Source: https://medium.com/@WeHeardWire/what-i-learnt-in-the-past-12-months-of-serving-thy-father-land-51b175b6d94d

So, in the last ~12 Months I went through the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) scheme and here are 6 things I learnt.


1. The Way, Tone and Manner in which you speak is very important.

So, I witnessed koro koro (visibly) with my own eyes of how people were given simple positions of coordinating Corp members within a community and how their mouth started arguments, fights and disagreements which hurt not only others but themselves. In fact, it gave them a bad impression even though, some of them did have the cleanest and most compassionate hearts.

Look at these words,

“Ahn Ahn, Bros! you for wait may i finish talking na.”
“HOLD UP, HOLD UP, I never finish talking”

The first is said in a more slow, cool tone. The second is said in a fast, hot tone. They both convey the same message, which is that the speaker didn’t finish his/her statement before he/she was interrupted. Unfortunately, even though the message is the same, they don’t play and sound the same way in the head. The second statement can earn the speaker a slap from a hot tempered individual.


2. Please oh! It’s not too early to start praying for a good Wife.

You see there are many girls out there, but most of them, their head is not there. They see you soaking garri every morning sometimes without groundnut or kuli kuli. They’ve never asked you if you’ve eaten that day or if you have anything to eat that night. They know that the only thing you are receiving is 19,800 Naira/month because the State doesn’t pay and your employer isn’t straight forward. You spend money on Data, Recharge card, Transport and Food, yet they still expect you to be doing voluntary donation all in the name of friendship.

“Flee from her, for she is a close relative of the daughters of Babylon and Jezebel. For if you continue walking side by side with her, your pockets will never have coins in them. They shall be nothing but an empty room.”


3. Try and make yourself comfortable in every environment you find yourself. It will save you Time and Money

You must know that you can’t have it all, and that comfortable means that you can get the essentials you need under your current economic situations and still have savings.

You can’t say because you want to wear slippers you’ll go and buy Nike Benassis or JDI slides with your 19,800. Ask yourself,

What will I eat and save after I buy the slippers?

Use your head.


4. If your job is depriving you of sleep, making you work late or random hours, what you have is not a job but torture

I learnt this while I partook in a remote internship. I was working with 2g internet (3g service came here November 26th, 2016). I was working with very irregular, inconsistent power supply. It was so bad that you couldn’t even predict the next time in the month when you will have power, nor could you predict how long it will last.

It’s not like I was an expert in the internship, I was on beginner level and I was still learning.

I made a lot of sacrifices like, having to travel to the city just to use my little savings to buy a new phone all because my phone spoilt (the cost of repairing could buy me a new phone), going to a filling station early in the morning and evening to charge laptop, using laptop at midnight because 2g was fast at that time, squatting with a friend, not eating regularly and some other rubbish sacrifices that I do regret ever taking .

All for what? To later lose part of my hair (Dead serious) and still lose the internship because I couldn’t meet up. I tried explaining to the Madam of the startup, and she gave me a very very big ela oju kan, an ela so great that I had to snapshot the reply. It was painful.

What made the reply painful? She did not even let me land. I asked if I could explain myself and the reasons for my low performance (which i was aware of) and it was a cold “NO”. I understand that money was being spent on interns’ salary and that I, like every other individual who didn’t meet up should be removed. This I processed normally. But even if she had pretended to read my story and had replied with something like, “I do understand where you are coming from, but the rules were clearly stated that if you couldn’t meet up you would be removed from the internship. Not to worry there would be another internship coming up soon, hope to see you there.” than a cold “NO” I think I would have been happier.


5. Do not be a Religious Fool

Yes, I do believe in God. I don’t believe in words without actions. I believe that if you work hard for something and put God in it, you’ll achieve your dreams because, God likes hard work.

So, what brought about this one?

In the place where I squatted with a friend (Corpers’ Lodge), the structure was gradually falling apart, the ceiling had missing tiles, some rooms had no windows and blah blah blah. To better describe it, everything you can imagine in a house that was badly taken care of, you can find it there. The question of why it wasn’t being taken care of, is a story for another day.

There were these beautiful birds, Owls that used to fly at night, from tree to tree and finally end up playing love inside the ceiling. Yes, sometimes the sounds they made were unpleasant, but i got used to them. Can you imagine that some people in that building were praying to God who created the birds that those birds should die? They held Prayer sessions late at night, disturbing my beautiful sleep all because they wanted these birds to die. I was like Jesus!!! Well for a while, the birds stopped coming, they will only play love on the tree and fly away.

Did this mean that the birds were spiritually touched by the prayer? Of course not, it was mere nature taking place. The birds got scared by noise made from the prayer sessions and a few weeks after the prayer sessions gradually died down, the birds came back again.

Did this mean that the birds were in fact witches? No!! Noise stopped, birds thought noise has gone, and so they returned to their usual ceiling.

Everybody living in that building was properly educated and from what the books have taught me about an Owl, is that, it is a bird that likes working at Night (Nocturnal). I don’t know how witches operate, and I don’t even want to know. What I do know is, that those two birds were normal birds doing their own thing.

How should this matter have been handled? Very simple … …. … just fix the ceiling and nothing will fly inside your ceiling. There would be no noise from the ceiling, no prayer sessions, no noise from Owls, because they wont have a place to play. It’s common sense that God put in us.

Where were they wrong? They refused to use the sense that God put in us to the best of their advantage (wasting wisdom, one of God’s beautiful gift), and ended up depriving people (me) of their sleep.


6. If you never try you’ll never know

Was it the night when I killed a snake that I was about to step on? (So proud of this one that I added it to my CV, *jk*)

Was it when I got on top a camel’s back?

Was it when I started drinking palm wine? (The real drink for men)

Was it when I learnt basic Nupe? (Oku be lazi : Good morning [it’s pronounced “ku-bay-la-jee”])

Was it when I went to the bush to drop it like it’s hot, and then during the process I got stung by Wasps? (They dropped it like it’s hot on me)

Was it when I went to catch fish with my students? (Catfishing)

Was it eating of cashew fruits? (Don’t let the juice touch your cloth, the stains can be bad)

Was it when I saw real juju protection rings (Ruka) ? (FYI, no joke, some of the juju things they do in Nollywood REALLY happen in Nigeria)

Was it when I tried Fura da nono drink? (Fermented milk and millet drink)

Was it when I ate Tuwo shinkafa or when I first tasted a Bismarck palm fruit? (Google them up)

Was it when I attended a night wedding for the first time? (Their weddings can even hold for 3 days and they can run from evening till dawn)

Was it when I was under the scorching sun? (I’m talking 42°C [source: accuweather] )

Was it when I killed a big rat with an axe handle? (really big)

Like Coldplay said, “if you never try, you’ll never know”. I won’t have known these things if i never tried them.

I indeed did experience many things in my service year, learnt a lot and saw a lot. Things that may have taken me and my introverted life little or many years to learn. Things that I may have never seen in my life and things I may never get to see again in my life.

It’s been an experience and I look forward to what life has in store for me.

For reading I say, Oku be tin!!! ([pronounced: ku-bay-tin] Nupe word for saying “Thankyou”).

This is so funny!