The first project I embarked on was the environmental Sanitation with my students. They really gave me their support I never
allowed the discouragement I got from the Principal the first time I mentioned of embarking on a personal project. Those students gave me their support as we cleaned up the whole school environment on that day. Though I had been having extra mural classes with them on their subjects, English Language, because they needed to study hard as exam class. On the day of sanitation I bought big waste basket and five brooms with my money and to kick off my project. However, we made use of it for the sanitation. It was an awesome experience. I felt good.To be of use to the world is the only way to happiness. Hans Christian Anderson
After the Sanitation I left them in the care of the class prefects of JSS3A and JSS3B. Though, later I found out the form mistress later carried it to her house I didn’t know why. When I mentioned it to LGI as how far I had gone with the project he was angry with me that I was supposed to come to him first before embarking on anything. He was right but I was running out of time, so I never wanted anyone to discourage me too. I submitted my proposal letter later after I had already embarked on it. Even when he directed me to go and make a very good and complete proposal letter, fulling the requirements before he would accept my proposal. He demanded i go through the guide of NYSC CDS projects to help me to write good proposal before approval. He discovered I already used my money to buy those things for the sanitation. It was on hearing this that he warned me not to use my money on community projects again.
“Meanwhile you can get a guide from ABC of community Development Service CDS/10
Those are what you must include in your proposal letter,” said Mr Mbonu, LGI Njikoka. “you can also attach your permission letter,” he advised. I left with the local government "public address system" which I never knew couldn’t serve any purpose because I didn't discover on time it wasn't charged.
That same day, I had met the Oyeagu market chairman. I received a phone call, 2nd son actually asked me to come to Awka that even at same place we met the last time. If only he knew how scared I was that day he wouldn’t have given it a thought at all. That was the night before my proposed Sensitization on Lassa Fever and CoronaVirus at Oyeagu. He was actually persuading me to do this even when I was frustrated and about giving up on the projects because I wasn't getting enough medical equipment. Though LGI started by telling me things that nearly discouraged, even though he released the public address system but he advised that I started later and he doubted my ability to complete the whole ten proposed projects before my passing out. Before i had barely five months to go.
Mr Ike, 2nd son advised I stop at any pharmacy that they would release sanitizer and hand gloove and nose mask though I doubted how easy that was going to be. On my way back from school I decided to stop by Renas Pharmacy Limited, shop 1&2 Elshaddai Plaza, Ezi Elias Enugwu Ukwu. I had patronized them few times on cosmetics, so I had confidence since they knew I was a corps member probably telling them of my proposal would not be a big deal to convince them. I introduced myself, and declared my proposal but the sales attendant, said that it wasn’t a public pharmacy but private that it was against them to release anything besides they weren’t the owner and the owner wasn’t running charity organization. I was amazed. It shocked me to hear they werent a charity organization as if I was asking for personal use. I went to the house and went to Okpala hospital close by with that confusion.
One moment of patience may ward off great disaster; one moment of impatience may ruin a whole life. Unknown
I always wanted to finish what I had already started, so I was patient enough and more tolerance since I had reached agreement with the chairman of Oyeagu market that Tuesday. Apprised him of our coming the next day which should be Tuesday I didn't have to fail. I had been mobilizing medical Corps members to join me on that Sensitization so going back now due to the financial and material constraints was completely out of my plan.
When I got to Okpala hospital, I met a nurse, looking at the corner before the door post was a tap bucket filled with water, I told the nurse who was a nursing mother, busy breastfeeding her baby. I told her my mission, she excused me to inform the doctor upstairs. Okpala hospital had been benevolent to corps members and entire members of the village, we had benefited from the hospital through getting free water since my stay at the family house. So I was confident of getting support from them.
