My children's big mummy.

My children's big mummy.

If you ever lived in a Nigerian household you would know  that you do not call your mother's or Father's older sister aunt, you call them big mummy, during our own time we called them 'Maami'. I had four maamis although three of them lived in Lagos so I was more familiar with those three more than the fourth one. My siblings and I were called 'aniyameta' literal meaning, 'someone' that has three mothers. These three mummies all had different roles they played in my life during my childhood and at a particular time I was so confused about who exactly was my biological mother that I had to trace her through my dad, so it was which one of them that was close to my dad that was my mum.

My children's big mummy is my immediate elder sister, she is a prettier version of me

That is me, holding the plate, you be the judge, who is prettier?. Picture taken four Christmases ago on T1's 10th birthday.

and I honestly do not mind( there was this song we had for her, omo dara latese  o dori)

Omo dara latese o dori..., Me helping her adjust her 'gele' in her garden , getting ready for a party in London, summer of 2013.

meaning a child that is beautiful from her feet to her head, she is arguably also more 'well behaved' ( she never gave the onidiri trouble like I did while we were growing up) wink* wink*. People, even our own children and our aged mum have sometimes mistaken our voices for each other but beyond that there is little or no resemblance in our mannerisms,  our way of handling stuff, our disposition etc. We are like chalk and cheese when it comes to the way we handle children, I am the no-nonsense type

The no-nonsense type caught on 'hidden camera' by paparazzi photographer T2, 2012 on T3's 6th birthday in her school.  

and according to her I expect too much from them. She is the softly-softly-catch-the-monkey' type

The softly-softly-catch-monkey type, most likely wondering why I appeared so stressed at the same event.

if you get what I mean. And according to them she is their best favourite person.

She is one of the few that I can trust my children with if anything should happen to me like going to the great beyond for example. I know she would take care of them just like her own. She pampers them a lot no doubt but she would not spoil them, she would not wield the stick like I would but she is good at lecturing and explaining to them what they did wrong, what they ought not to do, what they ought to do etc. 

 She is naked but not ashamed with them, even me their mother if I were dressing up or something, I would grab a towel to shield my body a little if any of my children should walk in  but she would not and that is saying a lot if you know what I mean. 

She is responsible for their first bras and all their underwear in fact she would usually start buying the bras before the the breasts start budding, she is responsible for all their  roll on and all hygiene stuff, despite the fact that she lives outside the country, she knows when they will run out of them and when to restock. It started before I started having children, when I was in the ministry of waiting, we waited together, she was more concerned than I was and would usually prod me, advise, cajole me almost to exasperation. When her first niece arrived,

Her first niece held by Grandma on the very first day of arrival, Christmas day year 2000.

she did all the baby shopping, I did not spend a kobo and since then, she has not missed any of their birthdays, she would call if she is out of the country and would usually be the first caller, she would pray and send them loads of presents, despite the fact that I often forget her own birthday.
 She taught them hygiene,  how to clean  their private from front to back as a girl should, to soak their undies and wash separately every morning before having their bath rather than piling them up along with all the other clothes to load in the washing machine,and to always remember to wear roll on. She is a prayer warrior and she prays for them even more than I do.

Summer is her favourite time of the year because of them. We would usually end up spending most of our summer vacation with her, she would also take a long break from work. They would play ten-ten, tinko-tinko, suuwe, Mr aeroplane and all the other silly games, I would take a well deserved break and sleep for about two weeks without lifting a finger except to stuff food and drink in my mouth. They would cook together, eat together, go shopping together, do all sorts together and leave me be. After my two weeks me-time. We would start the vacation proper by visiting one holiday resort or the other and all other places of interests. Her visit to Nigeria is usually for Christmas, she shares the time she spends with us equally between them in each of  their rooms each so that she would not be accused of being partial. 

On this particular summer vacation, we visited a holiday resort and it would be our first time on a roller coaster,

Our first roller coaster rides

the ride affected us differently, the children? They kept on going back for more, we had difficulty in dragging them back to the hotel even after night fall.

