MY EXPERIENCE ON OKADA

The moment I have been so anxiously waiting for has arrived. Finally, my name was called to come to the podium, I was full of ecstasy, the initial fidgeting and shyness now increased as I managed to gather momentum to walk to the podium amidst applauses and chants. Each steps I took from where I sat across the beautiful (and well filled with dignitaries) auditorium was taken with pride albeit a packaged one. I received the certificate of confirmation as the director of media and publicity for the newly elected president, a position I didn’t even dream of considering the fact that I just enrolled for internship at a communication and networking company some few months back. It was a great achievement on my part especially for my family for the fact that I was still an undergraduate on internship. Different thoughts ran through my mind; the financial requirements to start a family is no more a dream, I can for once and hopefully for life forget about my not so impressive cumulative grade point average, I can finally be regarded as a success even at my young age. These thoughts and many others ran through my mind for some time, I could look back and boldly say all the times I spent on Facebook, all the times I used in gathering followers on twitter, the instagram packaging, learning html, CSS, PHP and the likes has not really been a waste, in fact it has become a blessing. I was still in this mood when suddenly I received a heavy slap across my back, could this be a pained enemy? I thought to myself before I could turn around, I heard a voice saying “won’t you go and write Ogunti’s exam even if you won’t taste out of this eba?” At that moment, everything became clearer, it was the voice of my roommate and I have been dreaming all along. It was the day I was to start my first semester 400L examination and Dr Ogunti’s course being the first paper. A reputation of no nonsense clever man precedes him and he has even been tagged the man with digital marking, attributes almost, if not all student dreads.
I quickly dressed up (no time to bath) ate and got ready for school as I was almost getting late for the examination and my hostel was about a kilometre away from the school’s main gate. I left my lodge for John’s. He was a departmental mate that agreed the previous day to take me to school on his newly acquired Suzuki bike or okada as it is popular called around here. John was eating when I got there. He invited me to join him, something I cannot refuse owing to the fact that he was eating beans. I quickly partook in the ‘ministry’, gulping the watery beans down my throat. The plate was empty in no time and we set for school, an interesting (relatively though) journey to school.
The bike was soon in motion in no time and the cool breeze of the beautiful morning was another increase in my love for Mother Nature. These feelings were brought to an abrupt end by a tingling but sharp rancour in my stomach. A feeling I had felt mildly immediately I finished eating the beans at John’s. The beans and eba was reacting. It was like all my intestines were trying to sing the hallelujah chorus. I immediately knew I have to visit a toilet as soon as possible, but how fast or when my ‘as soon as possible’ will be can’t even be determined by me as I was almost late for an examination. I started calculating the time it will take to reach school and the maximum time I will spend in the examination hall. In fact, Dr Ogunti’s course can’t even be ‘finished’ in two hours. After all the thinking and jostling of my thoughts, I came to a conclusion; manage my stomach till I finish my papers. It was a successful plan or so I thought with one Achilles heel, I didn’t include John and his bike in my plans. But should I have?
I was as calm as ever on the bike, maintaining my cool. John on the other hand was trying to beat the traffic to get to school on time. Tuesday mornings are always busy on that road, it was no more a strange occurrence but the traffic that morning was surprisingly strange. I later learnt a portion of the road is under construction and hence, some diversions. These results in a traffic congestion, one that usually brought about halting the speed of the bike at regular intervals, an experience so devastating considering the situation I was. With each brakes John applied after accelerating for some time, my stomach responded with a verse of the hallelujah song it has been echoing. It got to a point I had to gently tell John to take things easy, ’don’t you know we ll be late for the exam? And you know quite well that Dr Ogunti may not take that lightly’ he shouted on top of his voice. There was no way to explain to him my stomach has been in a transient state, oscillating like a system with negative damping factor, at that point, to talk was at a risk of placing that hallelujah chorus on a repeat not to talk of shouting. I calmly remained quiet and tried to flow along with wave of the traffic and John’s driving.
I executed a plan, something I had read in a book a long time ago about controlling your mind. I began by taking my mind off the bike, thinking about something different entirely. I only remained on that busy road physically, I started thinking about how Manchester united my favourite club defeated Manchester city, the arch rival and noisy neighbour four goals to one. It was a sweet victory so to say, I thought about the lovely goal scored by Ander Herrera et al. Then I started thinking about my secondary school days, how things were easy as the senior prefect boy. The respect and the prizes on the end of the year party. They were lovely times.
My master plan was working until I felt a sharp stop on the bike, we were stopped by the sheriff at a large gate. That could only mean one thing, yes, we are finally in school.


bAbAdEE

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