Shortly the nurse came out with small bottle of sanitizer of either #500 as at then with two nose mask. But I never expected that. It wouldn’t serve us in any way. Looking at my face I was disappointed, I sent my regards when I found out that they weren’t going to release more. That was actually the one they were willing to release. Walking through the gate the nurse called me back and one of the doctors gave me some rough hand glooves I never appreciated that because I never needed them. “Manage it okay, sanitizer and nose mask are on high demand and because of this there is increase in price and scarcity of those materials too,” one the workers advised me because he saw disappointment written all over my face. I left, I decided to go back to the family house but later summoned courage to try at Amawbia where 2nd son suggested I should go.
Be not afraid of going slowly, be afraid of standing still. Chinese proverb
When I stopped at Ekeawka I phoned him, he said I should come to the same spot at Aroma, Indigo hotel precisely. But I had already decided not to go to that hotel with him again. I had a negative feeling and my intuition was not good at all. I should thank my stars for walking away free the other time. However, I stopped at a near by pharmacy, it began drizzling I entered into the pharmacy but the manager denied me help. It was an expensive pharmacy I wandered why they did same thing Rena did. I believed they had branches across Nigeria just like Rena. With that disappointment I still decided to try another pharmacy because I looked across and noticed there were many pharmacies at that Ekeawka. I told 2nd son that I had to go, he insisted I should come that there was one particular pharmacy he would help me secure some from. He encouraged me that with his influence and the evidence I had with me which was my NYSC cap and SDG letter, they would be convinced to release somethimg to me. I pretended I never heard him and hanged the phone.
Some group of people there directed me that there was another pharmacy opposite there. I made my way to cross the road with rain drizzling on my body almost getting me wet. It was very important to me and I was bent at achieving my goal the next day. So I wouldn’t mind any insults and abusing words I might get in pursuit of my goal. All I wanted was a rationale goal which I believed the Sensitization was one of the kind. I ignored the stress. When I entered into the pharmacy almost opposite Joez pharmacy was George pharmacy. I met nurses explained to the head who they addressed as mama. She advised me to wait for Dr George. I waited for two hours. 99% of customers coming in to the pharmacy was demanding for hand sanitizer just the way it was at Joez. While I was waiting he entered without my notice because i didn't know him, in fact it was my first time coming there and seated right beside me was another man waiting.
An essential aspect of creativity is not being afraid to fail. Dr. Edwin Land
One of the nurses told me he was around and showed me a chair to sit on close by his office. I went and sat down. When one woman who came with the teenager who was lean, she was very sick and after her injection they left. Mr Emeka was seated by my right hand side. I asked if he was also waiting for him, he said no he was waiting for someone else.
When the Dr finally walked out of his office looking fragile and very weak, Mr Emeka was about informing him how long I had been waiting but he said, “ Is that more important than my stomach. I’m very hungry I have to eat,” he left. I frowned my face. “You have to wait," Mr Emeka advised. “They said we should not embark on any community project with our personal money. It is against NYSC regulatory act,” I said. Emeka still thought I was begging for personal sanitizer until I told him I was embarking on Sensitization the next day. But I couldn’t get enough. After telling him my story thinking that he would help, considering what I had heard that individuals could help during the course of carrying personal projects.
No man is ready to invest penny on something they aren't going to reap from.
Mr Emeka informed me of his going when the person he was waiting for had arrived. To my greatest surprise he didn’t do anything to help rather we exchanged contacts. I had been telling 2nd son every single thing that happened, so telling him I was going, he then suggested I come to Unizik Junction. When the bus stopped at Unizik, he still said I should walk through the fly over which was a bridge. I was scared of walking over the bridge. When he persuaded I should come that his car was over there. I saw people walking over the bridge as rain was beating them, I followed the crowd. I was looking like a hawk that was beaten by the rain. I was wet and my wig was socked too.
When I finally saw his car I called and he opened. I hopped in. The first he did was to touch my hair. “Oh, you are wet and your hair too,” I shook my hair to wave off his hand. I wasn’t comfortable with the touch. He drove towards Njikoka, Enugwu Ukwu. He wasn’t happy that I dodged from coming to Aroma.
