Ogechi and I - Episode 4

 

After I had walked some distance away from the park, I
got hungry and stopped by a local restaurant to refresh
myself.
"Madam, wetin you get?"
"I get Egusi, I get Dror soup, Oha and Bitter Leaf. I also
get Stew-Rice, Ofe Akpu and Pepper Soup. Which one
should I brought for you?"
Nna see English...
"Give me Bitter Leaf."
"Garri or Akpu?"
"Akpu."
"Make I put how many meat?"
"A plate with one meat how much?"
"N400"
"Ha! Madam ee too cost oo."
"My son ee no cost oo. Ee go bellefull you well-well."
"The meat na today meat?"
"Na today meat nah . We no dey do carry over for here
oo."
"Okay oo, oya bring am nah."
"Okay my son."
"(Soliloquizing) Inside IMT campus, a plate of food was
N150 back in 2008. I don’t know if it has increased by
now oo. No matter the increment, if at all there is any,
it won’t be up to N400. For what? Is that how much
I’ll be spending on food? N800 for two meals a day?
From tomorrow, I’ll be eating inside campus. And I’ll
still patronize that my 2008 madam

All episodes of this story can be found here >> https://www.ebonystory.com/story/ogechi-and-i

. At least she knew
more than embarrassing me by asking how many meats
I wanted because she know say I no dey chop meat."
After eating, I stayed back to watch television until it
was closing time and I left. I joined a bus that was
going to New Heaven, with no exact destination in
mind. When the bus got to Otigba junction I told to
conductor to stop. I stopped because it is always very
lively there and remains so till the next morning. What
made that place lively were the hookers that normally
hang around there waiting to be picked up by
customers. I located a nearby bar and ordered for
bottle water, sat there sipping the water little by little
while feeding my eyes. That became a normal routine
for me. During the day I would go to a valley by Ebano
tunnel where water constantly flowed through an
opening on the surface of the rock to have my bath.
That place was more like a stream for the guys. Girls
were only permitted fetch water and leave, and that
only happened when no guy was bathing.

Read " Beautiful stranger " by the same author ( Oluwafemi Oreoluwa )

. If any guy
was bathing, a girl that wants to fetch water would
have to wait some distance away till the guy is through
before being allowed to step in and fetch. The
wonderful thing about that place was that there had
never been a rape case there, even though the
environment was conducive enough for that.
Sometimes, there could be up to 20 guys bathing and
just one girl waiting to fetch, yet, no guy would harass
her. Besides that, every other thing you could think of
happened there, from weed smoking to ritual sacrifice
all went on there.
Meanwhile, I had not forgotten the purpose for which I
embarked on a journey to Enugu in the first place, so I
was busy trying to find what to do before I ran out of
money since a place to freshen up and a place to spend
my nights had been settled. One day I stumbled into a
little café with some inexperienced workers. From the
look of things, the café was struggling to stand and
could not afford paying for the services of capable
hands. I took advantage of that and offered to render
professional service for whatever amount they could
pay. They doubted my capabilities at first and brought
out a typing project with they had at hand and told me
to type. They offered to pay me N50 for each page I
typed, and that motivated me a lot. Omor come see
typing! After my JSSCE exams, my mother had enrolled
me in computer institute, and out of all I learnt, typing
without looking at the keyboard was the lesson I was
most passionate about because I watched American
actors do so in the movies and I so loved it. So when I
had the opportunity to learn about computer, I took it
upon myself to study and master typing. I became a
very fast at typing, and as soon as I had learnt how to
type, I stopped going for the computer lessons.
Eventually, I worked with a computer firm where I
acquired the rest of the basic knowledge of computer.
So when I was given this very project to type, I shone