Izuu's Turn

When you see people walking on the street, cruising in exquisite cars, driving in and out of posh residences, it looks as if they will live forever! When you see them in mire, under Lagos bridges (in those days, I guess), jumping off and on to molue , existing in naked squalour, it appears they have failed in life. The rich looks like they have inherited the earth for keeps, And the poor merely existing alongside, to remind the rich of how successful they are. But in reality, both the rich and the poor die! And what is their lot: a rectangular space in the red earth, not even up to the size of some of the beds we so comfortably sleep on! All the make-up, costumes, body-enhancing surgeries, tattoos, body piercings, and whatever adornment we have so lavishly indulged in, would cease to matter to your new neighbours - the termites, the rodents, the tiny beings that you never noticed on earth! I write this, teary-eyed: my neighbour lost his dad to th

A very good pastor was preaching on Sunday and in his prophecies said, "You will get that visa this week..." Come and see the thunderous "Amen!!!" that shook the building! Throughout the ministration, he mentioned how scary embassies are for Nigerians. And I couldn't keep myself from wondering what the problem really is! Another scenario: a neighbour of mine recently went for a business trip to China. He spent about a week or more. When he returned, I asked how he procured visa for the trip. He said he paid 350k to his travel agent. Note that this excluded his flight ticket and other expenses. It was solely for the procurement of travel visa to China! Hmmm! I have also encountered a friend and school mate who told me that he sold the piece of land he inherited from his dad in order to travel overseas. At that time, I also had this notion that travelling overseas is the easiest way to make it in life! So, I kept in contact trying to find my o

Someone asked, just this morning, "Will you marry yourself in your present state?" What she means: If you take a good look at your character, personality, finance, etc, and you come to marry yourself (assuming yourself is another person), can you in all honesty agree to that marriage. This got me thinking! And I remembered what a pastor once said. He said that everyone is looking for a person that meets 100% of what they want in a spouse but find it difficult to locate. He further said that everyone's 100% exists but the problem is that even when you meet them, you may not even be up 20% of what they want in a spouse! Hmmm! Everyone is searching for perfection. Everyone is looking for THAT special one. The questions are: Are you perfect yourself? Are you a special one yourself? You are unmarried, gallivanting from one bed to the other. When your time comes, will you look for your kind? Or will you go for that fruitless search for a modern-day Virgin M

It is no longer news that a handful of individuals lost their lives last Saturday at recruitment centres for Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS) job. I imagined the number of people who turned for the exercise and my mind went back to the first time I attended such an event almost two decades ago (omo, I don old o!) It was Nigerian Breweries recruitment exercise at the Trade Fair Complex, Lagos. I got the invitation and took a night bus to Lagos, with the feeling that there would be about 20 or at most 25 others there. I got the shocker of my life when I got there and found over ten thousand people. As far as my eyes could go, there were job seekers milling around as if we were in some Nazi Concentration Camp! Yes, Concentration Camp! That is what this land has been turned into by mindless, gluttonous politicians. I was at another interview a couple of years later. It was KPMG exams somewhere in Ikeja, close to Airport Hotel. There were a lot of us too. We wrote the

This morning, I read a former student's FB status message: "Never fight over a guy cos he knows wu (who) he wants." Quickly, I recalled a story I've heard before: This girl loved this guy, and the guy had several other girls. The girl has had several suitors but because of this guy, she wasn't nice to any of them. She insulted and abused all of them at will. Years went by, they become graduates, working and fairly successful. "My guy" is busy enjoying all the privileges of married folks on the girl, without making any move towards making a responsible woman out of "my girl." Desperation sets in, my girl begins to frequent myriad spiritual homes, collecting prayers, substances, prophecies and the likes, both actual and fabricated. She persisted in seeking spiritual help until one of her spiritual guides almost "chop" her "thing" after depleting her bank account. She ran as fast as her legs could carry her beca

Someone once said that human beings do not come with manuals, that's we often don't know how to handle each person we meet. I agree with this! Have you really thought about the major instructions your own manual will carry, if there was one. Some of you reading this will carry this: WARNING: AVOID ANY DEALINGS WITH ME AT ALL COSTS. Or WARNING!ASSOCIATE WITH ME AT YOUR OWN RISK! I started a story about this neighbour of mine. Well, I was wrong! He wasn't waiting for anyone to come and move "jeep" for him. His official response was that he did it to me because my generating set disturbs him in his bedroom. So he slept in his car, playing loud music from 11.00 pm to 4.00 am just to get back at my generator and me! *I laugh in Arabic* Am not going to defend myself because he isn't here to give his side of the tale. But I am interested in what his wife said is the reason for his stupidity that night. She said, "He did it to spite me!&

Nothing much, other than that people have problems! I've sat in this church for over two years now. The church is almost always filled to the brim with lively worshippers ready to gyrate to good music which is never in short supply. They listen to the Word with rapt attention, taking notes, eagerly flipping through the pages of their Bibles and always wearing that angelic smiling faces we always get ready for Sundays. There's always, the young, the old and the in between; the beautiful, the pretty and the beautifully-wonderfully mades; the rich, the poor and the show-offs; the believers, the religious and the bench warmers. Interestingly, there is this usher that I love to watch. I only see him on Sundays, wearing suits, nay coats, that I suspect are ironed every Monday and hung in the wardrobe against the next Sunday. He's entertaining, unnerving and overtly annoying depending on how the wind of his drama, rather than the Spirit, blows him. Such people ar

Today is Sunday and I am wont to think of how many Christians that will, not just go to church, but really pray meaningfully. What do I mean? We do live in a generation that claim to believe in God, but would rather complain, grumble or try to solve their problems by themselves rather than pray about them. You are sick, bereaved or in one predicament or the other. Once you put it on social media, you get social media prayers dedicated to the social media god! They are so many - GWS, TH (Take Heart),WYQR (Wish You Quick Recovery), etc. It's your birthday. The same - WULLnP, HBD, LLnP, etc. When it's you wedding anniversary. It is HWA! You get married, you get HML. Even students writing exams pray on FB rather than to God. Sometimes, the longest prayer on social media is "God have mercy!" Nobody takes time to really say a word of prayer for you. And when they do, what I call quasi-prayer on social media, they say IJN! Whatever that means! Honestly,