₦airaland Forum

Truvelisback:
Like Agbero voice abi? Smoke Igbo well. If you Smoke igbo, your voice go deep.

Not sure what all this about smoking weed is coming from. It’s tobacco that potentially gives huskiness in the voice (or at least exaggerates it if you always talked like that anyway). Smoking weed alone won’t help make your voice low or deep in the way you want it. Maybe in the first few drags of a heavy joint you turn into dearth Vader for all of 5 seconds because your throat’s firing up but yeah. It wears off and goes back to normal pretty soon. Doesn’t cause lasting deepening of the voice.

Initially, OP, you might be going for a far rougher, rugged voice than what you currently have but unless you’re trying to be a singer or voice artist you’ll kind of get to a point where you’d rather the pitch of your voice was closer to normal for a guy. Having an overly deep voice can be a curse and a half sometimes. Just talk normally without hyper-fixating too much on how low you want the pitch or tone of your voice by to be. It might still lower some within the next year or two.

ObviaSere:
I use to smoke. Weed doesn’t give a deeper voice.

No but tobacco can do. When you have a naturally low, husky voice and you then add years of … nicotine partiality to it, a few Barry Whites come out of the vocal woodworks. But when you’re that low and more of a low bass than booming baritone it’s hard to be loud and speak up.

Artscollection:
Edo women sabi take care of man but dikwa ya!!

She’s Edo?

humberjade:
You seem not to get what I am trying to say, what I am saying is that, when you live abroad living all by yourself can be lonely and dangerous depending on the country of residence. So many people die alone in their apartments and no one finds out until the corpse start smelling. I can't even begin to mention instances when you wish you had someone close.

No, I understood exactly what you were saying but at the end of the day I’m also saying what I’m saying. Life would also be less dangerous if people minded their own business a little more and weren’t looking for which stranger to mug or knife just for the sake of it (to use a twisted example) or even cat-call. You can still have a robust social network and value meaningful social connections/friendships but also be capable of being alright in your own company and not desperately need social validation and company ’round the clock to stop you from rotting in your chair. Some people are allergic to doing anything alone and when it’s like that you’ve got to question how much someone hates themselves that they can’t even do a quick Tesco/Shoprite/Asda/Walmart run alone or enjoy a quiet night in with some chamomile tea and a bit of Bailey’s (and whatever else the drift wants to catch and vibe with) the odd Saturday night. As if being alone with yourself (emphasis on the “yourself”; aka, you, yourself and you, your own person) for just a little bit is a punishment worse than prison. You don’t have to be particularly introverted to enjoy a bit of quiet in your own space every now and then. It doesn’t negate awesome social networks and support that absolutely should be there for you whenever you need it but it does add a bit of needful self-sufficiency to your life. The outer world would be boring if everyone veered super-far in that direction but I think a lot of people in general just need a bit more of that.

The irony of it is that a lot of people are more inclined to view people with a quiet temperament that’s not the blatantly stoic, self-assured/strong-silent (or at least menacingly, fiercely “independent” antisocial kind) type as overly soft, overly shy (they may or may not be and if that’s genuinely the case and not just a sort of lay misinterpretation of quiet calmness as shyness, since a lot of people use quiet and shy synonymously; they both have an air of modest diffidence and a certain kind of gentleness), timid and stifled by over-protective parents as kids and all that wonderfully complimentary stuff (including that they’re somehow socially deficient in a way and it’s almost like there’s something wrong with them) and any of that may or may not be the case (just absolutely not inherently) but there’s an obvious link between quiet and being more comfortable alone more of the time, and there’s a connection with preferring ample solitude to just doing your thing and getting through many terms of life alone, because when you’re like that you just don’t need the same level of social stimulation to feel comfortable and just do stuff. It’s often the loud ones who are lacking in those independent life skills but they’re assumed to be confident and competent just because they’re loud, and that’s what a lot of cultures (ironically especially in the West) preferentially value now. In Nordic societies and places like Japan, people are much more insular and self-contained. Far, far more than French people are known to be.

