I had a mixed feeling when I saw wangu's pant hanging by the
window. At first, I wanted to reach for it. But everyone's eye was on the pant,
only the ugly one and I knew what transpired so there was no need reaching for
it.
Now I knew the reason he was excited. He had carried out his background plot without giving out a hint. He perfected and executed it without any hitches. Now he can gloat about it.
On my part, I was kind of relieved it was his military friend that owned the voice. Worse things would have happened if it was the Rsm or sgt Banjo.
I could afford a smile as he danced around the last time before relaxing on his bed for some minutes. He opened his locker and brought out the four pieces of condoms remaining and brought it closer to me.
"Just one week ago there were 21 condoms here. Now look what's left." He said and we both laughed.
That morning marked a new dimension of friendship between the ugly one and I. We both agreed to call-off the wager as it somehow disrupts the flow of things. In its place, we formed a new alliance that would sinfully conquer assaya camp and bring home trophies. We sat at our corner and recounted our individual escapades. He was keen about my stories as he found them interesting. My adventure with the attendant at delta kitchen restaurant impressed him so much. He said he never knew I could be so flirtatious. He recounted his own ordeal and told me about his photographer friend whose room he uses off-camp. He gisted me about the girl he picked up at the club for his friend and how he f'u'c'ke'd the girl. He swore that the girl had the tightest c'u'n't he has ever experienced and that he collected the girl's number and would love to see her again.
I asked how he managed to use the military quarters in having his escapades. He told me it was his military friend that helped organise the show.
We shared the condoms remaining and he promised to get a new set of 21 condoms that day.
The biggle was blown for morning parade and the usual morning activities started.
****************************
Day 9 - Wednesday
****************************
The morning devotion was carried out as usual. OBS gave the morning news highlighting recent happenings both within camp, and outside the camp. The director of sports made announcement about the schedule of sporting activities. The first football match was going to be between camp selected 11 players and the Assaya youth team from the community. After which the inter-platoon matches will kick off in ernest. He announced that the time table for the volleyball and football matches will be out later.
I searched for Wangu and found her at one extreme. She must be searching for me too as she was looking around. As the announcement went on, she walked over to my side of the line and fixed herself beside me. I took the attendance for the day and came back beside her as the Rsm took over while the flag was hoisted. It was announced that the fainters' platoon has satisfied the camp disciplinary committee with the level of thorough clean up they did at the camp and everyone laughed and clapped for us. We were informed that our man'o'war special activity would be on that evening while we may proceed to the accounts department and sign our transport allowance. Another round of clapping.
After the announcement, as the man'o'war morning drills was about to start, wangu and I had a brief conversation. She wanted to know what happened after she ran off. I told her the military man tried to come after her, so I wrestled him, and after a while, I broke loose from him and ran off.
"Do you thinks its banjo?" She asked.
"I'm sure its not him. I saw him in front of the army quarters with singlet and boxers when I was entering the hostel that night." I had to lie. That was the only explanation I could give her to rest her mind.
The morning drill started. I couldn't do much of the drills because I still felt small pain in my achillis. I sat behind and watched as they did the drills. It was as interesting as ever, with the funny songs they were singing;
Eieeiee, yawa go dey!
Eieeeiee, yawa go dey!
If allowi no dey yawa go dey!
If allowi come dey morale go high!
Then the shouts of "M-O-R-A-L-E" from the man'o'war and an immediate response of "HIGH!" from the corpers.
Corper no dey suffer!
Dey no dey beg for food!
Transport allowance!
Na their money oohhh.
Monthly allowance
Na their monthly oohh
M-O-R-A-L-E. . . High!
And so on.
I sat back and watched as others danced and ran around the pitch.
"Why are you not with them?"
I turned and saw adeola coming from behind. She sat close to my spot as she looked and expected an answer from me.
"I strained my leg," I informed her.
"Eiyaaa, kpele." She replied me and continued, "I hate this morning parade, one silly military woman just entered our hostel and pursued us."
I noticed that military men don't enter inside the female hostel, they just stand close to it while they blow the biggle. So most girls easily dodge the morning parade by remaining inside the hostel quietly until the military men leave. Seems its been noticed, and the military women decided to enter inside and pursue them.
"The yeye woman even poured some people dirty water." She continued.
Sgt Banjo walked to where we sat and said, rather calmly, "what are you two doing there?"
I explained to him that I strained my leg and he asked adeola.
"You strain you leg too?"
"Something like that sir," and he smiled.
"You," he said to me, "so na dis wan you dey pursue now? You don leave the other wan?"
