let me start by saying that today isn't my best writing day, so forgive me if i appear incoherent at times. to be honest, i'm a lil overwhelmed by not just the standard of living i have, but by how much worse things are indeed becoming. pretend as i want, that most of the issues on the news don't affect me by a mile, the truth is that as i have found out, life is a cycle. and someday, somehow, it will all link up to me.
black is often associated with negative things. sorrow, grief, mourning...illiteracy, ignorance, violence. many arguments have been made linking these acts and tendencies to the era of the slave trade and how this was the psychological mindset that ensured that africans got through the brutality of the time. whilst i have no empirical basis to argue for or against this proposition, i am completely unwilling to even argue.
in nigeria, every event worth mentioning erodes our faith in our abilities to govern ourselves. it appears, as you look around the continent, that the black man has no moral justification to assume leadership positions. in companies that are headed by white people, you always find a certain standard of integrity...a basic level of attention to detail that makes it appear almost ridiculous. nigerians and indeed black people do not think anything is life is really all that important. why queue up to take a bus when you can struggle in. why wait for your turn when you can be friendly with someone and skip the line. why wait long periods like everyone else when you can "facilitate"? in school, i found that young people were more willing to make jest of other students who spoke proper english. they felt it was superfluous and unnecessary to have a perfect grasp of a language that you will be using for the rest of your life.
while other countries in the world would applaud a child that is interested in expanding his knowledge base, nigerians mock a brilliant child to scorn. after a while, the child is bound to figure that being right isn't worth it. it even becomes a "slacking" matter if he insists on waiting on a queue. sad.
so, i am not surprised when i hear that a certain group of stark illiterates with access to weaponry have decided that western education, which has in no small measure ensured that our race isn't lost to the horizon of time, is prohibited. much as i know that the black race did have its form of education before the advent of colonial type education, noone can ignore the tremendous benefits that english education has brought us. now, we follow affairs in other parts of the world and are almost as savvy as our contemporaries anywhere on earth because we understand the concepts that are universal and necessary.
what surprises me is why it took the country so long to respond to a group of bullies who have been holding large communities in parts of nigeria, hostage for quite a while. it appears sometimes that the bad news just never stops because i do not recall any single period of time where almost every industry has ground to a halt. but nigerians continue, unfazed. like nothing happened. we watch the news and see the many young lives wasted because they were fighting a lost cause... wasted because they were misled by the teachings of a fellow, but more convincing, illiterate. we see 12 fathers die when the atlas cove jetty was bombed. military men who had to die because some others need to make a point. and we just move on. unfazed; in our own world; in a trance. i'm still in traffic since i started working in lagos all those years ago. i still do not have electricty more than two hours everyday. nothing has changed. nothing is better. it is really a sad existence we are living as nigerians in nigeria. i still pretend that black isn't a negative colour...
...and i just keep going. unfazed.
black is often associated with negative things. sorrow, grief, mourning...illiteracy, ignorance, violence. many arguments have been made linking these acts and tendencies to the era of the slave trade and how this was the psychological mindset that ensured that africans got through the brutality of the time. whilst i have no empirical basis to argue for or against this proposition, i am completely unwilling to even argue.
in nigeria, every event worth mentioning erodes our faith in our abilities to govern ourselves. it appears, as you look around the continent, that the black man has no moral justification to assume leadership positions. in companies that are headed by white people, you always find a certain standard of integrity...a basic level of attention to detail that makes it appear almost ridiculous. nigerians and indeed black people do not think anything is life is really all that important. why queue up to take a bus when you can struggle in. why wait for your turn when you can be friendly with someone and skip the line. why wait long periods like everyone else when you can "facilitate"? in school, i found that young people were more willing to make jest of other students who spoke proper english. they felt it was superfluous and unnecessary to have a perfect grasp of a language that you will be using for the rest of your life.
while other countries in the world would applaud a child that is interested in expanding his knowledge base, nigerians mock a brilliant child to scorn. after a while, the child is bound to figure that being right isn't worth it. it even becomes a "slacking" matter if he insists on waiting on a queue. sad.
so, i am not surprised when i hear that a certain group of stark illiterates with access to weaponry have decided that western education, which has in no small measure ensured that our race isn't lost to the horizon of time, is prohibited. much as i know that the black race did have its form of education before the advent of colonial type education, noone can ignore the tremendous benefits that english education has brought us. now, we follow affairs in other parts of the world and are almost as savvy as our contemporaries anywhere on earth because we understand the concepts that are universal and necessary.
what surprises me is why it took the country so long to respond to a group of bullies who have been holding large communities in parts of nigeria, hostage for quite a while. it appears sometimes that the bad news just never stops because i do not recall any single period of time where almost every industry has ground to a halt. but nigerians continue, unfazed. like nothing happened. we watch the news and see the many young lives wasted because they were fighting a lost cause... wasted because they were misled by the teachings of a fellow, but more convincing, illiterate. we see 12 fathers die when the atlas cove jetty was bombed. military men who had to die because some others need to make a point. and we just move on. unfazed; in our own world; in a trance. i'm still in traffic since i started working in lagos all those years ago. i still do not have electricty more than two hours everyday. nothing has changed. nothing is better. it is really a sad existence we are living as nigerians in nigeria. i still pretend that black isn't a negative colour...
...and i just keep going. unfazed.
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