For most of us, the journey started four years ago, while some, it was five years and others, six years ago. I watched as many alighted from their buses in Peace & Ifesinachi Park; carrying heavy bags and boxes full of cloths and foodstuffs. I’m sure a lot of advice were given; infact I can just imagine fathers, mothers, uncles, aunts, guardians, sitting their wards down, giving and raining advices upon them: “do this, don’t do this, go here, don’t go there, don’t make bad friends, don’t go after girls (for us boys), don’t go after boys (for them girls), don’t join cults, read your books and so forth.” I can just imagine their wards shaking and nodding their heads “yes sir, yes ma” in mock obeisance and cut short the advice time. I can imagine tears shed before the goodbyes, I can still hear the parting words of encouragement from my parents to make them proud as I become a Lion.
Running thro and fro our faculties for clearance, praying each day to get a reg number so you could become a full student. I remember the long queue in our faculties as we were cleared and fully admitted; I also remember the long and tiring and boring hours we spent in PAA all in the name of orientation. I remember us running in packs as wolves from our departments to GS building for GS 101 and GS 102 just to get at least, because the hall was always over crowded. I remember the 8 in 1 and the 10 in 1 we bought for our lectures, the ginger to copy notes we failed to copy; the feigned disappointment at lectures missed. I remember the 8 o’clock lectures which were like every day; so we had to wake up at least by 6am (for those of us who stayed in franco in our first in our first ear) to take our bath and wait in line for the okpa women, especially the Eni-njoku Okpa woman to come. Failure to wake up on time, meant you were going to stand in a very long queue before it was your turn to bath.
The three hour lectures were the most boring and tiring because it always come last; and so, we had an average of 10 hours of study time or should I say, 10 hours of being in the class every day, Mondays to Fridays. The cloths we washed and left outside to dry, only to come back and find them missing; and probably, see another student flexing with it few weeks later; the buckets stolen at the tap or tank; the days of drought in franco when neither the tap rushed nor did the tankers come to fill the tank, when boys would climb the tanks to scoop the remaining water in the tank, when boys would troop to the swimming pool with buckets just to fetch water.
I remember the nights, especially during the exam period when the school generator would choose to become faculty and NEPA or PHCN would look for one excuse or the other not to give us light. The night classes at NSLT, Carver building, Pre-fab and Social Sciences, even in the reading rooms of our hostels, all made us who we are today. I remember the pure water and mishai or biscuit that accompanied each night class. I remember the reading partners we had in our first years and the friends we made because they proofed to be knowledgeable in one course or the other. The reading group made up of friends and roommates are not left out. Infact, the days when we would go to class 20 minutes before the lecture starts and use our bags and books to keep space for our friends and reading partners. Those days when we would borrow a t-shirt from one friend, a jean from another roommate, a snicker or shoe from another friend in another hostel, a watch from a roommate and now bath ourself with a perfume or body spray that we’ve been hoarding for quiet sometime, just because we promised a classmate or friend in Mary Slessor/Akintola or Bello that we were coming to see her that night. Those days when we moved in packs of friends and jonzed together.

I remember the riot days, when students took to the streets crying and shouting “we no go gree oo, we no go gree” while our “oga at the top” was busy chilling in CEC; when students were jumping windows, dodging rubber bullets from soldiers and looting staff properties. Those days we wished and prayed earnestly for strike because of the long holidays that come with it. I won’t forget the term papers and the deadlines; the days when we went on 1-0-1 or 1-1-0 or 0-0-1; when N50 – bread 30, groundnut N20 or 5 fibre biscuits and chill it down with gallon water. Those were the days we would always pray to have garri at home because after forming fine boy with the borrowed clothes in Chitis, Sweet Berries, Coke Villa and 11:45, we would come back with empty stomach so hungry that G4 without sugarwould be the only way out. And those were the days we remembered to visit all the female friends we hadn’t visited in a long while, with the hope of getting something to “chow” when they invited us in. Those were the days when we had to compromise a little bit just to be accepted by our friends and feel among and fell like we know what’s up.
As I sit down recollecting these memories, different thoughts run through my mind: the friends we started out with but are no more today; the friends you saw in class or hostel some days ago only to hear of their sudden demise; the first class and best graduating students that died mysteriously before their convocation day; the student that hanged himself just to end the controversy hovering around him; the student that slumped after writing an exam in front of the biggest eatery in school, and they said the cause of death was stress; the final year student who died along with her family due to food poison; the students who slumped and died on their matriculation day; the friend who died of cancer of the bone marrow; the other friend who died of food poison, just indomie, they said; the lecturers dying at intervals; the students who died in car crashes on their way back home or to school. Hmmmmmmmm. The list is inexhaustible. Ain’t you lucky to be alive today?
It is a fact that 60% of us didn’t get the course we applied for, especially we science students who applied for Medicine and Surgery only to be dumped in Biological Sciences or Physical Sciences and so forth. As I look at the faces of my fellow finalists, I’m moved to tears. Tears, for what they have faced in this school. Tears, for what they are facing now. Tears, for what they are about to face tomorrow. Tears, because most of them are not leaving with their mates. Tears, because they are staying back because of one reason or the other. Tears, because 65% of them are leaving school more confused than they were before they got admission. Tears, because most of them don’t even know what to do with the freedom they now have; tears because a lot of them are not even prepared or even the real Lion they’re supposed to be; tears because a lot of them are a shadow of the true picture they ought to represent.
I’ve been asking myself this question for some time, and today, I want to ask all the finalists this same question: It’s a wonderful feeling to be leaving this Den after 4,5,6 years of hard work, stress and fun; now making it as a finalist; but wait! Making it as a finalist is not the problem, but making it as the finest you were meant to be, is! So the question is: Are you the finest you can be, the finest you were meant to be?
If the answer is NO, then guess, you know what you must do, because out there, there is no space and place for a mediocre YOU, only the best and finest of what you were meant to be.


GENERAL SAM.

Yours is compelling. There are still rooms for improvement, especially having regard to the grammatical clangers your write up is marred with.

quiet touchin, remind me alot of things

Nice

Awwwww
I just stumbled on this after i've graduated since July 2013.

You made tons of sense, I can't stop recalling what we faced in the den, your article brought back chilling memories

I'm proud to be among the Lions!

very compellin..and an eye opener on d plight of university students