Christiana Nwafor was a naiive twenty-one year old when she had been sent to Lagos by her mother.  The objective for the visit had been, in the mother's mind, that of either matrimony or employment.  If at all possible a perfect outcome would be the attainment of both, concomitantly.  But if this were not possible, and fate would have them choose only one or the other, then matrimony was deemed to be the superior.  For, in the end, what use would all the jobs in the world be, if a girl did not have a husband?  And, in the same vein, you could wait a life-time for work, and other than penury would not be much put out over it, but no worse fate could befall a maid other than to be literally left on the shelf.  And the biological clock is no respector of man or woman's needs for careers', and it ticks on, days turning to weeks and then years seemingly in the blinking of an eyelid.  In Enugu, the movements of this clock were intensified like the dry seasons heat was acting to drive the movements swifter. Indeed, most of Christiana's friends, and classmates, were happily married since the tender age of eighteen.  Nevertheless, Christiana did not allow these realities to deter her hopes for the future. She was tall and fair, and looked nothing like her mother.  Her face was oval in shape,and a small chin and nose served as a fine framework into which the brilliance of her large brown eyes lended some rays of glamour as the sun does the morning. And as the sun dominates the sky by day, her eyes were the sparkle of life to her visage and its most complementing feature.

Mr Tokunbo Ajayi makes a decision

Mr Tokunbo Ajayi makes a decisiion

The graduation:
The graduation ceremony at Obafemi Awolowo University in Ife had come and gone, even without the presence of Mr. Tokunbo Ajayi.  In a last moment of incertitude he had backed out of the attending the graduation alotogether.  For, he could not attend the ceremony as the fiance of Yetunde, which he no longer felt that he was; and Bola who had by now been secretly dating him for the last few months could not help but agree that the situation was at best awkward for all involved.. A week before the wedding he hurrieldy purchased two airline tickets for London; his was to leave the next morning and Bolas was to nleave the day after the graduation ceremonies at Ife were over. The plan was for them to celebrate in London, this next great phase of their lives which waited ahead of them, a future though unknown was firmly rooted in their committment to stya together. Contrary to appearances this sequel of events had not been hurried or altogether unplanned either, as they had spent largely every weekend together over the last few months, when Bola had taken transport down to Lagos to meet him.  They had found this arrangement necessary so as not to arouse any undue form of suspicion in Yetunde.   Bola had even broken off her relationship with the married man whose misstress she had been for a good while. She had come to realise, and not altogether without reason, that most married men never leave their wives, and although it had been a lot of fun( what with weekend trips to Paris, and expensive gifts), whilst it lasted, she was aware that no more could be expected from such relationships.  She knew well the fate of the sugar-daddy girls after their youth and beauty had long since faded they were inevitably abandoned by all of society and not least by the very men at whose hands they had been privileged to deserve such infamy.  no, she was fully dteremined that that would not be her lot, or as the popular love song stated," Lord, that shall not be my portion.." She had been wise enough to surmise that to her married lover she had been nothing more than a temporary amusement, a passing one at that, which could just as easily and quickly be replaced by another young thing which could also be any young thing...  As such she had beeen determined to leave this way of life behind as swiftly as she possibly could and before what little good remained of her name be lost forever.  But all that was well and good, what made everythuing more attractive was that she was quite as much in love with Toks as he was with her.  To her, he was as a breath of fresh air, she could nearly palpate the honor in his heart, and could smell the fragrant ardor of love and fidelity which he exuded around her.. In him she knew she never had to fear him becoming an old man fawning around young girls nor the plagues of infidelity.  perhaps he would not be able to splurge on weekends in Paris, at short notice; but at least he had the means at his disposal to keep her in a certain level of society which was not altogether bad.  In actuality, she wisely surmounted that it was always " better to not set one's eyes on things too great for her".  Yet, her the daughter of a primary school pricipakl would still have done very well for herself.  true, she had" lacked" much in that humble abode in Ondo state where she had grown up under adequate but quite meagre circumstances, thanks to the Nigerian government which could never pay salaries nor pensions on time, nor could it keep up the salary increases with the rates of inflation.. it was a world all gone amuck, not due to Papa's fault, as he had done all he was supposed to do. But what chance did he have as a sole upright principal surrounded by a corrupt government on every side.  And so they had mostly suffered wants and wants, just lijke the other 99.5 % of the population.  Her family had been duly ,albeit, informally intorduce dto the dashing Tokunbl, who in their eyes had been likened to a knight in shining armor coming riding in on a white horse to claim the hand of their beautiful but poor daughter.  Both mother and father had been quite overcome, for it was obvious by his manners and presentation that he was from the upper echelons of society that they so greedily coveted.
" I had always known that she was destined for great things" Papa had blurted out after the fact, in excitement to his wife.  And his wife was so overjoyed that words failed her and she nodded in agreement, as they had always known that this daughter whose beauty was indeed quite fabled would not fall short of the mark.  Finally her mother added, " Yes, I always knew that she had a little white angel sitting on her shoulder, for her life has so been charmed".

