Praised Like A Bee, Swatted Like A Mosquito

Aniefiokuduakabasiisrael is the name I got from my late father, Pa Edayt Essah Ogborgbor of Nung Abia Abinyoho Uta-ekpe in Obong Itam Village, Itu L.G.A. As I metamorphosed, so many things have happened to me that always made me feel like changing that name. My mother, because of these ugly happenings, renamed me Nkut-utit, meaning “let me see the end”. Right now I am thinking of whether to change my name to that of the luckful Jonathan or Nsennammfon. No, I still opt for the original name while waiting on God for its meaning to come to positive manifestation.
Dear reader, I have gotten a couple of tales to tell you, even if not in detail, from personal experiences anyway. You may learn a lesson or two: This columnist, I have a journal and a pen, but I am not a journalist. No, I am not, that is why I warn myself against violating the ethics of the profession. I only write to satisfy a passion. I am not paid, yet I bother not. The joy of a writer is in being read. At First Bank Plc I work and receive emolument. I am a security guard there. Few days ago one of our drivers saw my old scripts, looked twice at me, and with a hiss, said “money miss road”. I searched deep into his action and utterance and discovered that he wasn't referring to my too-much money, the lack of it or the misuse of it. He was baffled as to why a “ mere or common security man” should write in a tabloid or, if so talented, why he should be “Ette Watchie”. Maybe he expected only scribal elites or celebrated professors to write. Dear Mr. Monday, doing a menial job does not mean that I am mean or less in value. All the same, receive my unreserved thanks for your observation, comments or corrective criticism. You have made me remember appreciatively all the people who in diverse ways have contributed to my being what I am today. Today, I can even be visited or read at the World Wide Web. Thanks, Monty. Thanks Mr. Martins Effiong, without you I wouldn't know Monty.

For doing my security job, I have been mocked to scorn, I have been genuinely congratulated too, the former triumphing. Hear what an old girlfriend said when she surprisingly saw me in my security outfit: “Ani, na you be dis? You see as life dey turn?” A pigeon speaking pigeon English. She snubbed me, dropped her phone number and left. I kept deaf mute because she was with her mother. This text message accompanied her. “ Carol, my snobbish damsel, this is my final year in the faculty of Wear and Tear, University of Life. In our institution, we know that it is not everybody to whom it is well. We don't boast or brag. We don't write people off nor even criticize because we are not yet out of the woods and God is not done with us yet. However, it was a thrill seeing you after all those juvenile-prone years gone by. Please, pick up this PIN (………….) for a recharge. Endear me to your family. Till I. C. U again”.

There's another episode of shame that involved a man from my mother's villages, Edet by name. The guy wanted to buy an okrika shirt beside our bank. Immediately he set his eyes on me he left the seller, came to me and asked a double-barreled question: what are you are doing here, why are you wearing this type of clothes?” Imagine my fine uniform which I wore and took salute to the amusement of my wife and boys. Abruptly Edet left me without waiting for his answers. I didn't see him again except a female colleague he came to seek love from. The girl asked me “bro, what happened between you and that man? He said you have two brothers overseas and he sees no reason you should come and do this kind of job”. “ The mentality of some men”, I reasoned. Finally I let go all I wanted to tell him any time I see him. Edet was in India, a poverty-stricken overseas, for a purpose I know not. That overseas might have taken some senses out of him.

There is this other cocky young man who told me he worked as an aero contractor or something. With his clean-and-neat-as-a-pin suit on, he can't first greet me any time he comes to see our BDM. A young boy I left behind in secondary school and everything. I dunno how he regarded him self each time I greeted him “welcome, sir” or “bye, sir”. His own wasn't much of talking but a case of foolish pride. Egotism so debased.

“ If you ain't got something good to say about somebody, just shut up”. Maybe if Luky Dube had sung the above lyrics earlier, a lot less would had been said about this soul. They would have bridled their tongues. Talks of the streets! Dear Sir/Madam, I have more trouble with Aniefiokessah than with any other man I ever meet on the face of this earth, please allow me to think of Aniefiokessah.
Do not seek to be in my shoes. You wouldn't take what I have been through and still be and accepted folk in your neighborhood. If at all I am a handicap, I am the handicap I must face; I am the one who must choose my place; I am the one who knows what is wrong or right for me; I am the one to say where I want to go or what I want I want to do. I should be allowed to grow or develop at my own pace and speed. This honorable gentleman I am, take away from me anything love and there remains no me. But the people say I am the worst thing that ever happened to the human race, they lock me out of respect. Names-calling, derogatory remarks, pull-him-down (PhD) utterances, mention them. But why? The say I am excellent only when asleep but terrible ones awakened (na wa-o! But even if I am, and so what?). They say I speak evil of everyone except God whom I do not know (whereas their tongues are dripping of poison). They say because of my dirty ways of life, I have lost the affection of my people and the regard of others (yet I am not an outcast). They said I am a small man made for small thing (well, that's my trouble which they should leave for me). They say I am fit for a spade because I call a spade a spade (forgetting that I am fit for even garden forks and other tools, as a farmer). They say I am not a man to be tossed aside lightly, that I should be thrown with great force (I am happy I have weight and occupy space).

