the Italiano turned my attention to something else, and we continued our chit chat.

We talked about several things, even about my hair, and then he said (completely out of the blue), "Tu as un fiancé à Londres?"

"No I'm not engaged!" I said, even though I understood perfectly well what he meant (his French is hilarious. He speaks Italian, Spanish and English and so throws in whatever European word he chooses when he can no longer be bothered, simply because he knows whoever he is speaking to will be able to work it out).

"Do you have a boyfriend in London?" he said again, this time in English.

"No," I said. Then, in as light a tone as I could muster, "And you, you have a girlfriend yes?"

To which he said "No".

To which I said "Huh?"

To which he said "Huh?"

To which I then said "But your friend that my friend (meaning E-Weezy) was speaking to on Saturday, wasn't she your girlfriend?"

And what was his reply?

"No, whatever gave you that idea? She's one of my best friends."

I didn't know what to do at this point. I didn't know whether to go into the hand-holding, or into my spying and subsequent rage when I saw what I thought I saw on Saturday.

And so I kept quiet.

And then he said, "So you don't have a boyfriend in London? How come?"

I told him how come.

And then he said, "So basically, what you need is a boyfriend like me."

-----

And there dear friends, is where I have decided that I am going to stop. But before I go, I shall leave you with two words, and two words alone. And they are...

Hot (and) Cake!

Italy vs. France - La Lutte Des Amants

2007-11-01T12:00:00.000Z

I came to my blog just now with the intention to tell a big fat lie about a situation that currently plagues me, but I find that for some bizarre and completely inexplicable reason, I am compelled to tell the truth. (This' a first innit? Teehee!)

I have spent the last week in the company of two very good-looking, very intelligent gentlemen. As you may have worked out from the title, one is Italian, the other French (actually I thought he was Brazilian when I first met him, as he's half Asian).

The problem here is not that I find it difficult to flirt with two men at the same time (on the contrary, I am reveling in this current 'predicament'). No, the problem is that the Italian doesn't seem to want to play anymore!

Now, as one who is accustomed to a regular stream of admirers (hyuk hyuk) I am astounded! Astounded is too weak a word. I am flipping flabbergasted! As I said to my dearest Misan via email the other day, 'How dare he not like me? Is he crazy?!'

The Italian (who Misan insists on referring to as 'Oga P' simply because it gets on my nerves, and because she dislikes his name) confuses me. He spends the entire weekend with me, takes me to beautiful place after beautiful place, and then to a fantastic jazz club (which so happens to be where I met the Frenchy - am I naughty or what? Hmmm... Perhaps this is why he isn't interested. Anyway...) He insists on walking with me to my apartment every single time we go out, moves me out of harms way even when it's unlikely that the granny approaching on her bicycle could do me much damage. Then he invites me round to his, cooks me dinner, agrees to watch 'The Bodyguard' with me even though he insists it's a very stupid film and he knows he will be forced to spend the rest of the evening translating it into English for me. He insists I stay for ages and ages, until I'm literally falling asleep, and does all manners of other sweet things etcetera etceteroo.

But then... Nothing!

Now if the Italian were the basic ugga-bugga Naijaman sort (i.e. "Me man, you woman, man want woman, woman must want man" etc), or the sleezy Joey Tribbiani-type Italiano, things would be far less confusing. But as luck (or disaster) would have it, he's the complete opposite! He's a flippin' hippy, who just also happens to be a gentleman.

Moving on very quickly to the Frenchy. He makes me laugh to no end whenever we see. When we met at the Jazz Club, I was still yet to buy a mobile phone, and so he made a huge show of writing his number on my hand so that I'd be forced to remember him the next day (which was absolutely hilarious, and so not as cheesy as it sounds). He took me to a football game yesterday (even though he knew I would be bored stiff) simply because he wanted to see me but had already made plans to go to the game. He constantly asks me all sorts of questions, and is particularly anxious about my 'friendship' with the Italian. And yes, it is very clear that the Frenchy would be happy to get kissy kissy with Bitchy.

But... Bitchy wants the Italian!

To be honest, she wasn't entirely sure she wanted the Italian until the Italian began to act as though he was indifferent to Bitchy, at which Bitchy promptly began to flirt with the Italian like a wasp on heat! (Gosh, I'm such an idiot) And if you've been reading this blog long enough to remember my 'Flirtatious' post, you will remember that Bitchy is an unwitting flirt, and thus when she does take the decision to actively engage in flirtatious behaviour, is quite frankly, ridiculous to behold.

Sigh... I'm almost tempted to give up, but it's just so intriguuuueing. I am a hot cake! How can this possibly be happening?

N.B. I will not take kindly to comments that make mention of the lard, cakes and other such things that have been discussed in previous posts. The size of my arse is completely besides the point. If anything, it should be working to my advantage. It certainly would be in Naijaman territory. Perhaps I should just stick to the breed I know ey?

Le Tektonik... Bouges Tes Fesses!

2007-10-28T13:13:00.000Z

The things I do for my blog (and my internet addiction)...

The apartment I've been living in since Wednesday doesn't have any internet connection. My landlord (who lives in London but is currently in the middle of nowhere in rural Ethiopia) had implied that there would be several 'open' wireless networks that I would be able to tap into with ease. I did find the open networks, but then the signal in the flat is far too weak to open the simplest of websites (even when I was stood precariously atop a stool on Wednesday night, holding my laptop up to the window in a moment of sheer, pathetic, desperation. Don't ask how I thought I'd be able to use the internet from such a bizarre position).

Today, I decided I just had to get online, and so left my flat at 12.30 (bloody early on a Sunday for me) with my Mac in tow. Within the first 5 minutes of my search, I begun to despair as Sunday is apparently a day of true rest here in Paris. Nothing was open! 45 minutes later though, I am now happily installed in a chic restaurant called 'Le Fumoir', which is next door to the Louvre, eating a delicious (but ridiculously expensive) brunch all on my own, whilst choking on thick clouds of cigarette smoke, just so that I can have the pleasure of complimentary internet for at most an hour.

Am I sad or what? (Teehee!)

I have been eating so much food here in Paris, that even my vocal chords have been affected, according to my mother. The first thing she said when I picked up the phone yesterday, was "You sound fat". How she managed to detect this over the 6,000 miles of crackly telephone wire between us, I will never know. But Maman, who knows me like the back of her hand, has a knack for these things, and there was just no use in denying that in the space of one week I have become a walking tub of lard.

I am however a tub of lard with a newfound appreciation for graphic novels. Here they're called Bandes Dessinees or something like that. In FNAC the other day, I randomly stumbled upon an entire floor of the things. The first one that caught my eye, had the picture of an African girl on its cover, which of course meant that I had to open it. And I'm so glad now, that I did, because it is absolutely hysterical. The Aya de Yopougon series is about an almost incestuous little village in Cote d'Ivoire, where young girls who dream of becoming hairdressers chase after old men, or sexy Parisiens, whilst their mothers storm out of their households when children fathered by their husbands turn up. (Sound familiar?) It is just hilarious!

Oh and it's helped with my French too!

I went to Notre Dame yesterday, which was a teeny bit of a let down. But I insisted on seeing it even though Paolo (more on him later... ) didn't want to because he had been equally let down a couple of years ago. Even though I've been to Paris several times in the past, I've never made it to Notre Dame for some reason, and so it was an absolute must this trip. After 20 minutes in it's dark, depressing interior, we were back out in the Ile de la Cité, on our way to Saint Chappelle. The latter turned out to be gorgeous, and was thankfully worth the metal scanner and impromptu frisk at the hands of two very unfriendly policemen (St Chappelle is in the middle of the Gendarmerie, for some bizarre reason). On to the Conciergerie, to see where Marie Antoinette was beheaded, and then to the Latin Quarter for the most divine crepe I have had in my entire life - chocolate sauce, cocoa liquor, whipped cream and coconuts. (Can't you just hear the lard swishing as I type?)

Paris is absolutely fabulous! We went on the Bateaux Mouches on Friday (another highlight in Paris that I had never before taken advantage of), and even though it got so cold that I wanted to bite my fingers off just to stop the pain, I still felt all swoony and inspired and poetic and cheesy riding along the Seine and looking at all the gorgeous gorgeous architecture. Ever the bimbo, I was forced to act as though I'd always known that Paris was in possession of its own Statue of Liberty. I knew the French gave one to America okay, it just never really occurred to me that they kept one for themselves! Christ, perhaps I shouldn't be admitting this in public?

I also have to report that I received my first "holler" in Paris. Finally! If you're wondering what the hell I'm on about, basically I left New York thinking I was the most gorgeous thing on the planet because everywhere I went, somebody "hollered" at me. They'd walk towards me in the street, and then just when they were within earshot, would go, "Mmm...mmm... God bless ya sister!" "Have a good day now, you pretty thing!" I even got the occasional business card, and a couple of hollers from umm... women. And it wasn't just the unemployed layabouts in Misan's ghetto doing the hollering by the way, it was also chic sophisticated folk. The height of it was when I had a shop assistant in Macy's (a beautiful, beautiful specimen of the male species) follow me around for 3 hours. By the end of the 2nd hour, he was modelling clothes for me (obviously not female ones, these were for my brother), and showing me item after item, just so I wouldn't leave. When I finally checked out at his till, he subtly implied that he would be "clocking out" too in a few minutes, to which I replied, "Uh... Have a nice day.

But anyway... in Paris I have been somewhat astounded by the Frenchman's unwillingness to acknowledge my hotness factor. And it has been a rather painful climb back down to Planet Earth. Thankfully though my floundering ego has been salvaged this weekend (Woohoo!) The first of my hollers came, unfortunately though, from a street-side Tektonik maestro! I suppose I should have been flattered, but umm... I just wan't. If you have no clue what Tektonik is (probably because you are lucky enough to reside in another more normal part of the world), have a look at the video below. Le Tektonik has taken Paris by storm. I'm not kidding! French people are usually so chic, that this new stage in their sociocultural development is just bizarre... it's beyond bizarre, it's absurd!

I don't think this gentleman is very good at Le Tektonik, but then this is what the pros look like to normal eyes. Xxx

La Cochonne Stupide et les Gâteux Parisiens

2007-10-23T21:09:00.000+01:00

It has been so funny reading the comments from my previous post. Now I understand why the French are so touchy about their language. Everyone butchers it!

Teehee!

Tomorrow, I will be leaving my box of a hotel room for (fingers crossed) a much nicer room at an undisclosable (?) location. Et alors, il faudra que je dise "au revoir" à St Germain. Ce quartier de Paris est très beau, mais il y a trop de patisseries. Trop trop de patisseries. Les patisseries sont partout, et elles sont toutes petites, et toutes remplies!

(After poking at other people's french, I hope I haven't just embarassed myself there. Teehee! - Basically, I said I am having trouble with the number of patisseries in this part of Paris - St Germain dés Pres.)

Picture a very cold Bitchy (it's been absolutely freezing everyday thus far) walking briskly on the dewy streets of gaie "Pareee". Wispy white fumes are flying out of her trembling mouth and enlarged nostrils. She moves quickly, desperate to reduce the 15-minute walk to school to a 5-minute one (because it is 8:55am, and she was supposed to have left the hotel at 8:30, but was for some reason unable to do so - perhaps because she has never in her life been able to walk out the door at the correct time?)

Anyway, where was I? ... Bitchy! Trying as hard as possible to walk at her absolute quickest, wanting to pee (because the weather is far too cold, and icy weather for some reason makes her want to pee), but being accosted at the same time. Accosted, I say, by millions of trays on either side of her, trays lining the street, lurching (almost) out of their display cases at her, trays laden with goodies, mountains of goodies, volcanos of goodies, oodles of the good stuff! (In this case, the good stuff is so good that Bitchy thinks the only appropriate way to describe it Naijanized speak would be - "the bonz stuuuuurvs"? Ou peut-être, le bon "sturvins"?)

Palmiers, meringues, macaroons, eclairs, tartes, pies, baguettes, brownies, quiches, biscuits, cookies, the colours, the crusts, the crumbs, they hit our favourite bitch, bang, bang, bang, one after the other. They slap her upside the head, slap, slap, slap, window after window.

And thus the scene continues... Until 15 minutes later, when at 9:10am, Bitchy arrives in the classroom. Late, apologetic, breathless, hungry and desperate for the loo.

The first time this happened, on Monday, I was just gobsmacked. At first I stopped to stare, but then decided that the only way to make it to my destination would be to fend off the vicious images by putting both hands up on either side of my face, and picking up the pace. All I could do was swear at myself for having chosen to arrive at this very phase of my life, in the city of supreme bakers and chefs.

What was I thinking?

You see, not only have I been somewhat lax on the exercise front since I left Lagos, I have also been nursing a bit of a holiday paunch since my New York trip. Why? Uh... Possibly because I spent a large part of my time in New York eating?

In New York, I bought confectionery everywhere I went. I tore at my map until I found the infamous Magnolia Bakery on Bleecker Street. Dissatisfied, I made Misan abandon a taxi that had been hard come by (we must have waited in the cold for about 20 minutes?), just so that I could go to Butter Cup Bakeshop (Magnolia's sister bakery, on 52nd & 2nd). And dissatisfied still, I went on to Dean & Deluca on Prince Street, thinking that if there was a group of people whose taste I could rely on, it was my sisters from Sex & The City. I went to zillions of other bakeries as well, including The Little Pie Company on 14th & 9th in Meatpacking!

In short, each time I walked past a bakery, I went in.

At the end of my stay in NY (several thousands of calories later, and after a humongus (sp?) wastage of time), I concluded that New York's reputation as the home of brilliant cupcakes, desserts and cheesecakes, was not at all deserved. Ask me how the hell it took so long to arrive at that conclusion, when right from my first encounter with a flaky, floury, flavourless Red Velvet cupcake at Magnolia Bakery, it should have been crystal clear? (The folks at Magnolia could do to learn a thing or two from the Hummingbird in Portobello, or Peyton & Byrne in Soho - two of London's finest!)

What I wish now though, is that I could go back in time, wipe all that American fat off my... uh... slate, and begin afresh. Malheuresement, cela ne serait que possible si j'étais un génie ou un scientiste fou! Paris? C'est ridiculeux! I am literally stuffing myself at every opportunity - you would think I had never seen food before, or (if not for the beautiful white coat that protects me from the terrible weather) that I was some poor, starving African child who had only just left her motherland for the first time ever in her life! Que, je suis un cochon! During my coffee and lunch breaks, I have gorged like a freak (or a ravenous lioness if you prefer) on mountains of goodies. Today for example, I tried a cake (the name of which I have now forgotten, urrrgh!) which was so soft and just sweet enough, but with a lovely brown crust and crisp corners. Hmmm... C'était delicieux! Chei! I am ruined. And from tomorrow, I will have my own fridge ("un frigo"). And what does one do with a fridge in Paris except fill it to bursting with cheese and foie gras?

E wo!

What's this little piggy to dooooooo?

*NB - One of the pictures in this post is rather deceiving. I have not yet encountered a single cupcake in Paris. Perhaps it's too simple a confection for the French? Hmmm.... Je vais commencer le cherche pour un 'cupcake' Parisien à demain.

La Belle Salope Dans Un Hôtel Moche

2007-10-21T21:01:00.000+01:00

Just as there are loonies on the loose in New York, it turns out that there are crazy people on the rampage in Paris. I am yet to encounter them, as I only arrived this afternoon, but my friend assured me this evening, that they are everywhere. Unlike their North American cousins however, they don't howl or dance or kick things in the street. They look like boys, young boys, young boys dressed in street gear. Apparently their madness only exhibits itself (think screws loosening rapidly) when poor unsuspecting females respond to their snappy, fiery questions. I have been told not to say "Pardon" or "Excusez-moi" or anything of the sort when (not if) I encounter this rabid species. My instructions are to walk away and blank them completely, or babble back at them in rapid English. The latter, apparently, will be almost as effective as a bout of pepper spray (which by the way I also carry with me - a gift from my very paranoid Maman).

The end of my brief stay in New York was rather eventful, but not in the way I had anticipated.

The Saturday that followed my last blog post brought with it a mission to Ellis Island, which we aborted barely 10 minutes into the voyage due to an unforeseen and completely unexpected battle with a disgruntled, ageing nincompoop at the Post Office, which lasted for close to an hour. At one point things got so heated that I thought he said "Alright Bitch" to me (when in fact he said "Alright Mitch" to the guy next to him) and began to roll up my sleeves whilst plotting the best route via which to launch a hefty slap in his direction through the bullet-proof glass barrier that separated us. (Yeah right! I would probably have injured myself if I'd made any such move. I did get very angry though - at least that part is true!)

Also on Saturday, I managed to catch a showing of Tings Dey Happen, Dan Hoyle's one-man play at the Culture Project, which turned out to be hilarious beyond belief. I hadn't expected to enjoy it, after scanning through the lame signboard erected in the theatre's waiting area. I believe its title was something like 'Pidgin for Beginners', and its contents ranged from ennervating entries like "Dey = To Be", to equally irritating ones like "Na so? = Is that true?" But from the moment Dan (think skinny white guy with a rather odd/ overly-expressive face) walked onto the stage, my two compadrés and I found ourselves howling like a bunch of cheetahs. Aside from a lady behind us (the only other Nigerian in the room), it was pretty much our shrieking and laughter reverberating around the room the entire time. The oyinbo audience just did not get it. I suppose they either hadn't come prepared to find humour in the dark dank subject of the Niger Delta, or were having as much trouble understanding Dan's pidgin as they would a Korean monologue (and it probably didn't help that their hair colour was predominantly grey too - me thinks they were mostly retired university intellectuals/diplomats plus spouses/partners). The range of characters (of all shapes, sizes, tribes, accents) played by Dan was truly impressive! My absolute favourite was Sylvanus, an obsequious, opportunistic Port-Harcourt man with a wonderfully Igbotic (sorry, 'Eastern-Nigerian') accent who served as the humorous stage manager/assistant between scenes. But all the others were so well done, even Asari-Dokubo!

Obviously the sketches weren't just about humour, as all the characters together provided an eagle-eye view of the different interests at play in the ongoing Niger-Delta crisis (even though much-needed portrayals of at least one swindling state governor and one oil-company big dawg were notably amiss). But I'm afraid that's as far as my socio-economico-political analysis is going to go for now, (a) because my specialty is fluff, not serious topics, and (b) because the weird wireless here in Paris has slowed my Macbook down to an excruciating pace! I really hope these people aren't sending me a virus!

After Tings Dey Happen, came dinner and belly-dancing at L'Orange Bleue, a vigorous street-fight with some Latinos who stole our cab (using words though - I would never let anyone violent near my hair), a spot of clubbing (who says that?) and then a very piggy, very lazy Sunday, followed by a near flight-miss.

And after a very busy week in London, I am now in Paris, where it is almost 10pm and an alluring (albeit stingy and disappointingly flat) pillow is calling (nay, crooning) to me.

Bon Nuit Xxx

Big Footie in The Big Loonie Apple

2007-10-11T15:21:00.000+01:00

So that myth about America being the place to go if you're one of those women who finds herself shunned by Britain's fashion industry because she wears a Size 9 (UK) and above, is bull. I have searched high and low, from Gucci and Louboutin all the way down to frigging Payless, and so far, have only one pair of shoes (beautiful, beeoootifoool boots) to show for all my effort.

If I'm being honest, I have allowed myself to get side-tracked along the way. If ever there was a shopping Mecca, New York City is it. In the last 2 years, friends have told me again and again that if anyone was born to inhabit Manhattan, it was me. I thought they were joking, even exaggerating, and so never made the numerous plans to visit with the true intent to see them through. In the last 2 years, I have planned to come to New York five times, and I never managed to make it until last week.

Now, I see that my friends were preaching the honest truth all that time, and that the only thing my Doubting Thomas/Pharisee methodology achieved was to deny me of what some might even say was my birthright. I LOVE it here! I get more bang for my buck, nightclubs I stroll into have Mark Ronson DJ-ing casually on their decks, hair stylists are so skilled they make me dazzle like Hollywood royalty in under 40 minutes, and there are shops and restaurants on every corner!
I have been having a blast!

I couldn't live here though. The first reason being that the city would bleed me dry and I would find myself homeless in under a month. The second reason (... almost forgot this one) being that I love London (even though I am a little peeved having now discovered first-hand that all us Londoners are victims of daylight robbery, day in day out!) And the third reason being that there are too many crazy people running all over the bloody place!

On Friday afternoon, whilst on a jolly meander around Madison Avenue, the latter realisation was a little too much for me to handle. I had just spent 8 hours on a gruesome Virgin Atlantic flight, during which my insomnia kicked in, and during which I was deprived of a bottle of water for the first TWO hours we spent in the air. Why? Because the airline had lost a passenger. I kid you not - they made everyone sit in their seats for 2 hours, ran around counting us as though we were sheep in a barn, before eventually accepting defeat and making an announcement to the tune of:

"It appears we are missing a Ms. Maggie Gyllenhaal. Dear Passengers, if there is a woman sitting next to you, whose name you do not yet know, could you kindly tap her lightly on the shoulder and say "Hey, Are you Maggie?" Even if she is asleep? We would really appreciate that. Again, thank you for flying Virgin Atlantic. The crew will now be passing through with some refreshments for you."

I also got to witness two very dramatic scenarios in which oxygen had to be pumped up the nostrils of some passengers, and as you can imagine, was more than exhausted when I finally touched down in Newark, which I then discovered was a whole hour away from bloody New York City. E-Weezy who was with me all the while, but who had snoozed like a baby through drama after drama on the entire flight, became the voice of reason at that point, as I was more than just a little "tetchy".

Back to the mad people walking around New York. There are hundreds of them. In my time here I have seen more creeds and colours of loonies than I thought possible. They are everywhere - uptown, midtown, downtown. And they are not just mad, they are barking mad!

To illustrate, on Tuesday afternoon, I was sitting in a cab at a red light, en route to the Meatpacking District. I was watching a lady struggle with her blonde toddler and a pushchair on the sidewalk, when I noticed a tall black man in a blue beanie strolling in their direction. He had a Samuel L. Jackson (on a crazy day) bounce to his walk, and he had huge beady eyes, and little tufts of grey hair all over his neck and chin.

Dude in the blue beanie bounces over to two big blue bins. He lifts the lid off the first one, looks to his left and then to his right, and spits into the bin. In my head I'm thinking, "What the hell is this man doing?" He then goes to the next blue bin, lifts the lid, and does the exact same thing. Then he walks to the crossing, where my cab is still sitting, kicks a trash can (they don't say dust bin here) until it falls over, and stomps across the road.

The lights change, my cab begins to crawl, and as we inch closer to the blue bins I see the white stickers on their lids with the words 'United States Postal Service'.

Even though I think it would be uncharacteristic for the tramps in London to do that kind of thing, I doubt they would have much luck propelling their saliva through the tiny slits in the red Royal Mail boxes. Why? Because we have a postal service that plans for such eventualities! New Yorkers I am afraid to say, do not. So in a few days' time when I get back to London and begin the tedious sift through my mail, I am pretty confident that it will be saliva-free. And even if it isn't, I will be so wonderfully stuffed from my gynormous bites of crazy (but deliciously juicy) apple, that I doubt I will care. Xxx

The Land Is Green

2007-10-02T14:12:00.000+01:00

This is such a positive message, on a personal and a national level.

I know you heard it yonks ago, but we need constant reminders never to give up hope.

Happy Belated Independence Day!

(You know I'm always late)

Xxx

Bolanle And The 3 (Actually, 2½) Wenches

2007-09-29T13:52:00.000+01:00

I have finally finished reading a novel that I began two weeks ago, and which I rather deceptively put on my 'Bitchy's Been Reading' list last week (albeit no one noticed) even though I had barely read the first two chapters. The list below is supposed to imply that the titles piled prettily in that corner of my blog have been gorged on and dissected by yours truly. But in fact, this has often not been the case. Take 'The State of Africa' for example. Have I finished reading it? Nooope! And does it look likely that I will go back to it anytime this year? Nooope! Or 'Riding the Iron Rooster' - Did I get past the half-way mark? No I didn't. And am I ashamed to admit it? Nooope! It's not my fault if I get all excited at the prospect of diving into a new book, only to find after the first 10 pages that, well-written or brilliantly-researched though it may be, it does not set my pulse racing, I do not connect with its characters or contents, and I find myself having to stifle a groan whenever my fingers reach for its rectangular form, despite my desperate pleas for them not to. (nota bene, my fingers appear to be the only bones in my body capable of acting on a guilty feeling)

Moving on swiftly from the revelation that I am just a big, fat phoney, I want to talk about 'Seed' - currently Item No. 2 on my list.

Aeons ago, Yukay, who I both admire and envy (my throat is the body part for feelings of jealousy), blogged about Lola Shoneyin. He didn't dedicate an entire post to her (though he has never dedicated an entire post to one singular subject), and it was only a very simple statement like "... and word on the street is that phenomenal poet Lola Shoneyin's debut novel is on its way", but there was such enthusiasm in that statement that my curiousity (think twitchy knees) was aroused. And so I started googling. (yes I know I have a problem. Please let's not lose focus?)

Anyway, on Lola Shoneyin Dot Com, I read as much as I could read on Yukay's favourite poet, and even read an excerpt from 'Seed' I think. But then I found that I was forced to leave it at that, as no dates for publication or anything of the sort were forthcoming.

Fast forward about three months, to two weeks ago, when I was sat in the agency in the midst of shitty task number three hundred and thirteen. Rooting around in their database, I stumbled upon an electronic folder marked 'SHONEYIN'. I thought I was seeing things, so I opened the folder. And then I became giddy with excitement. I became more than giddy - I was near on epileptic! I couldn't control myself! I completely forgot for several minutes that Dildo the dog was sprawled mere seconds away from me. I opened the file on impulse, read the first 3 paragraphs, and then shut the window guiltily when it suddenly dawned on me that maybe, just maybe, interns were not supposed to feast on precious, unpublished, uncopyrighted material without authorisation?

I looked around the small office, like a kid about to dive sneakily into someone else's cookie jar, and thought...

Bloody hell I want to read this thing! I want to read it now!

But what if they say NO?

But what if they say YES?

But what if they say NO and then I go ahead and then they catch me and fire me and take out adverts warning all potential future employers in the teeny tiny publishing world in Britain, the United States and beyond, to stay away from a freak of a girl called....

To cut the story (which is becoming so bloody long, I do apologise, even I am getting tired), I asked if I could read 'Seed'. They said YES and were delighted that an intern would show such active interest in one of their authors. Why? Because they are truly lovely lovely people and not the ogres I may or may not have made them out to be whilst I was working for them last week - I tend to take a lot of liberties with my story-telling, but hey it makes for good reading dunn'it?

