On......the winner of next year's Booker

Yes it is a shameless plug and yes I ought to have drafted a more appropiate post to explain my absence but I really had to shout about this particular book.

I do not come to you by chance is about to take the literary world by storm. The author, our very own Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani, also happens to be a hottie apart from being a gifted writer. Grab a copy immediately.

You can buy it here:

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Read a bit about Ada here

On......death and the Nigerian policeman

The average Nigerian is terrified of death. Well, who isn’t right? But Nigerians are especially scared about the prospect of packing their bags and jetting off to the land of their demise. Take the police for example.

I was covering a bank robbery in Lekki a few days ago and the Mobile police force atypically made it to the crime scene before the robbers had completely scarpered with the loot. However, when they did arrive, they were so reticent in exchanging gunfire that all but one of them took cover in a nearby uncompleted building. Only one aged, dedicated cop had the balls to engage in a shootout with three of the armed robbers. His pleas to his cowardly colleagues, audible in spite of the staccato pummelling of the gunshots, were the saddest footnote in on overall distasteful affair. “Assist me,” he cried. “We fit take them, we plenty pass them”. The valiant enforcers of the law, protectors of the civil populace, cowered in their hiding place until the gunshots had died down and the armed gang had comfortably escaped.

I waited and waited but no ambulance came to treat the injured and pronounce the dead dead. The latter was obvious enough though; the lack of movement in a lifeless body, horrible in its stillness, is a dead giveaway. I saw no ballistics experts recovering bullets that had embedded themselves in the road, the cars and the perimeter fence that had surrounded the gunfight. There were no CCTV cameras to capture the faces of the brazen crooks who thought it impractical to bother wearing any sort of mask. The police interviewed no witnesses and dusted for no fingerprints. Blood was allowed to congeal and no samples were rushed to a forensics lab. There were no helicopters combing the area. I saw a few guys trying hard to look inquisitive and serious. They were either detectives or constipation sufferers. The only thing the police did of any note was to look exceptionally befuddled by the whole thing.

You should see the vigour with which our policemen hound commercial vehicles. If one tenth of that enthusiasm was reserved for confronting criminals then our society would be virtually crime free. Instead of nurturing their talents, they nurture their potbellies. They fear death like zombies fear life. Look to the west and think of the countless law enforcers that sacrifice their lives each day in the name of the fundamental ethos of their profession: to protect and to serve. In Nigeria, they have an ethos too - to pickpocket and to steal. A motto which they are quite prepared to die for.

On...... Lagosisms, LASTMA and laid back sloths

Life is nature’s hangover; the splitting headache that it can never quite shake off after a drunken binge. Life is a long hiccup; one that I do not particularly want to cure because death awaits at its end. Lagos life is inconveniently simple and orderly. You kinda know where you stand.

You know that people will not wait for you. You know that they will attempt to fleece you at every turn. You know that bus drivers are worshippers of Beelzebub and are in a hurry to donate their souls to him. You know that the rains will bring with them chaos and excess flooding. You know that you will find excruciating hardships and acute comfort, quite often as intimate strangers. On any given day, there will be at least one unloved, unclaimed and very dead body on the Apapa-Oshodi expressway. Bomb craters will occasionally masquerade themselves as state roads. The unending thrust and momentum of Okada drivers will make the Energiser bunny look like a cannabis smoking sloth. The water hyacinth will be a perennial eyesore and you will wonder where it all comes from and where it all goes. LASTMA will harass the law abiding drivers and turn a blind eye to the reckless ones. You will be the daily recipient of verbal and possibly even physical abuse. Ten minute journeys become one hour excursions. You will begin to suffer from dirt blindness: an affliction that prevents the sufferer from seeing trash and garbage, no matter how vast the quantity. You will hear the words Balende, CMS and Anthony at least fifty times a day.

There is a certain inconvenient order and simplicity to all of that. And I kinda like that.

On......a light hearted matter

There is never light. The ribcage of my laptop is now visible. The poor thing has been starved of electrical current for so long. My shaver has such little strength that it can barely walk (abi na work?). The small generator at the back mocks them with a horrible vibrating laugh. It has become stocky and robust through overuse and cruelly sneers at the skeletal frames of the other domestic appliances.