Some say my behavior can make the world a pandemonium (whereas I am a harmless dove looking for the kind of peace the United Nations cannot offer the world). They say I am the basest, meanest creature that ever disgraced the image of God (my supplications before God, not these spotless men). The say I am as ambitious as Lucifer, they say I am cold-blooded in behaviour, they say I am a bore (you don't need to go to school to know who I am, do you?). They say I am a wolf in a sheep's clothing, whereas you know too well that I am a sheep in a sheep's clothing genuine ( I don't play the ostrich). They say I drink like a fish whereas their “liquid contents only” can float a war ship. They say “woman” is my trademark whereas I am married to Marie (Satan leave me alone). They say instead of embracing my wife I have some dirty principles I always embrace (maybe they had forgotten to adjectify me as scissors, pliers, magnet or vice).

They say I am one small insignificant homosapien who make much ado about everything to impress myself on people. They say I write wise and otherwise to show up that I am wise or knowledgeable (point of correction: I write on random subjects. I write this wise, that wise and otherwise. I write zigs and zags). Typically these people are impressed with and remember what they call their own sense and my own nonsense. They say my life is full of crevices and gullies. They write all my good deeds on water and the bad ones on marble. Blind to their faults they sing their own praises and say every unprintable thing about me. Of course, they are not Pilate to say “I find no fault in this man”. I am grateful gossiping doesn't killed but gossips could. God must really love the common man because He made so many of them and gave them the ability to LIVE despite whatever is talked about or done to them. I hope you are not “common”.

If you are, please delete it from your dictionary in order not to be swatted like me. Well, I have learnt my lesson that the most amicable guy on earth can live at peace with his neighbor only as long as his choose. With a pair of rubber slippers under your feet and a raffia rope on your waist, people must talk; with a pair of Lords' brogues shoes and a no mean man's leather belt, they still talk. It is they who say “hosanna to the son of David”, it is the same they who say “crucify him”. Amo unam kpa amo kea tang awot.
Well, before ever there was world's history there was Aniefiok's history. They can keep on vilifying me so far it is good for them. They can continue using their low level language (LLL) to reduce me to the lowest common man (LCM), a status they don't cherish for themselves nor any of their loved ones. But if I were any of them, it would have been better I bite my tongue than have biting tongue. Thirsty, none of these people gave me water to drink; hungry, none of them gave me food to eat; hospitalized, none of them visited me on my sick bed. But sometimes I doubt whether there is a divine justice. All parts of the body get tired eventually except the tongue. I know that the mouth always talks about things that fill the heart, but it shouldn't be falsely as in my own case. Anyway, the hyenas are getting ready for the kill, but cowards that they are, they are stalking behind patiently, waiting for the prey to fall asleep. I am the prey. I am saying to the hyenas: go ahead and ravage. I honestly do not give a hoot, you humbugs. I don't tell the snoopers of my history or the invaders of my past to stop maliciously doing so, but they may find themselves stuck with more than they bargained for. Their lies, varnished untruths, half truths or any story telling cannot take a skin off my nose. I am happy I am such a good sport who can accept even defeats graciously. I simply leave everything in status quo and allow their farrago of statements and deeds to grow together until harvest time when the chaffs shall be separated from the grains. “Let it be … there will be an answer”, I always like those songful words wisdom from Mother Mary.

Everyone everyday says I am not the correct Aniefiok, everyone is wrong. Although they keep discounting me daily, in God's eye I am priceless. I am pious, but it is even they (you) who had sinned and gone short of the glory of this His Royal Aniefiokness. Mr. Leo Sayer, I have heard all you said, start saying something else. Can't I be anything else? Don't you have other names? Oh! Aniefiokmkpong! Imagine people who are not afraid of God being foolishly afraid of me! It makes me feel ten feet taller. It makes me proud of the me in me that makes them the me they fear. I reason with Shakespeare who said “what the greats do the less always prattle of”. At all times, I pray, may God's love fill people's mind, rule their hearts and guide their bla- bla-bla tongues, Amen. To God, His Son and His Spirit the trinity in perfect unity be all honor, power and glory.

To everyone who has caused this column to see the light of day, thanks all the way. From first publisher to the present, from first editor to the present; to Aniefiok Nkereuwem exceptionally who linked me to my first media outing; to you, you and you (unnamed but not unknown). Dr. Prince Bassey, I am not an ingrate to deny you your own share of credit. To all non dyslexics. To my late two fisted, no-nonsense he-man, my father. To my phenomenal mother. You both sent me to school, thankyou. To Marie, the one to whom I am married. My two bundles of joy, my cheerleaders (Mankind and Mystery) I love you all and dedicate this column to you. Dear reader, you and I successfully did this job together. Please, praise, don't swat, not only Aniefiok but the government of the day. Blessed is the tongue that doeth so.