Not saying it’s not important to be able to speak up for yourself and surround yourself with people when you need to because it definitely is but you’ve still got to stand on your own two feet at least sometimes or at least just go the extra mile in finding like-minded communities and stuff. You’ve got to be okay enjoying your life with or without lots of constant gregariousness but sometimes you’ve just got to adapt a little and find what you need rather than just expecting it to come to you.

Advancedman:
That is my biggest desire, business minding is different from care and check on closed ones that depend on what and how you program your circle.
The office mug is a different tale entirely so your absence is not noticed or felt by your organization, what's your designation pls?

Not to minimise the importance of good social networks but there’s some opportunity for integration everywhere in the world. You need a good support network (cultural, otherwise or both) you can rely on but you can’t really rightfully complain about being lonely when you’re not putting yourself out there with people and making those additional connections if you need to.

“But it’s so cold.”

And Nigeria’s so hot. The problem with this new generation of Nigerian immigrants is expecting the whole world to revolve around Nigeria, like it’s the only country on planet Earth. All these U.K. Insta. vloggers complaining about everything are just painful in their entitled freshness. It’s a new flavour of expecting the whole world to accommodate for them specifically and it’s embarrassing to see. Being an ignorant, entitled freshie who can’t adapt anywhere outside their region in Nigeria isn’t a flex. It’s embarrassing and it’s annoying.

“Nowhere to change Naira in this shop.”

It’s Tesco, for God’s sake. Go to Western Union if you need to change money. You wouldn’t go to Shoprite expecting to convert Naira to Canadian dollars or Dubai currency.

This generation of freshies can be so senseless. Yes, those initial adaptation struggles are an issue for everyone in somewhere new and always have been but most of the Nigerians who have emigrated since last year seem to be of a much more inherently unadaptable ilk to the ones from before then and a world away from the original Nigerian communities. Igbo communities in places like Liverpool and Scotland (for example) faced so much racism in the ’30s, ’40s, ’50s, ’60s and ’70s especially but they just got on with life and formed authentic, tight-knit cultural communities and unions while also knowing where they were. Yorubas fused and integrated with the local Brazilians when that transatlantic business was going on and likewise with Igbos and Ibibios in Jamaica and the southern U.S. (like Virginia especially). They themselves didn’t lose their sense of cultural identity (on the contrary) but they left a viable imprint and adapted. These latest freshies ain’t seen nothing and they need to shut up. They’re not adapted to a life outside their narrow confines.

nysc:
Your story is not complete. Regular French citizens have friends. When regular French workplace colleagues are sick, they are visited by their co-workers. People in the west are not as anti-social as you portray. The issue is that you have not yet fully integrated in the new environment you have found yourself. Be more friendly and people will care about you wherever you find yourself.

There we are.

humberjade:
That's why it is not good to live a solo life, always have someone who reaches out as often as possible. Living a solo life is okay, but you but not totally safe and healthy.

No one is an Island, we need others from time to time.

No-one’s an island but no-one has two heads. There’s only one you. If you can’t be truly comfortable with yourself, who are you going to rightfully be comfortable with? Why are so many extraverts allergic to a little of their own company and incapable of doing anything alone for 5 minutes?

eepeepook:
They’ll do him strong things in prison. I send my condolences ahead of time.

I don’t. A rapist deserves no condolences whatsoever. Let him rot.

vickydevoka:
In the UK if you look woman too much it's called rape

Lots of Nigerian men are very bad at respecting personal space boundaries and keeping their eyes elsewhere. Staring too much at the opposite sex when you don’t know the person is absolutely pervy as hell (although sometimes it can happen accidentally and your eyes just freeze on something or someone unintentionally; you’re not consciously thinking about it) but doing it to other black people whether they’re ladies or blokes just because they’re black and you’re black is creepy (in a way) and discomforting too. We share the same skin-tone and probably have certain cultural and experiential familiarities but that doesn’t automatically make us brothers. Even if it does, I don’t know you so steer your eyes away after two seconds. Don’t think it’s okay to just stare at people because they’re black and you black. You still don’t know them and they don’t know you. They’re not the only black people you gonna see.

