If there’s any experience every Nigerian
undergraduate student looks forward to, it is the
one year compulsory National youth service, the
euphoria of finishing a University education was
always spiced up by the expectation of having
this experience.


When I was about going for service, I had hoped
to serve in states like Rivers, Delta or some South
eastern states,I am Yoruba, so South western
states was almost definitely impossible, It was
therefore manically bewildering (Apologies to
Igodomigodo) when after much suspense, I found
myself in Ogun state!


I got to Ogun state NYSC camp on 5th March,
2013.
From the first minutes within the gate, we were
welcomed by stern looking, never-smiling, always-
barking-instructions soldiers, it was as if their
mandate there was to take away smile from our
faces too, While some chased us to the parade ground with sticks, others barked “Move before I move you”…Hey you, you’re a bagga!

I almost cursed back at one, who despite seeing I was just coming with my load, could not wait till I settle before chasing me out of the hostel like some Alagbon inmates, I can’t possibly remember
which was fiercer,his face which looked like a
tiger’s or his command,but for the koboko in his
hands, I would have asked if he was ever taught a
lesson in courtesy


The first week was tense, so tense we almost
concluded we were spending the entire three
weeks in hell, how ever, by the second week, we
had familiarised with the soldiers, to the extent
some of us even had friends among them with
whom we “ran things together”.


By the second week, the soldiers seems to have
lost their fierceness, some corp members could
even take advantage of them, stories flew around
of the ‘sexscapades’ of some female corpers with
certain soldiers too, we realised those rain-faced
uniformed men who woke us with gun boots and
heavy noises in our first week were humans after
all.

A bottle of beer could make a soldier your
friend forever, with exceptions whenever his
superior officer was around.


I remember a particular soldier we nicknamed
“Ballotelli”, he was an Hausa boy who joined the
military early, he was not only fierce but strict, he
was one of the few soldiers who made us feel we
should be treated like some military recruits.

Ballotelli it was who would wake us up around
4:30 each day, he once scared me out of my bed,
while I was having a sweet dream, I was
dreaming about getting married to a girl I had
always admired, at a point in the dream, the
Pastor said to me,”you may now kiss your bride”,
I leapt forward to do that which I’d long awaited
only for Ballotelli to put his gun boot near my
head with a loud scream, I woke up kissing his
dirty gun boot instead of the sweet lips of the
sister!

Seeing the gun boot, I jumped and ran like an
antelope being chased by a herd of lions, I had
gotten to the hostel gate undressed before I
remembered I was in the NYSC camp and not in
some guerilla war front.


When it was time for platoons to present their
dramas in a competition, I decided it was time to
get back at Ballotelli, I knew he would be there
that night, so I acted and talked exactly like him,
while adding some ‘ajasa’, while doing my stuff
acting Ballotelli on stage, everyone in the hall
laughed out loud, people told me I wasn’t
different from Ballotelli on stage, he was there too
and he laughed, he became soft and friendly
thereafter, and that earned me not just the same
nickname, but a 2 week celebrity status on camp,
and of course…Some advances from the female
folks


The name Balotelli seemed to have overshadowed
my real name, I got used to it in those two weeks,
but for my decision not to date girls in camp, I would have ended up dating 2 married ladies.

These two managed to keep their wedding rings
till the day of POP, while one was bold enough to
demand privacy with me, which I stylishly
rejected, the other wasn’t bold enough, but
would call in the dead of the night, telling me
stuffs not meant for your reading eyes *winks*


The camp life got so interesting and lively by the
third week, it was always fun going to parade
grounds, and it was likewise fun listening to tales,
some corpers were so funny that the soldiers
couldn’t help but laugh along when they jest at
someone or something, there was a day we were
being punished for strolling to the parade ground
despite coming late, the soldier who punished us
told us to hold one another’s waist while frog-
jumping.


Most of those who defaulted were females,
though I had a guy in front of me, each of the
other male corpers had ladies,whose waists they
held, while frog jumping, when the soldier wanted
to free us from our punishment, the guys
objected, insisting they deserved to be punished
for long all because they were enjoying holding
those ladies by their ‘Ukwu region’, the Sargent
laughed his heart out

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Source:

https://samueliyanu./2015/07/21/the-chronicles-of-corper-sam/

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