The Future Nigeria

“Add a little salt to the plantain, It would ripen it and make it sweeter”. How can that come from you? That’s not true I told my sister.  “Aren’t you are a science student?” I asked as I carefully tried to explain to her.

The addition of salt only brings about an increase in the melting point of the whole composition. With this increment comes an added time spent on fire to attain that needed heat , which is enough time for more deep oil percolation and time for the substance (plantain in this case) to get soggy.

She sat down there, looking at me like a little child who had just been scorned. Do you now understand I asked? Yes and No. Salt increases melting point I can agree with you because of elementary chemistry but Salt would still ripen the plantain and make it sweeter. Gosh!, she still doesn’t get it. I always know at that point when in an argument, the other party knows he has lost the battle but won’t admit it.

I told her, when it comes to plantain, it’s like a control substance for me and you know that very well, I m the wrong person you want to make a bad offer. She shook her head as she left saying “God help you”. That dint change anything as I reached out for the last plantain to get more fries. But all the same, I tried to ask myself, could she be right? Must there always be a science explanation for everything.

Could she had been on the right path this time? I asked myself .she could be right, just the same way some fruit come very sweet to taste and some do not. So I stepped up to ask her a few questions as she was a graduate of MicroBiology.”Is there any reason precisely why certain fruits like dates are always very good to taste and some like cucumber are just tasteless?”  DAMN YOU! She screamed, how can you say Cucumber is tasteless. I almost jumped out of my skin. No one has ever told me Cucumbers are  sweet.

Next thing , you will tell me Aloe Vera is very sweet isn’t it?. At least, not sweet in terms of “sweet”. People eat garden eggs and Shea butter but they never told me they are sweet to taste. Little did I know I just opened Pandora’s box by saying that. How can you say all that? What are you talking about she asked. I leaned gleefully towards her, have you ever heard anyone say that Apple is not sweet.

Have you heard anyone talk about Plantain like that? What is sweet is sweet. Period! I yelled. Lets call a spade a spade and not a big spoon!!.

I leaned back a little, I looked her in the face, it was more than the argument, it was more than Pears and sweet or not sweet things. She was smiling, has she found out I was right all along, why is she smiling? Smile turned to laughter and giggling. Then with the shake of the tail feather, I sniffed it,  I realized she was not laughing at me, my dinner, my lover, my plantain already black on fire.

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The use of words is such a rare craft or talent as it may seem. Sometimes it comes so beautiful that it gives vivid description of the state of the mind just like it’s a picture. It becomes so graphic at times you wish you could hold it. If you appreciate literature, Paronomasia or Pun wont come as a surprise to you.
Retrospect at movies. There are certain movies and sitcoms you watch and you just want to grab a piece of paper and put that one liner down. You get so enthralled with the adequate use of idioms and sometimes just the alliterations sweeps you off your feet. Limericks when fabulously composed become so rich you feel words are so fantastic.(Have you seen KRS1 describing what hip-hop is before?, then you would have an idea of passion of words)
‘Good news, agent Mahone. Due to the untimely demise of Señor Juan Nieves, I have now been promoted manager in charge of retail distribution and customer liaisons’. If you followed the series “Prison Break”, then you would remember T-Bag saying that just to say “He now supplies crack” That character was basically a raconteur.
Let’s move on into the movies proper. “V for Vendetta”. This movie is one I have seen for the umpteenth time. The movie brought out the real beauty of words in the 10 series-comic of Alan More. “ Voilà! In view, a humble vaudevillian veteran, cast vicariously as both victim and villain by the vicissitudes of Fate. This visage, no mere veneer of vanity, is a vestige of the vox populi, now vacant, vanished. However, this valorous visitation of a by-gone vexation…” O.K .I hear you say , wow that’s just too complex for communication, even the lady in response to that statement in the movie could only ask “are you a crazy person or what”. What I m trying to get at here is just the beautiful compositon of words that make you want to replay a particular scene over and over again. The careful use of alliteration in this scene was so beautiful virtually everyone who had seen it loved to listen to it again.

