Who am I?

I took a year off work for two reasons - the first was because I always wanted to go to MIT and I had a chance to do so, and the second was that I felt I needed the time off to 'find' myself (midlife crisis????). I had a great time at MIT 'finding' myself (including on the ice skating rink as you can see from the picture) and have come home more lost than ever. Starting to think it wasn't such a good idea after all.

Back at work, I feel lost most times and wonder if the other Fellows feel the same way at their various work places, or if its just me. I've been unable to find my rhythm and it feels like I'll never adjust. Friends at work who took time off as well say its a passing phase, I'll soon fit in and it'll be business as usual. But do I want that? It would be a total waste of my year at MIT. The only thing I'm certain about is that coming back home was the right thing.

I spend my weekdays waiting for the weekend (fingers and toes crossed that there will be no meetings) and spend my weekends dreading the beginning of the week and I wonder if the rest of my life is going to be like this. I shudder at the thought of continuing like this for another 20 years. Again I say, there has to be a lot more to life than this.

So I'll continue to pray that I 'find' myself soon, and find out what my purpose is in this life and what role I am meant to play. It cannot be that I was created to 'mark time' which is all I seem to be doing right now.

English - Our national language

I went for a christian burial last Saturday - my first time in a church in a very long time and was amazed at the Preacher (Pastor?). Not sure of his title, but he gave the sermon at this funeral. It was half in Hausa and half in English and after almost every sentence, he would go 'it's like' or 'let me tell you honestly' (being in a church I assumed that everything he told us was the truth!). Halfway through his sermon, he stopped and says to the crowd 'hello' and they responded 'hi' and he went 'are you with me?' For a minute, I thought I was at a comedy show, and not at a formal and somber occasion. It got me thinking about how much our command of English, has deteriorated, in a country where English is the National language.

Having been born after the death of some Nigeria's great leaders like Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa and Sir Ahmadu Bello, I didn't get the opportunity to hear them speak live. The first time I heard Tafawa Balewa speak, I must have been about 16 years old and it was some program on Radio. All the images I had seen of him, were like this one and at the back of my mind I kind of thought of him as some rural illiterate farmer (very local in Nigerian terms), even though I knew about all he'd done towards our country's independence. Therefore when I heard his speech on radio, it was a total revelation. He spoke English like the British! If I hadn't known he was the one talking, I would have thought it was one of the English Colonial Rulers. Subsequentlt I heard Ahmadu Bello speak as well, and it was just the same. And this was 50 years ago, when majority of the people in the country had no access to education.

It surprises and annoys me that now, with 'development' there are more schools, more teachers, a lot more people who speak English, but the quality of both spoken and written English is so bad. When I went to primary school, your child didn't have to go to the best schools to speak English properly - now you can tell once you speak to a child, what kind of school he/she goes to. Since we can't all afford the Regents and the American International Schools, we resort to the next best where the education is almost as good but the English is not, and then insist that our children only speak English at home to improve their spoken English. Our leaders on the other hand do it the easy way since they can afford it - they simply send the children to school abroad. If only they would stop stealing the money earmarked for education each year, (amongst all the rest) and use it to improve the quality of our schools. It would be a step in the right direction towards true development.

Friendship

I watched a movie today - Bride Wars, that made me realize how much I miss one of my friends. Bride Wars is about 2 girls who had been friends for over 20 years and were both engaged to be married. They'd gone for a wedding as little girls and dreamed of having their own weddings at the same location, with the same wedding planner in the month of June. Years later, they became engaged about the same time and hired the much dreamed about wedding planner for the dreamed about location and month. Unfortunately, she booked them for the same day in error and couldn't get another date at the location for three years, and so one of them needed to change her date/location for the other and they both refused to. So the friendship more or less ended but like all chick flicks (which is why I love them) the movie had a happy ending.

So back to my friend, who shall remain nameless. She and I became friends at 16 and hit it off right away. She was one of my closest friends for years - we wore each others clothes, saw each other through deaths, relationships, heartbreaks, job hunting, a marriage and divorce and everything else. Like in every relationship, we had our hiccups, but always managed to get through them. Until a few years ago, when we had a hoop that we couldn't jump through. It had to do with a mutual friend and thinking back, I realize how immature both of us were in handling the issue - but then they say that's the benefit of hind sight.

We didn't drift apart..... we just stopped talking to each other and instead told our sides of the story to everybody else, but the people that mattered - ourselves. And when we saw each other (which was inevitable since we have a lot of friends in common) we acted very civilly - talking about everything but. This was six or seven years ago and we rarely see each other any more but I really miss being friends with her.

