AGALIO

Appreciate what, who you have while it last. Don't be that young man, lady who only realises a worth when it is gone.
There is this dance I like to do whenever am happy, or excited, or thrilled. It's called the "Agalio" dance. I got it from my roommates some time in my final year in the university. They got it from their church; it was some symbol of joy or excitement, which was supposed to be the overall feeling in church. Afterall, it's said that in the presence of God, there is fullness of joy. I started doing this dance, and gradually, gradually, it stuck. It became a reflex action that happens whenever I'm a little bit excited.
On this fateful day, I had this little episode that somehow wanted to put a stop to my Agalio dance. I had a mighty fall that landed me heavily on my chest. The fall left me gasping for breath for a few seconds. Somehow, it had this effect on my chest that's left a hollow, dull pain somewhere deep in my chest. This pain, though subtle, stops me from indulging in little little things I'd been doing prior to the fall without even realising it. Things I take for granted. For one, am not able to do my Agalio dance as energetic and eager as I used to. Even when as a reflex action, I switch to the dance, the pain unapologetically reminds me that hey, you can't do that, not as you used to before.
The other day I won some folks at a Ludo game. The excitement at the win was heightened because I wasn't taken serious at the game. My, I was blatantly told- babe, you no fit win this game. And I was like-- no worry, I go shock you. They didn't believe me. Apart from the fact that it's been quite long I played the ludo game, a matter of 12 years or more, and I never hesitated at drumming that piece of factual info into their ears; somehow I don't know why I use to have this effect on people, this fragile-effect. I don't like it. Not-the-am-a-feminist-type-of-I-don't-like-it, but I simply don't like it. It has this weak undertone and innuendo that annoys me. One incidence out of many, I remember, is when sometime ago, I made a post on my 3 weeks NYSC camp experience, as much as I could abridge into some post without it becoming dreary. I talked about parades, and my take on it, how it affected me. I also talked about how I had some guys asking me to represent the platoon for the NYSC pageantry, and how I declined. This friend of mine called me up, and after some chit-chats on how service was going, and how 'classroom' was daily happening. After mentioning that my students must be excited and lucky to have me, he said, and I decided to read in between the lines, that he'd have loved to see me actually teaching in the classroom. To observe all my feminine charm, and ardour, how I would look like teaching the kids, how my whole anatomy, and facial make would be incensed and lit up, each part dutifully engaged in its own part in communicating whatever it was I was communicating at a given time. I asked, deliberately, to expansiate, what he meant by all that. He was having a hard time. I didn't mind, I didn't pity him. This had been going on for too long, and I really needed to get an explanation from a scapegoat, him. So I asked him, what do you mean. He then referred me to my post, telling me that I should have yielded to those guys asking me to go for the pseudo pageantry, and that I didn't have any business getting involved with any form of parade whatsoever. I wasn't done with him. What do you mean by that, still, I probed, further. By now, his throat was getting all clogged up, but I still didn't care. I was already at where he was trying to arrive at, I'd gotten the cue, but seriously I was tired of having people see me like that. Looking at me and seeing only an attractive petite woman who doesn't have the physical body structure for indulging in any form of manual work. To me, that is synonymous to being useless, completely redundant. Still, this position is not because I am a feminist. I am not. Not the type plenty folks are quick to lay claim to. So, I asked him to explain himself. He attempted to do that by asking me to sincerely explain what, and how I would be able to manage a parade on the parade ground with all my very delicate and 'abridged' body parts, that that was not my thing, that I should focus on going for pagaentries, doing catwalks, and maybe being a beautiful woman. This, I consider, demeaning, very demeaning, even though I didn't tell him that, at least not in those very words. On the parade ground were people, different kinds of people, male and female, everybody was there. People with and without sickness were there, terminal or not. Everybody remained there until those who fainted did and were taken to the medical centre. Come to think of it, I didn't faint, I've never even fainted in my entire life. I am not the weakest in the group. I do not even fall into the last thirty percentile of weakest people. Why was he saying such things to me. What is the very fragile thing about me that would make people have such conclusions about me, albeit telling me to go for delicate things, like pagaentries. Who the heck cares about pagaentries, and stuffs like that. I can do a catwalk, naturally, but I can as well do a manual work like others, at least others my size do. I know my limits, I do not try to overdo or show off. If I can't, I'd say. For one, I know I have issues with fetching of water. I don't like this particular chore. I could give you money, if I had, to do it for me. Although with my family background, and history, you have no business forming I can not fetch water, or any other thing of the sort, lol.
To the original gist. Those people practically dared me to my face that I cannot win the game. Maybe on the grounds that such things were for the thickened ones, the street-bred, not for the fragile ones like me. Sometimes, these type of hasty conclusions make me laugh. All these people do not know I actually have more 'pako' than 'butter' inside of me. I am very much stronger than I look. By strength, of course, I do not just mean physical. In fact, I mean a whole lot of things but physical. Agreed, one of the opponents was some Delta girl with all the Warri stereotypes. No, seriously, she was a typical Warri-breed. I was challenged, but I played it down, I jokingly said I would show them, and show them I did, I won. And I was happy. The kind of happy I felt was the type they could not understand. It was the type of se-you-think-it's-only-to-cross-my-legs-and-do-catwalks-that-I-can-manage-but-see-I-beat-you-at-your-Ludo-game-type-of-happy. And so automatically, my feet began, the rest of my body picked it up, my Agalio dance. Then, it struck me, a chord, from my heart, fortissimo, or a similar musical term, gradually becoming louder, clearly warning me.. You can't do that again, you can't do your Agalio dance again, not the way you would have really wanted to do it. That moment, something crashed inside of me. So, even Agalio, just Agalio, I can't do anyhow now. It was a sad moment. But I didn't let it show. Nobody noticed. Because I continued doing my Agalio, albeit with reduced friction on my chest.
Appreciate what you have while you still have it. If I had known a time would come when I wouldn't be able to do my Agalio dance anytime I wanted to. I would have done more than I did before. Both when I was excited and not. I would have done even more than that. I would have done a lot more than that, and have some of it video recorded so I can help myself whenever I felt like. But I didn't. I took it for granted, even if it was without my consciousness.
Appreciate what you have while you still have it.
Appreciate who you have while they're still there.
(P. S: MY CHEST IS Fine, WITHOUT ANY PAIN OO!) 