For all this parents could not really be blamed as, in their ignorance they had been sperd the details of their daughters sugar daddy days; in their naivitee they had not figured out that clothes designed by Yves saint Laurent in Chiffon could not be purchased with a principals entire yearly income, let alone on the daughters pocket money. 

In the garden of Mrs. Toyin Ajayi jr continued

ffemi had felt that they should just elope, or go to the registry office by themselves and be done with it.  they had both already been " victims' of huge society weddings which had made many amother weep with envy in Lagos at the time.  And in light of all the hoopla, the failure of these same marriages had made it even more difficult to bear than would be expected.
But Toyin jr. was an incurable romantic, and being true to herself there was something totally unacceptable about not crowning this true love with a proper ceremony.  For she knew that even the minds of men were affected by pomp, and elegance and ceremony. Inevitably ,all these elements aided a man to fall in love with his bride,and in the hard and cold days which were sure to come as some point couold be counted upon to sustain it. Then, the memories of past events could serve as an anchor for his soul to her, and allow the ship of their love to weather the storm.
" I have been thinking, femi darling," she began to address him, as she so often did whilst their were seated at the dining table.  he had finished eating, and although no mention had been made of what she was about to address, he could see before him that by default the conversation must be about the proposed nuptials and the fulfillment thereof.
She continued," I know you have left all the arrangements to me..."
And he thought to himself without betraying for a moment in his demeanor his displeasure at this nightly conversation," Would that they would have this all behind them! And he wondered facetiously if after the event was done and past they might nrun out of topics of conversation. But then he knew Toyin well, and once she had her mind set upon something it was nearly impossible to sway her from such, and she would doubtlessly replace this cause with another once this issue has been resolved.
He walked over to the other side of the table where his lover sat, and seated himself on the chair beside her, and gently cradling her face in his two hands he kissed first her left cheek, and then her right, and smiling all the while .
" My dearest Toyin,", he finally mustered," you know very well that the last thing in the world I would like to do would be to deny you of your opportunity for a wedding. It should have been both of our firsts, but as fate would have it, is both of our seconds. And i think we must bear this in mind when making the plans.  Can we not scale it back a little? It is not because of cost, but more privacy. I dont need the whole of Lagos to attend my wedding to make it valid. "
" I dont think that the term scaling back is one I care to use in this matter. How would I put it? Perhaps if I said something "different" from what our first marriages were those infamous jamborees where we hosted thousands.." Then she paused, and added" Yes,I like the idea of something different, yes,.. something far away from Lagos..."
Now that he opened the pandoras box, the flow of details cou.ld not be stopped, she was now hurling like a runaway train on the tracks being buoyed along by the coals of love." that sounds like an idea to me, the mere fact of removing the venue from Lagos will give us the freedom to make the ceremony more intimate and after what I went through with my first wedding i think that is preferable.. I have been looking at a number of places, and I seem to be settling for for a small chapel ceremony in Las Vegas, we can a small private court weding here before we leave for the U.S. of course, my brothers and their wives shall attend, and you brothers and sisters as well. As for the children, I had hoped they could be ring bearers but then when I think of the trouble of dealing with Iyabo, then I shelve the idea. .. I quite like Las Vegas in the spring.."
She needed little or no encouragement at this point to continue with her reverie, she could already see herself in Las Vegas, surrounded by close family and a few select friends, that appealed to her as a wedding that could be romantic and also fun.
Femi did not seem to be totally averse to the idea, and actually quite liked the thought of it, and it was discussed between them and decided that Las vegas might be the perfect place for them with twenty or thirty guests in attendance.
" i dont mind up to fifty guests total," Femi said, with a mischevious glint in his eyes," and then added as an afterthought," As long as the guests all fly themselves over there. I am not one of those rich nigerians who hires aeroplanes on stolen money to fly guests off to farflung destinations for the wedding of the century! No, and i dont foot hotel bills either, thank you very much. If anyone wants to attend the wedding then they should first make sure that they can afford it." At this they both laughed, for it was true that he would not support his guests in an ostentatious manner, but that was not because he could not afford to do these things, more than that these things offended his sense of propriety. If it came to donating money to the poor or the needy, then femi could open his wallet with ease, but he found it uniquely distasteful to be wasting his hard earned money on the rich and the frivolous.
Toyin had burst into laughter, and rose from her chair by the table.  She briefly rang the bell on the dining table to signal the steward to clear the dining table as dinner was over.  Then arm in arm they sauntered over to the white leather sofa which was in the adjacent living room, and laid down leaning on the small bule pillows that dotted it. Safely ensconced in each others arms on the sofa they fell asleep in front of the television.


