Thursday, June 21, 2012

Letter to the Nigeria that raised me up


Mother, do you recognize my face? See I haven’t changed much. You remember my sheepish smiles. I still wear them. I have tried severally to remind you about who I am but you seem to grow more distant. I swear I’ve changed. I’m older and wiser and stronger. You remember how you shove NTA at me and stuffed all its  contents down my throat. Well, that was what you had at that time and I’m grateful for them. My childhood memories, hang, like my muffler around my neck. I remember Cadbury Breakfast Telly shows and all the cartoons I watched. I doubt you remember watching some of them with me. There was Superted, Fraggle Rock, Muppet Babies, The Little Prince and Jabber Jaw. How will I not speak of Sesame Street, 3-2-1 Contact, Kidi Vision 101 and Voltron. Oh no! there was Doctor Who, Fawlty Towers, Some Mothers Do Have Them, The Adventures of the Famous Five, Rent-a-Ghost, and Behind the Clouds. Little Mama would give me One Naira and Fifty Kobo to buy a loaf of bread so that I could eat as breakfast with Pronto and Dano Milk before going to school the next day. You were not exactly the perfect mother at that time but I wasn’t complaining. Maybe I knew too little to complain. Mama provided my basic needs and I thought she could sustain providence because of your benignity towards her. As little as I was, I was an observant child as well as a keen listener. I didn’t have 2000 channels in my face or the internet tugging at me. I could observe, eavesdrop, relay and remember as young as I was.