Electricity in Nigeria comes in splutters like the dying gasps of a cancerous old man. You begin to grow suspicious on the few occasions that NEPA actually do their jobs and provide sustainable electricity. The other week, we had an almost uninterrupted power supply for 48 hours. I felt a bit like a call girl who had been given one million naira by a punter. On the surface you are happy, but deep down you are deeply mistrustful of what you will have to do for this ostentatious good fortune. Following the recent awoof of light, I am beginning to fear that they are planning a three month power blackout. Nationwide. This is how wary they have made me.

I was trying to open a bank account the other day and the customer service assistant asked me for a NEPA bill as proof of my address. I was immediately gripped by overwhelming hysteria and had to be escorted out of the bank premises before I managed to stop laughing. NEPA bill ke? Do these things actually exist? What exactly is one billed for? I investigated further and I actually came across one of these so called NEPA bills. They even measure electricity in real units of measure; kilowatts. I suggest that they start billing people in kilonoughts of nonentricity used. It would save them a lot of paper work if nothing else.

Dear Mr Adekunle,
You have consumed 1 million kilonoughts of nonentricity this month. Please pay your balance of zilch before 9/9/9999 and you will be assured of continued lack of electricity.
Regards
Mr Pana-Pana
Management

Nobody seems sure of when this sustainable power supply is to be achieved. Is it 2011or is it 2020? What are people’s thoughts? Can we really have sustainable power in this country? I fear that there are too many personal agendas for this to be a foreseeable reality. What happens to the generator sellers and distributors if there is regular electricity? What happens to the diesel sellers? What happens to big oil? What happens to Femi Otedola and co? Are we to reasonably expect all these people to quietly sail off into the night and never be heard of again? The fact is that it is still in the interest of far too many people – powerful people at that – for there to be an irregular and unreliable power supply. These people are so powerful that they helped your local government chairman win his election. And your Senator. And your Governor. And yes, even your President.

I cannot imagine that there are many more countries in the world that consume more diesel per year than we do in Nigeria. In most other countries, diesel pumps have become desolate figures on the forecourts of filling stations. In Nigeria, the stuff is at such a premium that it costs us twice the price of unleaded petrol. This diesel lust is fed by the need to power our generators because NEPA (now rejigged to PHCN) apparently generates less than 3000MW of electricity a day. The goal of the present government is to quintiple this meagre total by 2010. In the increasingly unlikely event that this is achieved, it would still not be in line with most other developing nations.

Darkness has enveloped our land at night and also the thinking and ambitions of those that rule our country. Provision of sustainable electricity should be the most pressing issue on the agenda of all our rulers. It appears that it is not. NEPA, and all its incarnations, has become a byword for ineptitude and poor performance. It is a national joke. It is hard to accept the current standards when indigenes of smaller, weaker economies are basking in the dull glow of their evening light bulbs whilst millions of Nigerians continue to eat enforced candle-lit dinners. It is a sham and I can confidently proclaim that steady electrical supply would eradicate one third of Nigeria’s problems today (a half decent road network would solve another third). Let us bring sustainable electrical power back to the forefront of the national consciousness. It is no longer enough to merely fold our arms when they deprive us of electricity only to yell “UP NEPA” when it is returned to us.

On a slightly different note, we had any number of witty acronyms for NEPA - my favourite being Never Expect Power Always. Can anyone suggest an equally apt one for PHCN?

On......a return to the organized bedlam of Lagos

The first thing is always the humidity. Dense and sultry. Lagos-by-the-sea. Where no breeze dare ride freely for fear of being hit by an okada driver. Baggage collection is much improved with two separate halls divided by a Pyrex screen. Another flight has just landed but at no point do we have to go and check the conveyor belt in the other hall for misplaced baggage.