Me in black with the 'slim backside' dragging T3, big mummy on the lft in denim skirt trying to catch up with the rest of them.

Me?  I developed acute morning sickness symptoms, I feared that I might be pregnant despite all the precautions so after day one,  I just lay down in bed for the remaining two days. For their big mummy, her bladder ran out of control, she had to wee like every five minutes

Big mummy running to a loo, on the right T2, on the left, Me and behind the camera is T1

and naughty children could not stop laughing at her and asking her to try more rides, she in spite of herself still followed them and went for only the very slow rides with T3 who was about six years old then and so not tall enough to go on most of the rides. 

On our visit to the Zoo,

Zoo visit, 2008 version.

I

Zoo visit, 2008 version.

T3 then 3 years old was scared of all the animals, so was crying non stop and  refused to stay in her stroller so big mummy had to strap her on her back for up to three hours till she fell asleep and we gently transferred her to the stroller.

After she fell asleep, we played a fast one on her and put her by this purple cow, not a life one of course to have a laugh and show her when she wakes up.

It is only through her that my children would cross the boundary I set for them and I would not be able to take any action, take shopping for example, shopping is easier, faster and less expensive when big mummy is not there so they would usually beg me to let's wait for big mummy before we can shop. With her in tow, they would load the trolley with lots of panti, crisps,

'Remove the 'panti' if you dare' look.

jelly sweets and all sorts of 'jedijedi' and they would be staring at me with that 'remove it if you can look'. Of course they know I can't because of big mummy's presence.

Her husband is my children's big daddy. I remember when one of my brothers came visiting and introduced himself as their big daddy, T3 corrected him vehemently that he was not their big daddy that big mummy's daddy was their big daddy, she meant to say husband but at that age, to her the daddy of the house was everybody's daddy, she did not yet understand the 'husband' aspect of things. In between both of them, I don't know who pampers them more, big daddy's specialty is procurement of 'jedijedi', cooking delicacies and serving up to three large pieces of meat per meal, he would also want to help them do the dishes, but trust me on that one, that would be 'over my dead body' as the saying goes.

Altogether, we are blessed round about, my children and I, for this wonderful couple that are our big mummy and big daddy and we can only advise those that do not have a big mummy and a big daddy to go and adopt. Chikena. 

What about you, have you got or are you planning on adopting?

African child...... What hairstyle?

It was a bright Saturday afternoon, I dropped my children at the salon to have their hair done. The youngest one; T3, the one that will kill me with questions one of these days if care is not taken  read this for example,  tried all the tricks in the book to escape the visit to the salon but without success. I laughed inside of me and thought, if only this girl knew all the tricks that I, her mum had in my kitty and still did not succeed in escaping the weekly hairdressing ritual when growing up, she would just give up and make the most of the situation by cooperating and enjoying enduring it.

Growing up, there was no weaving of hair, (weaving came later with the migration of Northerners who worked as Maiguards, accompanied by their wives who introduced the milder hair plaiting style called weaving)what  we had was the almighty painful 'didi',

Almighty didi

 you know, that one that not even the tiniest of your hair escapes the painful clutch of the 'onidiri' the hairdresser , I am talking about the type that even your eyebrows are plaited along with the hair on your head (those with bushy eyebrows will testify to this I am sure)and as if the pain was not enough, you also had to endure the odor, scent of the inner recesses of the underneath of the onidiri,

T3 enjoying the perfumed inner recesses of the underneath of Naijamum

because it is essential that your head be gripped tightly in between their two thighs to get the best result. And also this was an ordeal that would take a minimum of two hours if the onidiri is good and fast. If the onidiri was 'wicked' as we used to think she was,  she would from time to time give you a knock on the head with her 'cutting comb' 'ilarun'

Cutting comb (ilarun)

to make you cooperate by keeping your head still. No wonder we had a permanent runny nose when we were growing up( from crying from weekend to weekend).

A typical Saturday was a day set aside for hairdressing, or hair plaiting if you like. After breakfast, the onidiri would come with her tools, we would in turn get ready for her, she would usually commence her business of the day starting with my Mum's hair followed by all the females in the house and we had quite a few being an extended family system, aunties, cousins, nieces, house helps in fact every female member of the household.

