I need not bore you with the rethorics of primary reason behind the scheme formation, from what i deduced from my sister oral's history, i realised that, its a thing of luxury to have been educated in Lagos, crudely or sophisticated.
Thus, i made up my mind, infact, my sister's story heralded my NYSC's zeal.
I served in Imo state, Ehime Mbano L.G.A, on arrival, immediately after leaving the camp, i stayed with couple of friends at the popular NYSC lodge, situated at Aba Branch later moved on to my own quarter provided by my employer a secondary school known as Umuanunu Comprehensive High School.
I settled quickly among my host, the ibos, with this parochial thought that ibos, are money conscious, relatively bad, no thanks to the series of lessons given to me by my folks, that ibos are these, ibos are that(all negative).
To my surprise, ibos are friendly people, accommodating, cheerful givers.
We, i mean all corp members were helped in one or the other, like every society, there would be the bad apples.
MY XPERIENCE AS A TEACHER
I realised that, some part of the federation are lagging behind academically, like i did told some corp member friends that, some students if not all can't even meet up to Lagos standard (no pun intended) i did my best to encouraged the students that, the only way out is education, at least, the basics, a government tutor, that almost ended up as an English teacher.
I challenged the students in many ways, forced them out of their comfort zones, subjected them to series of thought provoking questions and the best were rewarded with Gift items bought with my money, i must confessed, i enjoyed doing it and if situation calls for such gesture, i would gladly offer my all.
I met one young woman, age 10-12(am not sure), a j.s.sIII student, whose name i cant remember, at first, sturborn, but naturally intelligent, an introvert, who will answer all my question whenever i walk into their class when they are doing nothing, i only teach the senior classes. She will reject the prize and told me, she was expecting something more meaningfull, and not perished items, like pack of noodles (assorted) she told me i could have gotten them educational gift items like Mathsets, school bags and note books.
I was amazed, although, i was planing towards something like that untill......
The young girl told me an amazing story that moved me to tears, we became good friend when we met at a Birthday party of another young lad of her age group, accompany by her elder sister, there she opened up, we had a tete a tete, i asked her what she intends studying, she told me she wants to be a lawyer, she was emphatic about it. I probed, why, and she was reluctant, i assured her that she could trust me, she later opened up that one of her brothers was erroneously imprisoned and that was the reason she wants to study law.(would have said more, but, its someone else information)
MY NEIGHBOURHOOD XPERIENCE
Day one i moved into my 0.5 star accommodation, my immediate neighbour prepared a rich plate of rice with tomato sauce, the only thing missing, no paper, mostly ibos dont eat paper, unlike we yorubas, we doesn't joke with papper, infact there's a saying regarding papper consumption that; a soul that doesnt eat papper, is a worthless soul.
I enjoyed every single day spent with the people, a village, closer to nature, saw varieties of greens, i ate banga soup for the first time in Imo.
A predominately christian community, 99% more of catholics, i live between the boundary between two communities, Umuanunu and Ezeoke, they are kindred, virtually everything is competition, with mutual respect, but could be otherwise once in a while. The Umuanunus are predominately catholics while Ezeokes are protestant, and catholic's saying must not be mentioned in their compound, though am always welcomed and i do teased them by saying or reading the popular Ave Maria, and the women in the compound will shouted, coppa! and laugh it off.
I could go on and on and on.
Lastly, i never wanted to comeback home, Lagos and i could safely concluded that, there is much to celebrate in our differences, and we should never judge others from where we are standing, rather judge them from where they are standing.
In essence, i've been a prejudice and ethnocentric to some extent, but my NYSC experience had changed all that.
I don't know about you.
Thanks
'damilola simeoni
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