…Life changes so fast sometimes with no prior notice and at times no permission as such.Today I look back and remember so much that had happened in my life, so much within such little time…            

I remember my primary school days at the university staff school where we wore ugly green and white checked uniform with brown shoes. Everyday started off with the mandatory morning assemblies held at the Adejoke Ijalaye Hall. Your arriving early to school was paramount and late comers were dealt with appropriately…assembly time constituted of a number of activities including the praise and worship session which was usually led by a teacher who dutifully chose two or three pupils to be the back ground dancers and that was what usually intrigued me – the dancing,it was hilarious…I would secretly pray in my mind that i shouldn’t be chosen and luckily, I never was, who would chose me anyway when all i did was stare and clap and never dance. Then there were also hymns to be sung, the hymn which was usually written on a cardboard and held in place with a stone was placed on a platform for all to see, it was led by either one of the two music teachers, and if they were not in a good mood, we would be asked to oooh and aaah it in addition to the normal one we sang, oooing and aaahing had something to do with us replacing every word with ooos and aaahs and that’s pretty much hard to explain.And the drums, always so skillfully played by the primary six boys, to the national and school anthem, which also must be sung well to avoid a repeat rendition.To cap up the ritual was Mrs. Onibere’s headmistress speech which was ever so informative. We were then led away to our classes after the benediction, in straight lines singing a marching song and I would never forget those songs, there was so many of them:

“we are marching marching marching,we are marching to our class, this way tra la la, that way tra la la, this way tra la la, off we go

“Eight o’clock is the time for school never late in the morning ( i always thought something awkwardly wrong with that line), eight o’clock for the boys and girls, come to school in the morning”

or maybe: “we shall make Nigeria great great great, we shall make Nigeria great great great, we shall make Nigeria great great great, right now and forever”

…and there was one we even had to jog to, that was always reputation destroying plus I couldn’t even figure the meaning of the song so ill rather not write it. And then if the teachers were keen on us that day, they would be looking out for the whiteness of our socks, our hairstyles, nails or the size of the square on the uniform, all as we marched past. And the successful majority marched past with glee…

Break time was not really my thing, after eating the nicely packaged rice and fish stew that mom made, I would sit and wait for the period to pass ( yes you can say I’ve been introverted all along), all girls played ten-ten, that game that i never really understood and so never played, at times, on good days I would go out to watch or have meaningless discussions about which teacher is a tree with friends. The bell ( a carefully built work of art) was primarily a metal hung on a stand which was usually hit with a stone to give the loudest noise that would reach even the kindergarten class. When it was time for it to be rung, you would see pupils gathered round it to take turns and I remember feeling so proud the day I got my chance. The ringing of the bell to signify the end of school brought the most melodic music to our ears, we literally ran out of class to catch up with the after-school fun…

…to be continued

image source – google  image II: Rikka”s Nigeria story: OAU staff school.