They even let me print out a copy so that I wouldn't have to strain for hours at the tiny computer screen. And two weeks after that fateful day, I am finally able to say, that 'Seed' is just brilliant. Absobloodylutely brilliant. It is so quick, and so snappy, and so spunky, and so full of energy, that everyone and everything in it is so fantastically alive. I felt like I was watching the scenes in High Definition - not that I have yet born witness to this new wave of technology, but you know what I mean. It was everything I have imagined the High Definition experience will be, and more.

I have a tendency to give too much away when I talk about a novel like this, and so I don't want to delve too deep. But Lola Shoneyin is just so subtle and so crafty and so delightfully wicked! I love her! She has taken a scenario right out of three quarters of the Nollywood movies sitting on shop shelves in Awolowo Road and being peddled on the street in Kilburn by dodgy Chinese ladies, and has turned it into a work of sheer brilliance. Characters who, if moulded by anyone else would be so placid, so bland, so lacking in depth, are so cleverly nuanced (I said 'nuance' when talking about McEwan didn't I?) The evil older wives (who I have termed 'The Wenches' in my title) could so easily have been blacker than night, without the slightest redeeming moment or feature. But slowly and subtly, Shoneyin peels the layers off each of them, even the evil-est of them, until you are left going "HA! Good for you! But oh! How terribly unfortunate. Pele!" Even the hideous husband, whose ailing digestive system is described in the most repulsive yet laugh out loud gobsmackingly hilarious way, had a moment of sheer frailty and utter despondency towards the end, so frail and so tragic, that I felt moved to weep for him. Obviously I didn't weep, because I still thought of him as a bumbling idiot, but Shoneyin made me want to weep, even if only for a second, and that was what was so bloody fantastic about her novel.

Another thing I loved about 'Seed' was the grand, poetic dialogue that ran through the entire novel, between characters who Shoneyin tells us unequivocally from the start, are all illiterates. It wasn't until I begun to read 80% of the novel in one straight sitting yesterday afternoon, that I realised that these people, who failed to detect the hilarious sarcasm directed at them by other 'educated' individuals, were speaking to each other in Yoruba. The wives (all except for Bolanle 'the graduate') insisted on addressing their husband as "My Lord". In scenes between the 3 wenches and their own mothers or relatives, their speech was infused with such drama, with such rich imagery and structure that they could have been characters in a Yoruba parody of Shakespeare's Macbeth, or even The Bible!

Just look at this...

" 'Keep your mouth shut Iya Simisola! It is a sin to speak evil of those who are led by the Spirit!' Iya Ade warned.

'You dare tell me to shut my mouth?' Iya Funmi took a deep breath and stood up. She turned her entire body round to gaze down at Iya Ade. 'You worm. From what mound did you crawl? If not for the mighty rains, would the pigeon and the turkey find themselves shuffling for shelter beneath the same awning? You talk about sin? Did they not teach you that bearing false witness is a sin in your church? Or does the Bible you brandish like a hatchet not say that?' "

I love love loved it! And I'm sure you will too when you get to read it in... Oh I don't know how many months' time. Teehee! I am so chuffed that I got to read it this early, and so excited too! Nigerian literature is truly blazing ahead at break-neck speed. Helon Habila got it soooo wrong when he said this is "the year of the Nigerian writer". This is the decade, no, the century of the Nigerian writer. Our people are taking over oh! Xxxx

Happy Ending

2007-09-20T20:11:00.000+01:00

I'm listening to 'Happy Ending' by MIKA right now, which is possibly one of the best songs I've heard in a long long while. On a whim this evening, I thought - "Isn't he playing in London soon? Hmmm... Perhaps I'll buy tickets?" Unfortunately it looks like I'm a little too late for that, as his myspace page informs me that all his London shows, which (wait for it) aren't till December, are completely sold out!

I can't believe it. I am in so much pain. Not just because I think he is absolutely fantastic, but because if I hadn't been such a moody billy goat a few years ago, I would probably have been able to call him up 5 minutes ago and request tickets from him myself, instead of being forced to stage a dramatic mourning session in the middle of my living room for the benefit of my very irritated brother.

Five years ago, on a random school day, my friend Zozo (who you may or may not remember from my rendezvous with The Jigga Man) came to me, and asked me if one of the boys in her art class could paint me. At first I thought, "Uh... Why?" but then decided I'd hear him out. His name was Mica, and I had no clue who he was. I was new to a school that was smack bang in the centre of London, and all that was on my recently-liberated mind at the time, was hopping from club to club and shop to shop like some mad, energised bunny on heat!

So I went to the Art building, to meet this Mica. And in walked the skinniest boy I had ever seen! He had these huge eyes that kinda drowned out the rest of his face. His cheekbones were so high and so pronounced that he looked a little like a ghost, but a ghost with an exotic past life, if that makes any sense.

Anyway, Mica and I chatted for all of thirty seconds, in which I began to think that being painted by a lanky emaciated boy in the year above me, might not be such a bad idea. He then said that he wanted me to wear something specific whilst he painted me, and that he hoped I would like it. I can't remember exactly, but I think Zozo was also in the room, and she gave me this funny look that made me just a little apprehensive.

Mica walked into a side room, and then came back in holding what was, and still is, the smallest, tightest corset I had ever seen in my life. I gave him a look that implied that I thought he was retarded. First of all, there was no way I was going to be able to fit into that thing. And furthermore, there was no way I was going to stand in the middle of a very cold, very large room, wearing it on my not so toned, not so flab-free body, whilst this strange boy (who had made the corset by himself, with me in mind - I was flattered, but just slightly freaked out) painted me! I was pretty slim back then, but exercise was a very foreign, nay, alien, concept to me, and I much preferred to maintain the illusion that underneath my regulation-imposed school clothing was a fabulous, sculpted, trophy-worthy bod!

So I said "No" to Mica. And he looked like I had just destroyed him or something. He even sent his Art tutor to me a couple of days later to ask if I had changed my mind. Apparently the painting couldn't work without me, and it was going to play a huge part in his A-level portfolio.

Still, I said "No".

I never found out what became of his portfolio. I think in the end he used a girl in his year as his model. But even though our school wasn't exactly a gynormous one, I rarely saw him after that. I think he tended to keep a low profile, and I did so too at the time, so aside from one awkward "Hello" or the other when we walked past each other (like once a month) on our way to classes, I didn't speak to him again.

Anyway, before you get the wrong idea and walk away believing (as I may or may not have led you to believe) that this guy, who has now become a global superstar had some kind of unhealthy fixation with Oluwabitchyola, I think it would be best if I shared one teeny detail.

I was the only black girl at our school. And I was a black girl with very long, very sizzling black braids. I don't think it was me he wanted specifically, I think it was my skin colour, and my hair, and what he thought would contrast brilliantly against the corset and the backdrop he had created.

So if you were looking for a story that would have me gloating at the end, as having once been the object of desire of someone who now has a No. 1 under his belt, and who is probably the sexiest Rock god to hit the British Isles since Freddie Mercury, uh.... I'm afraid you will have to look elsewhere.
This and 'Love Today' are my absolute favourites. And 'Happy Ending' of course. It's so weird because even though I barely knew him, I am SO so happy for him!

On Dildo's Beach

2007-09-17T21:22:00.001+01:00

Here sits Dildo, mucking up my beautiful view with her big behind!
Dear Blog Folk,

I would like to thank you all for the advice about Dildo. I am so pleased to report that she has not been to work since that very first day. Yaaay! And NO I did not lace her lunch bowl with laxatives or arsenics or anything of the kind.

Despite this good news, I can't seem to stop craning my neck over the border of my desk everytime I hear the door open. The barricade I put up under my desk last week is still very much erect, and despite two scuffles and word-exchanges with the office cleaner, it looks set to stay that way - especially after the little 'moment' Dildo and I shared last week - barely a few hours after I wrote the post below.

After my tattle-telling session with The Big Boss on Tuesday, I soon found that the habits of Dildo's owner, and Dildo's owner's partner, were not going to die so easily. Every single time they left their room to come out into our communal area, they left their door open, and a few minutes afterwards, their not-so-little furry friend trotted out to see what it was they were up to. (Apparently she doesn't like being left alone. I felt like yelling "Who bloody cares?!!" but bit my tongue).

Round about 4pm, I was given the joyous task of printing labels. With little or no ceremony, I typed the labels on my computer, and clicked print. I then stood up, preparing to make my jolly way over to the printer, when I noticed that a big furry body was SPRAWLED on the floor barely a metre away from my desk. I could not believe it! Raw, untamed panic built up inside me with alarming speed and I sat down abruptly. You see, I have always known that I was afraid of dogs. I knew this the day my mother turned up with two puppies and let them loose under our dining table. I was about 8 at the time, and although I didn't cry, I did curl my knees up under my chin and secure my feet firmly on the same small square of chair as my buttocks! But alas, last Tuesday, I was no longer a petite 8 year old with short, easily bendable legs. I was a ... {insert words to describe a truly stupendous goddess with a not so small butt, and some not so easily bendable legs} ... And I was panic stricken.

Dildo lay on the floor, unperturbed, preening herself, kinda like Cleopatra on a chaise longue, smack bang in the middle of my route to the labels I had so diligently typed out. I sat at my desk, fiddling with the barricade in the hopes of making it look even more impenetrable to the canine eye (what do I know about doggy IQ?), wanting to storm out, but rooted to the chair by my fear, desperate to bawl like a baby, but mindful of the need to maintain my 'professional' countenance.

Gawd, it was awful!

I really thought I was going to spend the rest of the day glued to my chair, until Dildo grew tired of the 'Isn't it fun torturing Bitchy?' game she had been playing all day! As luck (and GOD) would have it though, Cee came along (she has now become my favourite person in the office, a knight in shining armour, some would say), and sensed from my... um... wobbly expression that all was not so good in Bitchy's hood.

So she got down on all fours, at which Dildo promptly rolled over onto her back (she really is a diva), and began a laborious tummy rub of the stupid dog. Apparently Dildo is a sucker for all things massage-related, but she won't accept rubs from just anyone. She accepts them only from her friends, and only on those days when she requests them. In short, rub her at your peril! Whilst Cee rubbed and rubbed, and imparted all this information about the cranky dog that I had been told was "only a harmless bunny-wunny", I walked to and from the printer, picking up my labels, grabbing envelopes, and berating myself for signing up for the stupid job. Only I could have chosen to work for FREE in an office where a temperamental/ menopausal/ possessed DOG reigned supreme! I walked around lunging at anything in sight that I thought could possibly be of use to me during the remaining 90 minutes I would have to spend in the office, as I vowed at that moment, that I would not leave my seat, not once, not in the event of a runny nose, a water spill, or other such eventuality... not until it was time to go home.

Till next time... Xxx

P.S. Re Title, It was supposed to be a lame pun on the title of Ian McEwan's book. I had actually intended to give my lengthy verdict on 'On Chesil Beach' (months after everyone else, yes, I know!) but somehow all that got lost in the painful memories from last week that came flooding back. Condensed to just a few words, it goes something like this - "What is all the fuss about??" Fine, the suspense in the novel (which I think should even be classed as a novella) is fantastic, and McEwan brilliantly leaves his reader dangling in the air with such unrestrained abandon, and in such an easy manner that many have tried and failed to emulate. But, I am still not convinced that this is a work of literary genius, or that it is deserving of the Booker. Think about it - Is this the best book you ever read? Is it even close?

A Working Girl's Woe

2007-09-11T22:50:00.001+01:00

Bitchy sent the email below to a group of beloved friends this afternoon, and just now, on her way to bed, decided that she would share it on her blog. She decided this for 2 reasons. First, because she is aware of the fact that she has not blogged in a while, and is afraid that if she persists in being lazy, she is unlikely to ever blog again. And second, because she needs many hands on deck to help her deal with a very serious problem.

For the avoidance of confusion, you ought to know that Bitchy signed up 2 days ago as an "intern" with a leading literary agency in London. She was looking for something with which to pass the time between her sojourn in Lagos and her forthcoming globe-trotting stint. For 2 days, Bitchy has played the role of a receptionist whose activities include letting delivery men into the office building, answering the office telephone, trudging up 4 flights of stairs with a large sack of post in tow, replying to emails that the agents are too busy/irritated to respond to themselves, and standing at attention in anticipation of the arrival of clients before ushering them into the office and offering them cups of tea/coffee/poison.

This was not the role she signed up for when she filed her application. Bitchy was told by the lead agent that she would get the chance to read and edit manuscripts. Many, many manuscripts. That she would drown in stacks of them and retire home a happy bunny every day. But after her first 2 days, Bitchy finds that she is yet to come within even a hair's breath of a manuscript!

She has been deceived.

*Start of Email*

"This whole job thing is just turning into one terrible Ben Stiller-esque comedy show. First I'm getting tongue paralysis from stamp licking (I've worked out my own form of revenge though.... If an envelope I weigh needs 42p of stamps, I put a 50p stamp on it. Ha!) And then today, I got the brilliant news that this guy who works in the office next door (which for some reason keeps open the door it shares with us all the damn time) is coming back tomorrow, with his HUGE grumpy DOG!!!

Can you imagine???? And guess WHO sits beside the open shared door? ME!! I.e. Bitchy, who is TERRIFIED of dogs. I'm so scared. I've been praying all day for some kind of miracle. Please join me. I want the thing to drop dead over night.

What is wrong with these British people? A DOG in the office???? And they didn't even tell me about it when I applied!! I rejected another agency simply because they had a dog. And I hate how they act like you're some kind of gremlin from PLUTO if you say you're afraid of/ don't like dogs!!

I am MISERABLE!!!"

*End of Email*

Dear Blog Folk,

Please join Bitchy in praying for the infliction of a sudden and inexplicable but completely curable and easily treatable illness on said massive dog, which threatens to make her miserable experience even more miserable from tomorrow morning onwards. Apparently Dildo (that's not its real name, although it's similar enough) is an aggressive dog with a strong distrust for strangers. She is huge and barks like a lion. She is also the queen of the office and saunters from one corner to another unhindered. If opposed she has been known to growl and pounce. But, as Bitchy has been told, "she wouldn't hurt a fly" and her "pounces do not hurt"!!!

After the long consultation process with friends that ensued when the above-inserted email was sent, Bitchy decided that she will be leaving this job on Friday.

But first, there is the issue of the DOG to be dealt with.

Oh and before you go calling her a spoilt brat for the umpteenth time (*cough* Rukks), DID she mention that she isn't even being PAID by the agency for this slave labour?

***** UPDATE *****

Dildo is in the building. She arrived at 11am. So far she has done nothing but BARK ferociously at the poor office cleaner who through no fault of her own passed in front of Dildo's door a number of times whilst doing the vacuuming.

Bitchy has barricaded herself into her desk which, as she discovered, is high enough for Dildo the dog to crawl under if she so desires. Bitchy's dust bin, some lever arch files, and some cardboard boxes that she only just emptied as part of her post-sorting duties, have come in very handy.

Bitchy has also reported (subtly of course and in as non-whingey a form as she could manage) the gentleman whose dog Dildo is, to her boss. The gentleman refused to shut the shared door when Bitchy asked him to this morning. And so she went to the top!

The door is now shut, but Bitchy's barricade is still up. She is taking no chances.

The 'L' Word

2007-08-21T22:31:00.000+01:00

An hour ago, I watched 'Stranger Than Fiction' - the movie starring Will Ferrell, Emma Thompson and Dustin Hoffmann. It made so happy, I wandered about my house and into every bedroom singing/murdering The Darkness' "I believe in a thing called love" at the top of my lungs, in a ... umm ... husky (but very sexy) falsetto.

A few days ago I watched 'Out of Africa' - think Meryl Streep and Robert Redford frolicking in the Kenyan Savannah, on Safari, slaying lions and harvesting coffee beans.

A few days before that I read Khaled Hosseini's 'A Thousand Splendid Suns', which is possibly the best book I've read all year. The only reason I didn't blog about it then was because I didn't think I would be able to do it justice. That, and the fact that I was being lazy... as usual.

But anyway. What do these movies and books have in common I hear you ask?

Love.

Storybook love.

Fairytale love.

Not the love you get told to make do with simply because it does not exist/will never find you/would only be within reach if you intended to shack up with a white guy!

(By the way there was a lot more to these stories than the theme of love, but this is my blog, and I am allowed to overlook things like tragedy, war and burqas for the sake of making a point.)

Some weeks ago, I got a phone call from a friend I hadn't spoken to in a long while. My friend lives in New York and has a job that pays him shit loads of money but which robs him of basic privileges like phone calls and birthday cards, so this call from him was a rare and precious opportunity. We talked about his life, same old, and then about my life, crisis crisis help me please. His response to my crisis (please don't roll your eyes, I really was distraught) was that I should get real, and that happily ever afters do not exist. He then set about talking me through all the couples he and I had ever had experience of - friends, parents, parents' friends. We leafed through the dreadfuls, the only speak when they have to's, and the we're doing okay, at least we're friends, but this isn't what we spent those nights in our teenage beds longing for's.

Needless to say, the picture wasn't pretty.

At the end of our conversation, I decided to step back, be real, and stop arguing. Who was I kidding thinking that a happily ever after was sitting in a pot at the end of my mud-streaked rainbow, just waiting to be discovered? I grudgingly accepted that there was no happily ever after waiting patiently for me. No perfect pairing. No half with which to form a seam-free whole. And for a while, I got by thinking like that.

And then I went and did a foolish thing. I spent a week doing little else but feasting my eyes on Cleopatra and Marc Anthony, Scarlett and Rhet Butler, Clark Kent and Lana frikkin Lang!

And now I've gone back to being me.

Queer,

Naive,

And pretty damn stupid.

Now please, forget for a moment that you now think of me as a very silly, very naive little girl. Forget that, and answer my one very simple, very basic question:- Surely every love story out there cannot just be the by-product of some writer's overactive imagination? Would anyone really be so cruel as to create something so easily believable and so wonderfully desirable, when they know that such a thing could never be? Would they?

What does a girl have to do to get her hair washed beside a babbling brook around here?

A Nigerian Afropolitan African Brit, with Stalker Tendencies

2007-08-10T13:52:00.000+01:00

A while ago on The Afro Beat, we talked about the article, 'What is an Afropolitan?' which Misan found in a random magazine - Only Allah knows where she finds all the things she features on our site. That said, I think she's about to fire me, as my contribution lately has been... um... non-existent, and I'm now about to make matters worse by implicating her in a controversial discussion on my blog.

Back to Afropolitans. Very briefly, they are

"the newest generation of African emigrants... Some of [them] are ethnic mixes, e.g. Ghanaian and Canadian, Nigerian and Swiss; others merely cultural mutts: American accent, European affect, African ethos. Most of [them] are multilingual: in addition to English and a Romantic or two, [they] understand some indigenous tongue and speak a few urban vernaculars. There is at least one place on The African Continent to which [they] tie [their] sense of self: be it a nation-state (Ethiopia), a city (Ibadan), or an auntie’s kitchen. Then there’s the G8 city or two (or three) that [they] know like the backs of [their] hands, and the various institutions that know [them] for [their] famed focus. [They] are Afropolitans: not citizens, but Africans of the world."

The article, with other such paragraphs like that, and sprinkles and dashes of scenes with lounges playing Fela Kuti, made it sound like being stuck in cultural limbo was a groovy thing! And several of us cultural nomads were quick to embrace the label - Yes, we're sad. Sorry! We can't all be cool! And if you'd read how funky the writer made Afropolitans sound, you would've wanted to be one too!

Now, one problem I have faced, in my quest to become a fiction novelist extraordinaire, is my inability to identify closely with the Nigeria that I so desperately want my writing to be linked to. I don't want to be just another writer, I want to become part of that exclusive club (stop rolling your eyes) of African and more specifically Nigerian contemporary writers. I want to sit at round tables with the Chimamandas and Sefis and Helens, and smile like a saturated honeybee at the army of awestruck readers in front of me.

I want it, DAMN it!

But there is an obstacle - I am too much of a cultural nomad to be able to tap into their source. I don't speak any Nigerian languages, I've spent a pathetic amount of time in my hometown, I know nothing about the traditions of the place I call home (and I'm even talking about LAGOS where I spent the first 12 years of my life now, not even the village), and most of what I know, I know from wikipedia!

As part of my "quest" to join Naijawriterhood, I have been spending a lot of time stalking the club's existing members. A good number have become friends of mine, which I'm so pleased about as they are truly great people, but there are others whose books I am still yet to read.

One such other, is Uzodinma Iweala, he of 'Beasts of No Nation' fame. I know I will never read his book because I am too much of a chicken to read anything that features the word war or child-soldier on its cover sleeve, but I have read his article, 'Stop Trying to Save Africa'. That by the way is yet another article that we featured on The Afro Beat! - This one though I “found”, before you assume that Misan did. I was just too lazy to put it up myself so asked my friend to send it to her.

In 'Stop Trying to Save Africa', Uzodinma wrote, and I quote, "There is no African, myself included, who does not appreciate the help of the wider world, but we do question whether aid is genuine or given in the spirit of affirming one's cultural superiority... Every time a well-meaning college student speaks of villagers dancing because they were so grateful for her help, I cringe. Every time a Hollywood director shoots a film about Africa that features a Western protagonist, I shake my head -- because Africans, real people though we may be, are used as props in the West's fantasy of itself."

I remember reading this at the time thinking, "You tell them my brother! Put those condescending weirdos who think we're a bunch of hungry monkeys in their place!"

A few months ago though, I saw him featured in Granta's Best of Young American Novelists and became a little confused. But then I put that down to an editorial error.

Yesterday however, I came across this - an article entitled 'Am I American Enough For You?' by none other than Uzodinma Iweala, and I became more than just a tad confused. Now, I know it's dangerous to do this on the world wide web, but hey he's a public figure, and it's not my fault that when I googled him on a random afternoon all sorts of things about his life, his mother, siblings etc, blasted onto my Safari screen!

In 'Am I American Enough For You?' Uzodinma writes about an experience with a hostile immigration officer when he returned to the States from a brief holiday in Nigeria. He uses this experience to shed light on the typical American attitude to children of immigrants, like himself, who can call no other place but the United States, home. At one part he writes,

"On a personal note, I have been told countless times, when I've been critical of the United States, "If you don't like it, you should just go back to where you came from." My response: "You mean to Potomac, Maryland?" "

I went back to the 'Stop Trying to Save Africa' article yesterday after reading that, just to check whether or not I had imagined that Uzodinma was the same person who put himself forward as the proud harbinger of truth on behalf of his continent in that piece. I then emailed the 'Am I American Enough For You?' article to Misan (my wise and trusted friend :-) You can't fire me anyway, I came up with our name) who said, "Perhaps this is the curse of the Afropolitan? We wear many masks"... Or something to that effect.

I have now spent much of today pondering my status as a Nigerian and as an Afropolitan. Uzodinma's conflicting identities (although they don't really conflict, I'm just trying to make the story sweet so that a few people may decide to comment), really made me wonder about us Afropolitans, and about our internal confusion. Is it really possible that he feels as strongly about his status as an American as he does about his status as an African?

I have enough trouble trying to hold onto my Omo Naija identity as it is! And while I feel very strongly about my status as a Nigerian, I often get despondent when I realise how far removed my life is from the authentic "Naija" deal. My status as a Brit, is even worse. Forget the fact that I will soon have spent more years of my life in Britain, than in Nigeria, to me, the status starts and ends with the red passport! I mean I’m glad I have the passport, otherwise this year’s planned globetrotting would be a total nightmare, but that’s as far as it goes!

So now I ask - Will I ever be able to turn this confusion (it’s really not that drastic, but you know Bitchy loves her some melodrama) into something amazon-worthy in the way that someone like Helen Oyeyemi has been able to? Heck, she’s never even lived in Nigeria and she knows more about Yoruba culture than I do! I'm beginning to think I must've spent the first 12 years of my life with my eyes shut tight by the way! How did I live in Lagos for that long, and turn out to be this clueless?

Or should I just stop poking my nose in at what other writers are doing, and get on with writing my own story? I’ve tried that too by the way, and my friends and family have laughed their heads off at my stories! Apparently they are lacking in "authenticity".

For now, I think I will just go and take a nap. But any answers on a post-it or sticky would be much appreciated. The pretty one's head hurts. Xxx

To Tom Jones

2007-08-07T16:20:00.000+01:00

Dear Tom,

Did you know that the good people at the junction where Jankara Market and Balogun Market intersect, are fans of yours?

Or that the junction where the aforementioned good people reside is in fact named the Tom Jones Junction?

I bet you didn't.

And did you know that today Bitchy rode on the backseat of an okada all the way from your junction to the end of Idumagbo Avenue?

I bet you didn't know that either.

Yours,

Oluwabitchyola Xxx

P.S. Yes, you read right. This aje bota went on an okada today for the first time, and she loved it (except for the one teeny part when sand flew into her mouth cuz she was talking and squealing so much)! She even learnt that when riding the okada machine, one is not supposed to wrap one's arms around the rider's waist, or to hold onto his shoulder for support. Apparently, doing such can only alert the okada rider to the fact that one is a newcomer to the okada machine, and as a consequence, encourage him (if he is a meanie) to ride super fast and swerve super quick.

P.P.S. The Bitchy One will be riding several okadas between now and the end of the month when she bids the good city of Lagos goodbye. Stay tuned for "Okada Riding 102, 103...." etcetera etceteroo. Teehee!

Vroom Vrooooooooooom!

It's Over, SOB!

2007-08-02T19:10:00.000+01:00

By the end of the month I will have earned the title "professional okada passenger". A homie from the creative writing workshop will be helping me fulfil that ambition, although she doesn't know it just yet. Teehee!

By August 31st I will also have begun work on a short story worthy of an audience, wherever/whatever that audience will be and I will have published said story on a website at the very least (obviously the latter won't have happened by the end of the month, but you know what I meeeean).

Today was the last day of the Chimamanda/Binyavanga workshop. I spent close to an hour saying goodbye to everyone in a garden filled with mosquitos, roosters and peacocks, because I didn't want to leave. I didn't want the 10 days of arguments and simply hilaaarious conversations to end.

The last 10 days have been amaaaazing! There may have been a couple of people I wanted to throttle once or twice, but I made so many friends and learned so much about direction, ambition, inspiration, craft etc, that I haven't stopped smiling since I got home!

