The Chronicles of Love BxB short stories Collection

On a condensing harmathan Sunday, as the sinking sun was conjuring the blue curtains of the sky to golden leaves in the Western hemisphere, Mr. Bungalow received an astonishing kiss from Suzzy.

“What about you? Do you prefer hanging your hat on a well educated fellow to marrying any money bag who is deficient in sound intellectual vibrations?" Ojo's father had asked Kemi.

Ojo had a great opportunity to go to school to any level, considering the good intension his father had to train him to the highest level of attainment· in academic field. His father is a rich cocoa farmer in Igede, in Ekiti State of Nigeria. Ojo's father is called Mr. Alakowe Ile-Iwe, because of his great interest in education and respect for those who are well read. He is among the first ten cocoa merchants in the village, who donated a large sum of money for the building of the village community primary school. The people of Ekiti are generally known for cherishing education so much that, if an individual is wealthy, but is not well educated, he is regarded as "a nobody." However, a highly educated person who has good command of both the written and spoken English Language is most times almost worshipped like a god in by the people. The people are happy when any person in the environment speaks high sounding grammar that has 'suffixes echoing 'sm, sm, sm' and earth quakingGbingbin­gbigisms.

After Ojo had completed his elementary school education at Igede Community Primary School, his father, Mr. Alakowe Ile-Iwe, decided to enroll his only child at Eko-Akete Comprehensive Grammar School, located in Ado-Ekiti, the capital City of Ekiti State. "Good schools are difficult to find these days. It is not all schools that can be regarded as schools. There are schools and there are schools," he told his wife, Mrs. Ile-Iwe, when she suggested that Ojo should not be sent to any school too distant away from home.

 She reasoned that Ojo has been a very good helping-hand in weeding the cocoa farms, which is the family's major source of earning a living. Many cocoa farmers have abandoned the business of cocoa farming to join the train of oil exploration in the volatile Niger Delta, but the Ile-Iwes' family still profit greatly from cocoa farming even though it has been relegated to the background though it was formerly a major foreign exchange earner to the nation. Mrs. Ile-Iwe said Ojo's services will be highly needed to monitor the activities of hired labourers during cocoa harvest times. Some hired harvesters employed by the Ile-Iwes family to quicken the plucking, breaking pods and drying of cocoa beans were found to be dishonest in the past.

Some harvesters were found to be lazy sometimes relax and stop working when the farm owners were not around to monitor them. Besides, some of them were in the habit of hiding cocoa fruits in large quantity for sale to make money for themselves at the expense of the farm owners. For this reason, it requires the assistance' of eagle-eyed children like Ojo to act as little detectives to and out any dishonest scheme by hired harvesters during harvest seasons.

“Have you forgotten what happened during the last harvest season?” Ojo’s mother asked her husband.      

“Many things happened. I cannot recall the particular issue you are referring to,” replied her husband, feigning he did not remember the unforgettable thievery discovered by Ojo during the last harvest season, which became a big news issue that spread round the whole cocoa farmers' families in Igede community. His wife was at this point trying to draw his attention to Ojo's detective exploit, when he discovered the theft of some cocoa fruits by some hired harvesters.

“Wonderful! So you have easily forgotten so soon how Ojo caught some harvesters who hid some cocoa fruits in the swampy part of our farm in order to sell them for their personal benefits,” she reminded her husband.

Some hired labourers had hidden some harvested cocoa' fruits under some cut down plantain leaves, while Ojo, whom they thought was asleep some metres away, peeped at them and later went to inform his parents about the labourer's dishonest acts.

“Woman, I knew it is that same old story you like reminding me about again and again, each time the issue of Ojo's enrolment to a better school far from home comes up. But that is not a good reason to deny him the opportunity to attend one of the best schools in the state,” he told his wife.

“Best school in the state, best school in the state you keep repeating. When our cocoa pods get stolen without Ojo standing by to watch the harvesters, and we lose money the next harvest season, then you will understand better what I am saying about the need to enroll him in any school close by,” she said.

“You suggested sometime ago that we should enroll him at Omo-Ile- lwe Community Commercial School at Iyin, our neighbouring village. But mind you, a commercial school is different from grammar school. I want my son to be able to speak heavy sm, sm, sm sounding English, and I am ready to spend my last kobo to make sure he gets the best educational training to the highest level money can afford,” he emphasized.

“School is school. At least, Mukaila who finished from Omo-Ile-Iwe Community Commercial School is a well known intelligent typist in this village. Mukaila speaks very good English too, according to those who witnessed his interaction with the children of Moses Ajobowian, who came from Lagos some weeks ago. Besides, money makes a man not grammar,” she retorted.