And as all women who live with their lover before marriage, she now found herself in a hurry to put their affairs in order and regularise their situation. This was not only for her own sake, but also due to the fact that her brothers had made it quite clear that to them a tradtional weding ceremony was not quite the same thing as a court or church wedding.  For God's sake, they had said, you need some kind of legal footing in this case, no matter how much in love you were, because " when the shit hits the fan" yuo need all the protection of the heavy hand of the law.  This was not to say that they anticipated any problems with Femi, as they had both known Femi fairly well for a long time and they felt they had enough knowledge of him to vouchsafe for his basic character., but neither could pretend to know the interior workings of his mind.  In reality, they had felt, he was a better match than that "learned" engineer Tokunbo who thought himself a " cut above the rest of humanity" could ever have been. From what they had heard the man had not taken the divorce well at all, but then they had never understood what Toyin had liked about him in the  first place; and then to make matters worse, she had even thought that she would be happy living with him in that dreary flat in ikeja, that they could barely stomach to visit. Indeed, they had quietly sniggered behind the back of the engineer when Toyin had left.  True, Toyin was altruistic, but she had been brought up accustomed to a certain standard of living and when she had gradually realised that for all Toks positive attributes even he could not make 100 Naira become a million, and so on and so forth.  On the otherhand, Femi, though modest at all times, came from one of the wealthiest families in Lagos too.  He could afford to send her on those annual excursions to be spent worshipping at the thrones of hedonism at Harrod's and Selfridge's.  And, Femi appreciated her efforts, he would notice the new blouse, or the cut of the dress that showed her figure to advantage.  On the rare occasions when they attended social functions, he wanted her to appear at his side as the embodiment of sophistication and grace.

For the time being her focus was on the wedding, but after that, who knew what would preoccupy her mind?  She had already fully determined that she wanted, God willing, to have four children. This number had not been arbitrarily chosen but rather served to ensure that the numbe rof children she would bear would exceed the three of Iyabo.  Yes, she too could be competitive in all the arenas of life, and in this instance she the prisoner of his love, would reverse the role to become the warden herself holding him to her soul with the living shackles of their children for all eternity. 
He had originally objected to the idea vehemently, fancying himself the father of seven at the end of the day. " You would make me the father of seven!" he had gushed with some embarrassment.
And she had laughed herself at the expression of his face, " Father of many! They will call you when you go to the market."
Then he would reiterate that seven could never be enough, and to this Toyin was quite fearful that he might actually mean what he was saying, and she accused him of being a male chauvinist who thought that the only role of women was childbearing and housework. " Howe could you say such a thing.." she would say in all earnestness, having totally forgotten that she was the one who had begun the conversation in that direction. " And I who thought I knew you all along? Is that why they say everything changes when you marry? No, Femi, let it not be so for us..."
Inevitably,this would make him laugh all the more, as she still could not always figure out when he was serious or joking with her,
And he laughed, and and with a twinkle in his eye, he took her into his arms and covered her hands and cheeks with small little kisses ever so gentle as a breeze of wind on her cheeks, " Now that was a joke. i dont think

In the garden of Mrs Toyin Ajayi jr.

