I believe joy must feel different to everyone. What joy feels like to me must be different from what joy feels like to you. But sadness must be universal, and so must grief. Losing someone you love is the highest quality grief you would ever feel. I am sorry about the word quality. But the depth and breath of that emotion give to its quality. But you see, losing yourself is the greatest loss...
My time in Enugu taught me a few things about myself, in the way travelling does. I have a great fondness for locales with lots of old trees clustered together. And so I loved the village a lot. It was free, it was fun, I was very happy. Travelling engages you especially for a child’s curious mind. I asked an endless numbers of question on my first sights of many things. The zuma rock was...
Nkita was the first Igbo word I learnt. I do not think I knew another Igbo word for a long time after that. I am fluent in my language now. I will tell you the story of how I learnt to speak it later. During the time I spent in Enugu away from Kaduna, I managed to drink kerosene because I thought it was water. I had my first taste of breadfruit. I did not like it then. I do not like it now. My...
This is the story of my life. I have found it is necessary to not take life personally. I failed at a lot of things. I hope at the end of this series I have started to win at more things than I fail at. And that my successes are on a scale tremendously bigger than my failures. CN is an acronym of my name. CN is the first of five children born to Igbo parents of Nigeria, born in northern Kaduna...
It was a chilled day at work and all of a sudden, here comes the lingering debate on who the biggest afro-beat artist is. At the heart of this are my work colleagues; Belema, a sworn member of the Wizkid’s FC nation, and Sayo a loyal daughter of the 30BG family. Who wins an argument against a Nigerian??? Good thing both are… Amidst all these, their fantasies didn’t fascinate...
The world as we know it today is built on the ruins of impossibilities. Every groundbreaking achievement—whether in science, technology, medicine, or human resilience—was once deemed impossible. If history has taught us anything, it is that “impossible” is merely a temporary state of mind, not an absolute reality. Many people allow doubt to become a wall between them and their dreams...
Growing up, I often heard the saying, “The journey of a thousand miles begins with a step.” But it wasn’t until I heard an old man tell a story that I truly understood it. He spoke of a boy named Tunde who dreamed of becoming a scholar. However, he lived in a small village with no access to books or teachers. His dream seemed too far away, and fear of the long road ahead made...
In a world that’s always buzzing with things to do, boredom has become something we try to escape at all costs. We fill every spare moment with our phones, social media, and endless to-do lists. But what if boredom is actually a gift? What if those quiet, empty moments are exactly what we need to grow in ways we rarely consider? One surprising benefit of boredom is that it’s a spark for...
It’s 1 am and I’m up on my bed, sleep has disappeared from my eyes again. This is the third time in a row that I’m up at midnight and can’t seem to go back to sleep. I started having flashbacks of my life as a kid, the first memory that came to my mind was an exciting one, it was when my mum got me a bicycle as a surprise gift. She had just returned from a long journey and I was at home helping...
Two days ago I went into a supermarket with a friend who wanted to buy a pack of juice, we went in, saw what we were looking for, and quickly made our way to the counter, reaching the payment point the young lady, scanned and told us the bill, and to our greatest surprise it was N6,000 higher than the price we know, my friend complained that it was above her budget but what can we do...