I think a lot of black men are just bad for over-familiarity when it comes to other black people. A lot of it’s actually with good intentions but either way personal-space boundaries just have to be respected. If you wouldn’t expect that person to actually come up to you and have a conversation with you or exchange numbers you’ve got to remember that they’re still basically a stranger to you. If any dude (the unintentional creep can be a woman too but it’s far more likely to be a guy/man, obviously) in Nigeria reading this is trying to emigrate, just bear that in mind and add it to your basic social etiquette radar. If you think you recognise someone from somewhere then fair game to you while you try and figure that out for all of the handful of seconds that it’s appropriate to keep looking at someone for that reason but if you don’t know them and you’re just intrigued to see another black person, leave them be. If they don’t refer to you as uncle/sir in casual passing, leave them be and don’t kick up a fuss. You’re literally not in Lokoja or Ibadan. You’re in Toronto. You’re in Wrexham, Mold, Cornwall. You’re in Kent. (We won’t include little-Lagos Peckham.) You’re not somewhere where you can openly use age to bully someone who doesn’t bow down to your sense of entitlement. Beyond standard cordiality and the basic amount of respect that everyone besides the most heinous of monsters deserve, no-one owes a stranger anything.

Black people also need to kind the business of other black people in workplace and not assume that two black people in the same workspace somewhere in the world are both the same shade of “foreigner” who need to stick together because “white people hate us and gossip about us as soon as our backs are turned”.

mysticwarrior:
Just look at how he has brought shame upon his tribe.

Oh, shut up.

Isobug:
Some people will be like, "I know it must be them even before opening the page" But you won't see them here to say rubbish.
Alas, crime and wrong doing is a general thing, Igbo, Hausa, Yoruba, Efik, Ibibio, ijaw, Bini, Urhobo etc. Individuals only have to control him or herself to crime.
Just look at this mumu in far away UK commiting Rape of all crime. Is it not sheer stupidity

Right.

We complain of racism but on our very doorstep is a huge amount of tribalism. Same-country foreigners. But we have the guts to single out white people as still being especially bad to people who aren’t their own (racism is a very serious problem even now, don’t get me wrong).

Skyview01:
What is wrong with being in the village. I have seen the world and now crave the village life so badly.

Difference being you’ve seen the world. Nothing wrong with the village but certain colonial inherited biases won’t be unchecked until you allow yourself gain a new perspective on life. See how the version of marriage they’re idealising isn’t a reality, a practicality or even a desirability elsewhere in the world. It does have to be said.

Mikkeal:
You see if it has been in the South West for example ondo or Ekiti that wants to host abacha or akpu festival will there be uproar ,I tell you they are the most tribalistic tribe on Earth but they accuse others of being tribalistic

That’s a lot of Yoruba people for you (I love Ondo and Ekiti though). They like to attach themselves to things that are obviously Igbo (Osuofia, isi
-ewu, Aki and Paw-Paw, Igbo-English Nollywood, ogbono) but turn around to say that they can’t imagine being anything but Yoruba and that they make Nigeria what it is, that Igbos are just an inferior distant-second-tier version of them who happen to have some decent foods. Yoruba tribalists are complete idiots. Scum of the earth.

Sometimes there’s a degree of ignorance Yorubas have towards Igbos (lumping Calabar people with Igbos is bad enough; a lot of people feel like not referring to them by individual tribe or at least the generalised Ibibio-Efik conglomerate is bad enough) in the sense of having an insular way of viewing Nigeria outside Yorubaland (because they’re so much more used to the one they know) but that one I can excuse as just being ignorance. I’m not advocating for tribalism in any form (like, whatsoever) and there’s good and bad in and about every ethnic group but let’s just say I understand it when it comes from Igbos off the back of being done dirty in the Biafran war and the political marginalisation since. Yoruba tribalists are some of the worst people alive.

Swiftgrp:
Take note:

Elubo is the original and popular Yoruba name for the grinded dried yam powder [which is then used to make Amala by stiring it in hot water till it becomes semi-solid Amala].

The word "Alibo" is not Ibo but a corruption of the Yoruba word Elubo. Even the Hausas phonetically call it "Alibo," even though the real Yoruba pronunciation is Elubo.


Elubo - Grinded dried yams.
Amala - Grinded dried yams (Elubo) meal or swallow.