I'm so glad I went, and that I didn't give up after the first day, which went terribly. When my turn at the 'introduce yourself and say why you're here' thing came, I blubbered a bunch of rubbish about wanting to write just one big book, wanting fame (which I don't even want, and which I would never admit to wanting even if I did want it), I forgot to say where I was from or why I had applied for the workshop, and made myself sound like a complete bimbo/brat! I was so upset by the end of the evening that I became convinced everyone would only end up hating me. I think I had one of those out-of-body-moment things. I couldn't stop jabbering, and the more I willed myself to shut up, the more I jabbered... It was dreadful!!

Chimamanda is truly amazing! As is Binyavanga. They have so many layers to them as people, they are so accommodating and so funny and so dedicated and so inspiring all at the same time, that by the 3rd or 4th day, you could've been forgiven for thinking we were a bunch of looney friends meeting up just for the hell of it. Forgive the cheese, but it's truuuue! I don't know what's going to come out of this, if in 10 years time I'll be running my own workshop after having gathered dozens of prizes and a stalker or two en route (hehe), but I can't shake the feeling that something will. Let's watch and see what happens when I wake up tomorrow morning shall we.... Xxx

Welcome to the World Baby Girl!

2007-07-27T09:16:00.000+01:00

Enyimba, Aba, Warri, Ibadan, they've come from all over the place.

They are doctors, geologists, structural engineers, lawyers, consultants, university undergraduates, and freelance journalists, and they all want to write. Even if Binyavanga and Chimamanda hadn't impressed me, I'd have gained so much just by being in the class. I didn't know so many people wanted to be writers too, or that there were people who would take a series of buses for 2 days all the way from Maiduguri just to meet and learn from established authors.

To be perfectly honest, if the workshop wasn't in Lagos and the email had said to come to Abuja, I would've decided I wasn't going, even though I would've been able to afford a flight there and wouldn't have had to get on one of those Ifesinachi or whatever they're called vehicles just to get there. And if like some of the others who live in Lagos, I didn't have a car, and an okada or danfo was the only way to get to the venue in Ikoyi, I'm not sure I would wade through horrid mud-clogged potholes and the unending, torrential rain we've been having in Lagos, just to sit in a circle in a damp room, talking for hours about my craft.

Does this mean I don't want to be a writer?

No.

But that I am a spoilt brat?

Yes.

The glossy film reel is fading. I am seeing more clearly now.

The Silver Lining in my... uh... 18th Century Cloud?

2007-07-23T17:34:00.000+01:00

Now that legal education is done, and the 9 month holiday has begun, my appetite for literature has returned. And I'm soooo pleased it has too! Unfortunately, it's made me even more of a hermit, and in the 3 weeks I've spent in Lagos, I have been only to the following places - the hairdresser, the Nail Place, and church. I haven't even once been tempted to go hunting for carrot cake in Chocolate Royal, or duck curry in Pattaya. My books have kept me well-fed. Tis sad, but true I'm afraid. As such, I have had absolutely nothing to blog about!!

People, I have passed day after day in 'Casa Flamingo' (my bright pink home). Every morning I have devoured a splendid platter of the thinnest, most divine crepes known to mankind (courtesy of our in-house pancake whiz), injured my shoulder/wrist/groin/french manicure playing tennis, and then passed the rest of the day in a haze, with a book pressed up against my nose.

I have been in heaven!

I chose to blog today, firstly because I didn't want to be seen to be neglecting my blog (which saw me through many a boring/lonely day this past year) and secondly, because I have only just finished reading a truly fabulous book and decided I had no choice but to share my excitement.

Simi Bedford, she of 'Yoruba Girl Dancing' (which I am still to read) fame, has produced a novel timed to coincide with this year's 200th anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade. 'Not with Silver' is what it's called, and it is an epic tale (believe me, it's more than bloody epic, the thing is the size of an encyclopaedia)!!

It starts in Oyo, in the 18th century, heads to America (the homes and farms of slaveowners), and then returns to West Africa in the period running up to formal abolition. And it is spectacular!! Never having been one to pore over movies like Roots or whatever that other one with that Djimon Honsou guy was called, I couldn't believe how quickly I got into it, and how I just kept rolling along from place to place with the characters. Okay at times it might've dragged a little and become a tad preachy, but it was so incredibly detailed, and so alive, that I could not but continue.

If I'm being honest, I think what really hooked me was how well Ms Bedford seemed to know the architecture, speech, rites, custom, culture, history and personalities of Old Oyo. I confessed to be a geek a couple of posts ago, and will be a bit more specific now - I am a history geek! The true nature of my geeky interest is seldom revealed, as I am loathe to get into discussions centred on my beloved subject for the simple reason that my memory is a sieve... It's more than a sieve... it's a bottomless bucket! I can never retain anything, facts, details, nothing! And so I habitually conceal the breath of topics and periods I've covered in my academic life, simply because I muddle them all up, forget which crusader did what to which saracen, and which pope did what to which king, which king to which general, etcetera etceteroo.

When it comes to Nigerian history however, my ignorance is not feigned, it is in fact very genuine. I have never had the opportunity to study the stuff! That's the main reason why I was so taken with the Naij Documentary I blogged about aeons ago, as that was the first time the picture of modern Nigeria took on a form comprehensible to me. Ancient Nigeria, is even more difficult to access, partly because of the sheer lack of secondary sources (I am not geeky enough to try to grapple with dusty source documents, no thanks!). And so Simi Bedford's book, which literally fell into my lap (courtesy of my beloved Daunt Books - had to give a shout out to my homies there, you can find them on Marylebone High St in London), was a GOD send!!

Bedford's Old Oyo is steeped in conspiracy upon conspiracy, it's personalities are shrewd, fiercely proud people (who from her description of their kingdom, it's wealth and military prowess have every right to be so). And it is just such a phenomenal place!

Ever the lunatic, I saw myself in a silk wrapper, dancing and singing with the crowds at the wedding and few feasts she detailed, having my hair oiled and braided, and then being carried off on horseback by my tall, dark, warrior of a husband. The only thing my 18th century self took serious objection to (aside from the ritual, but not at all frivolous, killings) was the tribal marks she would've had to sport. Being of noble, and I'm sure, even royal, descent, I would have been marked at birth. And as I'm sure you know by now, Bitchy would rather die than allow any grandmother or wicked aunt scar her pretty face!

And I would of course have been far better looking than Benoist's Negress

My day dreaming aside, 'Not with Silver' was an incredible journey, and such a vivid one at that. My ignorant self learnt so much. Not only about Yoruba, but also about American, and then even Sierra Leonean (?) history. The egotistical (and inquisitive) Nigerian in me cannot but wish that Ms Bedford had devoted more than just a third of her novel to Old Oyo, and possibly even extended her reach to other Yoruba kingdoms at least (if not the entire Niger-area... hehe)! But I live in hope that someone else will, and soon too.

If no one does rise to the challenge, then me thinks I might just have to get on with it myself. Spurred on of course, by the excellent examples of Bedford, Achebe and Adichie (who by the way I'm meeting tomorrow... exciting or what?) who have gone before.

Woohoo! I'm on a high....

In My Other City

2007-07-09T16:01:00.001+01:00

In two days, my bathroom has flooded (wrecking my favourite pair of shoes that I left in the dressing room next door), our tyre has burst on the way home from the airport, and my phone has been barred by Celtel for no apparent reason.

This all screams "Welcome to Lagos" really, as it's nothing new, but I just thought it uncanny that such petty things should occur so soon into my trip.

I left Beijing this time last week, and did something I never thought possible - I travelled for 24 hours straight! When I left B's flat, it was 3.30am Beijing time (8.30pm Lagos and London time) and when I walked into my flat in London, it was a few minutes to midnight. Oops forgive the bad maths, I travelled for even more than 24 hours!

The whole thing was a nightmare. From the weird gothic Spanish "fashion designer" who attached himself to me on the Beijing-Dubai leg and couldn't keep his bitterness about life and everything in it to himself, to the 5 hour wait in Dubai (where I was forced to watch a razz Naijaman scratching his crotch whilst using the computer beside me), to the broken seat Emirates expected me to pass 7 hours squidging my butt on, to the noisy crew of 18 year old Bengali boys desperate to impress with their tales of club-hopping and skirt-staring, to the drunk African man screaming at the top of his lungs about Britain's pillaging of Africa whilst we touched down in Heathrow, to the ride home on the frickin tube (The Heathrow Express was cancelled because of the stupid Glasgow men).

It's no wonder I fell ill on my arrival in London, but after some serious retail therapy on Friday I was miraculously cured of my ailment, and managed to catch my flight to Lagos on Friday night with little trouble.

I will be here for a long time, unless of course the opportunity to go to South Africa that I've been squeezing a certain person for presents itself. I may even go to the Bloggers' thing Jeremy and Toks are planning (unless it really turns into the '1st Annual Convention of the Confederation of Nigerian Bloggers' or other such formal event that it's beginning to resemble), or the Shakira, Diddy and John Legend extravaganza, or the 'Season for Soyinka' at Terra Kulture. Who knows where the wind will take this bitch? Teehee! Stay tuuuuuned!

Seven Things

2007-06-29T16:39:00.000+01:00

1 - That I have the largest sized feet of any woman I have ever encountered, even larger than my giantess of a cousin. And I'm not even tall! My feet are size 9.5 UK i.e. 11.5 or 12 American i.e. size 43. I spend a fortune on shoes designed to make my feet look 'dainty' but many have discovered the truth on sighting me in a pair of yeti-sized UGGS in the winter.

2 - That my grandmother once considered calling a priest/exorcist (call it what you will) to 'save' me from myself when I was a kid. I was that naughty.

3 - That I sometimes suffer from inexplicable bouts of sadness, some would call it depression. I don't do slitting wrists or self-harm or anything remotely drastic like that, but I do get very sad, and I have been known to cry on occasion - actually you know this already.

4 - That I have doubts about my faith many times even though I know it to be the true way.

5 - That I am the most indecisive person on the planet. At one stage in my life, I was rather ridiculous. I would have 'returning days' when I left my house laden with shopping bags, went from store to store returning ugly item after ugly item, and arrived back home empty-handed. I always keep receipts and always always check a store's returns policy now.

6 - That I have never cheated in a test or exam or anything. Not even in one of those silly 'teacher's running out of things for the class to do' quizzes I had to take in primary school. At first it was because the thought never even crossed my mind, and then because I knew I'd be the one in a room full of 50 cheating students to get caught. But then about a year or two ago this weird 'honour' type thing appeared out of nowhere and I concluded there must be no pleasure in doing well without having earned it.

7 - That I am a geek. You may have worked this out from #6. I like to learn things, it is sad but true. But then I am also incredibly lazy which can make things so frustrating at times.

I have no clue who has or has not been tagged into this thing yet, as I've been rather bad at keeping up with blogs lately. Jaja, I would tag you to get you back for tagging me, but I imagine that's against the rules and would defeat the purpose of this exercise. Hehe! I also don't know of anyone who reads my blog regularly anymore, so this is kinda tough. But anyway, I am now tagging...

Cultural Miscellany
Snuffy
Jeremy
Mimi
Toks-Boy

Poo Poo Poison Poo

2007-06-28T15:46:00.001+01:00

From the Great Wall, instead of Shanghai, I found myself headed to the SOS International Hospital. I woke up with a severe case of food poisoning yesterday, so severe the doctor I eventually saw kept insisting it had to be something else - either malaria that had remained in my bloodstream since April (when I last went to Lagos - apparently mosquitoes in Beijing do not carry the parasite) or... wait for it... pregnancy! I should've slapped him round the head for that latter suggestion but at the time I was too weak and too sick to contemplate anything other than lying down on a bed and groaning.

Now I am well, as I have consumed an alarming amount of medication, but on parental orders, and much to B's delight, I am to stay away from Shanghai. I am upset for two reasons. First, because I was looking forward to 'Riding the Iron Rooster' a la Paul Theroux as I have never before traveled by overnight sleeper train, let alone in Asia! Second, because I really wanted to give China's most fashion-forward city a go, as I fear I may have exhausted Beijing's boutiques! There is absolutely nothing left to buy here, and I've been from grotty shops selling copy-cat Chloe and Marni clothing, to massive malls, like the World Trade Centre. Shanghai would've provided a welcome change - Bitchy got bitten by the shopaholic bug when she landed on Chinese soil you see.

Oh and The Great Wall? We took the cable car to the top of the Badaling section of the wall, and then began the trek down. It would've been rather uneventful had B not been slipping and sliding all over the place (apparently she doesn't own a pair of trainers), and had I not rediscovered my fear of heights. Our guide Eva must've been peeing herself with laughter, as we really were a ridiculous sight, but she maintained a professional facade the entire time. Unlike us, she walked the entire thing without holding onto the railings, as she makes the trek round the wall several times a week with tourist groups. The 'trek' (it was more a crawl to be honest, as all the rail-holding meant we moved like snails) also exposed me to more adoring fans, who flagged me down at many a juncture for photos with my gorgeous self.

Bowels-permitting I will be visiting The Summer Palace and the Panda House tomorrow, or maybe on Saturday. I also intend to walk in a hamster ball from one end of the lake in the Chao Yang Amusement Park to another without falling flat on my face (which I have been told is impossible) before I leave on Sunday.

Tian'anmen Rickshaw Wang Fu Qing 呆子

2007-06-24T09:38:00.000+01:00

The trek from the Meridian Gate of the Forbidden City to Tian'anmen is a short, but painful one when you're wearing the 'gladiator slippers' that're all the rave in London this summer!

En route yesterday, we noticed a queue forming in front of a ticket booth, above which was a sign saying "Tickets for Tian'anmen Gate" or something to that effect. So we joined the queue (as Tian'anmen was where we were headed), and paid 30 Yuan to yet another nasty cow who had begun to yell at me for having the audacity to show her an international student card in the attempt to obtain a student discount. Apparently I should've known from the Mandarin characters for 'Student Discount' that they meant Chinese students and not international ones. I felt like yelling "Oi Dummy, do I look like I speak Mandarin?" She should even have been grateful that we understood her at all! B may be Chinese, but she's spent her entire life in English-speaking Malaysia, and as a consequence, her Mandarin is appalling - It's part of the reason why she's living in Beijing at the moment. Today for example, she finally learned the Mandarin word for 'spoon' after a 20 minute signing and guessing game with a waitress in a cafe!

After our Tian'anmen Gate tickets were thrown at us, we carried on. We went through one gate, walked over a mini-bridge and found ourselves facing Tian'anmen Square. A little puzzled, we looked behind to find that the gate we'd passed through unchecked (and through which dozens of others were passing freely) was in fact the Tian'anmen Gate, as from where we stood we could see the gigantic gold-framed portrait of Chairman Mao beaming down at us! From that point up until Tian'anmen Square, there was no ticket barrier or gate or anything! We'd basically given the nasty lady who yelled at us 30 Yuan for nothing!

That was the first Olodo incident of the day.

Before I move onto the next, I would just like to say that I really did feel my inner revolutionary spirit stirring as I stood in Tian'anmen Square. Obviously I would never be the kind of revolutionary to stand poe-faced in front of a line of army tanks that'd been ordered to squash me flat! But I definitely could be one of those who marches and protests with tons of flags, whistling and singing! The camaraderie would be such fun!

The second Olodo incident crept up on us a lot slower than the first. After a hilarious stint at kite-flying in Tian'anmen, we went in search of a Hutong. A 'hutong' is basically a street or collection of streets that forms part of Old Beijing. Some of the houses in hutongs date back hundreds of years, but in general they provide a look at living arrangements of the factory worker classes in Beijing.

Our taxi dropped us off on a deserted street, pointed to a sign that said 'Hutong' and zoomed off. Being the David Livingstone of the duo, I managed to chase down a rickshaw, which was what my travel guide had said would take us round the "fascinating" hutongs of Beijing. The rickshaw driver showed us a sheet with 8 pictures on it. He pointed at it, said 50 Yuan, and we hopped in.

At first it was very interesting (and perhaps you could even say thought-provoking) to drive round these very impoverished parts of Beijing. Some of the buildings the rickshaw driver pointed out had one or two features that were similar to those in the Imperial Palace, but they really were very few and far between. I also didn't feel comfortable poking my nose into the lives of ordinary people and observing them as though they were a bunch of lab mice to be marveled at! After about 20 minutes, we were completely bored out of our minds as it was the same thing over and over again. We did go to one trade street which had a lot of artwork and fans, silk screens etc for sale, but after that it was snore, snore, smelly pong, smelly pong, and it didn't look like the ride was ever going to stop.

After about an hour and a half, the rickshaw driver announced that the tour was over, and it took a lot not to shout with glee at the news. Our joy was short-lived however, as he then held up a few fingers and said "400 YUAN Pleez!" Apparently when we chartered his fine chariot he had pointed at each picture on his crummy plastic sheet as a way of explaining that a visit to each "highlight" on the sheet would cost 50 Yuan. If you remember, I said there were 8 pictures on the sheet he showed us at the start. Rickshaw-man had then taken the liberty of showing us each and every single one of the snore-inducing highlights, wasting an hour and a half of our precious time, whilst we'd been thinking "Can you just hurry up and get this over with? Oh well, it's only 50 Yuan so who cares." We hadn't even climbed out of the rickshaw at some of the spots for which he wanted to charge us 50 Yuan! Many times when he stopped his stupid rickshaw and told us how special and "velly ancient" the site was, we just nodded and refused to get out of the rickshaw, indicating that he should carry on so we could be on our way!

One thing I can say for myself though is that I may be a spoilt brat but I am certainly not a dumb brat, and when it comes to being ripped off or wilfully deceived by crafty rickshaw drivers after smelly hutong rides, my hardcore Omo Naija mentality kicks in. Even though I was pissed off, I told B we were paying 100 each and that was it! I understood that he'd broken his back driving us around the hutongs, but he had told us it would cost 50 Yuan and we had not asked him to take the liberty of showing us so many things the significance of which we weren't even aware! B, who's always one for giving in because she'd rather be sitting in an air-conditioned room than sweating and fighting with a poor man on the street, wanted us to just pay him and hop in a taxi. I gave him the 200 we had amassed, he yelled "400, 400, okay 300, wan more 100". I groped in my handbag for a handful of notes, tossed him 50 Yuan and then stormed off.

The third and final Olodo moment came at Wang Fu Qing, which is an area that I suppose you could say is being developed as the shopping mecca of Beijing. It reminded me a lot of Lagos - massive and gigantic malls still under construction, with only a handful of them being used under all the scaffolding and saw dust. The two malls we went into were very nice though, but I was starving and all I cared about was food.

After dinner, we went into an electronic shop next door to the restaurant, as I wanted to buy a memory stick for my camera. I wanted a 2GB one and the most reasonably priced one was from some 'Kingston' (a brand I'd never heard of before), at 720 Yuan. The shop lady pulled out a calculator (I have now learned this is a regular trick in Beijing), punched in some numbers and said I should pay 600 Yuan. B, who's motto is, "Buy it, buy it, just hurry up", said it seemed reasonable enough to her, and after making sure the card worked with my camera, I thought, "What the heck."

We left the mall, me feeling proud at being a smartie who buys electronic gear in Beijing thus halving London's ridiculous prices, B looking anxiously for a taxi rank, and then spied a slightly more rundown-looking electronic shop in a row of kitschy shops. I was considering buying a video camera at the time, so we went in to find out how much one of the made in China brands would cost. A 2GB Kingston memory stick like the one I had just bought was shining in the display cabinet, next to one from ScanDisk (a brand I do know). I asked the shop lady how much the ScanDisk one was, she said 380. B and I were like "Whaaat?" I then pointed at the Kingston one, at which shop lady smiled and said "360 Yuan".

Apparently shops inside the malls see foreigners and other mumus like myself, bombard them with promises of air-conditioning and cheesy shop music, and then feel entitled to charge almost double the price an item is actually worth! So to break it down to those non maths wizards out there, I paid over 45 pounds for a memory stick that should've cost only 19 pounds!

The Chinese character in my title can be taken to mean either 'Idiot', 'Fool' or 'Sucker'. Appropriate isn't it?

To The Great Wall and Ming Dynasty Tombs tomorrow, I can only wonder what other experiences await me!

Superstar Brethren Immigration Bitch

2007-06-23T15:50:00.000+01:00

I have just tried and failed and tried and failed and tried and failed to leave a comment on my previous post, but seeing as I'm in China, and seeing as there's this thing called CENSORSHIP here, it's been rather difficult.

I don't know what it is about me and this blog now, I suppose learning that people I know (who are neither bloggers nor home-dawgs) had been reading it, put me off a little. I even attempted to start a new one, but I fiddled with the template's colour scheme and it got kinda uuugly so I ditched it.

Yes, Bitchy is a bit of a lunatic.

But in Beijing, she is something of a mini celebrity.

So far I have been stopped twice by people who wanted to take pictures with me. The first time was at the Forbidden City when B and I were looking kinda shitty. Traipsing round the massive Imperial Palace is hard work! And the second time was when we were taking the pedestrian subway to Tian'anmen Square, after we'd decided that the dash across the insanely wide motorway type road thing could only end in death! And then, I was trying on a dress in a shop a couple of hours ago, and when I came out of the changing room to look in the mirror, a gaggle of people were waiting for me, grinning and nodding and waving and all star-struck like!

Could it be because I'm so incredibly stunning? Or because I'm black?

B insists it's the latter. Apparently many Chinese people are tourists in their own country. They come to Beijing on holiday from regions like Hainan and Xian, and most of them have never seen a black person in real life before. I wonder if they will show my photo to their grand-kids? Teehee, I'm an idiot! But it really is such a refreshing change from the nasty uppity looks I've received in other parts of the world.

I arrived in Beijing on Friday at like 1am. My first actual chat on Chinese territory was... wait for it... with a Nigerian! Actually I wouldn't call it a 'chat' per se as I was really rather stand-offish. He was delighted to see "one of his sisters", as he exclaimed on the plane, whilst I was rather un-delighted. I see Nigerians all the time, big deal! He said he lived in Guangzhou, and from the 'Ghana Must Go' he was carrying, I figured he was a trader.

After the stony reception I gave him, I felt a little guilty and resolved to be more pleasant to the next set of 'brethren' I encountered. I spoke too soon, as the line I joined at immigration/passport check might as well have had "Nigerians" emblazoned in red above the desk rather than "Foreigners"!

I did try though... I smiled when they cracked silly jokes about my scruffy attire making it so obvious that I was a student, blah blah blah har har har.

At the immigration desk, a stony-faced Chinese woman snatched my passport out of my hand. She eyed me up and down without the slightest "Hello" or "Welcome to China" I'd heard other travellers receive from officials nearby, and gave me one of those, "If I had my way, you'd be heading back to the jungle" looks. In my head (obviously not out loud, I didn't want to have to fly all the way back) I went "What the hell did I do to you, you silly cow?" Like 20 seconds later she flung my passport back at me (mind you my passport is a British and not Nigerian one so I really couldn't understand what all the hate was about) and made the 'Shoo Fly' gesture with her hands. Before I left though, I decided to get my own back. Between where I stood and where she sat was a console that said "Rate My Performance". On it were 4 faces, the one on the far left bore a grin and said "Excellent", the one to its right had a half smile with the caption, "Very Good", the third said "Not Bad" and the fourth said "Poor".

Clutching my passport tight (that thing is precious), I slammed my thumb on the "Poor" button and glared back at the mean official. Unknown to me though, when you give an immigration official a bad rating at the Beijing Airport, the console lets out a loud beep! I froze for like a millisecond as her glare intensified into a look of utter outrage, and then scuttled away as quickly as I could, lest she revoke the stamp approving my entry into China!

Baggage reclaim, exit protocol, a scary incident with an unlicensed taxi driver shoving his "I.D. Card" up my nostrils, and I was on my way to B's in a taxi driven by a man who spoke absolutely no English whatsoever.

Bitchy... c'est qui exactement?

2007-06-20T14:54:00.000+01:00

Parting is such sweet sorrow,

Every blog has its day, and a different blog was birthed today.

Teehee! Am I poetic or what?

Something has happened to me in the last four weeks, and I can't say for certain what it is, but I fear I might have changed.

Or perhaps I've gone full circle? I think I might be right back where I started... not exactly, but you'll see what I mean in a minute.

I wrote my first ever post the week before I started at Law School. At the time, I had absolutely no clue which way my blog would go. I knew nothing about Blogsville, or about the thousands of people like or unlike me, sharing their experiences with friends and family and total strangers. I never thought anyone other than my best friend would read my blog. I never thought strangers would read my blog, or that they would like it, or that I would develop friendships with them and even meet some of them in person!

Tonight I'm off to Beijing, beginning my whirlwind (yeah right) tour of the globe.

Ever the diva, I am not backpacking, neither am I going away for three or four months at one go. But I've made arrangements to visit places I'd always dreamed of visiting over the next 9 months - Cuba, India, Argentina etcetera - and I intend to implement every single one of those plans.

In March, I will start the job I debated on this blog many a time, and by then, I imagine (and hope) I will be a completely different person.

I am already a different person from the one I predicted I would be back in August... I do have a life, I have love, I do not have an alcohol addiction, and I am not overweight!

Har Har!

Farewell blog friends.

Love,

Bitchy Xxx

The Urge

2007-05-31T20:42:00.000+01:00

So I said I wouldn't blog until after my exams, but two things brought me back here, actually three.

First - Pseudo WHERE are you going??? I saw your farewell message on The Afro Beat. I was so stunned I had to break my Blogsville hiatus!

Second - Miss Willie, Yes you can be my blog girlfriend. Forget those boys, especially as one of them is leaving the ville for no apparent reason. Teehee!

Third - I realised today that outside of one's house, there really is no place in which one can have a good cry in PEACE in London town.

Permit me to explain.

Around about midday, I felt 'the urge' coming. I tried and tried to shake it off, but being a cry baby hotcake (as was evidenced in my Miss Jones post), I knew the bad boys were going to come rolling down my cheeks any second.

So I darted out of the library (the skank hell-hole in which I have passed the last two days - Urrgh!) and headed straight for the loos. I knew it was not an uncommon sight to see a fellow female boohooing in the ladies' room, so felt that I would be safe if I went into a cubicle and cried as quietly as poss.

The first cub I tried, was disgusting. The gentlemen I debated with at the weekend, about the cleanliness of women's toilets versus the cleanliness of men's, certainly LOST that argument. Let's just say there were things splattered all over the bowl and it was uuuug!

The second cub was the middle one, and it was more than pristine. I put the lid on the toilet seat and sat down, and as I did, I let the boohoos rip.

Barely thirty seconds later, I heard someone walk in, and the only thing that passed through my mind was, "Gosh, I hope this person doesn't hear me crying". What I should have said to myself was, "Oh dear I hope she doesn't come in here and poop the place out!"

Christ People!

