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Of Mercury and Maradona
I. “I’d sit alone and watch your light my only friend through teenage nights…” Last night, sleep eluded me, so I stayed up looking for some good entertainment to watch. Past 1 am, I finally settled on watching Bohemian Rhapsody, the Queen biopic. In the dull moments of the movie, I would start to doze off but suddenly, Queen would start to sing electrifyingly: Don’t! Stop! Me! Now! and I would be jarred awake. As is the usual response after watching such a vivid and wonderful portrayal, I went on the internet to read about the legend, the very brilliant, very human lead singer of the band, Freddie Mercury. A complicated…
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Always On My Mind
“How many c’s are in ‘necessary’? But when will this coronavirus era end? I haven’t had shawarma in a while. It’s also been long since I heard Pretty Girls Rock by Keri Hilson. I should download it. What am I doing with my life? What’s my matric number? 183.. What did I come to get in this room again…?” There are usually about 3,058 thoughts going on in my mind per minute. How did I come up with that number? I don’t think it matters. Until recently, I used to think that things like ‘practicing mindfulness’ and ‘meditation’ were for our most beloved, most serious professional friends, also known as…
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Ninety-Nine Questions (Not Really)
Day 22: 15 facts about myself Helloo Nigeria my peoples. Today I shall be answering a list of select questions about myself, and they are interspersed by a few cute pics I took a while ago. You know what our ancestor Nelson Mandela said: When life presents you with it, one must never turn down an opportunity to be vain. So here goes! 1. If I had one superpower what would it be? Teleportation/Telekinesis is where the life is at. If you had asked me when I was ten years old, I would have said flying, but now I’ve seen that life is not really like that. Flying for what?…
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20 10 20
There is a man at the end of Burna Boy’s ’20 10 20′ track, at the 3:18 mark, who in the midst of the gunshots, the running, the chaos, shouts ‘End SARS!’. I think about that man a lot. Last month, something happened. I remember it felt like we had all been simultaneously plugged into a system of consciousness. Unplanned, protests were springing up all over the country. All of a sudden, there were people organizing action in Kaduna, in Ogbomosho, in Port Harcourt. Despite the odds, people were donating money, food, offering free medical service and legal services. Nigerians from varying economic classes, Nigerians at home and abroad came…
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After the Reggae
…play the blues… Let me first mention that the title of this post is in no way related to the content of the blog post, but it looks good as a heading, don’t you think? It’s been a hot minute guys. In the last post I talked about putting a pause on the writing challenge because of all the revolutionary things that were happening, or seemed to be happening, in my country. I did not, however, foresee the unprecedented trauma that we would collectively experience as a generation. It is the type I know will stay with me. Though I am still reeling from the events of last month, life must go…
