Nubian

I've loved this story for two years now (or even more). Sometimes, I forget that I can find it on Granta so I've decided to post it on my own blog so I'll never forget. Enjoy! 🤗  ******************************** If you go inside Nnam’s house right now the smell of paint will choke you but she enjoys it. She enjoys it the way her mother loved the smell of the outside toilet, a pit latrine, when she was pregnant. Her mother would sit a little distance away from the toilet doing her chores, or eating, and disgusting everyone until the baby was born. But Nnam is not pregnant. She enjoys the smell of paint because her husband Kayita died a year ago, but his scent lingered, his image stayed on objects and his voice was absorbed in the bedroom walls: every time Nnam lay down to sleep, the walls played back his voice like a record. This past week, the paint has drowned Kayita’s odour and the bedroom walls have been quiet. Today, Nnam plans to wipe his image off the ...

Some months back, Queenola and I made a pact to send each other prompts to help us with our writing. Of course, me being me, I developed cold feet and days turned into weeks then months. But Queenola is kind and she has agreed that we continue from where we stopped! 😊  The prompt from this story is that it starts with the sentence: THERE WAS NO SALT IN THE HOUSE. I hope you love what I did with it. Enjoy! And don't forget to share and post your comments. 🤗 ******************************* There was no salt in the house and Amanda was in a state of panic. "Why didn't I come with my own salt?" she asked herself. "Infact, why didn't I come with all the ingredients I needed to make the love potion as Baba directed?". Amanda was in such panic that she was on the verge of tears. She loved Jude, she really did, but Jude didn't love her back with the kind of intensity she wanted. And, to make matters worse, there was no salt or olive oil o...

Let me first state here that I am not a lazy (or unserious) blogger. Neither do I hate writing. Let me also emphasize that this is the third blog post since I decide to resume blogging. You see, I wrote an interesting piece about a wonderful young lady and I even published it too. But, something bad happened. (Yes, I'll say it is bad because, at the moment it happened, I felt like my world was crashing down and I almost slipped into depression). You may not understand what happened or the reaction that followed but I trust writers and bloggers will. The person I wrote about made a few corrections regarding the published post and, when I logged into my blogger account to effect the corrections, my hard thought out brain work and typed post was all gone. Search as I did for solutions/ways to retrieve my post, I found none and depressed, I went to bed. ***************************************** Sitting on a bench in a primary health centre, I gazed over the village looking at t...

Two years ago, I decided to start a blog. I loved the idea back then and I really felt that blogging will be an avenue for me to share my life and thoughts with the world. I, first, got a WordPress account (which I couldn't get the hang of) then I switched to this platform: Blogger. Blogged suited me perfectly as it was easy to navigate and very cost effective. I wrote a few articles....and then I stopped. My reasons ranged from my inability to blog with my phone to my laziness as regards writing and many more reasons which my head can't wrap itself around now. I just stopped. Though, once in a while, I did remember I had a blog, this blog was all but forgotten. In a few months time, I'll be graduating from the University and I have decided to be more deliberate with my life and the things I venture into. My next post will be my goals for the next 1 year....especially post graduation and how I intend to achieve them. Reigniting my love for writing is something that ha...

I am enroute Lagos for what I choose to call a business trip. In the usual fashion of most buses, a suited man starts praying to God, committing the journey in his hands which is fine by me. Then, out of the blues, he begins to pray for Biafra....in his opinion, a country destined for world greatness and ordained by God. I looked at my friend, Dubem, with incredulity. Wow! Just wow! It was funny, ridiculous and saddening at the same time. And to think that most Igbos want a Biafra. A country that has no fixed ideology. A country born out of our inherent need for independence. A country that would be made up of one-third the people of Nigeria. It baffles me that they can't see ....or rather, they've refused to see...that, unless the core Nigerian issues are addressed, the Biafran state will not succeed. Though I don't blame those who want a Biafra, it is still a sad thought. To most people, Biafra is a symbol of hope. Something to anticipate and pray for in this almost de...

The world isn't a perfect place. It truly isn't. You see deaths and sadness and chaos. Children die.....children. I grew up seeing children as innocents. Who would want to deliberately hurt babies? It's really baffling. Aleppo....where children have learnt to stop crying. I see the videos and pictures....and in all of them, these children are blank....no reaction. Just blank. I can relate. Now I hear of chemical attacks. Why??!!! I see bodies of little dead children being carried away to be buried. I see them. I am blank....I want to cry but the tears don't come. Then I hear of the rape of 12 year old boy and his assailant was only charged #30,000 and 1 month imprisonment. Just imagine. Where do people even get the guts to apologize for evil doing under the guise of 'family'? To the best of my knowledge, family should protect you....not hurt you. I can't hurt my sister. She's family. But I hear stories like this every day. A man beats the wife he promis...