The long journey home. I am bracing myself to confront the traffic. The smallest things provide the greatest details. There is a small goat tottering across the motorway that leads from the airport. I wonder what it aims to do when it reaches the other side. If its entrails have not mingled with the motorway by then. The biggest road problem remains the bikers and okadas. Mechanical bees. They swarm around your car, coming from all directions, threatening to sting at the slightest provocation. There appears to be no law about what an okada can and cannot carry. I intend to set up a photo log displaying the varied passengers I have seen on the back of an okada. Today there is one carrying two passengers. Hardly noteworthy, aside from the fact that the second passenger is one half of a dead cow.

Businesses continue to thrive. Everywhere one looks there is the ubiquitous florescent green banner that proudly advertises some business or the other. Whoever creates those banners must be making a killing. One such sign for a charity bemuses me. Motherless babies. I wonder if there isn’t a good chance that the babies are not also fatherless babies. And if not why don’t they just call the thing an orphanage. It is only a euphemism of course but motherless babies always sounded a bit too cruel somehow. A bit too Dickensian.

Governor Fashola is doing a good job. Ask any one on the street and he will tell you. For the first time as far as I can remember, there are discernible changes in the way Lagosians are living. Actually, strike that. For the first time, there is a discernible positive change in the way Lagosians are living. The Molues are gone. There are proper bus stops. People are queuing. I am amazed. Many overhead bridges and walkways are now protected against the elements. I hope this will mean fewer deaths from breakneck pedestrians trying to cross a motorway when an overhead bridge is one foot away.

The mechanised tentacles of construction and redevelopment are spread right across the city but still too concentrated on Lagos Island. The mainland is still far and away it’s poorer cousin. Urban improvement is less visible in Yaba and Surulere than it is in Victoria Island and Ikoyi. It is still a tale of two cities. I know Islanders who do not venture into the Mainland unless they are going into the airport. If one thinks this is a class thing then consider that there are just as many Mainlanders who would rather prostrate naked on a bed of scorpions than live on the Island.

As we enter the island I notice the traffic in the other lane. It is the same traffic that I have been noticing since the Third Mainland Bridge. I wonder what time those at the tail end of the traffic will reach their loved ones. And what time they will need to set off again in the morning. I fear the effects of the partial closure of the Third Mainland Bridge. It will be two months of great difficulty.

Asda and Walmart killed the trader. We stop at the Palms and Shoprite is fantastic. You can find anything and everything at reasonable prices. There is a suya man there buying huge quantities of meat. I ask him in Hausa why he does not buy his meat in the market. He says that whilst the meat is still slightly cheaper in market, the cost of transportation there and back removes any actual savings. How long before there is a Shoprite in every corner of town? How long before they start squeezing prices and forcing small traders and middle men out of the equation? The cost of a carton of juice is twenty naira cheaper in the market than in Shoprite.

I am so happy to be back. It has been fourteen years now since I have lived here, disregarding holidays in between. Fourteen years. More than enough time to spend in any one place I reckon. These days you get less than that for murder. I will give myself ten years here then let us see what happens. America perhaps would be the next great adventure. Gosh, I will be 40 then. Where does the time go? I aim to have fun. I left Jand because I stopped having fun. There will be disappointments strewn across the road in front of me. Tragedy even. But I will hurdle each one and continue running. Let us meet at the end.

On......the story of Ashewos Anonymous

With varying degrees of disharmony, the six women sat down in a semi-circle in a small conference room at the Eko Le Meridien Hotel. They were assembled for the fourth meeting of Ashewos Anonymous, a support group designed to ‘cure’ nymphomaniacs and other women who were addicted to sex. Since its inaugural meeting, numbers had dropped significantly, with the deserters finding the AA’s twelve step program either too demanding or not demanding enough. For their needs.

Alhaja Silikat, for example, had to stop coming after her husband and erstwhile pimp, Alhaji Mushin, had discovered the existence of these meetings. Alhaji had gone into semi retirement many years ago after becoming partially deaf. He still sold gas cylinders for a living but this was not enough to support a growing family of seven children. It was unfortunate also that his wife’s full time job of selling boli contributed very little to the overall family income. He decided one day that it would be more beneficial for him to become his wife’s agent and began to advertise her sexual services. He charged roughly about 2000 Naira per hour per person. In a good week, Alhaja’s big yansh would bring in about 60000 Naira for the family. It was hardly the kind of income that Alhaji was going to jeopardise and he was livid on hearing of her visits to Ashewos Anonymous. He warned her that she was never to socialise with those harlots, those midnight walkers, those damsels of the night. Alhaja, meek and always subservient, had listened to her husband and put a halt to her AA meetings.