It had taken Mrs Toyin Ajayi jr. several years to get used to the more relaxed pace of life in Nigeria compared to what her life had been in the U.K.  There she had veritably been a busy bee hive of activity during her school days.  She had had the fortunate experience of participating in a wide variety of sports on most days of the week. These had been as varied as hockey,net ball,badminton, tennis and general athletics. At all these she had excelled and had proven herself to be more of a sports-woman, than a scholarly type.  All this had been to her advantage, for even now in her mid twenties, she could boast of a slim and lithe figure which though perhaps not of the voluptuous kind, nevertheless many men still found pleasing..  Moreover, there were real advantages to being thin, and none more important than the ease of putting on a dashing appearance in her designer digs, with little or no effort.
Maintaining her figure in the metropolis of lagos proved to be no easy feat.  There was an abundance of foods and other temptations continously thrown in front of one, and little or no opportunity for exercise existed.  even the roads were nearly totally unnavigable by a pedestrian in some seasons, there were no pavements or side walks or trattoir. In the small private gyms that existed, the air was dank and stale, and smelled suffocatingly of sweat, and instilled in her a unique sense of claustrophobia and a need to flee as quickly as possible from the whirring sound of the airconditioners in the background, so far from a motivational tune as possible it was.  These poorly lit and humid places she hardly found tolerable.  Yet to exercise outside was not really an option either, as described by the lack of side walks.  So she had resigned herself to being satisfied with her Yoga routine which she did in the privacy of her living room, and this she complemented with short strolls in the gardden of the apartment complex.
On this day as she walked around the rose bushes and the sweet smelling Gardenias, and Hibiscuses and Bougainvilleas,she hastily glanced up over the high walls surrounding the compound, and tried to peer over and through the electrified barbed wire that sat as a crown jewel above the wall. And she tought to herself, that certainly she was at least in some form a prisoner. Yes, she thought to herself, love makes us a prisoner of the mind, and the husbands of this world act as the wardens to keep us all in check. But when I look up at this wall I cannot help but wonder, are the walls in the compounds of Afghanistan as high as these? For, no matter the wilful spiritual slavery which she had voluntarily subscribed to by being where she was, it was the physical prison of the high walls and the barred windows which made her feel like a beautiful caged animal, or rather like a well loved bird in a gilded cage.
She had said this to Femi many times, and in his usual fashion he had laughed it off.  It was not that he was trying to brush off her feelings or make her feel belittled, but he was a man who was firmly tied and molded by reality, although he also was a dreamer. But he would say" what can do?"  For this, the general insecurity was a fact of life, much becried and bemoaned in the newspaers on a daily basis for th " Rising state of insecurity in nation alarming". oddly enough, there was hardly a day that passed by when there was not one newspaer or the other with the sanme headline. There was one thing the articles always failed to come up with some plausible explanation for the disgruntled masses. As the fashinable worried about what dress to wear to the next party, and the color co ordination of their proposed birthday party,
and the expenditures on these dos became more and more ostentatious, the wealthy could simply not fathom why the less fortunate had tired of their roles as sycophants and had taken up a dastardly buisness of trading in human flesh to accomplish something in this life beyond misery and want. Sure, to kidnap anyone is to display a want of honor, but this had become the means of livelihood for a significant part of the population.  \Femi worried constantly about her safety.  He was well aware that due to her associations with him that she could be target for the kidnappers who had now migrated from the creeks of the Niger Delta and had settled down instead in the concrete djungle of Lagos with a thriving trade in Leke and Ikoyi.  The whole of Lagos had stood by in disbelief as the kidnapping had started in Lagos.  Truely the saying of Martin Luther King Jr. had become prophetic in this case for to tolerate injustice to one is to tolerate injustice to all, and as the injustice had been so easily tolerated as long as it was far away in some hinterland, and only involved expatriates... but then all the expats had wisely fled, the next target was the people themselves, or rather the haves were now targetted by the have nots.  In fact, Femi had totally dissuaded Toyin from any thoughts of working, and it had probably had a lot to do with the difficulties of arranging a suitable security detail.   As such she found herself with many hours to spend at home.  After her few chores in the morning, which mainly consisted of her supervising the maid and the steward and the cook, she would do her yoga routine and then prepare to wait for her lover who was soon to become her husband, well, as far as traditional law was concerned they were already married but now they were planning for the court wedding.

From the Bishop's pulpit at Sunday mass:

It was a usual Sunday morning in the middle of May, and early as it was the intense heat of the season had not yet had a chance to level it's firm grip over the city of Enugu, the city amongst the Udi hills which sprawled to the West and the North.  A few drops of dew remained on the leaves of grass, and from her hideout in the blue heavens of the sky the sun was attempting to peep through the clouds of the rainy season. here and there could be seen a lone straggler making his or her way to mass, for as the hour was still early, most of the town was still in bed, obediently obeying The Lord's exhortation to keep the Sunday a holyday, a day of rest.
A loud noise was heard across the parking lot of the cathedral and a small old green Toyota Corolla, which must have nearlier been older than the driver himself pulled into the parking lot , and a smart looking youngish fellow  quicjly stepped out, and after meticulously locking and relocking the doors of the car, he proceeded towards the front entrance of the cathedral.  He wore a formal light blue shirt and a pair of khaki colored trousers which seemed most suitable for the time of the year, and he strode confidently into the church and without much difficulty he found a seat in the back of the cathedral.
He was surrounded by all men as the men sat on the right hand side of the pews and the ladies on the left, for although there was no sign designating the seating as for men and women, by tradition , the women had always sat on the left and the men on the right, and it was in this way now a custom. As the person on the end of the pew never wanted to be dislodged form his choice seat it meant he had to negotiate his way through the legs of several men and found himself finally safely ensconed in the middle of the pew, with little or no ventilation, and barely enough room to sit.
The Bishop himself was presiding over the morning mass, and Obi was quite happy to welcome this unexpected occurrence,