I have no regrets about the decision I took at that time (which resulted in an incredible relationship) but I wish I had taken the steps to have a discussion with her on it, instead of waiting for her to talk to me about it. I wonder why it is that we could talk about everything else but this one thing that was so important to both of us. Unfortunately, too much water has passed under the bridge and we can never go back to being the friends that we were. And as I grow older and lose people near and dear to me, I marvel about how emotional we get about things that are worldly, when we should be concerning ourselves with the hereafter.

I hope that wherever she is, she's happy. I hope that she can find it in her heart to forgive me. And I pray that the Almighty Allah continues to guide and protect her, and grants her her heart's desires

25 Random Things About Me

I saw this on someone’s face book page and thought I would try it to see if I could come up with enough things about me. Fingers crossed


1. I like good food and I’m willing to travel far and pay a lot (and if that’s the only option, cook it) to get it.

2. I love to read. Everything but science fiction.

3. Coke and I have said our vows – till death do us part.

4. I like to spend money – will probably go round begging cap in hand, if I live till retirement.

5. I used to be so into politics - when I was 9, I went round my mum’s workplace campaigning for Shagari and stayed up all night for election results. Interesting that now that I’m old enough to vote, I’ve never even registered.

6. As I grow older, my tolerance level for lies diminishes. We all have those friends that tell lies all the time, and we simply discard what they say and move on. Now I find that I don’t want to be friends anymore.

7. I’m running a race against time, to visit everywhere in the world that interests me.

8. During the first half of my life I was very friendly and outgoing. Now I’m an introvert tending towards reclusion. I wonder why.

9. I can’t understand the American way of socializing - standing/walking around the room, drinking alcohol and talking. Give me a good meal (yes food again) anytime, and please, a chair to sit on even if there’s no food.

10. Choosing to come to MIT is the best decision I’ve made, ever. It’s an amazing experience.

11. If I got cancer, I wouldn’t go through chemotherapy.

12. I need a lot of ‘me’ time.

13. In University, I baked cakes to raise pocket money (with help from the amazing friends I had then, most of whom I still have today – thank God).

14. I miss my mum a lot more now than I did when I lost her 20 years ago – didn’t think it could get any worse.

15. I’m an internet junkie and don’t think it’s anything to be ashamed of.

16. Lance Armstrong is amazing. So is Barack Obama.

17. I’m a Grey’s Anatomy fan.

18. Friendship isn’t about talking or seeing each other all the time. It’s about being there for each other in times of need.

19. I hope I’ll figure out what I want to do with the rest of my life, before my life is over.

20. I’m nocturnal and don’t need a lot of sleep, unfortunately. I’m so envious of all those people that can sleep for 12 hours, straight.

21. I’d like to get a PhD, in-between the 200 other things I want to do.

22. Amazingly, I’m starting to like exercise. Maybe I will lose weight after all.

23. I hate being given unsolicited advice. If I want it, I’ll ask, thank you.

24. I try to see the ‘log in my eye’ before I see the speck in others. I wish everybody else would too.

25. This was a lot harder than I thought it would be but I got to the end ….Yay.

History is made

I think it is very fitting that my first post is the day after history was made - Barack Obama will be the 44th President of the United States of America, in sha Allah.

A month ago, I became convinced that he would win the election and I just wanted November 4th to come and go so that the formalities would be over, and Obama could get some sleep (I could almost track the progress of his grey hair, and wrinkles, over the past year). And so when CNN announced that he had won, I wasn't really surprised. I was very happy though, and celebrated his win for all of one hour, and then he came out to make his speech - a very sober speech. And I got very emotional. Suddenly the reality sunk in - the 47 year old Barack Obama would actually be the African American President of the United States. He is definitely not going to get the sleep I had been hoping he would.

I wonder how he feels. I felt yesterday that the reality of the situation had also hit him i.e. the amount of work he has ahead, and I wondered if he was thinking 'have I bitten off more than I can chew? Can I really do this?'. I also felt the absence of his mother and grandmother - I can totally understand how much he would have wanted them to be here to see him achieve this ultimate position. I was also raised single-handed by my mother and I lost her when I was still in college. Twenty years on, whenever something significant happens in my life - graduation, promotion etc she's always the first person, in fact the only person I want to tell. What wouldn't I give to be able to say to her 'Look what I have become, because of you'.

Obama winning the elections is God's will, that is why everything came right at the same time - a nation that was ready to embrace change, an amazing candidate and a phenomenal campaign (run by the most incredible managers). I remember watching him when he gave his speech at the Democratic Convention four years ago, and thinking he would go far. I had no idea how far and how soon.

I pray that the Almighty God protects and guides him as he carries out the very difficult duties that lie ahead, and I pray that in 2017, after he has served his 2 4-year terms, we will all look back at his long list of achievements and wish that we could elect him for a third term.