Of the six women that remained, each had a different motive for their continued attendance:

Hepritta Okolie, was the worst kind of ashewo, the unrepentant kind. In truth she only attended these meetings because of the free poff poff and minerals. If there was anything that Hepritta liked more than a big strong John Thomas, it was poff poff. She had recently secured a very lucrative patch on Sanusi Fafunwa and clients were steady. However, even after taking care of rent and tuition fees, buying food was a problem. Yes, she thought, when all these stupid ashewos finished talking opata she was just going to stuff as many poff poffs as she could into her bag before hitting the street. Tchhhhhw. Idiots.

Godwina Iriambong was not really an ashewo at all. She only came for these meetings in a secret bid to learn more about the art of being a successful ashewo in the hope that she too could improve her sex appeal. Sadly for Godwina, God was not in a winning mood on the day that he moulded her. Her teeth were small and sharp like that of a grasscutter and to compound matters she suffered from an inability to close her mouth for longer than one second which meant that her gnashers were always in full view. Her weight had always been a source of great distress. She had recently tried the award winning Akin’s diet which prescribed eating nothing but Banga soup day and night. Poor Godwina was usually so ravenous at night that she had once devoured about 3 kilos of Banga in one sitting. This was not quite what Dr. Akin had in mind. Her facial features may have been acceptable if she had a basic understanding of make-up arrangement. As it was, she had skin the colour of night yet insisted on a lipstick shade that was as red as uncontaminated blood. In addition to her unnecessary rouge and purple eye shadow, this gave her a rather freakish look which was responsible for at least two accidents and one small riot on the Lagos-Ikorodu expressway. Godwina would sit at the meeting nodding furiously at all that was being said, making copious notes along the way. For Godwina, therefore, ashewoism was not a malaise but an aspiration.

Funke Okunrinoletemilorun, founder of this society, was a young lady with genuine sexual neuroses. At the last count she had slept with no less than 127 men, not including the okada driver that would drop her later that evening. She came from a solid background and her parents were of considerable reputation. By the time she was 18 she had slept with all the male members of her household including the washaman that came once a week. At 21 she no longer felt any sensation during sex yet felt the compulsion to continuously seek new partners. At 25, she acknowledged that she had a problem and needed to proactively deal with it. She formed this organisation with the belief that there were other women who shared her predicament and that together they could help each other.

The fourth lady needed little introduction. I am referring of course to Chief (Mrs) Oladunjoye Akinpelu nee Harrison-Thomas, the socialite, the bon vivant, the collector of men, the lover of all things fiscal, and without much doubt the greatest fornicator of all time. She was now on her sixth husband and had amassed a personal wealth of some 1.2 billion Naira through various enterprises and divorce settlements. Her primary source of income remained her very successful brothel franchise which had started out as a modest concern in her boys-quarters in Ilupeju. Over the years it had grown into a national franchise and now boasted no less than 49 depots across the country. There were only four states in Nigeria that she did not have at least one brothel and development plans were already at an advanced stage. She had once bragged that if Mr.Biggs was the biggest franchise in Nigeria, then her brothels were a close second. Chief (Mrs) Akinpelu nee Harrison-Thomas was attending the meeting to make sure that none of her girls were attending. She had personally interviewed each of the 448 ashewos that were under her direct employ and she ran a tight ship. She was nothing if not thorough and did not want any of them to start getting ideas above their station by attending new fangled concepts like Ashewos Anonymous.