I smiled as he said this. Adeola asked which one is "this one" and "the other one" and sgt banjo started laughing.
"No follow dis man oh, him na bad boy," he replied adeola.
"Wetin be your name nau?" He was asking adeola and she replied.
He must really like women for him to be this friendly to me just to get adeola's attention.
"You dey my platoon?", he asked adeola and she replied.
"Why I no dey see you nau. . ."
I knew where the whole question and answer session was going so I excused myself and left them.
I went and joined wangu where she was with a group of female corpers in my platoon. The morning drills was over and the parade will soon start. We both left the group and talked alone. She gave me a list of all the items needed to be bought. Football, volleyball, hiring of jersey for football, costumes for drama group, dance group and so on.
"What were you guys discussing with Banjo?" She asked as I previewed the list.
"Nothing much, he was just looking for an excuse to get friendly with adeola, so I left them." I answered her and looked towards their direction to find him still talking with adeola.
"Womaniser!" She said bitterly.
"Easy, I thought you've forgotten about him?" I asked her. I knew it would be impossible for her to totally forget him and the little affair they had, but the bitterness in her showed pure undiluted hatred.
"He's a married man for crying out loud!"
"that's the life of a military man," I informed her. Its no big deal to them.
After moments of silence as I inspected the list once more, she said;
"This is the third time you saved me in this camp."
"Huh?"
"First time, you saved me from sgt banjo, second time, you saved me while I fainted and you took me to medical camp. Last night, you asked me to run to my hostel while you stayed back and fought a military man, an action which would have gotten you decamped."
I looked on with interest as she said all these, wondering the direction she was going.
"Why are you doing all these for me?"
I knew what she wanted to hear; I haven't really thought about it in that direction, and I was sure I'm not in love with her; not for a bit.
Love is too deep to start meddling with inside a camp. There are so many factors that should be considered while trading on the real love issue; such factors are not found inside the camp. Camp is isolated and could not be refered to as the real world. A love affair could be triggered by the wrong signals which may exist inside asaya camp but cannot exist in the real world.
"Like I told you while we worked at the kitchen, I care about you. I wouldn't want you to be hurt, you are my assistant and I need you to be focus in preparing lists such as this," I said as I waved the list in my hand and she smiled. I noticed she wanted to say something else, but changed her mind at the last minute.
The morning parade started as the camp band thundered the marching beats.
After the morning parade, I held a brief meeting with my platoon members. I asked those I handed over some camp activities to report their progress and they did. The volleyball team leader informed me she was having problems recruiting players as none of the girls knows how to play. I asked her to start a training session for the ladies. I would be present to help in teaching since I could play myself.
We deliberated on the amount to task ourselves; some members informed us that other platoons are contributing N500. It was not just sports and social activity the money will be used for. They are planning on throwing a mini-party few days to end of camp. We agreed to do the same and I appointed two ladies and a guy as the financial crew to collect, record and keep the money.
After assigning duties to many of them to ensure I carried everyone around, I dismissed them and retired to my hostel.
On my way down, I called oge and we talked for sometime. She informed me she was in her platoon's volleyball team and they've commenced training already.
The breakfast served in the kitchen was bread as I saw some corpers returning with bread and tea. After having my bath, I collected my meal card and headed to the kitchen, I wanted to eat bread.
I queued up, when it got to my turn, the girl ticking the meal ticket was suprised that my card was still plain without a single tick.
"You don't eat here regularly?" She asked as she tried to tick the appropriate spot.
"Not all times" I replied her.
"You must be a big boy to be feeding on mami every meal." She smiled at me.
"Well, if I was a big boy I wouldn't be queued up here waiting for a loaf." I replied.
"Where's you cup for tea?" She asked as she handed me back my meal ticket.
"Don't worry, I need just the bread." She smiled as I walked out.
I bought some akara balls, sat in one of the shops and ate my bread and akara. After that, I headed to the accounts department to sign my transport allowance but there was fresh crowd there mostly from my platoon. They all hailed me 'platoon leader'. I stayed back, gisted with few guys I assigned tasks to. They were doing fine. Sani had already bought a football and they've started practise. It was obvious I couldn't sign the money that day so I went to the game centre to play chess.
The biggle for lectures was blown, the game centre closed, the accounts department closed, so did all the joints at mami; everybody headed for the ever boring lectures.
