Awada

Áwàdá (be it different or the same).

        

 "I heard in Onitsha, you could shake hands with your neighbour, from your own house, because the buildings there are very close to each other. Stanley is that true?". The memory of this question; that I was asked by a course mate, lingered on my mind as I was on a bus heading home for the holidays. The thought of my friend's funny perspective of Onitsha kept me smiling, till I was carried away by the nostalgic feeling I get each time I step into Onitsha. All roads lead home, especially the one that I am on right now; from the dense clouds of exhaust fumes spewing from different vehicles to the rowdy like crowd walking to or from their different businesses,all made it feel like home. Onitsha is unique, I am unsure if the buildings in onitsha are close enough for neighbours to shake themselves from it, but, it is a place capable of bringing neighbours closer to each other. This holidays brought me closer to certain things as well, example: How daft my mentality is.             

           There are two places I dread going to, 1. Upper Iweka at night, 2. My past. But for the sake of this, I am willing to visit the later.  Awada, a heavenly paradise for hustlers. Growing up in an environment as rugged as Awada, you could easily see raw beauty in struggle. You could hardly see someone alive because most people there were merely surviving, and the beauty of it all was the fact that happiness was hardly lacking. People were mostly happy not because things were going fine for them but because they were not alone in the struggle for survival. And that made acceptance easy, it spurred authenticity among people, besides, who has the time to be fake when you're merely trying to survive?. But, you know beauty is not entirely complete till you see it's ugliness as well. Awada is not entirely pleasant, it has it's flaws. I remember the first violent scene I saw on the street, a security man was running from a group of boys, as he was running he suddenly halted, turned around and swung his matchet at one of the boys, the boy's ear(or at least part of it) fell off; I could finish this story but I was not allowed to see the end, I guess I was too tender to experience that. Growing up I saw so much more events like this, that it seemed our community was exempted from the law. Without the law coming to our immediate rescue, we only had our conscience to guide us on what was right or wrong. As juveniles, our parents try their best to bring up  human beings of conscience but the streets still decided  whether or not you'd make use of it(your conscience). There was so much influence for the youth on the streets, from rampant sell of hard drugs to constant bullying of young boys (this bullying was code named "driving", it often happened on the streets, whether or not people were around at the time). This bullying often times led young boys to the dreadful allure of gang involvement.  I never took driving lessons, so I was bullied a couple of times, it was after a while that I learnt how to ignore the constant "bia way" I heard before I got bullied. I also started maintaining a tough demeanor(most times were bluff) each time I stepped into the street. Apart from this lesson, I picked up a lot from the trauma that comes from growing up in a place as blessed as Awada.

                We never truly understand where we are coming from until we leave, I never understood the value of the experiences I encountered in Awada till  I left home for school. The caution I picked up from the streets guided me through activities in school, I saw people make mistakes that I wouldn't dear to make, not because I was a better person but because the trauma from  past experiences,  would not allow me try that. It made me feel almost more oriented than others. So, coming home for holidays and seeing things change was discomforting to me. Kids could now press their phones willy nilly on the streets, nights were no longer as scary as it used to be. Coming home I felt no form of nostalgia at all, because this novel leniency on the streets has robbed it of it's glory and has replaced it with this false sense of security. How would this kids learn?, would they ever realize how cold outside really is?. Questions like this kept bugging me, till I asked myself, "is the way I learnt about life, really the best and only way for everyone else to?". It was then that it dawned on me that I wanted everyone to go through what I went through, I didn't just want them to learn, I wanted to see this kids go through trauma just because I wanted them to learn the same way I did. My traumatic insecurities has unconsciously birthed a stereotypic mentality in me. This mentality made me believe ,that the way I went through, is the only way there is. Damn, With this mentality, as a police man, would I not arrest a boy driving a car just because it is not normal at his age?, or as a father, would I not abhor my son's success just because I  think it is not stressfull enough like mine, to be called success?. With this mentality, as a citizen, would I not be  skeptic about choosing a better leader, just because history has always permitted older men to rule?. I and anyone like myself would be daft to think this way. Believe it or not, as time goes by, the evolution of humanity gives us means to reshuffle priorities. So, I and others that are not comfortable with this constant shift in reality, can continue living in the past, or accept that our views are only creating stereotypes. This acceptance might allow us see how beautiful life actually is.

            I never understood how skeptic my mentality was, until I left it behind. But that's the problem with stereotypes, it harms  people making use of it, the more. You could imagine trying to convince the skeptic me, that a young boy from the streets of ojuelegba would win a Grammy or make afrobeats globally recognized, I wouldn't hear you out, because places like that can't produce things like that.....  Whether it's the streets of Awada or the streets of ojuelegba or any circumstance which seems crippling to you, just don't allow people who are unsure of what is possible tell you what is possible, ignore stereotypes.Then, for the rest of us who are so much in love with our own history and because of that won't allow others create theirs, I just hope we grow up one day and accept that we should not limit other people to our own learning and understanding, for they might be in a different time. The beauty of Awada or anywhere we come from is not the environment or the circumstances we meet there, the beauty is not even entirely about the lessons we picked up there. It is beautiful because the time we spent/d there was/is ours, it is where we come from, it is part of us. And the best way to appreciate this beauty, is by allowing others encounter theirs, be it different or the same.

Cyto

(Stanley is an imaginary friend, from the most beautiful place on earth, Awada).