Mama Ikpamosa, septuagenarian, wrinkled, toothless and recently widowed was a peculiar attendee. Since Papa Ikpamosa’s death her life was of very little meaning and she had attempted suicide several times. At the fifth attempt she had doused herself in diesel but forgot that she had bought no matches that week and therefore had to curtail that particular effort. As she slept that night, smelling like a Mobil filling station, she had something of an epiphany in which some celestial voice advised her to seek comfort in the company of other women. She decided the next day that she would stop trying to kill herself and try and make some friends instead. Ashewos Anonymous was one of ten groups that encouraged female solidarity in which Mama Ikpamosa had become a card carrying member. Her darling husband, in his infinite wisdom, had always discouraged her from keeping female company, believing women to be the product of Satan and only good for their superior culinary ability and reproductive organs. For the first time in her life she was interacting regularly with other women and loving every second.

The last woman in this motley crew was Doorshima Mbanengen, the poor unfortunate who was the victim of a generational curse that compelled her to have sex with any man who asked her. Her grandmother had once angered the Mammy water by boasting that she was of the very strong conviction that she was the most beautiful woman in all of Tiv land. The Mammy water had overheard her and placed a curse on Doorshima’s grandmother and all her future offspring. The curse was, for a woman, the worst of all curses - constant consent. She and her future generation were unable to say no to any advances made by a male. Doorshima’s own mother had died in childbirth and was not able to advise her daughter of the terrible hex that was to walk with her for all her living days. Doorshima had grown up unaware of this curse until she began secondary school and word got around that she was a “girl of loose morals and even looser pant”. Her compulsion disgusted her and she tried everything to rid herself of it, including joining The Sacred Church of Indigo and Lavender in the belief that hers was a spiritual problem. She left the church after the priest discovered her little problem and used it to his advantage, repeatedly. She sought out this group as a means to purge herself and try and understand more about her inabilities to turn men down.

The six women would talk of their exploits, real and imagined, with a candour and openness that would embarrass a market woman. Over time, they all started to look forward to these meetings and although numbers fluctuated, the six remained constant attendees. They did not really socialise outside of the sessions but a great affinity developed between the six of them, and it was truly remarkable to see them helping and encouraging one another, reclaiming the word ashewo in the process to become a term of endearment.

In a country where instances of female solidarity are as rare as blue gold, it was Ashewos Anonymous that brought these women together with a (dis)united purpose. It makes it incredibly sad that Funke, the founder and chairwoman, died less than a year after the inaugural meeting from an AIDS related illness. The women still met once a year in her honour and today, in Onikan, there is even a small memorial stone with the inscription – Remembering Funke, the greatest ashewo that ever lived.

On......the fable of the gap-toothed snake, the benevolent boar and the troglodyte

There is a popular misconception, one that seems to have been universally upheld, that the Lion is the King of the Jungle. This view is, in fact, inaccurate. Whilst it is true that across the various animal kingdoms, lions form a majority of the ruling class, there are small pockets of sovereignties, scattered here and there, in which other animals enjoy governance.

Take the Jungle Republic of Lacunia, for example, where Gadon Machiji, a gap-toothed snake, once ruled for some 8 years. The fact that a snake ruled was not in itself the surprising thing -other snakes had been in the hot seat before- it was that ruling alongside this sect of serpents there sat a reptilian-like, cave dwelling creature known as a troglodyte. Now, no one liked or trusted these troglodytes with their humanoid shapes and long serpentine tails. They rarely came out during the day and even when they did, they would wear dark protective eyewear so that one never saw their eyes. They were highly disruptive creatures and the only attribute they possessed in great abundance was evil. Even more surprising was the gap-toothed snake’s very public friendship with a benevolent boar called Waitandsee. Some animals even believe, to this day, that it was the resources of the very wealthy Waitandsee that sponsored the coup that allowed Machiji to seize power from his draconian but dithering predecessor.

After Machiji took power, things started to go wrong almost immediately. Firstly, decrees 23 and 42 were scrapped. These decrees had been introduced by the outgoing regime and had forbidden all animals from defecating or urinating in places that were not clearly designated shitholes.

Further, there had been murmurings amongst the animals that Machiji was the secret head of a cabal that imported the coca plant from his cousins in the Amazon rainforest. Everyone knows of the euphoric but dilapidating effect of the coca plant on animals. Under the old regime all convicted coca smugglers were brutally murdered as punishment. None of the animals dared accuse Machiji of being a smuggler for fear of the repercussions. A highly respected goat, and head of the Jungle Journal, had been bold enough to compile a series of missives suggesting that the gap-toothed snake was behind much of the coca influx. One day the goat received a package containing compressed porcupine quills which exploded when opened, killing the goat instantly. The murder remains unsolved but whispers permeated through the Republic that it was Machiji’s handiwork.