Ms Enoh was one of the officials at the high table inside the lecture hall. The speakers continued their ever boring lectures. One of them was trying to get corpers to join her networking group. She didn't call it that initially; she just painted it with fine colours, describing how you just need to enter with 5k, then receive a monthly payment of close to 80k with other bonuses such as an all expense paid trip to south africa and so on.
The EFCC, NEMA (National Emergency Management Agency) Road Safety and MDG's groups delivered interesting lectures and called for members to join them. You are to join anyone of your choice and will continue it as your CDS during your PPA.
Those where the only interesting lectures worthy to listen to.
As other boring lectures continued, I sent a text message to Ms Enoh and watched her reaction as she reached for her phone to read the text;
"You didn't tell me you are back? Hope the boyfriend treated you nicely" reply.
I could see her smile as her face lightened up. It was obvious she also was bored with the lectures. She typed her reply;
"Stop monitoring me, I'm not your girlfriend. Btw, I went for an official assignment at okene."
I read the text and smiled. She looked around the hall and I knew she was searching for my face. It would be hard for her to see me where I was.
I replied the text;
"You look great, the official assignment must have been refreshing. I hope you came back with my decamping letter" reply
She smiled once more as she typed on her phone;
"I changed my mind. I don't need a decamping letter, what I need is a gun, trust me, I brought back one. Don't come close to me again else I will shoot!
It was a funny text. I didn't reply immediately. I watched her as she glanced at her phone every 10 seconds, anticipating a reply.
Finally, when the reply was not forthcoming, she sent another text;
"Still there?? Reply"
I smiled. She's hooked. I sent a reply;
"You got me scared! A gun!!! You need another platoon leader asap!
The smile grew to a large laugh as she read the text. She tried to control herself as she was visibly disrupting those at the high table with her chuckles.
I saw her hitting her phone keypad once more;
"Don't worry, I won't shoot. Mrs Okhi is still at office, I will send for you when she goes back. Over and out."
Mrs. Okhi was the woman she shared the office and apartment with. I smiled to myself as I read this final text. Let's pray Mrs Okhi doesn't descide to sleep over this night.
Somehow, god decided to answer this sinful prayer of mine. . .
It was a memorable outing. . .
Now I knew the reason he was excited. He had carried out his background plot without giving out a hint. He perfected and executed it without any hitches. Now he can gloat about it.
On my part, I was kind of relieved it was his military friend that owned the voice. Worse things would have happened if it was the Rsm or sgt Banjo.
I could afford a smile as he danced around the last time before relaxing on his bed for some minutes. He opened his locker and brought out the four pieces of condoms remaining and brought it closer to me.
"Just one week ago there were 21 condoms here. Now look what's left." He said and we both laughed.
That morning marked a new dimension of friendship between the ugly one and I. We both agreed to call-off the wager as it somehow disrupts the flow of things. In its place, we formed a new alliance that would sinfully conquer assaya camp and bring home trophies. We sat at our corner and recounted our individual escapades. He was keen about my stories as he found them interesting. My adventure with the attendant at delta kitchen restaurant impressed him so much. He said he never knew I could be so flirtatious. He recounted his own ordeal and told me about his photographer friend whose room he uses off-camp. He gisted me about the girl he picked up at the club for his friend and how he f'u'c'ke'd the girl. He swore that the girl had the tightest c'u'n't he has ever experienced and that he collected the girl's number and would love to see her again.
I asked how he managed to use the military quarters in having his escapades. He told me it was his military friend that helped organise the show.
We shared the condoms remaining and he promised to get a new set of 21 condoms that day.
The biggle was blown for morning parade and the usual morning activities started.
****************************
Day 9 - Wednesday
****************************
The morning devotion was carried out as usual. OBS gave the morning news highlighting recent happenings both within camp, and outside the camp. The director of sports made announcement about the schedule of sporting activities. The first football match was going to be between camp selected 11 players and the Assaya youth team from the community. After which the inter-platoon matches will kick off in ernest. He announced that the time table for the volleyball and football matches will be out later.
I searched for Wangu and found her at one extreme. She must be searching for me too as she was looking around. As the announcement went on, she walked over to my side of the line and fixed herself beside me. I took the attendance for the day and came back beside her as the Rsm took over while the flag was hoisted. It was announced that the fainters' platoon has satisfied the camp disciplinary committee with the level of thorough clean up they did at the camp and everyone laughed and clapped for us. We were informed that our man'o'war special activity would be on that evening while we may proceed to the accounts department and sign our transport allowance. Another round of clapping.
After the announcement, as the man'o'war morning drills was about to start, wangu and I had a brief conversation. She wanted to know what happened after she ran off. I told her the military man tried to come after her, so I wrestled him, and after a while, I broke loose from him and ran off.
