Don’t you know that I am a married woman?

An acquaintance came to me to tell me that she was getting married. I was at a loss as to what to say. “Congratulations?” “I am so happy for you?”

It is common knowledge that the groom-to-be beats her openly, cheats on her even more openly and rather than contributing to her living expenses, “borrows” money from her that never gets paid back. Strange as it may seem, he appears to have hit upon a magical formula because this girl wants to “die put” on top of his matter and has now reaped what she thinks is the ultimate prize.

A husband who is anything but.

The right to say to people: “Don’t you know that I am a married woman?”

An MRS, as opposed to us lesser mortals that settle for an MSC or an MBA.

She searched my face keenly, waiting for a response.
I settled for a barely whispered “All the best”.

The latest NEPA/PHCN scam

I have hit upon what I believe to be a scam by our UNfriendly suppliers of power. I stand to be corrected, but I think that the coincidence is a bit much.

About 2 years ago, my friend who lives about 2 streets away from me started coming to my house at irregular intervals to do her ironing, blending and electricity connected thing-a-bobs. Her reason was that NEPA had started a load shedding schedule on their street. The explanation from NEPA went along the lines of the transformer needing servicing and how it was overloaded. The load shedding continued for months until the residents on the street got tired and contributed money which they gave to NEPA officials to fix their ailing transformer. I was not privy to how much was spent but within weeks their transformer was transformed.

Move on to about a year ago. An acquaintance who lives a street away mentioned in passing that they had a load shedding situation going on. Apparently, their transformer needed servicing as well. I caught up with her about 2 months ago and guess what? The street formed an organization and took it upon themselves to contribute about N1, 000,000 for the transformer to be fixed. NEPA officials gave them a ballpark figure for the repairs. It took them a year of levying every flat/house on the street to come up with the money. The very week I ran into her was the week that NEPA had stopped shedding their load. Mere weeks after money had changed hands.

Now here’s the thing. NEPA/PHCN started load shedding on my own street about 3 months ago. I have been made to understand that there is some special oil in the transformer that needs to be changed. Apparently it has not been changed since the ‘70s and now the transformer is unable to carry the load it normally carries. Yaddah yaddah yaddah...

I smell a rat, a fish and a skunk.

PS: Special thanks to the guys at Oyibosonline.com for thinking my post My Life in the Niger Delta worthy of wider readership. I noticed a spike in the number of hits my blog got and traced it back here.

An almost passenger

I was in Surulere the other day and a mad man (complete with matted dreadlocks and a loincloth) was standing near a speed bump. Naturally, as I went over the speed bump, I had to slow down. This guy actually reached out and tried to open the door behind. Luckily all the doors were locked. I was in shock!!

If the door was open, would he have tried to get in the car? Would I have been quick enough to drive off even if it meant losing my door and possibly injuring him? If all of that had failed, what would he have wanted if he managed to get in the car? A ride? Some conversation? Money? Would fellow drivers that witnessed him getting in my car have stopped to help get him out?

The questions are endless. Just so you don’t have to find yourself answering any of these questions anytime in the future, please always lock your doors when you get in your car.

You never know o! E fit be you!