Economic policy also suffered greatly under Machiji particularly with the introduction of the Seasonal Appropriation Program. The program made little sense to anyone other than the Republic’s creditors and whilst foreign investment increased, there followed a period of great famine and austerity. During this period Machiji and his cohorts got fatter whilst the good citizens of the Jungle Republic, from the marauding elephant to the industrious soldier ant, got leaner and leaner. Machiji’s government implemented a myriad of other failed programs, which only helped to divert attention and fritter scarce national resources. Some of the programs include the Animal’sBank, Directorate of Food, Streams and Jungle Infrastructure (DFSJI) and Better Life for Reptilian Women. All these programs are dead today.

The Republic was very good at producing palm oil but unfortunately did not really know what to do with it. You see, palm oil on its own is pretty worthless and has to be refined in order to be of any benefit. So whilst the good citizens were slavishly producing record amounts of palm oil, they had to export it and buy it back at extortionate rates. Also the Lacunian animals were not very good at hunting for themselves. Almost everything they ate they had to import from other lands. This was not helped by Machiji’s failure to provide them with the tools needed to sharpen their claws, grind their teeth and improve their ability to hunt.

It was not long, therefore, that the animals began to grow restless and started to rebel against Machiji’s poor leadership. Machiji responded with force and hundreds of animals lost their lives as they protested about the poor conditions. Even some of Machiji’s brothers in green were unhappy and staged yet another coup to dethrone the increasingly unpopular king. Unfortunately, over the years, Machiji had become extremely deft at the skills of evasion and managed to escape to a place called Gongo Rock which he christened as the new seat of power. All 27 of his brothers in green were caught and assassinated after a trial in a kangaroo court. Nobody was quite sure where the kangaroos had come from.

All the while, Waitandsee, the benevolent boar, was secretly harbouring fantasies of succeeding Machiji. After all, had Machiji not promised to relinquish power to the other animals after five years of rule? And who better to pick up the baton than his dear friend, Waitandsee, who had assisted in putting him into power in the first place? So the stage was set for an election. Unease had been growing and this would surely keep the animals happy. The election itself was a success but what happened subsequently was a disgrace. All the animals, including Waitandsee himself, had underestimated Machiji’s lust for power and desire to prolong his own rule.

He set up an ‘interim’ committee of his own choosing to replace him which consisted of various ostriches, giraffes and other animals of no consequence. This set the scene perfectly for yet another takeover, this time by the troglodyte which was to have very dire consequences on the whole Jungle Republic of Lacunia. One of the troglodyte’s first acts was to imprison Waitandsee and thereafter followed a series of animal rights catastrophes which are too terrifying to mention in great detail. Suffice to say that those were very dark days for the Republic with assassinations and kidnappings the order of the day. Hyenas and jackals moved freely among the animal populace under the veil of fear and intimidation. Under his rule, the molluscs with the hard shells pillaged the land for more and more palm oil. When a bold and fearless lion rose proudly and roared in disapproval, the troglodyte sent his hyenas to hang him.

His reign, fortunately, was not to last for much longer. The rest of the animal world took notice and whether by accident or whether by design, the troglodyte met his end mid-coitus, in the company of two specially imported Indian pythons. Coincidentally, exactly a month later, Waitandsee also met his fate in equally suspicious circumstances. It was the very day that he was set to be released from incarceration. Some say that the American bald headed eagle -self proclaimed guardian of the animal kingdom- was behind their deaths but there is nothing really to substantiate this claim. The Indian pythons were never seen or heard of again.