HYGIENE

It is more difficult for some people to take responsibility than to deliver a healthy set of twins without getting pregnant.
And they'd readily prefer you to put grains of sand into their dish than to point out, to them, where they're lapsing and not getting it right.
How else can we explain a situation where certain folks are refusing to own up to obvious responsibilities because they would just prefer not to be told to do so by anyone.
But I have one question for such people. If you know you'd sooner die than to be told what to do, why not try and be a little bit proactive and identify those things yourself, deal with them so that they don't all together become eyesores, all-the-senses-sores to others around till they cannot help it any longer but point them out to you, albeit meekly?
Chinonso was sure she's had more than enough of such attitude, and was almost beside herself for lack of what to do to address the particular situation she was faced with, different from what she's done already, without being the person she's trying with all of her being not to be on a daily basis, mean. Or on a much lesser note, the person they might think they have reason to think she is, forward.
But why can't some persons be responsible themselves, for themselves, and even for others; responsibility does come with the whole package. Why do they have to wait to be told before they find out that they ought to clean up, collectively, the GP tanks that's been the source of water in the apartment especially when it rains, Chinonso mused. Afterall, they're all using it, some of them for more than a year, before she very recently became one of them, and the insides appear dirty enough to breed various germs and bacteria as they would be unfortunately nonchalant to allow. Very nasty it is to think that they cook their daily meals with said water and still feel comfortable.
Chinonso was convinced they, the GP tanks, haven't been washed for a longer time than is convenient. Dirt, dirty dirt.
Irresponsibility at it's peak, Chinonso almost spat out. Oya go wash am na, sebi you say e dirty, as na you clean pass. Went a full blown lady, shamelessly. Ehn, you start first na, shuoo, why you just dey talk, go start make you see whether we go join you or not. Another fully grown lady chipped in as reaction to Chinonso's stance that the cleaning should be a collective work of concerned, well meaning, even if only for themselves, occupants of the apartment. Chinonso could only shake her head in utter disgust.
Responsibility is not a course taken in the university, or at least I do not remember that much. Actually, it happens to be a topic treated in secondary school; Civic Education, Social Studies, Moral Instruction and what have you; on the other hand, I remember this much because I have a lot of times taught same topic. Whether or not it is being taught, everybody is supposed to have a sense of responsibility. If you wait till you receive lessons on everything before you actually practise them, you might wait forever, and find out ultimately, you've only succeeded in wasting away.
Being a graduate isn't enough.
Being educated isn't enough.
Learn hygiene.
Inculcate responsibility.
Ask Chinonso, she'd enlighten you, both off her lesson notes, and more importantly, her head notes.