I mean, I know loos are for both the numbers 1 and 2, and that one shouldn't discriminate because we're all human beings etcetera etceteroo. But I have always been of the opinion that when one feels 'the urge' (and not the teary kind I described earlier) and one is in a public place, one ought to discharge that urge with consideration for one's fellow loo-user!

So there I was sitting on the loo cover, trying to cry quietly, when Inconsiderate Girl slammed her way into the cubicle on my left (the one with all the gross stains I had decided was too gross to cry in).

This is the scene that unfolded...

Inconsiderate Girl: [Slams Door Shut]

Bitchy: Oh dear I hope it isn't someone I know. I don't want to have to explain why I'm crying. Cry quietly Bitchy.

Inconsiderate Girl: [Releases a lot of liquid very quickly]

Bitchy: Sob, Sob, Boo, Boo, Hoo

Inconsiderate Girl: [Liquid, Liquid, LOUD FART, Liquid]

Bitchy: What the...?

Inconsiderate Girl: [Plop Plop Proooop Plop Prrrooooop]

Bitchy: [Opens door with loud BANG and storms OUT!]

PLEASE tell me I am not alone in thinking that kind of behaviour is unacceptable? Especially when you know that there are other people in the ladies' room besides yourself?

The Nigerian Proclamation

2007-05-29T09:01:00.000+01:00

IN RECENT HISTORY, NIGERIANS HAVE BEEN OVERWHELMINGLY BETRAYED BY THOSE CHARGED WITH ADDRESSING THEIR NEEDS. INSTEAD OF SERVING THE PEOPLE, PUBLIC SERVANTS HAVE SERVED THEMSELVES TO THE DETRIMENT OF THE MASSES. THE RESULT IS A NATION LACKING ADEQUATE INFRASTRUCTURE, ORGANIZATION AND SECURITY.

THE INEFFECTIVENESS OF NIGERIAN LEADERS INDICATES A LACK OF ACCOUNTABILITY TO THE CONSTITUENTS. NIGERIANS ARE NO LONGER RELEVANT TO THE LEADERS, THUS, LEADERS DO NOT FEEL RESPONSIBLE TO THEM.

THE RECENT FAILURE TO CONDUCT A FREE AND FAIR ELECTORAL PROCESS WAS YET ANOTHER ILLUSTRATION THAT THE NEEDS OF THE MANY ARE SECONDARY TO THE WANTS OF THE IMPORTANT FEW.

FROM THIS DAY, ALL NIGERIANS ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE FUTURE OF THIS GREAT & POWERFUL COUNTRY. CONSEQUENTLY, ALL NIGERIANS MUST COMMIT THEMSELVES TO THE FOLLOWING:

1. WE MUST DEMAND THAT ELECTED OFFICIALS BE HELD ACCOUNTABLE FOR THEIR ACTIONS AND IN-ACTIONS.

2. WE MUST EXPECT DEMOCRATIC PRINCIPLES TO BE HONORED, RESPECTED AND MAINTAINED.

3. WE MUST BELIEVE THAT ALL NIGERIANS ARE EQUAL UNDER THE LAW AND SHOULD BE TREATED AS SUCH.

4. WE MUST APPLY OURSELVES TO IMPROVING THE LOT OF EVERY INDIVIDUAL NIGERIAN REGARDLESS OF GENDER, RELIGION, TRIBE OR SOCIAL STATUS.

5. WE MUST STRIVE TO MAINTAIN A UNITED REPUBLIC DESPITE OUR DIFFERENCES.

ONLY UPON ACHIEVING THESE PRINCIPLES CAN WE AS A PEOPLE FULLY LIVE UP TO OUR POTENTIAL AS A LAND OF GREATNESS. FOR OURS IS A COUNTRY RENOWNED FOR ITS ILLUSTRIOUS PEOPLE, AMPLE RESOURCES AND SHEER PHYSICAL BEAUTY.
----------------------
This has been put up as part of Solomonsydelle's movement to show that Nigerian and other interested bloggers are unified in our disappointment with recent and ongoing political events. By using the same document with the same title on May 29th, we hope to attract some attention by making The Nigerian Proclamation 'rise' to attention on Google and various other search engines when anyone uses 'Nigeria' as a search term. Let the world know that Nigeria's people too are far from impressed. Put it up on your blogs too today! Peace out Homies :)

Letter to My Lovers

2007-05-23T10:48:00.000+01:00

To

Darcy Mark Jaja and Pseudo a.k.a Timmy the name-changer,

I'm in the market for a cyber Boyfriend ;)

The Yote has refused to start his own blog (which I thought would be named 'Yote in the City' for sheer comedy value) so I wonder how he will keep up with the competition.

Thus far, Pseudo is the lead runner. His "ooohs" and "ooohs" and persistent, almost religious, perusal of this blog (and even my Afro Beat blog), have endeared me to him.

Never being one to limit my options, Jaja, I wanna get to know ya! You already have the kinsman thing going for you, which could make Papa Bitchy very very happy I'm sure.

If either of you returns to the Bitchy one's City, what say you?

Are you up to the task? Can you handle this crybaby hotcake?

Can you?

My kitchen is hot! My sizzle is the shizzle!

Cyber-Weenies need not apply. Thank you! :)

I'm Sorry, Are You Sorry?

2007-05-23T09:45:00.001+01:00

I think I have a problem.

Scratch that. I know I have a problem.

I didn't have this problem when I was younger. In fact, I had the opposite of this problem then.

When I was a kid, my mum or dad would glare down at me on a regular basis, and demand that I say sorry to whoever it was I had offended (my brother, my sister, nanny 1, nanny 2, the cook, the driver, my piano teacher, my lesson teacher etc etc). I would refuse and in the end, they'd resort to yelling, "say SORRY!" over and over again whilst I stood firm, unyielding and unflinching.

I then came up with a killer response round about age 7 or 8, which probably heightened their growing suspicion that they had produced a devil child - "Why? WHY should I say sorry? What will the sorry do for you?"

Looking back, I see that for all my sins, I was a wise tot! What does the word "sorry" do? Why do we all assume it can take away the pain or harm we have caused? And more importantly, why does this word bubble out of my mouth with such ease now that I am older?

It's a dangerous word you know.

Why?

Because it implies an assumption of guilt. It lays all the emphasis on you, the wrongdoer. And it allows you and the other to forget that they may have done something wrong to you too.

I have spent a lot of my time apologising in my adult life. And subconsciously, I have been taking on a world of guilt. Many a time I have said sorry to someone, even though they too have done something wrong to me, and then when they haven't turned around and said sorry back to me, I have had to hold myself back from prodding them with my pinkie and yelling, "Oi! It's your turn now!"

Instead, what have I done? I have sat back and watched them accept my apology, and have allowed them to act as though, in the 'hurt me I hurt you' dance we were dancing, I alone was the wrongdoer, I alone was a dancer.

Well... No more o!

In an hour I will step out of my flat and into the brilliant sunshine that's been flooding through my windows (Londoners - isn't this great weather we're having?)

And when that man or woman who isn't looking where he or she is going gets in my way, so that I end up stepping on his or her toe, I will not say "sorry" or "gosh! I'm so sorry" or "oh dear, I'm terribly sorry".

Ehn Ehn!

I will stand there and glare that person down. Let them apologise to me now for goodness' sake.
Damn right you are!

Call Me Miss Jones

2007-05-21T16:41:00.000+01:00

It's Monday afternoon, late in the afternoon, and I'm in my pyjamas eating a cold lemon tart.

I should be studying, but once again, I have gotten bored of my Public Companies & Equity Finance textbook, and have decided to venture onto the world wide web to share my thoughts with whoever will be so kind as to read them.

This weekend, I spent much of my time thinking about how much I had in common with Miss Jones, the infamous character of the Helen Fielding series - you know her, the silly billy made a global phenomenon by Renee Zellweger?

These were the points of similarity I came up with:

Bridget writes in her diary. I write on my blog.

Bridget likes food and is relatively porky. I like food too, and though I may not be porky at this particular point in time, I have been (and will be) considerably porky at many a point in my life.

Bridget makes a fool of herself on an hourly basis. I make a fool of myself on a daily (maybe thrice weekly) basis.

Bridget had a man in her life, yet found it impossible to look beyond her perky British nose, to see that Mr. Darcy was the only person who would ever be able to tolerate her ridiculous behaviour. I had my Mr. Y, overreacted whenever he argued with me (apparently in my world, women can shout but men can't shout back), ignored all the wonderful things he did to make me happy, and honed in on all the negatives, forgetting that only a handful of people on the planet have ever been able to stomach me and my silly ways, and that 4 out of all 5 of them are tied to me by blood.

Bridget went crawling back to Mr. D, wondered at his ability to shun her advances, but somehow ended up being rescued by him after a disgraceful episode in Thailand. I have attempted to crawl back to my Mr. Y, and even though he ain't having none of it, he somehow found the time to help me revamp a presentation I'm due to give tomorrow.

Apparently folks, having the ins and outs of his private life published on the world wide blogosphere is something he detests and finds utterly unforgiveable. You would think I'd have considered that last week, after the Yote Strikes Back episode back in January?

I suppose I could argue that I'm not as bad as Bridget, because, her Mr. D was perfect, and mine was far from! But I guess when you consider how much of an effort he made with me, despite my acute inability to sort out the many silly problems I created in my life - like buying a pair of glasses on a whim, hating them, and then getting upset when Selfridges wouldn't let me return them; Or crying like a big baby when the piddly sums in my bank account were pilphered by some accursed rogue; Or skyving school, doing no revision, blogging for weeks, and crying like an even bigger baby when I realised my exams were only a day away; Or crying for well over two hours and refusing to go out, because of a hair cut that made little or no difference to my overall look; Or moaning about my hair or my weight, or my face, or my school work, or my social life, or my friends, or my family, or my career, or my groceries, or my tube travelcard, or my broadband, my wardrobe, my bank balance, the weather, my macbook, my esthetician, my cleaning lady, my fatigue, my boredom, my blog...

And when you consider that I was also unable to shoulder the costs of my bank-breaking telephone habit, or the costs of my bank-breaking duck curry addiction, and that he took on the former with only a twice monthly grumble, and indulged the latter (even throwing in the odd tub of strawberry cheesecake ice cream for good measure despite my phoney protests), I guess he wasn't doing too badly all along, was he? :(

Boys Can't Cry - Part Deux

2007-05-20T17:28:00.000+01:00

I seem to be part deux-ing everything lately, but I felt I had no choice where this particular post was concerned.

After writing Boys Can't Cry (numero uno) the other day, I was forced to reconsider my stance on the issue by my mother, who telephoned me all the way from Lagos to inform me that she was "ashamed" of the "bush" girl she had brought up.

According to mother (let's call her Snobby S for ease of reference - and please don't be fooled by the odd nickname, my mother is probably my best friend and is one of the most down to earth people I know, she just has a slight tendency to be uppity once in a while) the reason a lot of Nigerian men are "maniacs" is because of "ridiculous" attitudes like mine.

She said (and I'm paraphrasing here) that it's neanderthal-thinkers like myself who perpetuate this image of boys and men needing to be super-macho at all times, even when a good cry is more than justified.

She also said that if a man can cry in front of you, it is because he trusts you, and because he won't expect you to have a stupid (like mine she means) reaction or response to him.

After what can only be described as "the attack" from Snobby S, I suppose I was forced to think about why I had the attitude to men crying that I described in Part 1. And I realised that I had that attitude because of the little exposure I had had in the past to teary-eyed men.

{I have chosen to discount my brother in this short trip down memory lane that will follow, because crying when you're 10, and have just had your head clunked against a television set by your devil of a sister, does not count}

The first teary-eyed man I encountered was a philandering boyfriend from my early teens who pretended to cry (after subjecting me to much torture) when I refused to speak to him one particular afternoon. I remember sitting there looking at him thinking, "are you for real?" and "you actually expect me to believe that you're crying, when you're the one who's been messing around?" I was more than irritated by him at that stage, and I believe he too could see that I was on the verge of dumping his sorry ass which was why he resorted to turning on the waterworks.

The second was another boyfriend from my teenage years who, if I'm honest, I had no business dating. I can't remember much of our relationship, neither can I remember what he cried about, but I think it was something to do with the fact that I clearly wasn't in love with him, and was being a pretty mean bitch about it. I suppose he should be given marks for his powers of observation because at the time, even though I protested with "but you know I love you {insert pet name}, you just always beat me to saying it," [gag] over and over again, I was really thinking, "What the hell am I doing with this boy that I can barely stand to look at?!"

I guess the moral of the story is that Bitchy is a weirdo.

Or better yet, that Bitchy is just a bitchy bitch.

Or alternatively it could be that even though Bitchy would prefer a macho macho man, her Romeo is allowed to cry if he hasn't been pissing her off, and if her feelings for him are still genuine at the time, because then, she will probably cry along with him too from the sheer heartbreak of seeing her Romeo heartbroken*.

The End.

NB Heartbroken does not include soppyness over a football team's glory/defeat, sporting legends or any other sport-related eventuality.

Diary of A Bitchy Black Woman and Her Hair #2

2007-05-16T18:21:00.000+01:00

I have been itching to blog since I last did on Monday.

But I have just not had the time to! It's been crazy.

At first it was annoying me, but then it began to excite me because I knew that this evening I would, some way or some how, find the time to talk about all the random things I've been experiencing/ noticing/ whatever-ing.

Just now, on my way home, aside from the song I was singing in my head, I heard the following:

"To station cleaner. To station cleaner. There is some vomit to clean. Come and get the vomit."

"To the man at the bottom of the escalator. Please remove yourself from the station. The police have been called and they are on their way."

"There is a delay on the Victoria Line between Warren Street and Brixton due to a person lying under the train at Green Park."

Is this what London is normally like? Or have I just not been listening for a long long time?

Now... to yet another discussion about my hair.

But it's probably not the kind you're expecting.

Earlier today, I went to my "beauty therapist" for a quick "beauty treatment".

In actual fact, I went to this thin and over-worked Chinese (or is it Korean? I'm not sure) woman for an under-arm wax. Ha! There! I said it!

I only started having my arm-pits waxed a year ago. Prior to then, I had done what I thought all Nigerian women did with their arm-pits. I had been using razors. But I got tired of having to use a razor every other day (and I am not even hairy!!) so I thought I'd give this wax thing a go.

The first time I had it done, was in Lagos, where I happened to be last July. I had been walking past the new "beauty spa" right next door to my hairdresser for close to three weeks at that point, and thought, on one random afternoon, "what the heck, I'm going to do it jo!"

By the time the lady was done, my throat was hoarse, and there was no husky or sexy vibe to it.

I had yelled the place down. I knew I'd been yelling, obviously, because I'd been opening up my mouth to actually do the yelling. But I had no idea how loudly I'd been yelling until I walked into the salon next door to have my hair done, and my regular torture-master/ self-appointed body-fat monitor/ "hair therapist", Joseph, said "Nawa oh. That thing was painful abi?"

I got sucked into waxing my arm-pits from then on (which is why I'm still doing it and hating it now), because they all promised me (and by 'they', I mean everyone who has ever either come close to my pits with wax, or with whom I've swapped waxing and hair-removal tips), that it would get less painful with time. Another promise was that the growth-rate of my under-arm hair would slow down, and I'd soon be able to go weeks on end without waxing.

Bull Shit!

In the last year I have discovered that there is no such thing as a pain-free wax, and that when it is close to being that time of the month, or when it is that time of the month, or when it has just been that time of the month (basically all the damn time), a woman's skin is more "sensitive" to waxing.

I have also 'discovered' that my hair grows back "very quickly" (even though, like I said, I am not hairy), and that my hair grows in different directions. This, apparently, is why it needs to be ripped from my hair holes (are pores hair holes? I got confused about what the right term was just as I was typing now) with brutal, mind-shuddering, scream-inducing force!

Where my "beauty-therapist" works, they know me well, because I scream the place down. My name is often difficult for even Nigerians to pronounce (although I dunno what the hell is so difficult about it, it's not like my name is Ogheneginigba, or something like that). But everyone at Busy Body (what an odd name for a "beauty spa" I hear you say) knows my name. They know how to say it, they know how to spell it, and they recognise me instantly, even after a two month-long hiatus, when I arrive with different glasses, different hair, different everything... even when I am a different me!

Boys Can't Cry

2007-05-14T14:07:00.000+01:00

This post is completely unrelated to my previous two posts.

It is not about me or my relationship.

There will be no gut-gushing or trash-airing here so kindly zap back into etcetera etceteroo mode before you carry on reading.

Thank you! :)

Now, whilst I was struggling and failing to read one of my textbooks, I suddenly had this itch to find out the answer to the following questions:

1 - Because boys can't cry, do girls automatically assume (in a difficult situation) that there's no way a boy could ever feel as badly as they do?

But...

2 - If boys can't cry, then can they ever get as upset as, or more upset than, a girl who is boohooing away in front of them?

And...

3 - What do boys do when they feel like that (given that they can't cry)?

And finally...

4 - Do boys automatically see girls as manipulative because girls can turn on the water-works whilst they can't?

Notice I said boys can't cry as opposed to boys don't cry. Because I don't really think boys have any options when it comes to crying. You can't cry if you're a boy. You just can't!

Okay you're allowed to cry if someone dies or if you're in excruciating pain or if something terribly terrible happens (and that something terribly terrible would have to be something that would make a girl faint from the pain, or lose her mind were she in your shoes).

But boys are not allowed to cry about the things that girls cry about all the time.

If a boy started to cry because of a relationship/other issue, his girlfriend (even if she too was sobbing her eyes out at the time) would stop in her tracks and ask herself what kind of a wuss she had ended up with!

It has never even occurred to me to ask these 4 questions before. I guess I always assumed that boys could never get as upset about something as girls could, that they were desensitized somehow.

But then I really started to wonder (when I was reading my boooring textbook) where the basis for that conclusion came from. Why have I always assumed that a boy could never ever get as upset as me? Societal role-play and all the psycho-babble aside, are boys not human beings too?

Even with animals, do female dogs love more easily than male ones? Not necessarily. And do they feel the pain of abandonment more than male dogs do? Is there any proof that shows they do? Those sad-looking, abused and ill-treated dogs on the RSPCA/Animal Shelter adverts that crop up on British TV at this time of day, are they all female? Is not one of them male?

Sassie or Lassie, its still a sad dog!

Look Into My Pickle Jar. Pretty Isn't It?

2007-05-12T14:43:00.000+01:00

“When I grow up I want to be a banker like my daddy.

And then I want to start my own bank that will be bigger and better than his, and make him beg me for mercy.”

– Bitchy, age 7

Things 've changed. Not where being twisted is concerned (I still am). But I no longer want to be a banker.

Now, I have no clue what I want to be. I don’t know which way to go.

With 'good job' (that starts in just under a year)?

Or with 'no job'?

An odd choice when you think about it. Some would even say it wasn’t really a choice. For many, money (or is it the survival instinct) dictates which way they go. When faced with good job vs no job, they choose the former. Duh!

If I'm being real, 'no job' doesn’t really mean no JOB! It just means no job right now. My C.V. is brilliant (I don’t like to brag, but really it is! Hehe) So honestly? I would have absolutely no trouble getting another job.

'Good job' is the job I moaned about in my first ever blog post. Many law students are desperate to be in my boat, but I’m now getting pretty desperate to get out of it.

Here are my two reasons why:

1 - It's not my dream job.
I won’t suck at it. If I put in the effort, I could probably get bloody good at it. But it doesn’t interest me. Here’s an example. Two weeks ago when I met with partners and managing associates from the firm, I noticed that as soon as they began to talk about this and that huge deal, and Sakhalin this and that, I tuned out. I didn’t even notice it happening! I tuned out right then and there. Imagine the disaster that would've unfolded if one of my future bosses had asked me a question at that point? And can anyone explain how I will be able to do a job when I can’t even listen to future colleagues talk about it in an informal setting? By the way, I also tune out of my lectures that are centred wholly on preparing me for this line of work on a regular basis. Back in February, I even allowed myself to walk into a series of exams with the knowledge that I could potentially fail them, for the first time ever in my life. I did literally no work. I blogged, read magazines and did maybe about five hours of revision in the week leading up to the exams. Kindly note that these were Law School exams that many of my ‘comrades’ had been gearing up for since December! These were Law School exams that many an intelligent student had failed in the past. Somehow, I passed (told you I’m smart!) but I only just did.

2 - My relationship.
How will it survive my job? It’s already difficult enough as it is. Long-distance is no easy thing, and so far Mr. Y has handled it pretty well. But the thought of us struggling to stay afloat for another three to four years whilst both working incredibly insane schedules, is scary. Right now, he works like a maniac and I do absolutely nothing with my time. This means that whenever he finds the odd 5 minutes or so to breathe, I am ready and available for a phone call. It’s also meant that I’ve been able to hop back to Lagos at random junctures in the past few months, in the effort to keep our relationship alive. When I start to work longer hours than Mr. Y, and possibly even weekends too, how will we survive? (Obviously we’ll survive, but I mean the relationship – how will the relationship survive?) And when it becomes impossible for me to go to Lagos, and for him to come here, how will we be able to continue to feel as strongly as we do about each other? That kind of distance just could not make our hearts grow fonder. It just couldn't.

The pickle here is though, that if Mr. Y hadn’t come onto the scene however many months ago he did, then I probably would’ve pushed Reason 1 out of my head and gotten over it. I would’ve spent the last few months psyching myself into falling in love with the idea of a high-powered job, truck-loads of money, and don’t-fuck-with-me power suits.

I feel like such a brat. Many people are working jobs they despise. They’re busting their asses to make an extra buck, and working over-time in the process. Yet I'm thinking about giving up good job when I don’t even have a viable alternative to it! If I did have an alternative, this might not be so difficult. I could turn to my daddy and say “daddy I’m going to be a singer, will you pay for singing lessons and buy me a jazz club?” (Obviously I couldn’t, my dad is not an idiot! But you know what I mean.) I’d be able to suggest something else that I’d be doing with my time instead of good job.

Am I stupid for wanting to wait until I find the thing that makes me tick rather than plunging into good job and being miserable both in my work and personal life? Especially when you consider that if I take some time out, and the search for the dream job and the relationship with the Yote don't work, I will always be able to get another job! It might not be as great or as prestigious as good job (which I really should've called 'great job' from the beginning, I just can't be bothered to go back through this post changing it). But I will still be able to get another good job.

What I don't think I'll be able to get is another Yote. Don't get me wrong, I'm not one of those stupid little girls who thinks she's going to marry every single guy she happens to fall for. But Mr. Y makes me happy in ways I never thought possible. And even though I can't be 100% certain we'll be together forever, I just don't want to put us in a position that even Romeo and Juliet would find impossible to get through ...

Cooking for the Bushmeat Lover - The Intro

2007-05-11T12:41:00.000+01:00

So I'm moving on now.

The love life is lacking in lustre :(

Perhaps Mr. Y is panicking after seeing all this mede-mede I've been whipping up.

Perhaps he thinks I can't give him the jungle goodies he needs...

I need to reclaim my title as the Yote's one and only.

I'm going to work my way through all the meat recipes on www.congocookbook.com

They kinda scare me with all this talk of wild boar etc etceteroo.

So I'll be starting with the suya.

I will make Mr. Y fall in love with me all over again.

Forget that nonsense "Continental Man" talk from before.

Its all about the Bushmeat Lover now baby.

Screw You 36A

2007-05-09T11:51:00.000+01:00

The neighbours must be pissed.

Today is make smoothies day.

A basket arrived half an hour ago.

More fruit, and of the exotic variety.

Yay!

This is my kumquat, mango, papaya, orange and banana smoothie.

I call it 'The JamaicaYoteMan'

Have decided I'm not going to Law School this week. Will be making smoothies and broths instead, and reading and blogging too.

P.S. I don't know how to open the pineapple you see in the picture there.

The Opposite House

2007-05-08T17:48:00.000+01:00

"Now it's 4 a.m. and I'm still awake with my fingers splayed over my neck and its old loop
of pain
(and I am at St Catherine's again,
at the window again
amazed again
at the way a steep hill holds growing green on its swerve
when it will support nothing else).

On the wall is St Catherine of Siena, sheets of chestnut hair floating in heaven-driven winds, Catherine who I always fail to love when I remember that she is not the Catherine of spike-wheeled martyrdom. Catherine of Siena looks at me with all of her soul in her soft smile; she looks at me, glad that I will not be staying. I think about the mothers I know or have seen or have heard of. My mother, Amy Eleni's mother, mothers in books, mothers in Chabella's apataki, her stories about the gods. Twenty-four not being old enough, I want to tell my son, Not now, please."

Never having read her before today, I am in awe.

I am often OTT with my expressions of sentiment, and deliberately so. But this time my tongue lies not in cheek.

Get it today.

Save My Piggy Soul

2007-05-08T14:10:00.000+01:00

Fellow Foodies Listen Up...

Today I'm playing truant. I'm on a sabbatical and have now landed myself in a bit of a sticky situation.

I started the quest for the perfect parsnip chip earlier today. Half an hour later, I find myself sinking into a pit of despair.

Having amalgamated several roasted parsnip recipes courtesy of google, I did the following -

Peeled and sliced two parsnips (and some carrots that were lying about too),
Boiled them for 5 minutes,
Tossed the slices in olive oil, cayenne and some salt,
Made a fake oven tray using foil paper, greased it, and lined it carefully with the slices,
Put the tray in the oven for 15 minutes at 180 degrees C.

This is what my oven expects me to have for lunch...

Soggy,
Slimey,
Non-Crispy,
Non-Crunchy
Parsnip and Carrot Chips

I have refused to accept them and so have tossed them back into the oven and upped the temperature. I need a fat-free, carb-free solution to the problem. I will be at it all day. I shall know no respite 'til my chips are crisp.

Words of wisdom are more than welcome.

Diary of A Bitchy Black Woman and Her Hair

2007-05-02T18:20:00.000+01:00

[Nigerian accent] "May the good Lord bless you and keep you. Amen."

[British machine-woman accent] "After the tone, please record your message. When you have finished, you may hang up or press 1 to hear your options."

*Bleep*

A couple of days ago, I rang Julia*. After hearing that recorded message, I promptly hung up and chose to send a text instead. Returning to a hairdresser with your tail between your legs is not an easy thing... especially when she's a thunder-firing, hell damning born-again Christian.

I first met Julia several years ago when she was working at a fabulous place in central London - it was every black woman's dream! A clean environment with lots of stylish ladies (some white ones even!) tending to your hair's every need, in the most minimal of settings. Free of innit, wizzit and wa'gwan type accents, or the Anglo-Jamo patois I described in my Smackdown vs. Raw post, it was perfect.