What of Machiji? Did he live happily ever after? I wish I could tell you that he did not and that a hunter caught him one day and cut off his head. I wish I could tell you that but I would be lying. Machiji is still alive today and still slithers in the same venomous, reptilian company that he always kept. Would you believe that he recently even tried to be King of Lacunia again? A snake sheds its skin every year but even the Lacunians recognised that underneath this new skin was still the very same gap-toothed snake that had plunged the Republic into chaos so many years ago. He still talks out of both sides of his mouth. Recently, he crawled out of his lopgpile house and attended the ten year memorial of his dear friend, the troglodyte. He tried to tell us that the troglodyte was not really a troglodyte at all. He said that the troglodyte did not stash those cowries in Gongo rock all those years ago. He assured us that the billions of cowries that were sent to Helvetia, and have since been repatriated, had nothing at all to do with his dear friend and was some kind of administrative error. Snakes do not blink so he said all this with an entirely straight face and without a sense of irony. It is only after all these years that it has become very clear. Machiji, for once, was telling the truth. The troglodyte had not really been a troglodyte at all. He had merely been a serpent in human skin. The grimace and the dark eyewear had fooled all the animals into thinking they were different creatures when, in fact, they were one and the same.

On.....the corner of 14th street and Serenity

Starting Monday 26th May. See here for more information.

On......the price of fear

I wasn’t quite sure how to approach her as she stood there in her red dress. I am rarely prone to overwhelming lust but at that minute I wished to tear her clothes off and fuck her. Repeatedly. However my nerve failed me as it often does in these situations. You see I do not know how to approach women, never have done. All my female associations have been purely through mutual introductions or in ‘safe’ settings like educational establishments, workplaces, etc. The fear of rejection always weighed heavier than the potential euphoria of a girl's promise. Thus, I have never chatted up a woman. Sure the signs are usually obvious enough. A woman will do any one of a half dozen things to indicate that she has earmarked you as a potential suitor. She will give you a further half dozen signs to suggest that she wants you to come over. I can read all the signs but like an illiterate I fail to comprehend a single one of them. Actually I do comprehend but then in the process of the brain registering signal and transmitting instructions to my feet to start the walk, something breaks down. I freeze.

So once again I stood, or rather leaned, in that familiar position by the bar, eyeing a girl I liked yet powerless to do a damn thing to build up the courage to just go and talk to her. I wanted to know so much about her and it hurt me that I lacked the guts to just get her name.

How was I ever to discover that her name was Mandy for example? Or that she liked Art and was currently working in a dead-end job but was hoping to open up a gallery someday? How could I possibly know that after our second date she would invite me up for coffee and that we would kiss the night away never once wishing to spoil our innocent caress with anticlimactic sex? I would be forever ignorant that when we did eventually have sex, I would dream of the tightness and moisture of her pussy all day long. How was I to ever know that one evening, after eight months of indecision, I would propose in Venice where we are attending the film festival? Would I ever be able to reciprocate the joy and pride I felt after her immediate acceptance? Or the jubilation that followed when she ultimately introduced three beautiful baby girls into our lives? Or the fact that for every setback I faced in my early career it was her that cajoled, supported and encouraged me to keep persevering? Would I ever reach the heights that her mere presence propelled me to? Would she ever have quit that dead-end job and pursued her dreams?

I guess not. For here we were at 2.53, with the club closing at 3, remaining at the same level of acquaintance that we were an hour ago and damned to remain at for eternity. We will remain two soul mates drifting apart into oblivious anonymity without the even the grace of knowing what we never knew. For want of some courage a lifetime was lost.

On......the bizarre incarceration of Ra'id Tajudeen Hussain

I awoke blind to the stench of urine and sweat, not knowing where I was or how I came to arrive there. I tried to move but my enclosure was miniscule and my legs, cramped as they were, bounced off the walls of my cell.


I was in a crouching position and movement of any kind was a remarkable effort.


I called out but no sound was distinguishable to my ears. I was either deaf or mute. Or both. I knew then that I was under incarceration and this small, dark, humid place was to be my cell. I had been deprived of all my senses. But wait.....no.......I had my hearing still. I could just about make out, from some great distance, a ticking sound, thumping, rhythmic. Like a bomb. The ticking was at times loud, more urgent, closer, imminent. At others it was faint, steady, distant, but ever present.


I feared for my safety, for my survival, my base instincts wishing to thrive and continue existence despite my desolate environs. I could do nothing for now but sleep.........