 One of my tricks was to usually be the last to have my hair done although this was what the onidiri herself wanted,she would not want me to be the first in the queue so that I will not infect her with 'bad market' and all the time I would start praying frantically for some life threatening emergency to happen so that I would escape and go free for that weekend. But Sorry, nothing of such ever happened. When it would almost be my turn, I would sneak out and run away, but some busybodies would outrun me and drag me back. Not giving up, I would cry so hard and so loud and roll on the floor, that too would not work but it would sometimes make my Mum buy a whole crate of soft drink, to bribe me with,( and these were the days when two children used to share a bottle). In between sobs, I would consume the whole crate almost half of the crate and I would still refuse to give the onidiri easy access. The onidiri would be exasperted but would dare not leave because plaiting of my hair was a tacit condition for her retainership by my mum. 

My final trick was to beg to do 'kiko' this was the one done with thread, the Chimamanda Ngozi

Adichie's favourite, but that too had its own downside, after doing it,  I would develop boils at the back of my head, I would not be able to lay down to sleep for about four to five days after the hair plaiting and my neck would be in a permanently stretched position like a giraffe's. I would beg to go back to didi. The cycle continued until my mum gave in to my request to have my hair cut and after a while I could not stand being mistaken for a boy as a result of the new hair cut, so I started growing my hair again and the cycle resumed.

So when I look at T3, my daughter's ajebota style of crying, I just laugh and wonder,is this mild whimpering what they call crying? I can  bet that she has never rolled on the floor before, she has never cried till she would lose her voice.

To the discussion at hand, T3 just got back from the salon laughing and skipping, I asked her if she had stopped crying; Trust her to answer my question with another question....

T3: Who was crying?

Me: Where  you not the one crying that you did not want o have your hair done?

T3: But Mum, seriously ( that is the latest expression in use in my house) children's hair should be left free

Me:What about Mummy's hair?

T3: (eyes rolling) But Mum, seriously nobody forces them to do their hair.

So what type of hairstyle would you recommend for an African (girl) child or would you go along with T3's suggestion that children's hair should be left free?

Ode to a playground.

A place from your past or childhood, one that you’re fond of, is destroyed. Write it a memorial.

Growing up was fun, whenever I go to Lagos Island, sweet memories still flood my mind, memories of a clean sparsely populated and breezy neighborhood which encompassed Bishop Street, Olowogbowo, Elegbata, Daddy Alaja, Koseh, Balogun, John Street, Doherty, Idumota and Marina. Everywhere was our playground including the gutters and right in the middle of black well tarred  roads, cars hardly passed by, it was only a few people that had cars, commuting was not common then,

Na better school... searching for a good school in Nigeria?

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The world over,the government is charged with the responsibility of guiding its citizenry on how to make a good choice when placing their children in schools and other institutions of higher learning. A major duty of the government is to provide free education up to secondary level and also aid the provision of standard education up to secondary level. In Nigeria, things are a bit different, yes the State governments provide education, but in most cases it is such that the children of the state government  staff would not be caught dead in such schools.

A government school in Kogi State.

Another one in Kwara State.

There is indeed a large gap to be filled and this has led to the proliferation of schools in Nigeria that claim to offer good education. I have searched to check if there is any guideline emanating from government to help in making a good choice,  but there seems to be none.

All is however not lost, let's take a look at the following checklist and see if it wont help in the selection of a good school.

1. Private. Check. Chances are that if a school is privately owned and run, it is a good school, it is only if you are not a Nigerian or you don't live in Nigeria that you need further explanation.