“Ha, ha, ha, O, ha, ha,” her husband laughed and said “It is not only Mukaila, it is Muka foam. Muka, Muka. Muka Commercial Englishtypemiology.  Commercial English is different from real grammar. If you don't know, better know now, woman. I will train my son to any educational level with my cocoa money, and that is nobody's business,” he said with a tone of pride, due to the fact that he is counted among the few educated men in Igede, because he belongs the old Standard Six Certificate level brigade, in the old and former Ondo State, which Ekiti State was later created from.

Ojo’s mother however, has no idea what a good education is all about. She thought that any school is as good as any school, in as much anyone who finished from a school can read, write and speak English. She is not educated because her parents had felt that educating a girl-child was a waste of precious money, as they thought that a girl-child will one day end up as a property in another man's house. This type of philosophy has been denying a lot of intelligent young ladies the opportunity of going to school. In recent times, it has however been discovered that most educated married ladies take good care of their parents even as they are in their husbands houses more than some married educated male offspring, who are usually pre-occupied with taking care of their wives and children, to the detriment of their own parents who had spent their life savings to train them educationally.

“You are free to say whatever you like because, your parents managed to send you to an olden days Akara-moin-moin school. After all, Mukaila's mother read up to standard three too, and she told me some time ago that people like you who attained standard six old school system are inferior to modem commercial school graduates like her son, Mukaila. Because I did not go to school, that is why you sometimes speak big, big English words I think cannot be found in the English Language people's culture. Very soon now, I know you will start speaking words that will make the roof of our house collapse,” she told him.

 “How dare Mukaila's mother claim that Commercial School graduates of these days are better than old Standard Six Certificate holders like me? I, who shook hands with Mungo Park when I showed him the way to discover the River Niger; I, who made the Landers Brothers to land safely in the Niger Delta; I, who single-handedly made Adolph Hitler to surrender to the Allied Forces during the Second World War; I, who communicated with Bartholomew Diaz to determine how he rounded the Cape of Good Hope; I, who showed Christopher Columbus the way to discover the continent of America and later guided him to West Indies; I, who sent Vasco da Gama a map that guided him through a sea route from Europe to India; I, who helped Ferdinard Magellan, who was later imitated by Francis Drake to complete the first circumnavigation of the world; I, who was the first person to critic Nicolaus Copernicus hypothesis titled ‘On the Revolution of the Spheres' which put the sun at the centre of the universe, and the earth as one of the many planets which revolves round it. .. ; I who ...  I who ... I who ... ," he went on claiming because he knew the names he was mentioning sounds like heavy, heavy grammar to his illiterate wife.

“Oh, I wish my parents had sent me to school,” she said bitterly as her husband went on mentioning some notable names in the history of exploration and wars in the world.

 “Ah, ah? Muka, better than me English-wise? Mukaila! Mukaila! Mukaila! Commercial! Commercial! Commercial! You have been saying repeatedly without allowing me hear any other word whenever Ojo's education issue is being discussed,” he retorted angrily.

“But he makes plenty money from his typing-work, and that is what matters in a man's life, coupled with his well-functioning walking-stick that can satisfy any lady,” she said.

 “Yes! Mukaila is very good at typing fast, and he has been making a lot of money daily. But he is still very deficient in understanding of English syntax,” he told her.

 “I thank God that you have just admitted that he makes plenty money through his typing, and he is very good at it courtesy of his commercial school education,” she replied.

 “He is just an ordinary typist making money from ignorant people. Sometimes when some people gave him letters to type, your Mukaila-ology did not even know how to correct some little spelling errors made by them. Apart from that, when there were also syntax errors in some of the sentences, he could not correct them. I was...the one who pointed out several syntax errors to him when Mr. Alafia gave him a letter to type two weeks ago,” he said.

“What does Mr. Alafia know himself? He is an illiterate like me too,” she replied.

“The letter was written by Mr. Alafia's primary six school son. ~en Muka was typing everything gbruru-gbrara (anyhow), with his 'I-go-die' Christopher Columbus's era typewriter, while I, was standing by his kiosk at the Cocoa warehouse, I pointed out all the mistakes in the letter to him, and he thanked me very well. And now you are here telling me his mother said this and that about his being better than me in 'English-shish ism.' What arrant rubbish!" he had boasted while coining his own word, because the people of Ekiti like any word that contains the sound of ‘ism, ism.’

 “Is that why you are condemning commercial school as substandard? At least nobody knows everything. Besides, anybody can make mistake no matter his or her age and level of education,” she reasoned.

“Oh, you are still having mouth to defend his intellectual inefficiency. You have not heard the full story yet. His letter typing error is just a tip of the iceberg of Mukaila's several blunders,” he said.

“What else do you have to say about him?” asked his wife.