So when I complained I was going to leave that Sensitization, he persuaded me to do it. I complained I hadn’t enough hand sanitizer and nose mask. He said I should manage it. That it was my fault, he asked me to come that he had a big pharmacy that could help me but I was stubborn to bluntly refuse his offer to offer. So I had to do with the little I had got. I thought that he was going to do something perhaps stop by the pharmacy at Eze Alias junction but he didn’t. I thought he was even going to get some from the so called pharmacy before coming to Unizik Junction. He never told me his plans anyway.
I concluded in my heart that if I had gone to that hotel that night, I would have had another story to tell. As he was driving he asked me to use the seat bet but I refused. I hate using it even when I was on a ride with my brothers. He was always persuasive, I took it and placed it on my neck just like a he-goat that was about to be slaughtered. Just looking like a clown, that when we got to a filling station, the fuel attendant couldn't stop looking at me and my seat bet. It was because of the awkward way I causally placed it I never wanted it and didn't care about what someone would think of me.
It was later that he removed it and loosened it to tighten it on me. “You are a doubting Thomas. You don’t know that seat bet is protective. Just see my cousin who lost his arms and legs at a ghastly motor accident the other day just because he refused to use the seat bet. You have to be careful, Hope,” he warned.
No one can make us feel inferior without our permission. Eleanor Roosevelt
When we got to Eze Elias Junction, he drove me in front of the family house gate which was fenced with zinc and a zinc gate. I had to come down but not until we had our usually goodbye greeting. He brought at his palm, I placed mine. “Goodnight,” he said and I wanted to removed the seat bet but it was dark, I couldn’t see, since I wasn’t used to it, he had to help me remove it, with annoying words to me, "village girl,” I smiled. "You know I am not a village girl,” I said and left him with a goodbye note.
A dawn realization came to me suddenly why he used those blunt words mildly on me. He had been looking for the right word and time to tell me that I was naive that was why I couldn’t decode his feelings the last time we went to Indigo hotel and this time I failed him by accepting his offer to come to the same hotel again. I had always been called names by men and fellow girls. Some said I was so naive and not timid to give greenlight to the signals men always give me.
I always know when a man needed something from me. Most of them had called me bush girl and others timid girl and this one referred to me as a village girl. Was I that local and not able to know the amoral feelings of men and their advances? I know I always brush aside passses men make at me. No doubt I knew when a man wanted to take advantage of my weaknesses to have me warm his bed.
The night before Sensitization on Lassa Fever and CoronaVirus
I was restless. How to embark on such Sensitization. Though I had already spoken to the chairman of Oyeagu market but embarking on the Sensitization without enough hand sanitizer wasn't good at all. What kind of citizens do we have in Nigeria? The wealthy ones didn’t care to help the needy. Nobody wanted to give aid to the poor. I began to imagine how cruel the world and the inhabitants are. I realized how supportive and grateful my students were to have me do extra mural class for them. With all the news they had been hearing that I was having issues with fellow corps members and permanent teachers like Mr Chidi who wanted us to be dating but I didn't accept his proposal. How my students got to know this I couldn’t tell. That happened on the day of environmental sanitation of my project. They gossiped among themselves that it was punishment the Principal gave me for being absent after resumption and resuming late. When I heard the gossip I told them it was a personal CDS project.
Faith makes the uplook good, the outlook bright, the inlook favourable, and the future glorious. V. Raymond Edman
I saw how excited the students were when I announced I was going to embark on a scholarship scheme. They saw the determination in my voice. But unfortunately, the pandemic, CoronaVirus swiped up. I still siezed the opportunity to embark on the Sensitization to sensitize those market men and women who were oblivious of the virus, cause and effect. I decided to give it a try. Organizing for the Sensitization on CoronaVirus and Lassa fever was the difficult decision ever.