2. The name of the school. Check.

Avi- Cenna School in Lagos State.

if the founder of the school takes pain to arrive at a good and meaningful name chances are that it will be a good school, parents have been known to prefer schools with  oyinbo names,  like Vivian Fowler, Avi Cenna, Grange , Corona, Loyola Jesuit, Chrisland, Day Waterman, Greensprings, Supreme Education  Foundation etc. It is the parents' belief that the more English or foriegn the name is, the better the performance of the school in helping their children achieve good results. Parents cannot be blamed really because there are names like Aunty Yewande Schools, I rise and shine secondary school, Blessing Impeccable Schools, Holy Ghost Fire School, Proper Arsenal International Nursery and Primary School, Sachel School, Branded College, Normal College, Nursery, Primary College, ( I mean, is there any such thing as an abnormal college?) Tambad School etc. Imagine your child saying " The name of my school is Proper Arsenal Nursery and Primary School" (in Tatafo's type of voice). Are we not carrying this football craze too far? Poor child.

3. The school fees. Check.  This is perhaps the major determining factor. Let's listen to this conversation between my friend, Ngozi and I.

Ngozi: Which school does your child attend?

Me: Blessing Impeccable

Ngozi: ( frowning, trying to check if the name rings a bell, unfortunately, it does n't) How much do you pay per term?

Me: ₩600,000

Ngozi: (finally convinced) Na better school.

If the school fees is not in hundreds of thousands, chances are that it is not a good school. Apart from the main fees, there should be other fees such as development levy, utility fee,( for electricity and water) Maths clinic fees, Excursion fees, Inter-House Sports fee,in short, an endless list of all sorts of ridiculously named projects.

"......na better school"

4. The uniform. check. Now this is a very funny one, it must include a tie, a blazer, a pinafore, leggings or tights and wait for this, bowler hats,regardless of our climate and weather, otherwise, potential parents might think the school is not up to standard.

Bowler hats, blazers in this all year round summer?

5. The type of and the number of school buses. Check.

Toyota coaster is the favourite of good schools in Nigeria, Toyota hiace fully AC with curtains is however a second choice, a good school must have a minimum of one Toyota coaster and a minimum of two Toyota hiace buses. This is however not an Herculean task because a separate fee of an average of ₩40,000 per term for transportation is charged by schools that provide school bus service,

6. The nationality of the Principal. Check. Majority of parents in Nigeria are of the opinion that their child will perform better and get better results if the principal is a foreign national, it could be British, American, French, Australian (like in my children's school, and assisted by an Indian) Indian, or even Ghanaian. Most school owners are of the opinion that Nigerians ( for reasons best known to them) are not good enough to head a school.

7. Foreign trips. Check.  For a school to be deemed as good enough it must offer outrageously expensive foreign trips, to America,( for example my children's school organized a trip for her students to go and witness Obama's swearing-in ceremony, even if they were only able to watch on screens littered outside the inauguration venue), Britain, Canada and more recently Dubai, it does not matter if the students have not been to neighbouring African countries like Ghana, The Gambia, Kenya e t c. The reason behind the choice, I guess is that the farther the country of choice, the more money is to be made on foreign trips by these schools and also the more 'posh' the school would appear to be.

No, you are not mistaken, the Queen actually stopped by or was it the school that visited? That indeed was the Queen of England with students of Vivian Fowler. Can you beat that?

8. I.T. compliant. Check.To be regarded as up to standard a school must offer IT, traditional black board and even the modern white board must give way for projector and other learning aids, flash drives are used to collect class notes by students and downloaded unto the students lap tops, in some schools, ( Greensprings for example)  these lap tops/ tablets are rented out to students annually at a fee you would get a brand new one in the market

Now this is neither a film trick nor "demo", these children use tablets and its not paracetamol, Greensprings.

9. The curriculum. Check. Just as everything in Nigeria is in mega proportions, to be a good school, the student must offer a minimum of 15 subjects and be put through up to three different curricula simultaneously , we have Nigerian curriculum, British, American e t c, our children have now become professional exam writers. Some  schools aiming at being even better concentrate only on either British or American curriculum, so their students will not sit local exams like W A E C, NE C O, Lagos State Government Exam and GCE which they consider to be unnecessary distraction.

10. Co- curricula or extra- curricula activities, a good school must have facilities for these and offer a variety of them. Schools should therefore have music room,  tailoring and home economics room, arts and craft laboratory all equipped to the nines. And the students must play hard just as they work hard, and their playing hard must reflect in trophies, prizes won in competition, tournaments both within and outside Nigeria.