That is, until it shut down without warning when the owner (a British guy who made it a point to remember every customer's name) went bankrupt.

The salon's workforce spread out all over London. Most chose to remain in the same area code, and one even went on to star in that random British reality show - I think it was called The Salon?

At the time, I wasn't loyal to Julia. Her thunder-firing and hell damning was bloody irritating, even to Christians like me! She was in the habit of launching into her biblical propaganda whilst washing my hair, accosting whichever poor woman was next to me having her tresses soaped. For reasons I still don't understand, I always felt compelled to shoot lady at sink 2 an apologetic look, as though I was in some way responsible for Julia's relentless bombardment and harrassment. Her favourite tactic was reciting John 3:16.

Lady at Sink 2, whoever she was on the particular Saturday I arrived, would shift in her chair nervously and uncomfortably, whilst Julia probed and questioned her on her faith and relationship with God. If she was a rude one, she would take out her ipod. If she was a cowardly one, she would answer politely, and would make weak attempts to cut the conversation short - which never worked, Julia couldn't (and still can't) take a hint.

One day, Lady at Sink 2 was a fiery Jamaican lass (they always are aren't they) who, despite her well put together ensemble, looked like the kind of person one ought not to mess with. Julia, as usual, began her probing and poking, only for the lady to put one well-manicured hand in the air and shout - "Halt!" Julia stumbled a little, I couldn't see her face as I was lying in front of her with my neck against the sink. Lady at Sink 2 continued - "This isn't church! I didn't come here for a sermon! I'm paying through my arse to have this time to relax, and you think I'm open to listening to this bull sheeet?"

Julia was flabbergasted. She rinsed her hands, and I (thinking she was preparing to back away) said a silent prayer - "Jamaican Lady abeg please come back same time next week! Amen!" Little did I know, but Julia was actually lunging into her handbag in search of her Bible. My hair was soapy and wet, and I was in a very compromising position, but even I had to turn round to look at her (along with the rest of the salon) when I heard the words "Get behind me Satan!" as she began to extol verse upon verse on Lady at Sink 2.

Needless to say, Julia wasn't very popular. Whilst some hairdressers would have two or three people waiting patiently for a turn with them, Julia's chair would be unoccupied, and you would find her waiting patiently behind in it, reading her Bible. Being an impatient so and so (the one thing in life I can not stand is waiting for a hairdresser) I always ended up with Julia, knowingly subjecting myself to the torture that would lie in store whenever we made our way to the sink.

Today, years after those irritating Saturdays, I went back to Julia. I had actually been to her last year when she worked at a very nice Lebanese-run place, but then I think they fought with her over the Bible-quoting thing and so she left, and I just couldn't be bothered to follow her to her next even more random establishment.

Today's reunion was long, as it always is with Julia, and she wanted to know about 'Miss Nigeria' and 'Madame President' (her irritating nicknames for my cousin and my sister).

Somehow we managed to get onto the topic of what I was doing at the moment, and where I was going with my life etc. I told her I was still sticking with the law thing, but was now thinking of jumping ship in a couple of years to become an editor or publisher.

Next thing, she says - "It's as if God answered my prayers when he sent you today. Kai!"

I thought to myself - "Christ! WHAT now?"

She then went on about how she was thinking yesterday about the three books she has had in her head for a while now, which could really help mankind (I promise you she said 'mankind'), but the problem is that she isn't such a great writer, which surprises her because she's such a fantastic talker.

She then looked at me expectantly, and I thought - "What the hell am I supposed to do with that info?"

Realising that I wasn't going to throw any offers her way, she proceeded to go into the detail of these books, nodding enthusiastically as she laid down the plot of each, saying how determined she was etc etc.

Anyway look, to cut this 'tory basically she wants me to PUBLISH her books (which thankfully I'm not in the position to do any time soon) AND to find someone who will ghost write them for her.

Now, the problem with Julia though is that she never gives up, and she will literally bring up the issue every single time I go to her. I really don't know what to do because after having suffered with Whilomena* (another hairdresser, but more on that cow next time) for the last 6 months, I know that my hair will only return to its former glory if I allow Julia to take the wheel!!

----------

If you are appalled at what a silly billy I can be, I implore you to head here ---> www.theafrobeat.com to see for yourself that I am in fact capable of occupying my time with non-fluffy matters too!

Go Shawty!

2007-04-30T13:23:00.000+01:00

Crap!!

I missed my 1000th profile view fake birthday thingiebob.

Happy 1095th Profile View to me!

I would like to thank my ma, my pa, my Yote, my homies, and my blog dawgs... you know who ye be! ;)

Naij - A Documentary

2007-04-30T09:03:00.000+01:00

Christ! I really should be working. But Jeremy has commanded a post on this issue, so here I am, several hours earlier than intended.

What is it about me succumbing to people's wishes and commands of late? I was never like this before! In the past, I was a mule. If you told me (or suggested to me) what to do, I'd tell you, in plain and simple English, to piss off. On Saturday for example, my HauTe editrix demanded that I do some PR for the magazine. I had other plans. But no, being the great mumu that I am nowadays, I ended up spending two hours copying and pasting pictures, and attempting to construct 'witty' prose.

Scheeeuuw!

Naij - A documentary.

Before I begin, I would like to say that the organisers of the premiere really kinda got on my nerves in the run up to yesterday. I applied for an invitation to the premiere aeons ago, and also asked for their You Tube embed code, so that I could put the documentary's trailer on my Afro Beat blog (more shameless PR there, but whatever...) for publicity and awareness' sake.

They replied saying that they couldn't let me have the code, even though the blog was members only at the time, for 'copy right' reasons. A week later I found a You Tube embedded box (showcasing the premiere) sitting pretty on a friend's webpage. Turns out he knew the somebody of the director, or maybe the somebody of the somebody of the director. Who knows! (Gosh I really should stop with all this hating and bad bele-ing, and get to the good stuff!)

Anyway, so after giving me serious isho on the embed code front, they then said they'd run out of tickets for the screening but would be having another one soon. True to their word, they emailed me a month later saying the next screening would hold on April 29th at the Cine' Lumiere, and attached an invitation bearing my name.

Their very strict instructions stated that on receiving the invite, I should confirm my intention to attend immediately so as to secure my place on the guestlist, and that I should waste the colour ink (that stuff is expensive!) in my fancy printer, by printing a copy of their full colour invitation to guarantee admission. I didn't reply immediately because I was slightly irritated by all the protocol, but little did I know what next they had in store.

Three days later (I kid you not) I received an email saying something along the lines of - "You recently received an invitation to the premiere of Naij. Kindly note that until you respond in the requisite manner, your admittance to the venue will not be...." blah blah blah.

I huffed and puffed about their blockheadedness to anyone around me who would listen (basically, the four walls of my flat - even the Yote didn't have time to waste on such an issue) but sharply heeded their command. (I dared not front. I wanted to be on that exclusive list!)

This all happened about a month ago.

Yesterday, after a somewhat tumultous afternoon, I waded through the Knightsbridge area and arrived at South Kensington tube station. My friends (the poor victims of the movement for the cultural emancipation of OluwaBitchiola) were late, as I'd expected, so I made my way to the venue without them. Along the way I got stopped by not one, not two, but three sets of individuals of negroid persuasion, who sighted my clumsy A to Z and asked 'oh so innocently' if I knew which way the Cine' Lumiere was. Obviously I did! I had a bloody A to Z with me! (Bitchy did not go to this event with the intent to make new friends, Bitchy is bitchy, as you ought to know by now. Hehe...)

I finally got to the door, gave my name to the doorman guy, and found a gift bag being thrust into my hand, with smiles from affiliates and comrades of the director all round. In my head I thought, "can these really be the same people who sent all those uppity emails?" Who would have thought that they would shine their eyes so bright, and be so kind as to hand out cookies and Fanta (which I had changed to a Coke... what a diva), and meat pies. Had I known they would be so generous, I wouldn't have wasted a ridiculous amount of money on lunch in the area. Just kidding... teehee! I don't do meat pies. On days when I crave Mr. Biggs-esque delicacies, I go hunting for scotch eggs and sausage rolls. The real stuff. Mmmm.... Yummy!

Within half an hour, we were seated, and the show was about to begin.

The director, Jide, a young investment banker, gave a short introductory speech about the reasoning behind the project, and its intended outcome. Even though I'd been briefed on his stats by my resident gossip columnist, and knew that he was pretty young (as directors go), I still found that I was very impressed by the committment he had shown over two years to a project that could not have been easy... or cheap!

The documentary took the audience from about 1954 to 2007 in two and a half hours. We didn't once get bored, neither did we fall asleep, as in the case of Bamako. My friends and I still haven't gotten over that atrocious film by the way. In fact, just as the opening tune was being played (the national anthem of course), Maxine turned to me and whispered - "Bitchy, this better not be Bamako part two oh!"

And it wasn't.

We sat through incredible archive footage spanning from the petition for independence presented in London by eminent Nigerians (including Fela's mother) and the conferences by African intellectuals such as Nkrumah, Kenyatta, Awolowo, all the way to the current Obasanjo regime. The route (it really did feel like a journey) went something like this (I apologise in advance for any errors or misyarns at this stage. My memory is appalling. And also, feel free to skip this part of my post if you're a pro on Nigerian history)...

Petitions for independence by proud African nationalists (amongst which were many prominent Nigerians), the eventual granting of representation in a white-run parliament at home, a 1956 or so visit from Queen E'liza (as Osuofia would call her), the setting of a date in 1960 for independence.

The make up of the first Nigerian-run parliament (Awolowo, Tafawa Balewa, Okotie-Eboh (a wiley finance minister), the Sardauna of Sokoto, Azikiwe (a lot of people are still yet to learn that he really was just a figure head) etc), the internal strife and political backbiting and inefficiency. I had always wondered why my Yoruba uncles were full of little adulation for Awo - a man that I had been told was 'the father of the Yorubas'.

The first military coup by mid-ranking Ibo officers, the merciless slaughter of the Sardauna, Awo's imprisonment. The counter coup and rescue by another military officer (Aguiyi Ironsi), whose first press conference was hilarious - the guy really hadn't thought through any cohesive plan for the nation at all!

The northern coup, which saw many Igbos slaughtered, was led by figures such as Murtala Mohammed, but which eventually brought Yakubu Gowon to power. The peace talks in Ghana between Ojukwu and Gowon (Ojukwu wasn't having any of that cigar/food and wine-sharing nonsense).

The Biafran War - footage from mercenaries, international networks, it was incredible. Ojukwu's flight, Phillip Effiong's surrender, Gowon's mercy, and his government's subsequent inefficiency.

A coup to oust Gowon, led (I think, this could be wrong) by Obasanjo, Danjuma etc, which had Murtala Mohammed at its head. Murtala's assassination, the lost potential, the nation's widespread mourning, the firing squad death of suspects, Obasanjo's assumption of power, and the handover to Civilan rule - Shagari.

Corruption in Shagari's weak and useless regime, civilian unrest, the Buhari-led coup that brought in W.A.I - the War Against Independence, the brutality of that short regime, a botched attempt to kidnap Dikko from London (hilarious!!), Buhari's overthrow by Babangida (I could be wrong at this point as there was a whole part in the story they deliberately missed out because it was just the same people repeating the same mistakes or something)

Babangida's regime, the decline in the naira because of the worldwide oil glut, the Nigerian Mafia's drug invasion of America, the abandonment of government scholars in foreign countries, the advent of 419, June 12, Abiola's shady dealings, the annulment of the election, MKO's arrest, Shonekan's 'interim government' and Abacha (the defence minister in Shonekan's cabinet)'s assumption of power.

The Abacha years, the rediscovery of religion, new wave preachers, oppression, MKO's death, and Abacha's God-sent heart attack.

Abdusallami Abubakar, the handover to democracy, Obasanjo's release, 1999, Obasanjo's campaign and victory. The incredible changes between 1999 and 2007 that the nation has completely forgotten about, and an analysis of the dangerous failure to redistribute the newly acquired wealth to the poor.

Having written all this, I really have become aware of a sense of gratitude that I now feel towards Jide and his team. Prior to yesterday, I had struggled, and failed to put the pieces of my country's history (my history) together. My friends and I had often lamented about our complete ignorance of its complexity, and now, for the first time really, I've gotten to see that there truly is a fascinating story behind Nigeria. I no longer see Nigeria as a wreckage, a ship with no destination, substance or hope. I see it for the difficult experiment that it is (for that is what it has been all along), and for the immense challenge it represents to any person or group who attempts to control it or steer it in one united direction.

The Naij documentary was fascinating - I hate that word, but it was!! It was surreal in the beginning, when the Sardauna and Balewa opened mouths out of which popped some of the most upper class, Winston Churchill-esque accents I had ever heard in black men. And it was hilarious to observe the steep decline in the fone' as time went on. I had always wondered why my grandfather (who will be 90 this year) sounded like such a pompous tosser! On the telephone, he could pass for a member of the royal family, and I don't mean Prince William, I'm talking Prince Philly! You know, "Hyar, hyar" and all that osh pigosh!

To Jide at al, congratulations, c'etait fabuleux, long may you reign, more greeease to your wrist, etcetera etceteroo.

The Icarus Girl

2007-04-25T09:56:00.000+01:00

I'm sitting in my flat, on a Wednesday morning, eating pork sausages and ketchup, and feeling very 'Manhattan' with myself. I don't think women in their twenties in Manhattan eat pork sausages on Wednesday mornings, but I think this is just a warped projection of my desire to live the New York dream.

A long time ago I thought I would one day be a writer, and that I'd have a fabulous apartment in New York in which I'd sit all morning long, looking out into Central Park from behind my typewriter, and gathering mounds of inspiration.

I suppose that day is now long gone because, as you know, I'm on my way to becoming a city lawyer.

Quel snore!

The cultural enlightenment and emancipation of OluwaBitchiola has so far been very exciting. In March, there was Bamako, which I despised, but there was also Shuffering and Smiling, which I never blogged about. That was a documentary about Fela and Femi Kuti, and their endless struggle with Nigeria's many problems - political mismanagement being the key one from the film's perspective. I'm surprised I forgot to talk about it on here, seeing as I went all the way to Clapham (CLAPHAM people) to see it. Ooh wait a minute, I did talk about it, but on The Afro Beat.

Yesterday I ventured into a territory even more foreign to me than Clapham... I went to Dalston. I actually didn't know I was going to Dalston at the time, I thought I was going to Hackney. My three friends and I (one yellow investment banker, one development economics wiz cum fashion designer, and one stunning Spaniard in baby pink trousers) got onto the Bus 149 from Liverpool Street at about 7pm. The aim had been to get to Hackney for 7, but it turns out maths (well time mathematics anyway) isn't my forte'. Why did we need to get to Hackney at 7? Because 7 was when the 'pay what you can' tickets to the play we were going to see, were going on sale.

Quel cheapscates!

Needless to say, we didn't get to Hackney at 7. But we did get to Dalston at 7.40. The play, was at the Arcola Theatre, in what can only really be described as Turkeytown. I never knew that just as the major cities (London, New York, Lagos even) have Chinatown, they also have Turkeytown, which is where good people of Turkish origin come out to play. In the corner shop (or so we thought initially, but it was really just a dirty warehouse) nextdoor to the theatre, we stared at shelves for well over 5 minutes, struggling to find something familiar to purchase. Rukks, ever the daring soul, went for the least strange-looking biscuits she could find, whilst I ended up with Doritos, Ells with Walkers, and E-Weezy with pretzels.

As luck would have it, despite the website's advice to arrive at 7 to be sure to secure 'pay what you can' tickets, there were still some available at 7.45. It was a funny moment when the lady asked us what we were going to pay, and I said £5. She thought I meant £5 for all 4 tickets, and struggled (but failed) to hide her scowl. In hindsight, I really should've thought ahead, and shouldn't have gone so well dressed!

Tickets bought, weird Turkish snacks abandoned, chitchat underway, and I see a girl by the counter who looks oddly familiar. So I nudge E-Weezy and say "I think that's Helen Oyeyemi". After some hilarious debate, I conclude that it is her, and that I'm going to say hello. I suppose if she had been a much older author, I might have thought twice, but then seeing as she's my age, and we have friends in common, I didn't think much of it.

Turns out, it was Helen. The only reason we were surprised to see her there was because our friend Tomlinson (yet another code name thank you... I do not have friends with names like Tomlinson) had brutally rejected our invite to the play because he already had plans to go see it with "the author herself" (i.e. Helen) on Thursday. It hadn't really occurred to us that she would want to see it more than once!

Helen, as you must know, is the author of The Icarus Girl, a book I have purchased twice and never read.

I first learnt about her about four years ago, when the book was as yet unpublished. We were both still at school at the time. She was on her way to Cambridge, and I to LSE (talk about the wrong university for a hopeful fiction writer). I bought the book in the first month of its release (because I have a thing for hardbacks... quel dork, ey?), read the blurb at the back, and gave it to a friend. I then bought it again last year on a whim (okay because it was only -N- 600 at Nu Metro), but never once worked my way onto the first page.

Why? Because I am the biggest fraidy-cat known to mankind, and I had heard it was a very scary, almost disturbing story. Even the critical acclaim phrases on the back of the book were saying so, so I did what any discerning fraidy-cat would do... I heeded their warning, and left TillyTilly and Jessamy Harrison well alone.

Well... I certainly got 'acquainted' with them last night. And it wasn't pretty! At one point, I even held onto Ells and E-Weezy, shutting my eyes because I was afraid of what was coming.

Talking to Helen after the play, she said the director had cut out many of the book's more frightening scenes. I had thought the play was bad enough! I couldn't stop myself from declaring to the author then and there, that I was never ever going to read her book.

How surprised was I then to find myself dredging it out well past midnight, and reading the first chapter. I got to the end of that, and abandoned the book in the kitchen, just so TillyTilly couldn't get at me whilst I was asleep.

(Yes, I have a very vivid imagination)

Back to the play though... it was very well done, and there's still loads of time to go see it. Its on at The Arcola, which is in Dalston, not Hackney, get it right! And I could even go as far as to say that it was worth the near-death encounter Ells and I had on the way home.

We decided to take the Bus 30 which'd take us right back to our cosy little end of London. The problem was that the Bus 30 didn't come anywhere near the theatre. So we got on some random bus with Rukks and E-Weezy who then, wisely, decided to go all the way on it to Waterloo. Ells and I, got off at the Dalston Lane Junction, and found the Bus 30's bus stop on Balls Pond Road (which was distinctly more creepy than the junction with all its bright lights). We stood there for a minute, pleased with ourselves, until I decided to check what direction buses at that stop were heading in. It turned out they were headed even deeper into the lion's den.

We then crossed the road, and saw that the Bus 30 was already at the bus stop nearest to where we were standing. I looked around me and thought, there is NO way I am standing on this street for another half hour with a stunning Spaniard in her baby pink trousers waiting for another bus. I believe she had the same thought (minus the stunning Spaniard bit). And before we knew it, we were both legging it down the opposite end of Balls Pond Road, as fast as we could.

It pains me to think of what was going through the minds of the other bus-awaiters that we had stood beside at the wrong bus stop. First, a posh looking black girl and a hot white girl stand in front of them looking flummoxed, then they cross the road and stop for a good minute, then next thing they're flying down the road with the black one in the lead, before the white one overtakes her leaving a good mile between them. (I never said athletics was my thing at school!)

We ran so fast that we got to the stop long before the bus, and then had to get our breathless selves together hurriedly when a scary looking man began his approach (I suppose even a toddler would look scary against the Balls Pond Road backdrop). I could see Ells' veins popping as the man got even closer and the bus crawled sluggishly for what seemed like ages up the road. As Olodumare would have it though, thirty seconds later we were safe and snug on a filthy Bus 30 surrounded by two Chinese girls, one drug addict and some old people, and were on our way home.

My only regret is that we forgot to make a pitt-stop at Obalende Suya.

--------

Helen and I should be going on a date to share something we have come to discover is a mutual passion next week. If anything other than drooling ensues, I will be sure to blog about it.

Ooh and I'm going to the screening of the Naij documentary on Sunday. Will be sure to blog about that too, even though Jeremy already got in there first after his private screening. Can you smell the envy?

Coming Live To You From CRU [Cowards R Us]

2007-04-14T00:15:00.000+01:00

Its just after midnight. In layman's speak, its still 'Friday night' and...

Lagos is deserted. Completely deserted.

The ride back from the Yote's house was frought with tension, tension and MORE bloody tension. In his silence I could hear the accusatory - "Why the hell were you refusing to go home all this while when you were falling asleep and taking up the space on my sofa with your silly derriere?"

I'm exaggerating. Of course he wasn't thinking that. But he was on edge, and I was effing scared.

Every night the Yote takes me from Ikoyi to V.I.

On Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays we encounter eight to ten cars en route.

On Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays we occasionally queue up behind ten cars at the V.I. end of Falomo bridge alone! And in total, we see possibly sixteen cars.

Even in the group I've placed it in, Friday night shines and beams way more than the others because Friday night in Lagos is, and has always been, a big deal.

It hasn't been a big deal to me for a long time now as Lagos time is Yote time and I have absolutely no interest in engaging in the 'see and be seen' thing the 'elite' set are so famous for. The most contact I've had with clubbers and bar-hoppers during my last 3 trips to Lagos, has been spying on them from behind the windows of Yote's monster truck.

Tonight, there was not a soul to spy on. Not a clubber, not a hopper, not a nothing! There was no one to laugh at. There wasn't even the dodgy banger that I have been known to delude myself into believing is a band of robbers waiting to pounce on us.

Now, as far as I know, no curfew has been set in place. And earlier today, when the sun was shining, there was no katta-katta. Or perhaps I should say there was no reported katta-katta as I have lately become acquainted with the rock-solid propaganda machine manned by Oga Tinubu, his goons and the like.

At one point this afternoon, I even ventured as far as Obalende, and then Marina (yes I know these places are not far before anyone crucifies me) and there was absolutely nothing going on. You could've been forgiven for thinking it was a Sunday - even the danfos were few and far between! There were cars on the road, several of them. But there was no manic traffic. Gone were the angry horns and the hoards of people and beggars. Those random hawkers carrying toilet seats and encyclopedia volumes were absent too, leaving only the real deal - the guys selling credit, chewing gum, and things you actually need whilst sitting in a car! Lagos was pleasant for a change, and I sat like a misguided little pup in my car, making a mental note to tell the Yote off for his million and one conspiracy theories about this weekend's possibilities, that had frightened the hell out of me.

I also made a mental note to tell him about Saheeto, and his quest to become a member of the House of Reps this year. Just to get you up to speed, Saheeto was crowned 'the small chops king' of Lagos back in 2004. In 2005, he extended his realm by seizing Abuja from any local small chops hopefuls, and then in the same year (as Ovation informed me back when I was an avid reader) he took London by storm!

Saheed Kekere-Ekun, the go to guy for those extra puffy puff puff balls, and that uber juicy piece of stickmeat/pepper snail, is the PDP (correct me if I'm wrong, which I probably am, as I was too gobsmacked to take a proper look at the poster) House of Reps candidate for Lagos, and is thus a potential member of that crucial institution (well it's crucial in other countries) - the Legislature.

For more on Saheeto, click here. Its a Sun News (don't you love them?) article which begins - 'He applied for job of a waiter, but got employed as chef, today he has carved a niche in fast food business'. The typos are not mine.

The Yote feels that my extreme aversion to Saheeto's audaciousness stems from my being a descendant of Snobby Snobberson herself. Remember her? My mother?

Call it snobbery, call it whatever you will. Just answer me this - What could a man who only went so far as secondary school, and who has spent his entire working life building a small chops empire (even if it is a remarkable empire - click here), have to contribute to an institution that is (sorry, ought to be) the fount of the nation's legal order and the source of its continued amelioration?

Tonight, on the Lekki Expressway, large groups of heavily-armed soldiers have only just set up road blocks with hefty bags of sand a la the U.S. in Iraq. I didn't see these myself. Perhaps I'm glad I didn't as I really and truly might've burst into tears on seeing them. The Yote was the one who saw the soldiers dragging the sand bags, when he drove on the opposite side of Falomo bridge, away from V.I.

Does this spell trouble for tomorrow? Is it a sign that the rumours of violent clashes between warring political factions could be more than just rumours? On some level I am comforted by the notion that the govt is attempting, or at least, wanting to be seen to be attempting to prevent any harm coming to voters. But then, thinking back to how lazy and non-responsive this outgoing regime has been, I can't help but think that the threat of serious violence tomorrow must indeed be very real and very potent, for the govt to get off its backside and decide to maintain a visible presence on the streets!!

Tomorrow, I will be indoors. There will be no live coverage from the voting stations on this blog. I don't do danger/conflict/anything that could potentially mess up my hair. My middle names are not Christiane and Amanpour. Sorry! And ironically enough, my hope is, that the next time I blog, I won't have a single thing to say.

Pants on Fire

2007-04-09T23:11:00.001+01:00

What a lazy arse I've been.

I wish I could say I've been doing something particularly exciting these last 3 weeks, but I can't.

Sorry.

I've been basking in the glory of my previous post which so many people, surprisingly, found hilarious.

After all that glory-basking, I realised that nothing worth reporting or even remotely funny had happened to me, and I couldn't bear the thought of coming on here to spout some carelessly-constructed trash only to receive 2 or 3 pity comments.

But I have now decided that time is fast running out.

So I'm taking the plunge. Screw you if you don't find me funny. Even the pros take time off!

Now, aside from the acute laziness, the glory-basking and the failure-fearing, I've been experiencing a record amount of eye-opening during my 'mini-sabbatical'. Below are some of the random things I've 'discovered' of late that I rightly/wrongly feel are worth sharing:

1 - People lie.

The hair-do I moaned about last time received rave reviews from friends in London. Indeed, after all their ooing and cooing, I considered coming on here to do a retraction and put in a little praise for Feline. Until I came to Lagos. Barely within an hour of my arrival, my father asked why I was wearing a wig. He wasn't being malicious. He was genuinely curious. My brother, independently, then asked the same question 2 hours after that. And then a couple of days later, my newly-appointed esthetician (who has promised to rid me of all unwelcome inhabitants on my forehead) asked me to take my wig off so she could get a proper look at my face!!

2 - The Yote lies.

The liars are not confined to London alone it seems. On Friday, I was filling the Yote's sister in on the disastrous hairdo I had only that morning rid myself of, when the Yote chirped into the convo reinforcing and demonstrating just how disastrous the hairdo had been. I turned to him, mouth agape, at which point he stated matter of factly that the hair had looked incredibly fake, but he hadn't wanted to have to sit through another hair-inspired crying episode, so he hadn't said anything. This is the same Yote who had pretended (six days before that) not to be able to see any difference between my "do" and my real hair. There are no words.