When you read poems like “I carry you in my heart” by E.E Cummings, dang!!!, you feel the warmness around you .probably it was inspired by a true to life situation but you can roll along with its meaning. Words have set people free and words have incarcerated people. A good view was delineated by “The great debaters” No wonder the phrase, “Pen is mightier than sword” .More often than not you can determine the spirit of a writer or the mood with which he writes from his compositions.
I also love this from ‘Finding Nemo’ – ‘’Of course I like you. It’s because I like you that I don’t want to be with you. It’s a complicated emotion.’’
In Herzog’s ‘The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser’, the child-man Kaspar and his guardian, an intellectual, had a debate on whether objects have wills and motive powers of their own. His guardian attempts to demonstrate that they do not by showing that he would stop an apple rolled by his colleague with his foot, and therefore the apples movements and arrest of movement only occur as a result of outside influences. The apple bounces over his foot and rolls into the grass.
Kaspar: ‘Clever apple! It jumped over your foot and ran away!’
Not really the complex use of words as could be seen in the above but just the way it comes, the way its composed and the meaning it carries at that particular instance.
Then I ve got this crammed in my brain by Prof Nash in “A beautiful mind” – See if I derive an equilibrium where prevalence is a non-singular event where nobody loses, can you imagine the effect that would have on conflict scenarios?
What about this? “If we all go for the blonde and block each other, not a single one of us is going to get her. So then we go for her friends…” if you’ve seen the movie, you wont confuse it, that analogy gave birth to the famous “Game theory”
I would end with these from a great mentor: Albert Einstein, “I don’t know what World war 3 would be fought with but I know world war 4 is going to be with stick and stones” and “Gravity is not responsible for people falling in love”

Unbridled Dreams

This was inspired by the fact that I discovered that there is a limit to which I allow my brain to “roam”. This has been due to certain factors like age, upbringing, program studied in school but after a certain event, I decided to remove the gearbox in my brain and allowed it to zoom outta control. I had discussed with some friends way back in my 3rd year the idea of a wireless transfer of energy so we can face out cables.Different ways by which it could not happen were all flying in the air!!!.No resources in this country, radiation through radio would affect human brains, intercepti….blah blah. 2 weeks after, I was at the library holding Time magazine in my hands. “2 students from California Institue of Tech develop wireless power”. I ve been among the privilege few to have counted to infinity and back. You should be there.Ask Charles and Othello.Its a wonderful experience If its to appear on the cover of time magazine, I already got my copy more than 5 years ago.(and I mean that.lol!) If its about Maserati , then I would be on my way to getting a re-paint and bodywork for the 3rd time to usage Burj-al arab? My 2 weeks honey moon is already over. Still doesn’t mean I m truly a fan of idealism If its my programming skills, no feeling conceited but I m already the team-lead programmer for the upcoming google O.S ..and if its bout a pretty chic, roll bounce baby, you already know yourself.(not part of the dream: there is always a take a pee part of the sleep!) If its about my apartment, Diddy’s perfect town is only a comparison, the contractors are almost through with the hanging gardens of my beach house. My career? We are already working on the 83rd file of the cold case crimes in Nigeria. 47 of Nigeria’s leaders with ineptitude are already spending time. About honoring your parents…… ooOps! I just remembered I left mum and dad at the Waldorf Astoria, need to get them to Madame Thussaudes on time. Brb. Back. About being an ace in investment, then the “Black Wednesday” by George Soros is only a joke, you haven’t seen anything yet, watch out for “Blue Thursday”. Sports! Wooooooow! Did you see the autograph on the camera last night, I left Del potro on the court kissing his kneels in tears of defeat. If its about dressing finesse, I m already with Brionni suits for the next 10 years. If its bout getting close to God, those 5am moments would be a deep place of revelation of secrets and I would be saying things twelve years to come. (That would be something vital and useful for stock market (common, don’t tell me “Hey, its not all bout money” cos I know its not)). Being an expert in literature? My euphemisms would be so nice, letter to a just widowed 27 year old lady would give her instant elation like scholarship to Cambridge. If its music career, I should be sharing the same mic with Wyclef and Mos def. IF all these happen, then who would write this note? If dynamism is a true theory, who would want to be its objects. I would be so busy with life; a chaperone would take my place with my lady. So busy I would have a doctor as my P.A for series of collapse. Worn out beyond repair and barely live for half of my time. Still, I would dream,look for the most recurrent of the dreams …and hey who knows, if I was meant to be on the same pitch with Tiger woods. ..and I m still dreaming, I would see you when I get back from the meeting with Carlos Slim

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