A few ethnic groups that are close neighbors to the Yorubas, such as the Igalas eat Amala as well with their own soups perhaps because of their part Yoruboid ancestral connections. I saw the reference to the Igalas eating Amala on a YouTube food channel a few years back.

I actually didn’t know about Igala people and amala, although I vaguely got that impression.

Optimum2023:
Not news. Reminds us of those COVID-19 days when the CDC would reel out daily number of infections, deaths and recoveries. At a point, we all got used to it and stopped caring because it became part of normal life. It was expected.

People just needed a daily dose of fluvoxamine. It would’ve helped reducing the symptoms of Covid and the social rustiness that came to many-an extravert especially who couldn’t cope with the sudden isolation. That’s what people really needed back in late 2019/2020/21 as a conglomerate.

AsaBlackheart:
Well because the average yoruba can't prepare it. I can't.
I've seen it prepared once and the process is damn long.

But if someone organizes a abacha festival here in ogbomoso, trust me, we will go. 😋

Abacha’s not even that hard to prepare.

Igboslayer:
Shey una dey see these people. .na di same people wey dey shout one Nigeria when Obi dey contest for presidency , now na Biafra . Igbos are by far the mist ethnic conscious people in Nigeria . They think of their tribe first before anything .

Nah.

Trustedpronet:
But the Igbos are happy when they see phino go on international taw...i have seen Igbos performing masquerade festival in another man's state yet the world did not end. Hausa and Yoruba are the only tribe with national interest at heart.

Which Hausa?

Karemarealty288:
Some bigots will not know that Amala is called Alibo in Igbo....why the banta?

It’s really not.

bjtinz:
Na wa o. 27k for afang??

You know how the saying goes. Igbos cook better than Yorubas but Calabars cook better than Igbos (non-Anambra Igbos anyway). Afang soup is worth every penny. It’s like a spicy blood tonic packed with lots of vitamin C.

I’d pay up to 40k for it unquestionably and you do often have to get your wallet out. Ofe Owere, oha, Igbotic egusi, nkwobi, exquisite onugbu and Calabar vegetable soups are often expensive. But they’re worth it. It’s not exactly nonsense ewedu-abula so you have to pay for the quality if you’re eating out.

francisobiabo:
Could you debunk his views/opinion with relevant point.
You are free to air your view which may
be borne out of a superior reasoning.
Thank you

Leave the village. See the world a little more. Then you won’t need to ask.

Emetex22:
ofcourse people eat better food when given choices, I don't blame u for running away from ur kind, ewedu cunt, spits, the stench is second to none, shit, spits

Ouch.

I’m not the one to discount spiritual factors but it sounds like he just had a stroke. I hope he recovers soon anyway.

TemplarLandry:
God bless Israel!

Literally.

safetyboot:
WOMAN! WOMAN!! WOMAN!!! How many times did i call you?
See what you have caused you husband and son

What in the heck are you on about?

Throwback:
I have no tears to shed for America.

Since guns are like toys to them, let them continue toying with their lives.

I just weep for the innocent people who get caught up in all this at the club, at schools and Walmart. Literal children get shot in America.

I know this isn’t really an answer to the thread but just to put it out there I hate this culture of people sharing tips for how to cook the best jollof rice. A bit of that’s definitely needed so we can all be on the same general ballpark when it comes to having some general idea and some standardised tips to work with but most of the time it’s just the same recycled points that the Internet’s been vocal about from 2014 (“please you’re not going to add a lot of water, you’re going to let it steam, cover it with foil for extra steaming, fry your tomato paste well, add plenty curry oo, let it burn a little to give that bottom-pot taste”). We know, and there are more unique ways to cook jollof. People who really know what they’re doing when it comes to jollof rice tend to just get on with it or keep it relative secret that only the people who are with them when they’re cooking can get initiated with, which is partly why try as you might your jollof rice can hardly ever taste exactly like auntie Nkechi’s/Bisi’s, your mum’s best or iya-olopo so-and-so’s. And there’s a billion and one different ways to cook the same thing anyway, partly because it’s such an individual thing, so the taste depends on the very person themselves (which is a good thing), to the extent that sometimes you can almost taste their personality through the rice. Jollof rice (not just because of all its variations and traditional precursors, like jollof coconut rice and native red palm oil rice, seafood jollof, banga rice, which are all amazing, but because it’s a unique as well as generalised food just in itself) is just as much an individual thing as it is a general thing and we mustn’t forget that. Someone’s essentially giving you a bit of them when you eat their jollof rice and general rules or no general rules that individuality remains. The people who are willing to share their personal individualities when it comes to cooking jollof (if it’s not too personal to them) make for more colourful and interesting tip-imparters than the general slew of “rice must burn lass-lass, please you’re going to use plenty of de Rica and tatashe, you’re going to stir with wooden spoon and use low to medium heat” reh-te-te … ers. It’s old news, it’s boring now and it’s not giving people any unique cooking tips that they might want to try out for themselves beyond just getting certain standardised basics right. It actually kind of annoys me.