I never knew it wasn’t going to be easy at all. Like the saying, nothing good comes easy, this project was a more tedious one. This proposed Sensitization was going to be my third project, I proposed for ten projects and 2nd son asked to know what I hoped to gain for a project, if it was just a project or I had a targeted goal. That was the question he asked on one of our meetings, I believed the meeting we had at Aroma. Read also, the effects of daring to live a perfect life. The day I met six men in a dark guess room at Indigo hotel in Awka that made me forbade never going to take such risk ever again. Listing my projects of ten he confirmed it was worth a National Award if I successfully accomplished them.
I was able to mobilize two medical corps members, who helped me go for the Sensitization and it was successful.
No help is greater than the help you genuinely give yourself
I actually had a big proposal but CoronaVirus colonized it and disrupted my plans and projects. The virus became alarming just like a drumbeat. It was a very noisy Virus.
At night I wandered but decided to give up. When I told Mr Ike of giving up making it the third time, he still refused. Even when I told him that those medical corps members were about to disappoint me that I was not ready to go alone, since I wasn't a medical corps member but a public scientist and a public administrator.
It would make the project unserious and irrelevant. All this was happening on Monday. He said I should try to carry out that Sensitization and he left me confused. He was ewally encouraging person. I love him for being so wonderful and encouraging I bet he never wanted to use his money to buy nothing for the project because I may be reliably irresponsible to depend on him for everything. He wanted me to feel the pain of the process. Everything was happening so fast and at same time. I had appointment with one of the Abba indigenes who happened to be involved in traditional activities according to few people I reached out. I reminisced how it had been since I started my personal project from day one. It hadn’t been funny. Just yesterday how Mr Linus Nwoye took me to Eze Abba's palace when I returned from church. I told him to be sure of his presence since he told me and I had also heard from one old woman of Abba community that the Eze wasn’t staying in Abba rather he only pays weekly or seasonal visit. The woman said he was always around every Oye but he said that Eze would be at Abba on that Sunday.
I made my way to Abba immediately I returned to church, we met at Ngwu Mbezi junction and we took off to the palace of Igwe NC but was so disappointed to hear from his gatekeeper that he traveled back that morning. If Mr Okoye was a small boy I would had given him a hot slap on his face. He didn’t know how long distant I was coming from. I wasted my money and my strength in vain. I had to let him go so that I wouldn’t unleash my anger on him. At least I had known him for something he helped me out with. Talking to me about Ngwo Abba festival, he quenched my curiosity. So he had really been of help to me.
I realized I had gone far, going back would be failure. I began to call Mary sending her articles on Lassa and CoronaVirus to read for tomorrow because she said it was unannounced Sensitization. Evidence in her voice showed she was trying to back off. But I was persuasive and determined. I sent a message to Aderemi Iyanuoluwa Deborah, one of my CDS group corps members, who was also serving at General hospital Enugwu Ukwu. I sent her a note of detailed analysis on COVID19 for her to go through it and prepare herself well for tomorrow. She agreed on coming next morning and even promised to come with one of her friends. I never knew in detail or much about COVID19 then, until that night. Jennifer one of the Batch A1 who was passed out of out camp barely one week because of CoronaVirus. She sent me the message about CoronaVirus and why it was given COVID19.
It was then I got to know that CoronaVirus was a respratory disease spread all the way from China.
A proof that Mr Emeka actually thought I wanted the hand sanitizer for personal use, when I returned from the Sensitization and had travelled home to see my parents, few days later, I got a text message from him. He went as far as sharing me recipe for making homemade hand sanitizer. "What for?" I asked in amazement. This was days later when I had already had the Sensitization at Oyeagu market. "Wonder shall never end!"
Taking a bold step is good when you are walking with your head. Always be conscious of yourself and implore a good sense of reasoning in whatever you are doing. Stay focused and determined while you keep pushing hard untill you press the right button.
Read other stories,
How I felt on my first parade in Umunya camp
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