Playing hard

Swimming competition, Day Waterman College.

Good at carting home the trophies, Vivian Fowler

11. External  Examination results. Check. This is another selling point. It does not matter if it is only a fraction of graduating students that do well, as long as there is a list of names that can be pasted on notice boards to show intending parents that their students do well in the examination. Note also that you the parent have to organize extra home lessons for your child and the school will of course take the credit when the results turn out good.

12. Location. Check.The factor that sells a property is the same as the one that sells a school; location, location, location. Parents don't mind commuting up to two hours to go and two hours  to come back or even longer every school day because of the location, in search of a good school for your child? Consider areas like Victoria Island, Ikoyi, Lekki, Ikeja, Magodo, Surulere etc, it does not matter if you live faraway from those areas. A friend and a co parent in my children's school confided in me that they had to relocate from their own house to  a rented place when their children became of secondary school age in quest of a better school.

13. Intercontinental cuisine. Check.Quality of the meals served in the school especially those that have boarding houses. Schools that have such food like hot dogs and burger, ice cream, jollof rice and chicken, chicken and chips, designer rice,  etc on their menu seem to be better than those schools where Mama put will bring her basin of rice and beans and ponmo to sell everyday without fail. However while  such schools are more concerned about nutrition and balanced diet, it has been discovered that Mama put floors them in the taste department.

14. Facility for foreign exams. Check. SAT, TOEFL, GMAT, Cambridge Checkpoint, IGCSE is a sine qua non. A school is not considered good until it can prepare students for and administer these exams.

15. Spoken English. Check. From my observation, students from different schools can be told apart by their 'accent', each school has its own unique 'foreign' accent, thanks to the school they attend. So in your quest for a good school, avoid schools have 'Engiligbo' English language spoken in Igbo as there lingua Franca, and schools that the teachers are versed in pidgin English and other local languages especially Yoruba as medium of conversation, you know schools where oil is called oyeli (Igbo)and teacher is pronounced shisha(Yoruba), the type of school you would find Akpors and his cohorts

16. Discipline. Check.  A good school will gladly indulge the students and their parents, punishment is almost non-existent. Gone are the days of morning duty, sweeping and keeping our environment clean, clearing bushes e t c like we had it in our own time, a good school would usually pay people to do that. The heaviest punishment in a school that I know for example is washing your own plate for one week( Vivian Fowler), trust me, I make up for this at home by ensuring my children wash plates to the extent that they do a better job than our dishwasher. Note also that offences and punishment that go with them would have been printed and given to you before enrolment

17. Public image/ perception or call it goodwill if you like. A good school would usually not be an island.

Walk to create awareness on dangers inherent in Drug Abuse, Vivian Fowler.

Care for the less privileged children in the society.

Excursion, a visit to the Oba of Badagry

It should be involved in what goes on in the society and in the area it is located and once in a while be featured in local newspapers  and magazines for one good deed or the other it carries out and how it affects the society positively.

18. Facilities and amenities that are up to international standard; to cap it all, a good school must invest in these. Some schools have air conditioned classrooms( Chrisland) and they run power generators through out the school day except when there is PHCN. Laboratories must be able to compete with that of any school outside the shores of  Nigeria. Well kept lawns, fields etc are also essential.

Halls of residence, just like home.

Well kept lawn, Vivian Fowler.

 19. Vibrant PTA. Check. A good school would have the creme de la creme of the society as members of its PTA, giving rise to networking opportunities and competition amongst parents in giving, sponsoring, playing and yes praying together, you could even learn a few new ways of speaking in tongues(just kidding) .

Parents praying together.

20. Have I forgotten any other point? Add your own.

If you are armed with this check list you can't go wrong when choosing a good school for your child, how has your school search journey been?

Nigerians, keeping the change since 1973

Do you remember the phrase 'Keep the saing change' by Jenifa, in the film 'Jenifa'by Funke Akindele?Well Nigerians have been keeping the change since the introduction of the Nigerian currency, the Naira and Kobo on January 1st 1973.. Change hear means money returned to someone as the balance of the amount paid for something.