3 - I too am a member of 'Liars R Us'.

I have never been on an okada, or a danfo, or molue, and I can count the number of times I've been in a taxi (in Lagos) on one hand. There is always light in my house, and there are no mosquitoes. I've never been anywhere dangerous or remotely exciting like Agindingbi, Shomolu, Oshodi, Mile 2 (or is it Mile 12?) or any of those places. I'm a sheltered brat frollicking in what can only properly be described as a doll-cage. This realisation isn't exactly groundbreaking, but it did make me feel rather foolish the day it dawned on me last week. Prior to the realisation, I had always thought of myself as a hardened Lagosian, who knew all there was to know, was the epitome of 'hardcore', and was on a par with any rough rider. I don't know what I was thinking really, considering that I haven't actually lived in Lagos for the last 9 years. I suppose the person I'd been comparing myself to was the Yote, who couldn't even get from Ikoyi to Chocolat Royal without directions a couple of months ago. (I love you boo!) How misguided was I?

To sum up therefore...

I am an outsider in Lagos. And it hurts to say it. Disarming this long-concocted delusion has not been good for my sense of self, I tell you. I also have friends who tell me what they think I want to hear - I can't quite tell if this is a good or a bad thing yet. My guess is its more bad than good. Furthermore I have a boyfriend who feels my constant hair woes are a form of superficial hypochondria. The same boyfriend also got just a tad frustrated during the week, when I tried, and failed, to explain why I suddenly felt so alienated and detached from Lagos. His point was that 'Lagos' is full of so many different types of people who undergo completely different experiences everyday, in which there're unlikely to be many commonalities. I couldn't pinpoint the exact aspect of Lagos I felt distant from, neither could I articulate my sentiments to the satisfaction of the Yote, but all I knew was that I was more than overwhelmed by how estranged I was from the entire Lagos experience.

I wonder what other people hold onto when seeking to define themselves as Lagosians? Are there specific characteristics/experiences that define the Lagosian? Or is every person's identification of himself as a Lagosian based on his personal (and internal) determination of what constitutes a Lagosian?

Help!

Oh and by the way, my newly-opened eyes and I will be on the look out for more treachery. I intend to expose the scam that is West African Idol soon. Stay tuned.

Smackdown VS Raw

2007-03-20T23:36:00.000Z

What is it about ghetto salons that invites cat-fights, bitch-blows and all other such teengs for absolutely no reason whatsoever?

I'm sitting in a rather Jamo-fied (i.e. Jamaican-manned but African-owned) establishment on Monday afternoon having a rather skanky full-head weave (my FIRST thank you very much) stitched to my scalp by a very glamorous and very butch Jamaican feline, when a similarly butch, but not-so-glamorous (and alarmingly hairy - by which I mean facially hairy) Jamaican woman marches in.

First, she makes a fuss about having to wait longer than 10 minutes to have her hair done. Did she make an appointment pray tell? Nooope. Are there any free members of staff walking about doing nuttin? Nooope. But she kicks up a right fuss.

She's asked to be patient by the Kenyan owner (who by the way was arrested a year ago for running a BROTHEL in Mayfair... yes you now know the salon of which I write. I can't believe I still go there when desperation calls. Father forgive me!)

After huffing and scheeuwing, not-so-glamorous Jamaican woman takes up the empty seat next to me.

I don't give her more than a second's glance. I can smell the fire seeping out of her nostrils. Lady wants trouble and is surveying the room for something (or someone) to pounce on.

I get lost in my Equity Finance Textbook (riveting stuff!!) and 10 minutes later hear her say "Excuse me?" I know for a fact there's no way she's talking to me, so carry on being riveted by my riveting equity sumting.

Chinese Dude (who does the manicures in the place. It really is a market place... I kid you not!) calls to the lady doing my hair (i.e. very glamorous and very butch Jamaican Feline): "Feline... she taalkeeng too yoou."

Feline turns round to look at very butch but not so glamorous and alarmingly facially hairy Jamaican woman - let's call her 'Hairy Chin' for ease of reference.

Hairy Chin ignores her gaze, and so Feline returns to her work i.e. sewing skank-ass weave onto Bitchy's head.

Then Hairy Chin yells: "Oh so you gat de eyez too look me now wooman?"

[Kindly read italicised statements with a conk Jamo accent, unless otherwise stated, from here on end]

Feline: "I wurk in fraant of me! Nat behind!"

Hairy Chin: "Whatchu mean ya werk in frant? I calling to you, you ignaar me. Now you say you wurk in frant? Scheeeuw!"

Feline [Addresses Kenyan butt-kissing owner]: "Controool yar castumer Kenyaaan"

Hairy Chin: "Whatcha mean controol yar castumer. You'z mannarlessss! TYPICAL Jamaycan! Typical!

Feline [Slams skank-ass weave onto Bitchy's lap. Pushes back stool violently. Stool falls over]: "Who you teenk you is? Who de frig you? Udder castumers sarry, but FACK youu wooman! Yooseless! KENYAN controol yar castumer! Kenyaaan!!"

[Kenyan scuttles over]

Kenyan [read in Kenyan accent]: "Feline please. Feline calm down. Che!"

[Feline and Hairy Chin are chin to chin, puffing out heaving chests like gangsters buffing up for a street fight]

Chinese dude [read in Chinese accent]: "Feline. Easy Feline. She maykeeng trabble you Feline? I show har dooor Feline!"

Hairy Chin and Feline yell Jamaican profanities ("Frig You!" "Fack You!" "Blaady Appity Teeng!" "Yoooseless!"), spitting in each other's faces.

Chinese Dude and Kenyan get caught in the cross fire, eyes half shut, fearing being blinded by the venomous saliva.

The struggle rages on.

Hairy Chin is pulled out by Chinese Dude and Kenyan - This takes a while as Hairy Chin weighs more than the two combined.

Feline slams back down onto her stool, yanks skank-ass weave off Bitchy's lap, and returns to her stitching - shaking and enraged.

Bitchy leaves the establishment an hour later.

Bitchy returns home and cries to the Yote on the phone.

Bitchy's hair SUCKS!!

Bamako

2007-03-15T23:32:00.000Z

As part of my movement for the cultural enlightenment and emancipation of Bitchy (or OluwaBitchiola as I was christened after the razz outbursts of last month) I went to see Bamako.

Before I went, I told the Yote of my intention. He replied - "that's a little arty farty for you".

In Yote speak that meant "You won't enjoy it. Why on earth are you going?" but unfortunately at the time we were speaking I'd forgotten to put on my translator hearing-aid, and so didn't heed the advice of the wise one.

To cut a long story short, the Yote was right. I did not enjoy it.

Several people have already benefited from my long tirade about what a terrible film it was, but I would just like to share my view with the world in case Stephen Spielberg or Spike Lee voices a similar opinion in a week's time prompting a 360 degree revolution in world opinion on Sissako's project. And we all know I won't get any credit when that happens.

I suppose my take on the movie could be considered overly critical, so permit me to explain my starting point. Here are a few things I believe about cinema and the medium of film:

1) A film should be an experience, be it a pleasant one or not.

2) If a film is being shown in the West, it should be judged with the same criteria applied to all other films showing in the West, regardless of its origin. Meaning, the film should not be patronised with praise given simply because of the fact that it is based on Africa, set in Africa, and made by an African.

Bamako basically follows events in a makeshift courtroom where the plaintiff is Africa and her people, and the defendant is the World Bank, the IMF, the G8, multinationals and all such other Western powers/corporate entities. The courtroom is in a rural compound attached to some houses, and the inhabitants of said house carry on with their comings and goings as if the courtroom were not going on in their backyard.

Whether or not my synopsis is factually accurate, that is sha the general plot. Reading that, you're probably thinking (like I foolishly did) - "Wow, that sounds really interesting!"

WRONG!

Bamako had all the potential to be a captivating and clever film, but instead it was the dullest thing I have seen in a long time which sent me to sleep THREE... I repeat... THREE times. I would say that's a remarkable feat, given that it was only two and a half hours long.

The movie is basically one cleverly-worded lecture after another. There is nothing spontaneous or real about what happens in the courtroom. The lectures (I'm sorry... "testimonies") after the first ten minutes become tedious and snore-inducing. Sissako ought to have asked himself why it is that such lectures (on poverty, globalisation, debt, emigration, poverty, globalisation, debt... you get the picture!) are rarely given in blacked-out theatres. Perhaps its because in such environments, even if the speaker is the most enthralling specialist on the planet, the viewer's chemical faculties are more easily triggered, and he will fall ASLEEP?

None of the 'clever' elements in the film were introduced subtly. You could almost hear Sissako screeching "Look at me!! Aren't I clever?" with every multi-layered/quirky maneouvre. To illustrate... at the start of the film, to make it clear that the inhabitants of the backyard were going about their business as though the courtroom was not there, he showed the madame of the house having the straps of her top tied by her house-boy, in the way your mother/girlfriend would ask you to "zip her up". I thought that was clever until he showed it happening AGAIN on Day 2.

What else did I hate?

The Arguments.

Africa was depicted as a pathetic shell of her former self. I had problems with that depiction, but not (before you suggest it) because I'm some misguided Afro-centric nationalist who deplores any impression of the motherland that departs from the imagery of her beauty and riches. I had a problem with the depiction because it was simply incessant whingeing.

Yes, Africa is in a terrible state at the moment... The situation is more than terrible, more than bleak, I get it. The white man robbed her of her man-power through slavery, broke her spirit through colonialism and emptied (and continues to empty) her coffers through World Bank/IMF-sponsored economic policies. I get that too. Africa has been crippled by the West. Yes, I get that. Most of us who have ever looked into this issue for longer than 2 seconds (and who will probably be the only ones to ever go out of our way to watch the film) know all this.

Because we know all this, we also know that poverty, disease and desperation are not the only things that define Africa. We know that some of Africa's territories are breaking away from the cycle of desperation despite having to face these very obstacles the individuals in Bamako whinge about for so long. We know that Africa will get nowhere if her people are encouraged to sit on their asses and mope and moan about how badly they've been wronged by the West. The West knows its wronged us (well the powers that be do) and the West will continue to wrong us if we don't get our shit in gear or start taking matters into our own hands, and instead persist with the kind of attitude promoted in Bamako.

Another thing we (viewers) know is that Africa's 'citizens' share a considerable portion of the blame that the movie lays so shamelessly on the West. Our contributions (I speak not of crooked politicians alone) are/were instrumental to the huge mess Africa is in now. What Sissako implies through Bamako (Hey! That rhymes!) is that Africa has every right to blame the West for her misfortunes, and should keep on doing so for every single misfortune that arises from here on end!

Is that the message of progress? To sit around waiting for handouts from other sovereign nations when we will soon be (and in the case of Ghana, are already) celebrating the 50th anniversaries of our own sovereignty? Even though this may look like I'm trivialising the past (and continuing) sufferings of Africa, I can't help but be reminded of road accident victims in Lagos. You hit Mr. Passerby with your car, take him to hospital, foot the bill, and then get a phone call a week later from Mr. Passerby saying that his mother is sick and you must pay for that too, and another call a month later saying that he can't find work because times are tough, and so you must pay for his child's schoolfees.

To the optimistic or perhaps more academic eye, it may not look like that is what Bamako was doing. But to me, it did.

The only way I can think to conclude is to say that perhaps Bamako wasn't intended for an African audience. I don't think it can have been. Firstly, because it provides a purely unconstructive forum for 'victim' mentality which is the last thing Africa needs. And secondly, because it is just too damn boring for any African to sit through.

Bitchy is retiring. Feel free to pick holes in her long-ass argument. Shey BlogWorld is all about free speech? In any case she can handle a show-down on the comments page, so bring it on.

Coobie and The Boob Lady

2007-03-14T00:27:00.001Z

I'm sitting with my mother in a lounge in the airport. We're talking, and laughing, and enjoying my last hour in Lagos, when a pack of ghetto-fab people arrive. One's face is buried beneath waist-long dreadlocks, another is in a tight muscle-top (through which a blossoming pot-belly is visible from certain angles), another has tribal marks on his face, is wearing a cheap suit, and clearly doesn't belong. All are wearing sunglasses - the airport as you know is indoors.

I can see Mother's thoughts running through her mind. In a former life, I believe her name would have been Snobby Snobberson. She later confirmed that she was indeed thinking something along the lines of - "Who the hell are these? And why on earth are they sitting so close to me?"

Five minutes later, a similarly decked out party arrives. Mother mutters "Dear God... More of them?" Luckily no one else hears. From their exchange, it is clear the new invaders are friends of the earlier party. The all-star female cast in Party 2 is glittering under the weight of bling, bling and more bling. The quiet one in their midst is obese, to say the least. She squeezes herself into the seat beside Mother with much difficulty, and her spare parts breathe a sigh of relief as they seep over the chair's wooden base. She too is in sunglasses. She too is blinging.

The 'quiet one' in Party 2 is Mo'Nique a.k.a. Miss Parker.

The member of Party 1 in the 'tight muscle-top' is Cuba Gooding Jr.

Mother has no clue who they are.

I do. But I act like I don't.

Mother and I retire to a café on the 1st floor of the building. Through its greasy windows we see the members of Party 1 and 2 mingling and chatting more freely amongst themselves.

Cuba needs to take a leak. He walks, with tribal-marked/cheap suit dude by his side, through the hall. No one gives him a second glance.

The toilet facilities in Murtala Mohammed are not to his taste.

He walks back through the hall seconds later, and returns to his seat in the lounge (which is run by a private concierge company, not an airline, for those who are confused).

Cuba is restless.

Minutes later, he's off again. The toilet is out of the question, so he goes on a jolly meander. He looks from side to side, watching and waiting, watching and waiting. He moves very slowly, deliberately so.

And then... a Lady in Pink approaches. She is well-endowed. Cuba looks pleased. She hugs him, he does not resist. They remain thus, with her heaving bosom pressed up against his 'pecs', for an indecent amount of time.

Then Lady in Pink skips merrily on her way.

Others, having observed the scene for a millisecond or two, continue their buzzing and busy-beeing.

Cuba stands, hands on hips, ignored, but patient.

He waits.

Mother and I leave the cafe. We say our goodbyes. I walk through the passport and luggage checking facility (if it deserves to be called that), emerging hot and bothered on the other side after being frisked by a neanderthal in a mouldy brown suit.

Mother makes for the exit. Sneaking a peak at the muscle-topped man whose name she believes to be "Coobie", she finds him enveloped in a crowd of six or seven admirers.

Coobie is radiating.

Mother smiles to herself and makes a mental note to tell me of Coobie's eventual triumph.

Lagos

2007-03-05T14:03:00.000Z

Alive

Blessed
Lagoons, Palms, Creeks, Beaches

Dangerous

Filthy

Lawless
Okadas, Pedestrians, Policemen, Politicians

Painful
Rape, Robbery, Murder, Violence

Suffering

Throbbing
Rallies, Riots, Uprisings, Teargas, Koboko, Fire Power, Alaiye, Armies

Ulcerous

Waste.

Miss "Diva" Ross: Being Bitchy In My City

2007-02-27T09:27:00.000Z

I was not a happy bunny on Saturday.

At some point during the day, all optimism and enthusiasm flew out the frikkin window and I became a miserable cranky beast!

Events had taken a turn for the worse after I'd arrived at Murtala Mohammed Airport, grinned at the Customs guy and trolley-seller people like a deranged idiot, and nearly broken the backs of the Yote and his driver as they struggled with my embarassingly large suitcase.

The plan for Saturday had been that the Yote would take me home, I'd spend two or three hours clowning around with my mum, dad and my sister, and then he'd come by and whisk me off to his maison, where we'd spend the entire afternoon gazing lovingly into each other's eyes. Five minutes before the Yote and I were to commence any gazing or lovva-lovva-ing, he got called to a meeting. He then spent the next four hours at said meeting, and by the time he was done, I was seething (not at him of course) at the ridiculous individuals who had called him in on a Saturday! Did they not know Bitchy was in town? That she had been waiting for weeks to be whisked away by her Yote? Like... totally ruuude... dude!

The plan for the evening had been even more exciting. My dad had agreed to add the Yote and I onto his table at the This Day Awards thingiebob, and I had been so psyched about it. Just before you condemn me as a wannabe Lagos Big Girl, I would like to state that I, like many, think the Awards ceremony is a ridiculous farce - How exactly the winners represent "good governance and exemplary leadership" is beyond me. The ridiculous money-making scam masterminded by Mr. Nduka O and his goons at This Day, was not the focus of my attention... Diana Ross and Lemar were.

Now... You may remember the details of my love affair with Miss Ross from my post on Dream Girls, but you may not know about my even more passionate affair with Lemar. I love him so so soooooo much. I wouldn't go so far as to call him a genius or anything like that, I just think he ROCKS, and I love him for it!!

The Yote knew, long before he and I began this rocky-roaded relationship, how much I loved Lemar. So when I told him I wanted to go see Lemar, he didn't grumble or mumble... he simply said he was too tired and wasn't gonna come along in case I embarassed him in public with my drooling, swooning and off-key crooning.

By 7pm however, the thought of putting my contact lenses (let's face it, the glasses are funky, but I would rather die than see Lemar in those red frames) onto my very tired and very puffy eyes filled me with terror, as did the thought of putting on makeup, a dress and shoes, and making polite small talk with my parents' friends.

I had no choice but to stay at home.

I called my dad a few hours' later, and came so close to boohooing when I heard Lemar's incredibly beautiful voice so clearly in the background. He just happened to be singing one of my faaaavourite songs at the time. It was all too much for me to handle... It still is to be honest. I feel like crying now just remembering how amazing he sounded during the few seconds I heard him on my dad's phone. SOB!

The Yote then randomly decided to put on the TV, and lo and behold... they were showing the This Day Awards!! And we were just in time too, as even though Lemar had finished his set, they were calling Diana out at that exact moment. I was so excited!

And out she came... in a horrid yellow Big Bird-esque outfit, but she still looked soooo beeeoootiful!! For a 62 year old, she twirled with such energy and poise. I love love loved it! To make myself feel better, I'd been telling myself that she would probably only sing for 20 minutes and then leave, as all the other old school artistes my parents had been to see have done... but nope... Miss Ross was on the stage for over an hour!!

I watched with baited breath, knowing that Diva Diana was going to give me something to blog about, and at last, it came...

Half way through her performance, a man in a black fedora got up, strolled casually onto the stage, and gyrated in front of Miss Ross for a couple of seconds. She looked alarmed, but said nothing.

I thought.. "Can this be? Has she changed with age? Where is the bitch-slap? Or, her trademark move, the violent shove?"

Then... ten minutes later, a guy in a White Agbada cum Fila thing climbed the stairs leading to the stage, with a bouquet in hand. His noble intention was to hand her the bouquet and then be on his way.

What did Miss Ross do?

She wagged her finger at him, the way you'd wag it at an ugly dog named Poopie, and then said, "Don't you come on my stage!"

White Agbada cum Fila dude was flabbergasted, as were the other members of the audience. In true Naija style, he paused for a couple of seconds wondering what to do, and then held his bouquet high and flung it at her perfectly manicured toes.

It was sooooo funny! She was clearly perturbed, but tried not to show it. She carried on smiling and doing her Diva Supreme routine, whilst her bald bodyguard sheepishly picked up the damaged bouquet.

I suspect Miss Ross had thought he would shrink back to his seat with his head bowed, after she disgraced him in front of his fellow CEOs, Senators, Governors etc... Little did she know that the Nigerians at such a gathering didn't give two sheeets if she was Diana Ross or Diana, Princess of Wales.

You can't blame her I guess. After all, as I later explained to my mother, who couldn't get over how rude Miss Ross had been, that was probably the first time in her 40-something year career that she performed for an "elite" group of people and members of them interfered with her personal space. I also think that if the first guy hadn't gone on stage to dance with her (which was rather stupid of him, I mean, come on she's Diana Ross for goodness sake!!) then she might have been more polite to the other guy who simply wanted to give her flowers, and wasn't expecting her to grind him like a Koko-let in appreciation.

Like a true professional, she carried on with the rest of her set, at the end of which she received thunderous applause. A couple of times during her performance, the camera skimmed over my parents' table, and I could see my daddy's big head swaying away. Teehee! I didn't have to be there to know that he was singing along to every word. The dude is obsessed... He looooves Miss Ross! And of course, on Sunday morning, all I heard was his harmonious (not!) rendition of "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" and "I'm Coming Out!"

Sigh... I should've ditched the Yote and gone to the show with my parents. But then I was tired, and I wanted to kotch with my Yote. Isn't he blessed with such an amazing girlfriend? Who else would give up a night with Lemar and Diva Ross just for him? Teeheehee!

The Apprentice

2007-02-20T18:47:00.000Z

Happy 500th Profile View Bitchy... You GO Girlfriend!

In other news today, a Personal Assistant to a Big Exec somewhere in the City of London, received the sack for a miscarriage of duty on the London Underground.

[The Story Begins]

At about 1pm this afternoon I sat in a Circle Line carriage holding my breath. I had no reading material with which to distract myself, and so undertook a survey of my fellow tube-travellers, trying and failing to detect the source of the foul stench obstructing my nasal passages.

At Farringdon, several people boarded and left the train, and just as we were about to set off, a blonde woman hopped on at the last minute. She caught my attention as soon as she made it through the closing doors because I couldn't believe how brave (or stupid) she was.

B.A. ("Blonde Assistant" - I'll tell you how I knew she was an Assistant in a minute) had attempted to prevent the heavy metal doors from closing with her petite little hand, which of course would never have worked. Lucky for her, the kind (or exasperated) station platform patrol guy signalled to the driver to open up the doors again just in time. It would've been a rather gory sight had he not done so, as B.A.'s incredibly petite hand would indeed have been crushed.

After her near brush with finger-death, B.A. then held my attention for another reason entirely. Her face looked so familiar that I found myself staring at it intently for more than the permitted number of seconds, as I discovered, when her angry eyes flashed "Back off Lesbo!" at me. I quickly looked away and then realised that I had not in fact met B.A. before, but I had definitely seen her on television. I couldn't for the life of me work out when I had seen B.A. on TV, or what she had been doing on TV, and so persisted in sneaking the odd peek here and there in an attempt to jog my memory.

[As you can no doubt imagine, I was really rather grateful to B.A. at this point for all the pondering/perusing opportunities her presence on the train was providing, as up until her arrival, I had been faced with the prospect of instant stenchocation and had been in desperate need of a distraction...]

I managed to sneak a few more furtive glances at B.A, until she turned her back to me (I think she was appalled at how rude/sexually suggestive I was being). My up close and personal view of her backside alerted me to the fact that she was carrying clothing. The only reason I noticed the clothing in the crowded train was because of the ugly red tie dangling precariously off the back of a shirt and suit get-up, which blatantly did not belong to B.A.

In true tube-stalker fashion I then wondered why on earth she was carrying a man's suit with shirt and tie attached? And what kind of boyfriend or father she had who would make her do such a thing in the middle of the day when other normal people were either at work, commuting to/from work, or in my case, trotting off home with bulging carrier bags of food and essential items!

And that was when I decided she had to be an Assistant, either that or some poor unfortunate intern/temp, in a massive corporation, and consequently the personal slave of a rather large man with a penchant for ugly ties. I concluded the man must also be a bit of a cheapscate, as his suit was wrapped in the flimsiest polythane (or whatever that plastic wrap stuff is called) I had ever seen on dry-cleaned clothing! Even my crappy £5 a shirt dry-cleaners uses the good stuff that doesn't fall apart once swung over an arm. I felt sorry for B.A. It wasn't her fault that her boss' ugly tie was dragging on the dirty tube-carriage floor, it was his! You would think that if her boss was important enough to have his own Assistant cum Personal Slave (which I am told is a rare thing even in big affluent City corps) he would be earning enough to use a more "up-market" dry-cleaner with better packaging?

[Anyway...]

The train pulled into King's Cross which is the only place on the route to Moorgate where the train empties dramatically, and then fills to double its previous occupancy in a flash! Its really rather remarkable what goes on at King's Cross.

As the doors opened, my eyes wandered from B.A. (who made a quick exit, anxious to evade the weirdo situated several spaces too close for her comfort i.e. yours truly) to a rather smelly-looking father and son combo. The duo looked like they were headed for the two seats across from me, which filled me with the type of irrational panic only smelly passengers on the tube can inspire. I wracked my brain for something I could do to stop them from occuping those seats, and momentarily considered flinging my grocery bags onto the empty seats and declaring that I was "saving" them for someone. Unfortunately I am no longer 8, and the tube is not a Primary School classroom, and so I resigned myself to glaring at their really rather filthy attire and body parts - the son's nose had crusty flakes on it and he must have been at least 19... the father had the largest thumbs I think I have ever seen, under the nails of which was the largest amount of fingernail dirt I had definitely ever seen!

I held my breath, and the doors began to shut. Then, they slammed open again when a wiley Latino dude barged his way in with more gusto than B.A. had done a few minutes earlier. Whilst Latino dude and his slimey friends congratulated themselves in their mother tongue on having made it onto the departing train, I looked through the space between the open doors wondering, impatiently, when the train was ever going to get moving.

And that was when I saw it... the ugly red tie... trampled and forgotten on the King's Cross platform.

Now I know why she didn't last long on that television show.

THE END.

Baffledom

2007-02-13T20:02:00.000Z

Highlights from my sojourn as an honorary citizen in the kingdom of Baffledom

1- Why the British are obsessed with tea?

Why I felt guilty for not offering a cup of "the good stuff" to the workmen tearing up my flat today?

Why I caved in and asked if they wanted a "cuppa" four hours after they arrived?

Why I felt both sickened and pleased with myself on seeing their flabby faces flush with delight as they downed the horrid milky-brown fluid I had reluctantly concocted?

2- Why the British refuse to learn the patterns of their own crappy weather?

Why I felt like a lone hoodlum walking down the street wearing UGGs and two hoodies under a wool coat four hours ago?

Why I was on the receiving end of odd stares and glances and became the only explicable reason for the fat old lady's hurried crossing to the other side?

Why I walked home just now under the shade of a large umbrella, feeling lonely in the umbrella-bearer club?

Why the same idiots who earlier looked at me suspiciously, scowled at me with envy from underneath soaking-wet mops of hair and smelly drenched clothing?

3 - Why the British refuse to stock stamps in their corner shops?