Adding liquid smoke to rice might not make the rice smokey in the way we might envision (whenever I’ve done it it’s just given this mechanical barbecue-y flavour that I’ve never liked) but at least that was something new and original. Roasting the peppers and stuff and then boiling them before blending is another example of how to up the originality game (some of us figured it out long before people started talking about it online and were freshly experimenting with it as recently as 2017/18). So’s using a blend of ehuru, a touch of crayfish and fennel seeds + maybe some goose fat (etc.). A mixture of turkey/torotoro, duck, venison, shaki, kpomo and oxtail, maybe (basically not being afraid to tap into meats beyond the bog-standard chicken and beef, because ultimately there are better-tasting meats and turkey jollof for one bangs). Boiling ukwa and corn in the meat broth before using it to cook the rice. Using African Breadfruit (ukwa) tree or oha/ora/uha (camwood/African rosewood)-tree (if that’s a thing)/udala-agbalumo apple-tree firewood for smoking and ukwa oil for toasting rice/frying the stew before the main jollof cooking. Marinating the turkey and plantain with maple sugar and seeing what kind of taste that gives. Doing it with chicken breast chunks, liver and bleached palm oil. A bit of barely perceptible St Helens influence finally lending its way to clear recipe-articulation, maybe with just a little touch of MSG and a dollop of Italian passata. Going into the wilderness to find that golden strain of Canadian goose to boil alongside okporoko so that you know you’ve got a sturdy base for your concoction rice. Managing to turn leftover oha soup into jollof rice (some people do). Finding out whether just a touch of pure Uyo crayfish fits jollof rice (with plenty of tatashe) as much as concoction/native rice or if it’s a bit strong and a crayfish more for the native dishes. Or just having a really cool recipe you swear by that you don’t mind sharing and isn’t just a “look at how my liquid is at nearly the same level as the rice, and this thing still go burn oo” rehash. That’s the level of innovation and grounded creativity I want Nigerians to get to one day when it comes to how we think about jollof rice if they want to brainstorm forward hacks and stuff. Foil paper and only adding a certain amount of liquid so the rice doesn’t become soggy (letting the liquid:rice ratio be proportionate is fundamentally just common sense if we’re being honest) and frying the tomato well-well (and all these other tips that every other Insta.-forming chef promises to make the sweetest jollof) is just old repetitive ground at this point and we should be moving on from the repetition. Jollof’s too special for that.

Nigerians think they own everything they eat, from indomie to tomatoes to cassava to pasta/macaroni. And while Naija adaptations aren’t bad Italian pasta is unmatched.

geoworldedu:
Speak for yourself Phyna. In life humans tend to believe that whatever they are doing and are overused to, everyone in the world are necessarily doing the same and it is impossible for them to do otherwise. Just like the religionists think that if an atheist or an irreligious person is going through tough time or at the point of death, he will pray to a god. Or if he is falling down or got struck suddenly by something, he will exclaim 'Jesus'.
Back to the topic, dear girl, it isn't every girl that will get pregnant while in a relationship. Some girls don't even have sex with their partners in relationship. Some don't like sex. Some have pains during sex, so they try by all means to avoid it while some have infections, so they don't even get pregnant at all, not to talk of aborting.
So Phyphy, get your facts right or except you just want to trend.

Bingo.

RIP.

yanabasee1:
What's the difference between Isi Ewu and Nkwobi?

Isi ewu’s made with goat head. Nkwobi with cow feet.