Different denominations of the Naira

Change or what is called refund in some other countries is one thing Nigerians love keeping. No matter how smart you think you are, you may never be able to succeed in retrieving your change from Nigerians,  well I beg your pardon,most Nigerians. Let us examine the following scenarios

You are at a filling/petrol station to buy fuel, you give the petrol attendant instruction to sell ₩5,000 worth, he will attend to you and ensure you have some change to collect by living some fraction less than that ₩5,000 say, ₩4.942 or some other fraction and he will either tell you your tank is full or that he does not have change. You will be forced to part with ₩58. There is hardly any customer that is not put through this daily except maybe a few people like me, carrying on the lone crusade of 'change collection' So at the end of the day a typical petrol station attendant would be taking home a tidy sum that will by far exceed his salary at the end of the month. Meanwhile they do not know that there is no such job as petrol station attendants in most countries in the western world,( you are expected  serve yourself and go in and make a payment) and that it is a privilege to them that such jobs exist in Nigeria.

The experience ,when you are unfortunate enough to take Public transport like buses and keke Marwa

Keke Marwa

and even taxis is worse. From what I hear, the best bet is to board with your exact fare, the dangers inherent in not doing that are far too many, you could be late for your appointment because you might be taken beyond your stop to get change if you are not ready to forgo your change, you might have to get physical with the conductor if care is not taken, you might be joined together with some other passengers( conductors call it marriage) alighting at the same destination to go and sought out one another as per the change.

The fact that you have a car and so do not take public transport does not exempt you except if you don't have a driver, if you don't have a driver, no problem, petrol station attendants will be waiting for you, if you do have a driver, please don't send them to buy fuel except you are in the car, (that is a story for another post). And if  you should send them on some other errand, do not make the mistake of asking for your change, there would be consternation on their face as if they have never heard of such a request before in their life. And if you, like me should cultivate the habit of asking for your change, your drivers will not stay long, you would have to keep getting new ones. And off course, most likely you will have an house help, these don't  render account talk less of giving you your change, if you force them to render an account, it will be so inflated that it would be obvious, so the fear of not losing  your house help especially if she is good at her job is the beginning of wisdom, so most people look the other way.

The neighbourhood supermarkets, maiguards that sell provisions, recharge card sellers are also lurking  in the corner waiting for you. Most of the maiguards now have exercise books and pen for you to write your change and since they cannot read, how would they know what you have written in the book? The implication is that right from the onset they do not have the intention of giving you that change. Sellers of pepper, vegetables groceries etc in the neighbourhood have a better deal, you exchange your change for maggie, onions and other 'orisirii' whether you need them or not. Stores  like Shoprite started right but it seems that they have realized that Nigeria is a 'non change giving country' and so have gladly joined. But what I don't understand is who benefits from this act at Shoprite, is it the staff at the tills or the company?

Banks too are just as guilty, especially as regards transactions like Western Union Money Transfer and Moneygram, the fractions in dollars are usually not paid, the excuse? they do not have Dollar coins and Cents. If a bank does not have coins who will have? 

Since I have imposed on myself a change collection crusade, you might be wondering how I have fared so far?Trust me, it can be very frustrating. Thank God for ATM cards and POS, I load my savings account and use my ATM cards wherever possible so any fraction or change left will be left right inside my account.

At petrol stations, I deliberately refuse to be friendly and so do not respond to all the 'happy weekend, happy new month, and happy whatever it is' greetings and I tell the attendants that they should round up their sale, I pay to the last whole number, and so any fraction they sell on top is at their own risk.

For dollar transactions in banks I request that any remaining fractions be converted into Naira and paid me or be paid into my Naira account.

I guess on public transport, you would have to have your exact fare, but since this may not be possible 100% of the time, you may have to forgo your change once in a while. 

You might also be thinking that my self imposed 'change collection crusade is 'much ado about nothing' well I beg to disagree, I believe that a little honesty goes a long way, and a con is a con no matter how little. What do you think?