Why I was unable to fight the urge to explain to the pimply gentleman at Blackwell's (or was it Blackstone's) that the ugly card I had purchased from him on the eve of Valentine's day, and was scribbling in with his cheap biro, was in fact for my sibling and not for my boyfriend?

Why I left the mailing of my brother and sister's Valentine's cards till the last minute?

Why I stuck two 1st class stamps to the envelope housing my sister's card, tossed it into the red post box and then had none left with which to mail my brother's card?

4 - Why living among the British has made me a greedy, boiler-loving, worldwideweb-dependent weirdo?

Why I opened a packet of Double Gloucester Kettle Chips when I knew dinner would be arriving any minute?

Why I felt cruel last night on seeing my 17 yr old boiler dumped in a pile of rubbish amidst trash bags and torn cartons?

Why I yelled and barked at a total stranger over the telephone yesterday when she told me I would have to pass the next four weeks broadband-free?

Bye Bye B.T.

2007-02-09T19:18:00.000Z

How utterly naive of me to think I had been deprived of BroadBand, not by the incompetence and inefficiency of imbecilic (?) men, but by divine intervention.

When I speak to inanimate objects, people think I'm joker. The last time I spoke to my boiler, several of you cracked up. Boiler was probably amused along with you lot, but his skanky ass isn't smiling anymore, that's for sure! Having overhead numerous telephone conversations, and having spied on a couple of meetings between myself and Mr. Davies of British Gas, Boiler is now fully aware that as of tomorrow, I will be in possession of a BRAND NEW boiler, and that said BRAND NEW boiler will be fully functional by Monday evening. What does this mean for Boiler? That his ass will be out in the cold, in an icy scrap yard, and that there'll be no Bitchy to plead with his daft self, or to beg him to keep her warm, any longer.

My phone line now, is taking me for a fool. Better yet should I say the morons manning my phone line i.e. BT. Not only have the nincompoops permitted TWO BroadBand providers to charge me (when only one of them was providing me with Internet service) for the last FIVE months, they've also now gone and removed BroadBand service from my telephone line, just because they felt like it.

Boy have they messed with the wrong Bitch this week.

Let it be heard now that I am prepared to forego BroadBand for the next two to three weeks if it means switching to another telephone company that won't be so utterly moronic and idiotic. They thought I was joking when I screamed at their stupid automated machine woman, as she talked yet some more nonsense about how they were too busy to attend to my call, but were "very sorry".

They thought I was joking... You may think I am too.

If they like they shouldn't call me back tomorrow "between the hours of 8 and 10am" like machine woman said they would.

They will see who is "very sorry" then.

Just to show that I really mean business and am not just talking out of my arse, I waited the 3 minutes it took for the Google Images page to load, in order to be able to give you an idea of just how angry I am right now.

Woe is Bitchy

2007-02-09T14:34:00.000Z

To all the Blogger faithfuls in Lagos/Enugu/Damaturu or wherever who persist in this hobby whilst battling it out daily with a shitty internet connection, BIG UP my brothers, WE SHALL OVERCOME!

Having been disconnected from my uber-fancy Wireless Broadband setup, NOT because I didn't pay my bill, but because everything in London grinds to a screeching halt once there is even the slightest trickle of snow, its been very difficult for me to exercise the patience now required to get online, and more specifically, onto Blogger.

I woke up yesterday morning, looked out the window, and did my best Pavarotti-esque version yet of "Ohhh What a Beauuutiful Mooorning!". London (well, Park Road to be specific - I can't speak for Tott Court Rd where the likes of The Rukks live) was glistening... and it was gorrgeous! The snow was everywhere. On lifeless trees, and ugly pavements, and even on ugly window sills! It was like a moving, breathing Christmas card, albeit two months too late.

After prancing about in front of the window for a good half hour like a right idiot, I flipped open my Mac Book, only to be told 2 seconds later that I wasn't connected to the internet. I wasn't in the least bit phased, as I'd seen this message more than once or twice before, and so I did the usual refreshing and resetting of laptop and router, exercising my recently acquired "British" patience.

In a matter of minutes the patience was tossed aside, and things escalated to the "Nija" technique of giving my equipment "a good beating" to.. emm... "correct" its electronic head as it were. Good Lordie, I am so ashamed to admit that I spent well over ten minutes shaking, and then slapping, and then punching both my router and MacBook. But in my defence, the cajoling didn't work, and they really left me with no other choice. By the time it dawned on me that the fist-banging and "domestic violence" wasn't going to work either, I was red in the face (literally) and in the mood to shout at somebody. Hmmm... Who to shout at? My service provider of course! And so I telephoned Sky.

A Scott, who I could barely understand, told me, after the painful routine of pretending to be my mother (the account holder) and divulging all sorts of unecessary info, that my phone line had failed the line test. Before I go on, can I just ask this one little question that's been burning on my mind for sometime now?

WHY is it that whenever you call these fools at Sky or 02 or Tiscali or BT (or anywhere where they you know have an account with them, and that they've already succeeded in sucking your gullible ass into setting up Direct Debit), that when they pick up the phone, they say "Hi you're through to {....} How can I help?"

Now, I have no problem with the phrasing of the opening line or anything like that, MY problem is with the fact that they invite you FIRST to tell them your entire problem (knowing that if you've called them its cuz you're really desperate and either about to have a baby or a heart-attack) and then when you're done, act as though YOU'RE the stupid one, by informing you that they really can't take on such detail until you provide them with your account information.

I always feel like saying...

"Wait a minute you stupid high-school drop-out, did You not just ask Me what the problem was?

Did Your idiotic script not just direct You to ask Me that question?

And did you not follow it like a complete Dunce, when you know that what you Should've said was "Hi, you're through to {insert stupid name}, can I have your account number please?"

And now, You have the Audacity to act like I, Emi, BITCHY, a university degree holder, am the mumu?

Simply because I, Emi, BITCHY, a university degree holder, told you my story, like you requested, Before telling you my account number?!

Oloshin!"

But I never do.

I'm too polite! Its this recently acquired "British-ness" I mentioned earlier that just keeps holding me back from giving these hobbits a piece of my (worryingly aggressive and Yorubatic) mind.

So back to the Scott...

It took a while for what he was saying to register, as I have a lot of trouble understanding conk Scottish accents. I know "conk" is an adjective that only really works when describing Igbotic or Yorubatic (i.e. "H" factor) accents, so you can imagine HOW bad the Scottish accent was, for me to refer to it as "conk"!

It emerged, after lots of "Pardon?" and "Come Again?" and eventually, "Ehn?!" from my end, that I'd be wireless-less for 5 days (FIVE WHOLE DAYS) whilst BT (as this was not a fault of Sky - it never is ey?) sorted out the problem.

There's no point in going into what I said to Scotty Mc Scotterson, as I don't remember saying much at all. I was too stumped to say a thing, or argue, or demand to speak to a technical technician guy. Five whole days without Broadband? I simply got off the phone and decided it was a sign from God, or Olodumare, or somebody!

And so, here I am... On my ancient Sony Vaio using ugly Internet Explorer, which I hate, and a crappy dial-up connection, which I hate even more, consoling myself with the knowledge that it could be a lot worse, as the whole episode could so easily have ended with me blogging from a cyber cafe! Yuck! No offence to any cyber cafe regulars or anything, but I simply cannot stand the places. Maybe its because the only ones I've ever been to, have been smelly ones in Lagos like the "Cool Cafe" or whatever its called, which is far from cool! But anyway, that's a story for another day.

I came on here to talk about the time E-Weezy and I went to the ballet, which would've been a lot funnier than my BroadBand woes, but unfortunately those good intentions flew out the window once I "logged on", and was treated to the screeching melodies and harmonies of my "dial-up" connection. It brought back the pain I had been struggling, and failing, to ignore since yesterday morning, and I couldn't take it anymore. I had to share... if only to be the recipient of some sympathy, from somebody, anybody, somewhere, anywhere!

Poor... Poor Bitchy.

----------

As you may or may not have noticed, this post is unaccompanied by the usual picture or graphic - This is what happens when even Googling, a favourite pasttime of the Bitchy One, becomes difficult. The best she could do for the aesthetic benefit of her few faithfuls was increase font size and add splodges of colour here and there. She hopes the effort has not gone unnoticed.

Flirtatious...

2007-02-07T08:32:00.000Z

To be told, after well over a year and a half of solid effort, that you're still an incorrigible flirt, is indeed worrying.

The Yote brought this up on Friday night during a light-hearted conversation we were having, as couples do. Of course, the conversation became not so light-hearted when I responded with something along the lines of - "What?!! EMI?! Incorrigible Flirt Ke?! Is your head ..."

Teehee! Okay maybe I didn't respond in quite so aggressive a manner, but you get the picture... I was upset, understandably!

A year ago an alliance of "concerned" female friends had gathered together in order to get the message across to me, somewhat sheepishly, that I was an outrageous flirt. In the words of one friend, "Why do you think old grandpas and little boys alike have been falling for you at the same time, you monkey?" I think that particular friend had more reason than the others to be concerned, as her younger brother's friend had fallen head over heels for me, even though I had a boyfriend at the time.

I'd felt really rather donkey-like after they spoke to me, as I'd always assumed that the reason men and boys grinned like baboons when I spoke to them, was simply because they were bowled over by my sensational wit and charm.

As the Yote, in his usual polite manner said on Friday, "Why won't they be grinning when they think you're giving them the 'come on'!"

All I could say or think was "Ha.." (to be said with Yoruba market-woman inflection/intonation)

I am now very worried about this instantaneous combustation (?) into excessive flirtation that I am unable to control.

The Yote is not the insecure type, and thus simply found it amusing to see his friends' perplexed, confused and worried expressions whenever they conversed with me.

I am not so amused. Its completely unacceptable to think that of the leeches and slimeballs I've come across in my few years on earth, well over 70% of them would've retired from a conversation with the Bitchy one thinking... "Ooooh she wants me."

"Eeeeeeuuuuwwww!!!!"
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At this point, the Bitchy one must retire. But, if you have any tips, any pointers at all, about overcoming a feature of your personality that is tightly stitched to every fibre of your being, she would like to hear from you. Pronto.

Is this what I do? All this tossing the head back with laughter nonsense?

The Afro Beat

2007-02-05T09:50:00.000Z

So I've done it...

I'm finally on my way to becoming a revolutionary, and a Power Ranger.

http://theafrobeat.blogspot.com

I wonder how easy it'll be to run both blogs. Oh dear...

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Thanks to everyone who's said they'd like to have a look!! I'm so glad guys... If you've looked at The Afro Beat, and feel you would like to join, simply send me an email - theafrobeat@gmail.com

The Power Ranger Replies...

2007-02-02T10:09:00.000Z

@ Jeremy -

the True Love quote you put up the other day was what made me wonder about the cause of the modern day feminist, and what exactly she is fighting for. And from the comments on your blog I could see that a lot of people, like me, were confused. I've always thought feminism meant stripping yourself of all things womanly so as to be seen to be an equal, by men. I suppose that's the feminist stereotype, and I've unknowingly subscribed to it. To a certain extent, "feminist" became a dirty word, not just for me, but for a lot of my friends. I did courses on Medical and Family Law, and then (completely unrelated to my Law degree) a short History course on the role of the Feminist in the British Empire, at university. In the process I came across articles by some modern day feminists who denounced the role of the mother or the wife as being a partriarchal suppression of a woman's freedom. Every single socio-political or socio-economic issue was reduced to "gender", and to the struggle between man and woman, even in the most roundabout ways! Some of those writers were ridiculous! They saw a battle of the genders in absolutely everything. I came to the conclusion then, that you had to deny yourself of a role I believe women were created to fulfil, in order to be a feminist. From what you've said, that assumption was wrong. I think you should do a post about the modern-day feminist, and what she does, because I think I might want to be one. The initial sighting of the label, "feminist", threw me. I pictured modern-day Emmeline Pankhursts yelling "votes for women" and thought... "but we can vote already. What is your point? What about the other more pressing issues?"

@ Mimik -

I do want a label. Not just to put myself in a box, but so that I know what I'm working towards. You know me... I've always needed that kind of framework to have direction. That's why a lot of what I'm doing now feels so pointless and I have absolutely no motivation. I don't want the "corporate lawyer" label.

@ Wily -

Feminism does need to be redefined. I have a feeling Jeremy was alluding to the possibility of the label having already been redefined, so I'm thinking perhaps its just that the rest of us, maybe in Nigeria more so, haven't picked up on this new meaning. I want to be the feminist who deals with the kinds of issues you've described, and more... I don't want to sit around waiting for someone else to do the work in my own country. This is not to say that others haven't started, but they need all the assistance they can get.

So do I conclude by saying I'm going to label myself a "feminist", with the modern meaning of the term attached as a sub-title, for the avoidance of confusion? Or do I abandon labels altogether and try and find a sense of purpose, without the comforting framework of the 'box' directing the way in which I should be going?

I suppose I'll just have to wait and see... and maybe... just go with the wind, for once.

Go Go Power Ranger

2007-02-01T23:53:00.000Z

I'm not a feminist. Should I become one?

Do I understand what 'they' are fighting for? Not really.

Are we not equal in society? Am I naive for having thought that we were equal all this time?

Is it wrong to want to have a family, and look after a husband and children? To want to ensure their lives run like clockwork and they never lack food, water, comfort or laughter?

If a woman wants this for herself and thinks, or knows, it is what will make her happy and truly satisfied, is she doing something wrong?

Is she letting the side down by not wanting to take up arms and fight an injustice that she neither sees nor feels?

I'm confused.

I drank no wine at dinner. But my head is spinning from the SHITTY antibiotics the Yodi has made me promise to take until the very end.

I don't want to be a feminist.

I want to be something.

A lawyer? A publisher? A writer? A revolutionary? A revolutionary writer? A revolutionary writer's publisher?

A what?

Do I want to fight injustice? Yes.

But only if its an injustice I understand.

Like the Niger-Delta crisis, or the poverty, or the corruption amongst the powers that be.

Do I want to die in the process? No.

But am I willing to make sacrifices so that there will be change? Yes.

Do I believe that as a happy-go-lucky publisher cum author cum lawyer cum full-time mother cum part-time revolutionary I could see through a change?

I don't know.

I feel left out and confused.

I want a label.

We're You're Dream Girls... Boooooys We'll Make You Haaappy... Yeeah Yeah Yeeeah!

2007-01-30T18:54:00.000Z

Motown.... I've been obsessed with it since like the age of 5 when I discovered that my beloved Michael and Janet were in some way linked to the Jackson 5, who had been discovered by Diana Ross, who'd head-lined the Supremes, whose boyfriend and baby-daddy was Berry Gordy, who had master-minded the careers of Lionel Richie, Stevie Wonder, The Temptations and who owned the entire music MACHINE known as Motown.

I was so obsessed my dad bought documentaries on Michael Jackson just for me (and on Madonna and ABBA for himself... weird). Later on, in that heaven-sent month when NTA showed every episode of "The Jacksons: An American Dream", which is still my faaavourite mini-series of all time, my very busy father would wait up till midnight, or whatever God-forsaken hour they were showing it, just to press play on the video recorder. He didn't know what all the fuss was about. He never watched the episodes, he just did it so that his brat of a daughter would get to watch the enactment of a story she already knew inside out. I dunno why he didn't just agree to extend my bed-time by four hours so that I could go through all the trouble myself.

By age 8 I could recite hundreds of bits of trivia, not just about MJ the great, but about his family and his "friends" too. The quest to see just how many Motown-related facts I could stuff into my brain without exploding gave way to a true and genuine appreciation of Motown, its hits and its stars. From about 14, I bought compilation after compilation, watched the zillions of biographical mini-series (It turns out Gordy had a penchant for the cheesy but delightful productions), and last year, I even saw the "Motown Dancing in the Streets" musical... twice!

After that rather unecessary summary of my obsession with all things Motown, you won't be surprised I'm sure when I say that for the last month or so I had been DYING to see Dream Girls. I'd heard about the movie aaages ago on E! to be honest, but only developed an interest in it when I learned it was about the Supremes. You see, I'd switched off instantly when Ryan Seacrest or whoever it was, announced that Dream Girls would be starring our dear Miss Knowles. Love her, I do - You could even say I "Lust" her (I know I'm using it the wrong way okay?) because if I was a same-sexer I most definitely would do her. But then, I neither love nor "lust" her movies. To put it simply (and I hate to be so boring and state the obvious)... they suck!

Dream Girls doesn't hit British cinemas till Friday - I know... how slooow are we? But, ever the resourceful Sherlock, Bitchy kept a close eye on the cinemas within her vicinity and jumped and danced for joy on Saturday afternoon when she discovered the movie would be opening on Sunday, and not on Friday as advertised.

Getting to the point is taking forever, so I'm just going to get there.

I Loooooooooooooovvvvvvveeeed IT!

It was just.... phenomenal... In every way - The MUSIC, the colours, the clothes, the story-line, the MUSIC, the choreography, the sheer fluffy-bitchyness of the entire thing, the depth, characters, the personalities... the everything!

First, our friend Miss Knowles, looked amazing! Although 6 or 7 shades lighter in complexion that Miss Ross, and in possession of a voice (again..) 6 or 7 times richer, she pulled it off! It was incredible! When she danced, I saw Diana, and whenever she so much as moved, I saw her again! See the clip below of my absolute favourite bit in the movie, for an illustration of this Diana-esque behaviour! She also took a leaf or two out of Diana's book, and didn't once attempt to sing like the Diva Supreme, which would have been a complete disaster if she had - Diana Ross played Billie Holiday in Lady Sings the Blues decades ago and withstood all pressure to sing the Billie way, instead doing a personal imitation that earned her a Golden Globe and an Oscar nomination.

She did annoy me a little I confess, but only when she talked. She wasn't Diana when she talked... she was back to being irritating, boring, over-dramatic Bee. But she didn't talk often thankfully, so in all, it was grrreat! Her performance clearly wasn't worth the $15 million (or whatever ridiculous sum Yodi said) Daddy Matthew weasled for her, because she so blatantly wasn't the intended star of the whole show!

Jennifer Hudson...

Blew me away from the minute she walked on in a leopard print silk scarf and stomped onto the stage at the amateur contest. I had heard she was incredible, that she'd won the Golden Globe and been nominated for an Oscar, but I hadn't really given it that much thought. As Florence Ballard... Oops.. sorry... Effie White, she was just phenomenal - Am I being paranoid, or have I used that word twice already? The scene media critics raved about where she sang her heart and guts out alone onstage was so worth every bit of the hooha it received.

I couldn't believe how good she was. I spent the entire movie trying to work out where I'd seen her before, and why her face and voice were so familiar. I then felt like such a dumbo when I got home and onto Google to find out that she was the Jennifer Hudson I'd cheered for (and then gotten bored of) on American Idol 3. Its amazing how far she's come. I found out today that she beat over 200 people to the role, including Fantasia who'd beaten her in 2004 to the Idol title. I also found out, much to my relief, that she'd had to put on over 50 pounds for the role and hadn't, as I'd imagined, spent the last 2 years stuffing her face with chicken thighs and cupcakes just because she didn't make it to the A.I. final.

Right now, I'm listening to Eddie Murphy singing "I Meant You No Harm" which is probably the most beautiful song in the film. Of course, as you'll find out, he never finishes it, and even on the soundtrack I purchased on Sunday from Amazon (I love how speedy they are!) its unfinished too. Its so sad! A lot of the other songs he does in the movie didn't quite make it onto the soundtrack (the US version that is... I was too impatient to wait for the fuller UK version to come out in 2 weeks), and its a shame cuz he was so sooooo good. I was really surprised by him. I'm not a fan of his pregnant-girlfriend-dumping ass, and so had even forgotten about his disastrous attempts in the '80s and '90s to make it as a singer, although... that's probably a good thing because he really was a thousand times better than I'd been expecting (even without the prejudice from his crappy music videos tainting my vision).

After all this, it pains me to add that Jamie Foxx was in fact, the most disappointing thing in the entire film. His performance was several centigrades below lukewarm. It just wasn't good enough. His singing too, left much to be desired, which was such a shocker after the Unpredictable album. With hindsight I suppose it was the songs and production on Unpredictable, rather than the man doing the singing, that made it a success, but that still doesn't make it easier for me to swallow the Foxx's far from Foxxy performance as Berry Gordy... Oops! I mean... Curtis Taylor Jr.

I'll stop here before I give away the entire story in the process of bemoaning Jamie's terrible performance.

Ooh.. one more thing. I'm not for a second implying that Dream Girls or Hudson deserve Oscars, before anyone crucifies me! There were definitely a few parts of the movie that got on my nerves... and even though they were few and far between, they managed to do just a little damage to my overall enjoyment of the whole film. The problem, I think, stems from its being an adaptation of a musical. A couple of parts are just a tad theatrical, or cheesy, or downright random. Now, I easily forgave them, because I'm a lover of musicals, but I'm not sure Oscar and his friends will be able to. Come to think of it, perhaps I shouldn't pretend as though I always knew Dream Girls the motion picture was based on Dream Girls the Broadway production. After all, I'm the same person who turned to her little sister and said "Why the hell are they bursting into song every minute? This is so cheesy!" to which she replied, "Its a musical, you mumu!"
This is my faaaavourite bit in the entire film! I can't get enough of it... I've watched it over and over... Yes, I'm a loser. But, Beyonce' is just faaaabulous! I wanna be a Dream Girl too!

Cooking for the Continental Man - Vol. 4

2007-01-27T15:09:00.000Z

Before I'm inundated with wise cracks from the Rukks and the Cheeks, I would just like to say that... yes, I do know how to count, and yes... I do know the number "3" comes before the number "4".

Seeing as more than one person has already taken it upon themselves to try out my frou frou recipes, I decided it'd be best if I put up the secrets to the one Squash feast I cooked up that I know is guaranteed to impress these faithfuls, if they can be called that at this early stage... teehee! That feast is Vol. 4, the praises of which I sung whilst writing Vol. 2 the other day. I don't have a name for it yet, but for now we can refer to it as...

The Amazing Buttery Meaty Squashy Fest

Stuff:

Half a Butternut Squash

2 tbsps of Butter (or more if you're going to the gym tomorrow)

Drizzles of olive oil

2/3 of a Corned Beef Tin

An Onion

Roughly 3 or 4 tbsps of Canned Plum Tomatoes

2 Red Chillies

Cooking Time: 30 minutes max

What To Do:

From the list of ingredients alone you probably already know what the outcome will be. First, "prep" the squash (Teehee! I love this... I have my own super chef terminology already!). Then heat the olive oil in a pot, add the butter and throw in the squash chunks. As usual leave that to fry whilst turning it occasionally and if necessary, adding more butter.

Meanwhile, chop up the onion and the chillies. Heat a little oil in a frying pan and toss the onion and chilli pieces into it. Fry until they're a golden (but not brown) colour and then scoop the corned beef out of the tin and into the pan. Stir the mix till the corned beef softens, and ensure that you lower the heat at this point - corned beef is notorious for its desire to adhere to frying pans! When the mix is a noticeably darker shade of brown than the un-fried corned beef had been, add the 3 or 4 tbsps of canned tomatoes. How much you add should depend on how fluid you like your sauces to be. I'm not of fan of turning fried corned beef into a tomato-ey stew because I feel it takes away oodles of flavour, but if you are, then you'll need a hell of a lot more than 4 tbsps of canned tomatoes. However much you add, the tomatoes should at least loosen the beef and onion mix to the extent that it becomes clear its meant to be a chunky sauce of sorts. Keep frying it for as long as you wish to, or until it begins to leave annoying brown skin behind with each turn in the frying pan.

All this while you should've been checking on your squash and turning it frequently. The squash should be at the mushy but still relatively solid stage that we spoke about in Vol. 1. This stage is just... the best! The squash should be brown at the edges and corners but of a golden hue in general. Your fork should be able to dismember any chunk with ease unless very delicate care is taken. When sampling a chunk, it should be soft, but should at least require more than one slam of the big white ones before melting into sugary buttery goodness in your mouth... You must get what I mean by now.

What to do next? Toss the squash onto a plate and layer the corned beef on top of it... et voila! C'est fini.

You may be wondering at this point why I raved and ranted and had a near orgasmic encounter on Thursday, the day I thought up this amazing buttery meaty squashy fest. I think its because two of my faaavourite meals are, fried plantain and corned beef stew, and fried yam and corned beef stew. With the amazing {...} squashy fest, I literally had the best bits of both of my favoured accompaniments to corned beef stew - the raw and unprocessed sugariness of fried plantain, and the texture and thickness of soft fried yam (Like I said the other day, Bitchy does not do yam rocks!)

It was heaven on earth... and truuue fans of "the mean beef," will dig it.

P.S. This recipe requires no seasoning whatsoever. If you buy a good brand of corned beef like Fray Bentos, you won't need any salt or black pepper or anything... it'll do all the work!

P.P.S. Volume 3 will be up on Monday at the latest. I'm reeeally kinda sad now and might tarry a while before creating Vol. 5 because I have only 2 of my Squash palsies left to get through. Sigh... just as we were beginning what looked to be an orgasm-inducing affair.

I mourn...

Super Woman

2007-01-25T20:26:00.000Z

Why do men believe we owe them all of everything within us that is good? All the joy, all the honesty, all the thoughtfulness, all the patience, all the kindness, all the love, all the... everything?

When will they ever understand that sometimes...

We just don't want to give... not anything... not even a 2 minute phone call.

We too get tired.

Cooking for the Continental Man - Vol. 2

2007-01-25T18:19:00.000Z

I am so pleased to be able to report the following two things.

1 - the Ruks is attempting the Vol. 1 recipe tonight... Yaay! Before I know it, I'll have a following, and

2 - At this very moment I am in the process of giving birth to my fourth squash recipe, which I assure you is a thousand times more complicated and more delicious than that in Vol. 1.

Before I get down to the details of the Vol. 2 recipe I would just like to add a little tidbit to the recipe I put up yesterday, which is crucial in dealings with our friend - "the squash". That tidbit is, please do not hesitate to add a little olive oil or sunflower oil or whatever to the mix when you're frying the squash. Butter's great for the flavour but you need the oil to keep your pan constantly greased.

Okay... so...

Butternut Squash and Broccoli Cream Soup

Stuff:

Half a Butternut squash

Enough water to cover the squash in a pan

Splodges of single cream or double cream

Two thirds of an M&S pack of Broccoli

One Vegetable stock cube

Cooking Time: 25 minutes

What To Do:

First peel, core and chop the squash into chunks (can we just take this part as a given for the next 3 recipes? Thanks... we can refer to it as "prepping the squash"). Place the chunks into a pot and fill the pot with just enough water to cover the squash.