" Yes, yes, my brothers and sisters, hehad started," we must make an effort every day to choose God over evil, I cannot tell you how urgent this message is, for each day must be lived as if it is the first day and the last day you will live, the first day, because then you will be enthusiastic in the Lord's work, and the last day, because then you will be fearful of the judgements of God. The reason for the urgency is because the Lord cannot wait, His message of salvation must be preached from the rooftops,our very lives must bear witness to the faith we hold dearly in our hearts.  Yet, I shudder to think that we can so easily fall into complacency, and be overcome with a sense of self-righteousness, a condition where we take for granted the Saviour of the world.  A man who loves his wife remembers the little things she likes, and pays attention to the smallest details, and likewise a man who loves God, must be attentive to the small things and great things with equal diligence.  I know the question before you all right now, you worry that we have no pope, or you worry over who the next Pope will be or will not be. "Ca me fait egal", it is not for us to tell the Spirit of God, for we know not where he blows from or where he goes; and only God and God alone can see the interior of men's hearts' and make judgements thereupon.  In all things we must trust in God and His mercy, and remember that " God is close to the broken hearted" and to those trampled down by lives woes.  For us there are more immediate problems, problems with security in a nation of unimaginable proportions. Problems of injustice and corruption which have laid such a heavy weight upon the back of the working man that instead of ourlife expectancy increasing over the last fifty years it has worsened, and that not only due to AIDS. Yes, we have great good here in our town of Enugu with our sprawling seminaries and convents, how many saints there are, are known to God alone! Yet, it is an undeniable reality that in parallel to this great good, to this pearl which has been entrusted  us to safeguard the faith for future generations, there is intense evil.  Against the goodness, which perhaps goes unrivalled, there has sprung up an evil which may also be unrivalled, an evil where a man kidnaps and kills his brother or sister for money. These acts are repugnant.  So today and everyday let us rededicate ourselves and our lives to Jesus Cristus, and let us renounce all inclinations to sin. Let us hold on to the hem of the cloak of the Blessed Virgin, and determine to lead chaste and Holy lives."

 The words had reverberated to the core of his being, it was not that Obi was a bad young man, but neither was he a saint, and he had felt that certain parts of the homily were like the Holy Spirit carrying a lance to his heart to excise certain propensities that lay therein towards sins of the flesh. Sins of the flesh, he mused, were necessary for procreation, yet at the sametime he recognised that in his hearts of hearts there was nothing he wished more for than to lead a life that was upright in the eyes of God and man.  Yet this was the theoretical aspect of the equation, for his soul fully acknowledged all these things but it was in the practicality of the matter that his soul met opposition in the form of his own physical weakness wherein he often and freely fell in love.

Mr. Tokunbo Ajayi at a crossroads.

for three weeks he thought incessantly about what his next course of action should be, and in his mind he played out a variety of scenarios, pretend that nothing had happened, admit that something had happened, or just stay away until he knew what he should do next.   He consoled himself in the thought that no one can ever know what the future holds, yet inspite of this his own frivolity presented itself as an undeniable knife in the guillotine of his soul ever ready to fall and sever the fountains of grace which kept his soul in communion with God.  But, as all men, he had little power over the whims of the flesh, and he resigned himself to the fact that in due course, he too, like so many before him, would succumb to the demands of lust.  And long forgotten would be the loves  of old, which would remain as objects buried in the sand of time with  little  or rather nothing to disturb them, and their secrets to be forever forgotten.  For twith the passage of time, even the thought of Toyin had long since lost it's power to influence him, for he had so trained his soul to dismiss all thoughts of her immediately

ALL TALK and no action.

I have never seen a country with such a propensity for meetings, and galas, and fetes ; but dont be deceived, little or nothing is ever accomplished at these farces or jamborees.  These meetings are infact an insult to the intelligence of all, ..it is over and over again ALL TALK AND NO ACTION. and dont worry, 20 years from now we will still be holding these endless discussions with no change, no improvement.  If truth be told I cannot hide my disgust.  And then I remember the stories of the fate of the pensioneers , old men cheated out of their hard earned pension, indeed, we have turned ourselves into a conglomerate of fools with our endless good will which always falls short of the mark, and inregards to our treatment of our fellow man, I shudder to say that we turned ourselves into people worse than animals of the forest.