I awoke to loud noises from outside the cell. Again I cried out but again my voice died on utterance. I tried to discern the noises, to give them meaning, to understand who my captors were and what they wanted with me. All attempts to understand were futile. The language they spoke was foreign to me. Again tiredness overwhelmed and sweet sleep embraced me.


As I grew stronger I began to grow more aware of my surroundings. The cell was largely dark and devoid of any discernible doors or windows. On occasion, the cell would be partly illuminated with a faint, dull glow, like a great light from beyond was trying desperately to force its way in. The walls seemed soft, padded and worryingly seemed to move occasionally in constrictions, as they had a life of their own.


I was kept alive intravenously. A long tube was attached to me and the other end extended somewhere beyond the walls of my confines. Many times I would lie awake to try and hear a sound to see how this tube was replenished with food and nutrients. Each time I would sleep and fail in any attempt to make contact with my captors. Perhaps the nutrients that came through the tube also contained overpowering sedatives. In any case the tube was my only means of sustenance and I was reluctant to tamper with it.


I was left largely in silence and for many months the only consultation I had was with my own thoughts and memories. I had somehow grown accustomed to this place. I was getting stronger each day and I knew that I was being kept alive for a reason. The voices I heard outside the prison assured me that there was some sort of life out there in spite of my solitary confinement. Through my own imagination or perhaps even in reality, I felt that the voices would sometimes address me, speaking calmly, gently, and even lovingly. At other times the voices would be a series of loud yelps and exclamations. I felt that I had a friend on the other side, perhaps they were even fellow prisoners. There was one voice in particular which I began to find pleasurable. Despite the babble it would always be there. It was the voice of a female. There were times when I would go into great distress and kick and flail wildly in desperation and discomfort. Even at those times of anguish, I could hear the voice and it would return me to the placid, dormant state that had become a predominant sentiment in my institutionalised solace. So many times I wished I could regain my vocals and master her tongue so that we could communicate. I desperately wanted to meet this voice that had become a companion these past few months.

The cell reduced in size each day. Little daemons would come at night to silently remove small blocks that would constrict the space. I knew this for each time I slept I would feel movements within the cell and yet there were no physical presence when I awoke.

It is true that those in captivity will, over a period of time, begin to feel a certain attachment to the prison that holds them. After a while I thought less of my previous life, its incandescent lights and perpetual joys. The truth is I even forgot altogether what it felt like to be free. All I had now was darkness and voices and I had begun to cherish these two nebulous things. Even the movements and vibrations within my cell no longer frightened me. They were now a part of me. I felt safe and comfortable, no longer caring who my captors were

It is one of life’s injustices that at the apogee of comfort, there shortly arrives discomfort. The vibrations (were they earthquakes?) grew more uncomfortable and more periodic. Each time those lifelike walls would tighten and close and squeeze. I felt that I must surely be the subject of some cruel experiment but wait........there was a light in the distance. Not a faint hum of a thing but a distinct glimmer. There it was, it grew brighter and it drew me closer. Suddenly, and without warning, the light revealed a door. There had always been a door! But it had been sealed shut. It was now opening to whom? To what? A paralysing fear gripped me and I did not want to leave my cell but those vibrations were getting worse; they were expelling me from my dungeon and into the light. Gloved hands grabbed me around my head and pulled me roughly towards the great light. A great blade shimmered above my stomach and cut away at the intravenous tube that had been my saviour. I wished to return to my prison. This world was too cold, too exposed, too...........light.

I opened my lungs and I spoke for the first time in 9 months. I asked for food and for water. I complained about the cold. I begged for return to the darkness as the light hurt my eyes. My voice had returned and therefore I screamed and screamed. And then I was placed into a shawl and ignobly carried and placed into the arms of one of the captors. The captor spoke and it was her. The voice that soothes. My eyes still refused to focus properly in this new light but I could just about make out her figure and she was looking at me and smiling. I stopped my complaints and suddenly I felt very safe again. This was my mother, Halima Hussein, and she was to name me Ra’id Tajudeen.



The Bizarre Incarceration of Ra’id Tajudeen Hussein