Boil the squash for as long as it takes to soften it. Now... be very careful at this part. I suffered a serious mishap that set my confidence back (but only for a couple of minutes... teehee!). You've got to keep an eye on the squash whilst its boiling. To some, that would be stating the obvious... but to me it really wasn't quite so obvious. I thought I could leave the squash boiling in the kitchen whilst I sent a couple of emails. What I forgot to consider was that because I was using very little water (to prevent as much sugar-loss as possible) the water evaporated pretty damn quickly! I'd also taken the cover off the pot so that the water wouldn't bubble over and spill onto my cooker top, which meant the water evaporated even more quickly!

So roughly ten or twelve minutes later a whiff of something rather alarming and rubbery made its way up my nose, I raced into the kitchen and found all the water missing from a very angry, very blackened, pot!

All was not lost however, as squash really is a gem (To be fair I think this was the moment our love affair began). The pot was pissed as hell... but the squash wasn't phased in the slightest. All I had to do was scoop the squash chunks out of the pot and onto a plate (of course leaving behind strips of black skin here and there), and from then I was free to continue with my rather ambitious soup. At this stage by the way the boiling (or rather, burning) had achieved exactly what I wanted, which was soft, mashed-potato-like, melt-in-your-mouth squash!

The next phase involved the broccoli. You should've begun boiling the broccoli at the same time as the squash by the way (in a separate pot obviously... duh!) but being a total amateur at that time, I didn't think to do that. I set aside my squash, mashed it up even more with a fork, before setting about boiling the broccoli. That took very little time though, to be honest.

Next... remove the broccoli from the pot in which its boiling, DO NOT chuck the water by the way. Then, cut the broccoli up into very tiny, very soft pieces. Then... return the broccoli and the mushed up squash to the swampy-looking broccoli water and twirl it around for a couple of seconds. You can decide to get rid of some of the water if you're looking for something a little more broth-like.

At this point, put your solitary vegetable stock cube into the mix (I have to confess, I used a chicken cube... pray tell, who has vegetable stock lying around in their cupboard waiting to be used on a whim? Certainly not I). Keep twirling the mixture to make sure the stock fully dissolves by the way, pick up your pot of cream and splodge as much or as little as you desire into the pot. Now the mushed up mix in your pot should finally begin to look something like soup.

I'm afraid this is where I stopped. I boiled and boiled and boiled the mix but it wouldn't get any thinner. It literally stayed put... as a mushy broth.

So.... I ate it that way. It was delicious, after being seasoned of course (yet another thing to be taken as a given even though I don't mention it). However it was just a little sickening as the texture really wasn't quite right. Another point to add is that I had more than enough for one in the pot by the way, so please ensure there's someone with whom to share the mushy love if you do decide to give it a try. Also, feel free to add mushrooms - I would've done, but was too lazy to chop anything else up after the tedious task of chopping up squash, and so stuck with squash and broccoli alone. But go ahead... jazz it up, and be sure to let me know how on earth to get it from the mushy stage to the soupy stage.

Cheerio

P.S. Vol. 4 is orgasmic! I'm literally this close to tears right now, because something so simple and so effortless has turned out be a masterpiece. As with all my other inventions, it isn't a jewel to look at, but you'll see... you'll have to stop yourself from moaning... and trust me, it'll be difficult.

Cooking for the Continental Man - Vol. 1

2007-01-24T19:32:00.000Z

Oops! Got a little side-tracked after the last post and discovered a million other things I'd rather blog about, but seeing as I've committed myself to this cooking thing. Here goes...

Squash with Lemon and Herb Chicken

Stuff (I hate the word "ingredients" - Its such an ugly word):

Half a Butter nut squash (the long kind not the short kind)

3 giant table spoons of butter

Chilli flakes

1/4 Nando's Chicken

Cooking Time: 30 minutes (or 45)

What to do:

Melt the butter in a pan (preferably not a frying pan, use a pot). Ooops.. before that, rinse the squash, peel the squash, core the squash (i.e. chuck the seeds), and slice the squash into cube-like chunks. The latter part of all that can be rather difficult. I ended up using this massive knife, and even that didn't make it much easier. Squash is a bitch! But this bitch is now a pro after having battled with several of the yellow bitches by the time of writing.

Oh and in case you forgot, you're only chopping up half of the squash. Wrap up the other half, put it in the fridge and save it for dinner time! Yippee.... Not!!

So where was I? Now you can melt the butter and then place the squash chunks in gently - you don't want hot butter soiling your cashmere jumper and my pot is notoriously bitchy when it comes to spitting at cashmere! {I'm such a bloody liar - I wasn't wearing a cashmere jumper when I did this. Do I even own a cashmere jumper? Okay maybe I do... But there's no way in hell I'd ever wear it whilst cooking!!}

Now this part annoyingly takes a VERY long time. What we're trying to do is fry the squash in the butter to the point where it gets soft and slightly mushy - kinda like fried yam (after you've boiled the yam first oh... not those yam rocks some people pass around as fried yam!). The problem with squash is that the darn thing likes to brown and caramelise before it hits the yummy mushy-goodness stage that we want.

One trick (and I'm blushing with pride that I discovered this all by myself and not on "squash4dummies.com", if such a thing does exist) is to boil the squash first before frying. The hot water does all the softening for you and when it comes to the frying all you need is half the above-stated amount of butter to seal the deal!

Down-sides to this method are the spitting and fizzing that will ensue when you transfer the wet squash from the water pot to the butter pot, and the annoying fact that the squash loses almost all its sugariness whilst being softened in the water pot. The latter point is a huge disadvantage from my perspective because the joy of squash is in its sugary goodness.

Whatever method you decide upon should be determined by (a) your indifference to butter and the huuuge amount of saturated fat that entails, and (b) the amount of time on your hands - The "water pot and butter pot method" takes about 10 minutes whilst the "butter pot solo method" takes about 25 to 30.

Once you're over the hurdle I now refer to as "the softening", you can begin "the seasoning", with a pinch of salt and some chilli flakes, and then finally, "the gentle placing" of the slightly mushy chunks on a clean plate beside a warm piece of chicken. If you acquired your Nando's chicken a short while before you began the grueling course of dealing with the squash, you can even skip the warming part and save yourself a few seconds.

And with that, you have it... a deeelish plate of squash and lemon and herb chicken.

P.S. This was my first recipe so forgive the simplicity of it all. I was rather apprehensive about the task at hand. I was also in a hurry to get something into my tummy.

Stay tuuuned for Vol. 2 - Squash and Broccoli Cream Soup!

Cooking for the Continental Man - The Intro

2007-01-24T15:56:00.000Z

So I haven't blogged in a week - Perhaps because I've been bogged down with hosting faaabulous parties, doing school work for a change, facebooking, watching American Idol etcetera etceteroo... AND I've also because I've been doing a lot of cooking!

Isn't that amazing? ME... Cooking!!

I've never been a deft hand in the kitchen... Like most other women of the negroid persuasion, I can get by in the kitchen and produce something edible, but unlike most other women of the negroid persuasion, that something edible is usually the product of hours of cursing, sweating and furious spillage-control. I don't enjoy cooking but then its something I've always wanted to be good at. One of my New Year's resolutions this year was to become a "domestic goddess" and on January 1st, I planned to achieve that by vowing to cook myself at least one meal a week for the entire year.

Well.... Three weeks passed and I did no such thing until a series of events that led up to me having a fridge FULL of cooking ingredients that were bound to expire within a couple of days if I didn't do anything with them.

On Friday night I placed an order for groceries online. Stuffing my basket with the usuals - chocolate, biscuits, bread rolls and poptarts, I checked out and thought nothing of it. On Saturday a very grumpy looking fellow arrived late (and he still had the audacity to be grumpy... scheeeuuwww) with a mountain of shopping bags. I should've worked out then that something wasn't quite right but I was in the process of getting ready for my partaaay at the time and so really the groceries were the last thing on my mind.

Anyway I eventually decided to unpack them and began to groan in the process. I uncovered FIVE Butternut Squashes, Two MASSIVE tubs of Porcini mushrooms, Three packs of puff pastry, Onions, garlic, chillies, cream and loads and loads of other things that you would order if you were say... in the mood to have a Christmas party?

I worked out after a lot of fuming and more cursing, that I'd forgotten to remove certain items from my online grocery basket which had been placed there by yours truly in December when planning for the Christmas party she was scheduled to have in LAGOS! Needless to say that I'd already HAD that Christmas party, in Lagos, on December the 23rd, and thus had absolutely NO use for all the very fresh, non long-life, non processed, non preservative-stuffed food that was blocking my path in my very tiny kitchen. P.S. I also have a very TINY fridge!

Anyway after the party (an astounding success mind you... teehee!) was over and done with, I woke up refreshed on Monday morning (Sunday was a complete write-off), and decided I was going to have to cook my way through the jungle of fresh produce.

Now... I'm one of those bad beles who thinks (even though she can't cook) that people who say they can cook when all they can really do is follow carefully laid-out procedures and pictures in recipe books, are pathetic. I don't think they qualify as good cooks because they aren't doing anything creative or spontaneous.

To cut a long story short, this week will diarise my journey into the hitherto forbidden forest that is my kitchen. I've already come up with 2 recipes of which I'm rather proud and will share in a minute. I've called it "Cooking for the Continental Man" because:

1) I only ever cook for men (be they boyfriends, brothers, cousins, hungry friends) as its not worth going through all that hassle for myself alone - I really don't appreciate it and would rather spare myself the torment by just picking up the phone and dialing well-memorised numbers, and

2) When I filled him in on the joys of this creative recipe-development process, the "man" in my life a.k.a. he who shall not be named, asked me why I was wasting my time with all this "mede-mede" when efo elegusi is the key to unlocking his soul!!!

Therefore... pleasing the Yodi is clearly not the object of this whole exercise, and I've invented a fictional character - "the Continental Man" who won't "mmm" and "aaahh" sarcastically when hearing the ins and outs of my culinary delights!!

P.S. Ummm.... The theme is Butternut Squash.

P.P.S. Please understand... I have FIVE of them (and five massive ones at that) to get through. I'm literally eating, breathing and shitting butternut squash.... Squash Squash Squash Squash Squash Squash Squash Squash.....

Votes For Hotties!

2007-01-17T12:55:00.000Z

For Race? Or Tribe? Or Sex? Or Hotness Factor?

Its a toughie...

The Economist informs me that Barack Obama is looking to enter the 2008 race for the White House. He will publicly declare whether or not he so intends on February the 10th... but its pretty likely he's already got his shorts, trainers and socks on, otherwise he'd be pretty foolish to have said anything at all regarding the matter.

The Economist also confirmed something even I already knew, that Hilary Clinton will be a contender in the big American race, come 2008. With the support of America's most charismatic President yet, and the first man to ever make me watch the news, she could well give Mr Obama a sweatier and more ferocious contest than he'd bargained for - Even as a youngster I knew not what my mother meant by "sex appeal", but I knew Mr Clinton possessed something!

I don't know much about politics... and certainly not about American politics, but I do know about making tough decisions. It looks to me as though Black women in America are going to have a lot to think about over the next two years. From where I sit, I have prematurely concluded that the more pressing issue for Black-American women will be the colour of their President as opposed to his (oops... uh... its) sex. But then again, I could be wrong... Like I said, I know next to nothing about politics.

One thing's for sure, America will be making history one way or the other in 2008, and this time, unlike the other 5 in my lifetime, I will be paying close attention - If not to the candidates, at least to sexy Bill! And if Mr Obama somehow metamorphed into a hottie before 2008... he'd be sure to get my vote, if no one else's.

Luckily for the American public, I won't be able in anyway to influence the outcome of something so important to them using my unashamedly frivolous reasoning and powers of logic.

One thing I do wonder though, is when I'll ever be able to do my little bit towards getting someone worth looking at onto the Nigerian Presidential stage? Or when I'll get to decide between a male Igbo/Ijaw/Itsekiri President, and a female one? When will the Nigerian body politik, or whatever its called, ever face a similar conundrum to its American counterpart? Are we destined to an eternity of stuffy, "homeward-bound" ( the new incumbent has kidney problems for goodness' sake!), non-south south, non-female and non-hottie Presidents?

We don't have the same history as the States when it comes to the century-long oppression of a particular racial group within society, but we did have our own ethnic dilemma some decades back. Like America, will it take a few hundred years to get over? Or is there hope to be found in figures like the Duke and Okonji-Iweala? The treatment of the latter by the somewhat senile OBJ, who branded her a threat to his (non-existent) celebrity factor and dismissed her from his Cabinet, suggests we could be waiting a long loooong time.

If it were to happen though, I'd certainly get off my backside and vote. Till then, I'm not so sure I see the point.

Yote Strikes Back

2007-01-16T22:01:00.000Z

The Coyote has decreed that he no longer wishes to have "the ins and outs of his private life published on the world wide blogosphere". As such, I have been through post after post deleting humorous anecdote after humorous anecdote to satisfy my spoil sport of a lover boy.

I'm defaulting on the decree even now with this very post, but I'm in mourning over the loss of some great great work, and am thus willing to risk the wrath/sulking/whatever, that would ensue were he to eventually discover, one fine day, that even after he'd issued his command, I'd still gone ahead to write about him (Ooops.. held myself just now from writing "his sorry ass"... but that reeeally wouldn't go down well if he someday stumbled upon this blog now, would it? Talk about a close call!)

I find it somewhat ironic that this "decree" was issued after I refused to share the link to this blog with him. Could it be that he's trying to get back at me? Or could it be that knowing what a blabber mouth his girlfriend is, he simply doesn't trust me to keep the private parts of our relationship private?

(Hold it pervert! I didn't mean private parts. I meant... private parts! You know... the private stuff that makes a relationship a relationship? I should change it, but somehow, private bits doesn't quite cut it..)

It serves me right though. I've done nothing but talk about blogs and bloggers and blogging for the last four days. To be honest, I'd even begun to worry that he hadn't once expressed the slightest bit of curiousity or interest in what I was getting up to. Well.. now he's expressed his curiousity, I've refused his request, and he's gone and flexed his mean "man-muscles" and layed down "the law".

I should disobey... In fact, I should pay the meanie back by spilling every incy wincy juicy detail about our love life.

But then...

I'm not going to.

Not because I'm a chicken, but because...

well...

its him!

Its my Yote.

I wish I could be stronger...

But I can't.

Soweeee...

Pastor Perfect and the Poverty Poison

2007-01-15T12:55:00.000Z

Today's Pastor Perfect is a different pastor... So hold your horses and give me a minute to run with this.

There I was this afternoon, racing home from Law School to blog like some complete loser... I turned on my stupid Mac Book (which by the way no one should even consider buying. By-pass the frikkin thing on the shelf, ignore the cheap price, and move on to a beta sumtin - the Power Book!). Oops... where was I? My Mac Book took forever to start up, I logged into my gmail account, did a little loser-ish dance because Mikoo had left a comment, and poised myself to talk about the issue that I thought was too good to be missed. I was going to do a review of the movie E-weezy, Dabs, Rukkyfrocks, Max and I watched last night, which was destined to have my few readers howling with laughter, and I was ready to begin.

Above the email that got me all giddy - "[Bitchy in the City] New comment on Pastor Perfect and his Poison Pen" - was a different email from Mikoo herself titled "Rev. King". I wasn't going to open it because I knew it was yet another Reuben Abati article (hehe) but decided to be gracious as she'd been so nice and left a comment on my blog.

Now.. I have no choice but to talk about the good Reverend King, because its just too good a flippin opportunity to pass up! Damn you Mikoo!

If you haven't read the article, I apologise, but there's no way I'm pasting up the whole thing. That Reuben dude is long-winded in every sense of the word. The article on Rev. King today was the first one, of the million Mikoo's sent, that I've actually managed to finish!

To summarise:

The good Rev. King, or sorry, "The Most Holiness Dr Reverend King", as he insisted on being called in Court, was a loon.

He used young women as sex slaves, hypnotised their dummy fathers, brothers and friends into handing them over, and required them to serve him naked and "warm" his bed.

He also "enslaved" his congregation who were required to pay a fine of N25,000 if they coughed during the service, and were flogged with rods, hit on their heads with sticks, or assigned a bedroom punishment (in the case of the ladies), when they were "naughty".

He was tried for the creme de la creme of actions after, on July 22 2006, he sprayed six members of his congregation with petrol and set them on fire because of his outrage at the fact that a prized sex slave of his, Vivian, had been unfaithful to him, and they had known about it.

During his trial for murder, he slapped a trial witness, refused to obey court procedures, and then promised to meet his persecutors at "the gate of judgement", after he was sentenced to death.

What comes to mind is the image of a deranged baboon who should've been locked up in Yaba Asylum and severely medicated from the date of his birth. The nut-ball thought himself to be the Christ, or if not the Christ, someone with direct access to God, who could "rain down fire on the whole world" with just a few words in a matter of minutes.

What's more astounding (although considering that these events took place in the Nigeria that we know and love, perhaps we shouldn't be so surprised) is the congregation members who stood by their "Daddy" and "Lord". While the mad man's trial lasted, his bearded followers insisted that he was merely being persecuted as Christ had been, and would triumph in the end!!

The writer of the article went on to blame the various Christian councils in Nigeria who he said should take more responsibility for investigating new churches and movements.

He also blamed the Nigerian government for creating conditions in which people are so poor and desperate that they turn to any fool or mongrel with the promise of miraculous solutions to their molue-load of problems.

Is anyone starting to think that "poverty" is being blamed for a few too many things these days? Poverty was blamed for the deaths of the hundreds of people who died at the Pipeline explosion in December, and poverty is now being blamed for the greed and opportunism that pushes certain people to extreme movements that they know are far from the truth. Forgive me for the generalisation, because we all know there were some real dummy donuts in there who thought Rev. King was their ticket to salvation. But then we also know that there were many others who decided they were going to follow a man, wicked as he was, because of the promises of a better car, house and recognition as a "big man" at home in the village.

Perhaps you could say that if people weren't so poor in the first place, then they wouldn't be lured and deceived by the mere promises of material comfort, which is fair enough. But then I just feel poverty is no excuse for being a fool. We instantly assume when we hear about people like Rev. King and that other wacko, T.B. Joshua, that their "flock" consists of the down and outs. But that isn't true! Rev. King's sex slaves were university graduates in search of the newest Louis Vuitton bag. T.B. Joshua's "converts" included (when I last saw a documentary about him) and still include teachers, clerks, and even some real dumb-ass white people who left the comforts of Scotland or wherever it is the two idiots I watched came from, to follow a man they believed to be true and good, even though he was sleeping with everything in sight and little children were being flogged in his Sunday School for refusing to sing testimony to " the mighty grace of T.B. Joshua, the man of God". I remember how creepy it was to see the words to the song written on the black board in their poky little room... I also find it incredibly creepy to see that I still remember the tune to the damn thing because I was just so appalled at the time that its obviously stayed in my mind!

Why is it that one lady who sells boli on the side of the road in Ajah will go racing to such a church come Sunday, whilst her neighbour, selling akara, won't? Or why is it that one little kid will rather chop the beating of the century than sing about the grace of T.B. Joshua, whilst another will happily chirp away and even earn brownie points because he has such a good voice?

I don't have the answer... So I'm leaving it there.

Pastor Perfect and his Poison Pen

2007-01-14T15:21:00.000Z

What is it about judgmental Christians that really gets to me! Their ridiculous habit of quoting Bible verses at you combined with their self-righteous criticism seep under my skin to the point where I find myself doing or saying things I would never normally do. I'm not saying they push me to do more naughty things... teehee! But they certainly push me to do things like stick up for total strangers that I don't even know!

Yesterday I wrote about the new trend I've literally become obsessed with! For the last 3 days I have completely immersed myself in the Naija blogosphere. I've stumbled across a really rather tight-knit community in which total strangers have formed enviable, and what look to be long-lasting, friendships. The funny thing is they have different opinions about things and they all approach issues from completely different starting points. Some are married, others are... ehem... sexually liberated (teehee!), others are just plain hilarious to the extent that they border on ridiculous... whilst others are puritanical and judgmental and everything that makes people sigh, hiss and point fingers at the Christian message or faith or religion or whatever you feel most comfortable calling it.

Today I left a comment on a blog by this girl called ONB. I put a link up to her blog on the sidebar yesterday when I came across her blog, cuz some of the stuff she writes is truly hilarious! She's also one of those brave people who opens themselves and their lives up to the scrutiny of others because she wants to get things off her chest, and like me, loooves to write! She's great at what she does but then she's also extremely honest about who she is and how she lives her life. A post she put up a couple of days ago (could be a week ago now.. forgive me, I know I'm stale okay?!) has probably made her blog the numero uno on blogger's counter in terms of the number of hits per day. In what I presume is her usual light-hearted manner, she revealed a little too much... ehem... personal info if you catch my drift. This info sparked a wave of comments, and the last time I checked, she'd received about 110.. all about this one post. Oops I think Bitchy's getting her facts wrong. The 110 comments she received were about the second post she put up in response to all the criticism on, and reactions, to her earlier scandalous post - that post itself only received about 60 or 70 comments I believe.

Anyheeuuw she was reeeally angry when she wrote the post that received the 110 comments... and rightly so! I can't say I agree with her mode of expressing herself, as I'm always just a little of weary of being foul-mouthed on the net (... you all know I'm a chicken!), and I definitely don't condone the stuff she wrote about that brought on the onslaught, but I definitely do agree with how angry she was.

You should've seen some of the shit people said in their comments... telling her she was a slut, that she had no decency, that they were "grieving" for her lost soul etc etc. It was just so patronising, and to me, the exact representation of everything that Jesus stood up against when dealing with the Pharisees and all those other hypocritical people.

It also reminded me of this guy at Law School who came up to me randomly once. First, he called me "Sister Taminika" (In my stylish getup, trust me I looked nothing like someone called Tamanika!... Anyway I forgave the monkey, my name is just a tad difficult if you're a first-timer). Next, he started trying to force me to come to some weekly Bibly Study being run by himself at college. There was one happening that day, in like 2 hours' time or something, and I told him I'd arranged to do other things as I hadn't known about the Bible Study, but that I'd try and come the next week. Do you know what the monkey said next? "Ah... well... seek ye first the kingdom of God!" whilst sighing and shaking his stupid little {... insert the race that I habitually insult.. PS I am not a bigot!!...} head. I thought... "Uh... wait a minute, is this total stranger who I've been seeing for weeks now and who never once bothered to talk to me, or learn my name, even though I've been in his class all this time, and who is only talking to me now because he's heard through the grapevine that I'm a Christian, trying to give me a guilt-trip?!" The little {...} mugu didn't know he was pissing me off. He kept on.... He followed me down the stairs to the cafeteria talking at the top of his voice about "The Master" (his really rather scary pet-name for Jesus) and how he was coming back to send all the ignorant folk around us into "The Lake of Fire".

The final straw was when our little {...} evangelist asked me, "So if you were knocking at the gates of our eternal home and The Master said to you - 'Why should I let you into my kingdom Tamanika? What have you done for me?', What would you say?" I was so shocked at this point that I just looked at him and said "Well first of all he wouldn't ask me that question. If you understood the concept of grace you would know that nothing we do on this earth can buy us a place in 'our eternal home'... that's not the point of living a Christian life." I felt a little pleased with myself because the monkey was silent for a while and then muttered some crap about how I did have a point. I started to look for ways to untangle myself from the very awkward conversation when he started to probe me about the church I go to. As soon as I said what it was, he started to go on about how much better his church is, and how "their good shepherd" is really gifted at caring for "his flock"! If I could've, I would've thumped him on the head, but I couldn't. I simply made it clear the conversation was over, and then called my friend, FT1, to rant and rage about the audacity of the stupid guy. I also swore that I would never go to his "stinking" Bible Study if that's what everyone there was going to be like... I was reeeally mad.

Reliving that experience I now understand even more why ONB was so angry about the stuff that was said to her by similarly judgmental Christians like my little {...} friend. To think that even though he didn't see me as someone who needed "saving" (because I made it very clear to him that I was a Christian and not someone he could evangelise), he could still be so insensitive and condescending in his dealings with me, that in the end, even though I had been hunting for a Bible Study of sorts to drag my lazy sinful arse to, I became so angry that I swore and resolved never to give the idiot the satisfaction of seeing me at his Bible Study!

I left a comment on ONB's page saying that Christians need to be very careful about their approach. What you say to someone, and how you say it can be so detrimental to the message that you're trying to get across. In the end, you rile people up to such an extent that even other Christians, who would ordinarily be open to what you have to say, end up blocking their ears like little kids, screaming "blalalalabla-I can't hear you-blalalalabla" just so they can cut out your annoying and condescending voice... and obviously you get nowhere.

Gosh guys.... my first serious post! Wahey! Hehe... its rather amusing that the first time I decide to be serious I end up talking about religion, even though we all know I'm not exactly the most... ehem... qualified person. Teehee! Maybe its because its Sunday? I actually came on here determined to talk about Reality TV... but... emm... I still haven't done any work, and E-weezy, Dabs et al will be here any minute, so the Bitchy one must depart. Toodeloooooo

Fluffy Bitch

2007-01-13T14:45:00.000Z

Poodles... I despise them... Always have.

I despise them even more now that I see I've become one!!

The last two days have been spent, aside from plaguing the Coyote with planet-hopping plans, travelling the world wide bloggers' web. The majority of these have been blogs authored by my fellow "country-people" which have made me howl out loud with laughter.. but have also made me think.

This blog doesn't make me, or anyone else think... It makes me laugh... and we all know it makes my Bitches laugh too, but is that enough? Bitchy is not convinced.

I've never taken life seriously. I've taken certain aspects of life seriously - family, friends, education, religion, percy pigs, red lipstick, Yves Saint Laurent... goddammit I'm already being ditzy again! Okay... I'm joking.

I was trying to say that I've taken certain bits of life seriously... very seriously. But I don't think I've ever taken life itself seriously. Perhaps that could explain why I find it hard to watch the news or read the papers... or why I had to give up my subscription to The FT after two months because it was turning out to be a complete waste of money.

I don't know how to take serious things seriously... But all that's about to change! Yeeeaah man! The Bitchy One has come to the realisation that the years of fluff and umm... empty stuff... are over. They have to be over! Time to grow up Bitchy! Teeheeee....

So stay tuned - my next post will be serious... very serious. It might even make you cry...

P.S. I believe I deserve a pat on the back even though I accepted defeat and got rid of the FT subscription I bragged about months ago. I may not have broadcast this info at the time, but I replaced it with a subscription to the Economist, which I have slowly grown to (a) understand and (b) find interesting.

I will get there... I'm already on my way...