simply oroque's view

yesterday, i heard on facebook that gary coleman had died. mr. coleman was a child star in the 80's, who rose to fame with a cheeky grin, childlike stature and witty lines that seemed a little advanced for children of that era. naturally, considering that i watched the comedy last in the 80's and i honestly wasn't a TV person (i still am not), i have no personal feelings of grief for mr. coleman's death...to be honest i actually didn't remember who exactly he was. and so, as with all things 2010, i hopped on the internet and googled the name and suddenly, his death took on a different dimension. i suddenly realized how much i take for granted. this is a 42 year old man who lived all 42 years in a child's body. at a certain age, it made sense for him to look like that and the fact that he used it to his advantage and shot to fame on the back of his looks, meant that he was never taken seriously all of his life. the fact of the matter is that while normal looking ...

i grew up in a home where both my parents are pastors. no seriously. i know you can't tell from how i turned out but we did have quite a strict christian upbringing complete with praying every morning and what not. so from early on, it was made very clear to us that we must respect every one and treat them fairly. we must show extra care to the elderly and the physically disadvantaged,and above all, be extra considerate for born again christians. by consideration i mean, you know, that they can do no wrong. as soon as someone started a speech with "greetings" and ended it with "God bless you", i was expected to bowl over and die. literally. i mean, my dad used to treat members of the church as if they were this distinct species that were not subject to the rules that applied to other common folk, and i detested it. detested it but had to live with it, and slowly come to terms with the fact that whatever a born again christian says or does is spirit led. so yes, ...

i'm not one to mark mindless milestones like a new birthday or the turning of a jubilee, in whatever form (golden, silver, wooden etc) but i do feel a sense of some achievement as i lie on my bed tonight (its actually 9.15 pm or thereabout) typing out what is my 50th post. somehow, it feels more important to me that for once in my entire life i have achieved a small level of consistency in something and although its just blogging, it has taken a lot for me to keep going. i used to be the guy who'd read stuff other people write and be the first to pick holes in it. i'd ridicule their concept, argue with their reasoning and (my favourite part) correct their grammar. for me at the time, i felt that if anyone would take the pain to share your thoughts with the world, the least you can do is make it worth their hard spent time. i still feel that way about writing but its now much easier to forgive imperfections because i now know from experience that taking criticism after pouri...

someone asked me today, how do you know in nigeria, when its time for elections. you know, what are the tell tale signs? he says in the US, most ordinary people suddenly start attending important events and giving all manner of key note addresses. suddenly, normal bankers, lawyers, and incumbent political officers decide that they have a sound opinion on every issue under the sun. issues that have existed in America for ages, suddenly get heightened attention. the last american presidential election was amazing. even an average nigerian like me knew what the positions were on immigration and border control, gun control laws, abortion and gay rights etc. i saw mike huckabee, john mcCain, hillary clinton, barack obama give speech after speech and argue in debate after debate. you'd see large halls full of people without so much as a cough, listening with rapt attention at how each candidate intends to use their money and mandate, watching body language to determine who was less than ...

okay, so when i wrote my blog yesterday, i told y'all that i do absolutely nothing during my leave period and i wasn't lying. but then lying on my bed late at night, i began to think about all the things that had happened to me in the past week or so just to get a sense of what i can use my free time to accomplish. and then my mind went to sunday during church service. the upper saturday, we had a church youth programme about financial empowerment and afterwards, encouraged all the participants to network and exchange numbers. so last sunday after service, as vice president of the youth fellowship (yep, thats me), i was standing behind the church looking like a proud father when sister wunmi came to me and said she had some things to sell, that she is certain i would be interested in. naturally, i was surprised at the certainty because frankly, i havent ever said more than a cursory hello to her since i joined the church in february. next thing she goes and bring pants and sin...

hey people, its lil ol me again. you know this isn't often how i start my posts but i am on annual leave (i.e. relaxed, thought-free, pressure-free etc)...and yes, again! i know a lot of my friends on facebook totally look out for when next i will announce that i am on leave from work, and some people have asked me to stop calling it "annual" leave since i seem to take countless "leaves" off work during any given year, but its not entirely my fault. apart from the fact that i think a lot of people secretly wish that like me, they can take countless days off work, its not entirely a random exercise. here's how it works. every year i am entitled to 24 working days away from the office. this roughly translates to a full month off work (adding the weekends of course) and one needs to take this leave periods piecemeal if you do not want to appear irresponsible by missing important deadlines or skimping out when huge time-sensitive projects are on your table, and ...

well, its really simple, a 23 year old guy who rapped like DMX and had one of the most culturally artistic videos in the nigerian music industry, passed on yesterday. He had a car accident, broke several critical bones (reportedly including his jaw), and slipped into a coma for days. i know for a fact that he was just getting famous and had a few really good gigs lined up before this happened. so, just to say my own farewell to the man, who just began his climb and became another reason for those of us alive to value the moment. a grim reminder that somehow, no matter how smooth things get, it could all end just like that. goodnight Mr. Da Grin, there's certainly no grin on our faces right now.

let me start straightout by saying two things: i have nothing against Mr. Babangida, and I have everything against Mr. Alao Akala. For the one thing, it takes guts to remain relevant in the world after over 17 years and if any celebrity can do that, (keep trying Whitney) then i must commend them. So every respect to the evil genius, and to be honest, i don't really know why they all call you that. As you must expect, i read with the same amount of angst and irritation, the comments ascribed to Mr. Babangida (i shall call him IBB like everyone else, going forward) and the first thing that came to my mind was the classic "off with his head!!" sentiment. IBB is credited with saying that Nigerian Youths are 'useless' and cannot govern hence the need for him to return to power. Now, two things. I read the interview as reported on SaharaReporters website and for the love of me didn't quite see where he said that in those exact words. secondly, the interview was cond...

okay, i'm listening to a lot of music right now as i write this so if some of it doesn't make sense...well, thank you lala.com for the sake of y'all who live outside nigeria, or under a rock in mars, the president went to the USA for the nuclear summit. it was his most high profile and globally publicized visit outside nigeria, and like everyone else, i sorta slightly hoped he would "represent" us correctly. well, the truth is that when two president's meet, its really hard to know if they are both happy to see each other as the smiles are plastic and stuck on firmly throughout the day, so watching him and obama act all friendly wasn't an indication. so it was with every joy that i caught glimpses of an interview that he gave Christianne Amanpour. as you can tell by now, i am in love with miss amanpour, and were it not for the great gap in personal and career achievements, i would have proposed to her to marry me. but i deviate... as usual, she kept the re...

sometimes, its really difficult to understand how deep certain prejudices run. a lot of people, myself inclusive, consider themselves above and beyond any form of tribalised sentiments and feel that with education comes the enlightenment to live beyond stereotyping. however, i found out while catching up on the news today that the late governor of kano state, alhaji abubakar rimi, was the first governor to introduce the May 1 holiday as workers day to commemorate the contributions of the worker to state building. somehow, i live with the impression that because the north is so low on the western education scale, that it translates to a leadership class that is bereft of ideas. i am always intrgued to find out that almost every government parastatal has a hausa fulani man at the helm of affairs who can hardly read a document correctly...sometimes, one may put it down to the ability of the northerner to be his brothers keeper and ensure that another norther replaces him in office (or so ...