2012-03-03

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A lover in a window.

"it don be six long years since he left without a word...I thank the Lor' Ah'm okay; Ah thank the Lor' that he don open my eyes to see the glory coming from the heavens. Oh Yes, I do see them angels, in the chariots makin their way down fromheaven to rescue me from the deeds of wicked men."
" Now, you tell me Bessie, who gonna bulieve that? If that were true then why am I seein you here every evenin, and It aint no party I see you at.No each time I come here, it been in that same old chair I sees you, lookin off into the distance, watchin every car go by, to see if he has come back to ya. It's time to stop the maudlin now, he aint comin back, no more than dead papa gonna come back to life."
" You is talkin about the dead comin back to life? I 's a christian, Oh yes, I am dear Lor'! And I am ready to give testimony, I believe in the resurrection and the life after deatyh, no, papa he aint dead, he be alive in heaven"
And her friend shook her head in disbelief because she saw that the analogy was a sitting duck to be taken out of context by her sister.
" I am sorry to say this Bessie, but you aint the first woman to have been left by her husband, and believe ye me every moment of this day, there is another man moving on with his life for better or worse, so to speak. The difference is that they might wait a year for him but ah never heard of her lady who sat and waited for six years after such a betrayal."
" Ah wasnt waitin all the time, dont get me wrong, Ah've done a lot, ah've thought a lot; infact I even went out with a man or two in between, the waitin . And I is workin two jobs and taking care of the childrens, Ah've been known to rock a party or two. But then when the dust settles, I find myself goin full circle again, thinkin about everythin, in the way someone thinks who has unfinished business, and then I tsit inthis here rockin chair, thinkin about the past, hoping for the future.
" Now sister, Bessie, that don be some stupid thinkin, thinkin about the past which has gone, and will never come back; you may as well be living a life of fantasy in a swanky apartment on Fifth Avenue; As for the future? You have no future and you are the only one who does not know it"

In a den of thieves continued.

Likewise in the society there was a clear demarcation of it's own acquired schizophrenia, with two worlds living parallel to each other; on the the one hand there was the rich who lorded it over the poor with a despotic profligacy, and on the other there was the lot of the dispossessed who feigned a servile posture while the hatred of their situation simmered as an unquenchable fire in their souls waiting for the right moment to erupt.  Like an active volcano the people waited for the right moment, for it was no longer a matter of if, no it was a matter of when.  For life was quickly becoming so unbearable, that death was no longer feared but even anticipated as a welcome end to the life of turmoil and strife.  For in death, the soul could sleep in the night without fears, and there catch up on the long nights  of lost sleep due to terror.  For in death, the body plagued by sickness for which a cure was unaffordable due to prevailing circumstances, there it could rest peacefully, and without pain.   what a tragedy, that a people who had set off on a journey of optimistic independence from colonialism should  come to a screeching halt and meet their Waterloo in the quagmire of the Presidency at Aso rock.  Where the President of Goodluck, operated as a rudderless boat in a manner which could only have rivalled the infamous and insignificant presidencies of his predeccessors.  The public could rest assured of one thing only, and that was that it's leadership would continue to entertain the world with it's blatant mediocrity and total absence of imaginativeness which was near comic in it's utter deatchment from the reality of the people.  In effect, the president presented himself as a buffoon who had strong inclinations to jetting around the world in a jet ( whose purchase was misguided) attending international meetings to which he could contribute little or not at all, thereby reiterating to the world at large his own irrelevance.

in a den of thieves continued

Indeed, there was nothing to accuse him of safe of being a reject of society, a fact for which he could not really be held responsible for himself; for he was little more than an angry product of the very society which condemned him to a life of crime and intrigues by virtue of the inherent corrpution upon which it was based, a corruption which denied the rights of the common man in every way imaginable. In its inconsistencies it created a veritable maze of suppressive regulations, and demonstrated that it could only be relied upon to further deface the image of the common man, and dehumanise him to the level of an unwanted creature, or byproduct of creation.  In this society,the common man rubbed shoulders with the rats of the slimy gutters the only difference being that the rats were fat and well fed on the refuse that accumulated unhindered, whilst the men became leaner with barely any extra flesh to spare on their bones.
" tell me Father, tell me, am I sinner to steal?"
For in his mind there existed two parallel reailties which were irreconcileable: in his soul he was still the mild and gentle christian who believed in the resurrection of the dead, and he believed that Jesus was his personal saviour, but he was a robber at night, and he was successful in his trade.  Like a schizophrenic he lived two lives and whilst in either life he faced that wholeheartedly and refused to consider the other

In a den of thieves continued:

It was the same grim resignation with which she had faced the death of her father, and then her two eldest sons, and then her husband, all in rapid succession. It were as if death were an unwanted friend who barged in freely at will, and brought with it unprecedented disaster, and grief, and yet you are forced to accept this friend.  And so in the silence of her heart she had held many discussions with God, and with the spirit world, bargaining in futile hope of delaying the inevitable.  to make matters worse, it was not as if the causes of their deaths were some complicated cancer that could not be cured even in more privileged locales, or some long standing chronic malady; no, they had all died from simple treatable diseases, which if discovered in a timely fashion could have allowed it's victims a chance at a reasonable life expectancy.
  And so when the young men had knocked at her door in the middle of the night she had known what it meant even before they spoke, she had thought that surely the boy must have died like everyone else before him, that to have heard that the boy was still in this life, although in an injured state had been good news.  For this last boy she had begged God, to take her first before her last born son, as she could not, indeed would not imagine a world without him.  " If he dies," she had said, " Then I may as well be dead, as there will be no joy left for me in this world.  When I see his face, my life brightens, when I hear his voice, then I am consoled."
It seems as if providence had heard the prayers of the widow, for the boy had been spared from a bullet to the heart by an inch, and it certainly was not his own prayers that  had  purchased his escape from a wanton death.  But ,where the world all too often fails the poor man and the destitues, time and time again, God sends his mercy and His pity where he will, when he wills, and lightens the burden of the rejects of society.  And so, the widow, Mrs. Obiageli, sat in her nice starched ankara wrapper, with a neat white blouse and gingerly dabbed the sweaty fore head of her beloved son, the armed robber.  To the casual observer it would have been impossible to have ascertained  upon looking that this was a man who ran around at night with guns, as a aura of peace and tranquility surrounded the pair.  On his chest sat a small picture card of the sacred heart of Jesus, and by his side was a picture of the Blessed Virgin.  He opened his eyes and looked upon his mother, " mama I am sweating please wipe my forehead."
And she obediently continued with her motions.
In due course the constable from the police station arrived to investigate the gun shot victim and whether there was sufficient evidence to apprehend the man who presumably must have been involved in some  illegal affair. 
" No, officer," he answered mildly, as his strength was diminishing with the fever that was ravaging his body and he spoke in a barely audible whisper." No, it is not me, I was shot by robbers in Asata on my way home.'
" You were on your way home from where?" the constable queried him with his eye brows dancing in his fore head " You have just said you have no job, so if you have no job where do you go that you get shot, Eh?"
The boys mother shook her head but said nothing. Then after a pause, the boy responded, again with difficulty," Constable, I went to the market and stopped at a bar before I went to return home. And it was in the bar that I think the armed robbers saw me and followed me out.."
"If you have no job how come you are in the bar buying beer? E jo, you be thief, only thief wey get money to spend in bar."
The boy shuddered, but as he was too sick to argue his fate, and he had just been medicated with a pain killer, he fell into a deep sleep and the constable not seing himself able to make any more headway at the time, left to return to his other investigations.  It had appeared to him that the boy was a liar, but then no crimes had been reported the night the boy was shot and as such there was really nothing to charge him with.

A recipe for Nigerian stew.

This stew might come in handy for your weightloss diet. I find that the use of the fresh ingredients make this healthy   Please note that this stew recipe does not include meat or fish.  It is a base stew which can be prepared ahead of time, and as it contains no meat or fish it can hold in a refridgerator for two weeks, or in a freezer for four months.  If you want to have a meat or fish stew take out from the base and add to the meat or fish, however, once you add meat or fish to the stew it will only stay good for three days in refridgerator, frozen longer. At all times boil meat first on it's own and the remove it from the stock and then add to the stew.  the stock must be refridgerated so that all the fat will solidify, and then scrape off the fat  from the stock before you use it.  For chicken, make sure you remove all skin before cooking in the same way after making the chicken stock refridgerate and remove the solidified oils.

2 fresh Red bell peppers( sweet.)
1 or 2 orange habanero peppers
2 medium sized sweet yellow onions or 1 large.
10 Roma tomatoes.
1 can crushed tomatoes 16 oz-24 oz.
1 can hunts tomato paste.
Sea salt to taste.
Cayenne pepper dried to taste.
Freshly ground black pepper to taste.
2-4 table spoons of corn, groundnut, or mazola oil.

In a food processor adding as little water as possible blend all the fresh ingredients, then place in a large pot and begin cooking on medium heat, as soon as mixture starts boiling reduce the heat to low and add the canned tomatoes and tomatoe paste.  Continue to steam this stew for about 1 1/2 hours on low heat until all the liquid has evaporated.  then add 2 - 4 tablespoons of corn or mazola  oil, increase heat, and fry the stew for five to ten minutes stirring  all the while.