"Do you thinks its banjo?" She asked.
"I'm sure its not him. I saw him in front of the army quarters with singlet and boxers when I was entering the hostel that night." I had to lie. That was the only explanation I could give her to rest her mind.
The morning drill started. I couldn't do much of the drills because I still felt small pain in my achillis. I sat behind and watched as they did the drills. It was as interesting as ever, with the funny songs they were singing;
Eieeiee, yawa go dey!
Eieeeiee, yawa go dey!
If allowi no dey yawa go dey!
If allowi come dey morale go high!
Then the shouts of "M-O-R-A-L-E" from the man'o'war and an immediate response of "HIGH!" from the corpers.
Corper no dey suffer!
Dey no dey beg for food!
Transport allowance!
Na their money oohhh.
Monthly allowance
Na their monthly oohh
M-O-R-A-L-E. . . High!
And so on.
I sat back and watched as others danced and ran around the pitch.
"Why are you not with them?"
I turned and saw adeola coming from behind. She sat close to my spot as she looked and expected an answer from me.
"I strained my leg," I informed her.
"Eiyaaa, kpele." She replied me and continued, "I hate this morning parade, one silly military woman just entered our hostel and pursued us."
I noticed that military men don't enter inside the female hostel, they just stand close to it while they blow the biggle. So most girls easily dodge the morning parade by remaining inside the hostel quietly until the military men leave. Seems its been noticed, and the military women decided to enter inside and pursue them.
"The yeye woman even poured some people dirty water." She continued.
Sgt Banjo walked to where we sat and said, rather calmly, "what are you two doing there?"
I explained to him that I strained my leg and he asked adeola.
"You strain you leg too?"
"Something like that sir," and he smiled.
"You," he said to me, "so na dis wan you dey pursue now? You don leave the other wan?"
I smiled as he said this. Adeola asked which one is "this one" and "the other one" and sgt banjo started laughing.
"No follow dis man oh, him na bad boy," he replied adeola.
"Wetin be your name nau?" He was asking adeola and she replied.
He must really like women for him to be this friendly to me just to get adeola's attention.
"You dey my platoon?", he asked adeola and she replied.
"Why I no dey see you nau. . ."
I knew where the whole question and answer session was going so I excused myself and left them.
I went and joined wangu where she was with a group of female corpers in my platoon. The morning drills was over and the parade will soon start. We both left the group and talked alone. She gave me a list of all the items needed to be bought. Football, volleyball, hiring of jersey for football, costumes for drama group, dance group and so on.
"What were you guys discussing with Banjo?" She asked as I previewed the list.
"Nothing much, he was just looking for an excuse to get friendly with adeola, so I left them." I answered her and looked towards their direction to find him still talking with adeola.
"Womaniser!" She said bitterly.
"Easy, I thought you've forgotten about him?" I asked her. I knew it would be impossible for her to totally forget him and the little affair they had, but the bitterness in her showed pure undiluted hatred.
"He's a married man for crying out loud!"
"that's the life of a military man," I informed her. Its no big deal to them.
After moments of silence as I inspected the list once more, she said;
"This is the third time you saved me in this camp."
"Huh?"
"First time, you saved me from sgt banjo, second time, you saved me while I fainted and you took me to medical camp. Last night, you asked me to run to my hostel while you stayed back and fought a military man, an action which would have gotten you decamped."
I looked on with interest as she said all these, wondering the direction she was going.
"Why are you doing all these for me?"
I knew what she wanted to hear; I haven't really thought about it in that direction, and I was sure I'm not in love with her; not for a bit.
Love is too deep to start meddling with inside a camp. There are so many factors that should be considered while trading on the real love issue; such factors are not found inside the camp. Camp is isolated and could not be refered to as the real world. A love affair could be triggered by the wrong signals which may exist inside asaya camp but cannot exist in the real world.
"Like I told you while we worked at the kitchen, I care about you. I wouldn't want you to be hurt, you are my assistant and I need you to be focus in preparing lists such as this," I said as I waved the list in my hand and she smiled. I noticed she wanted to say something else, but changed her mind at the last minute.
The morning parade started as the camp band thundered the marching beats.
After the morning parade, I held a brief meeting with my platoon members. I asked those I handed over some camp activities to report their progress and they did. The volleyball team leader informed me she was having problems recruiting players as none of the girls knows how to play. I asked her to start a training session for the ladies. I would be present to help in teaching since I could play myself.
We deliberated on the amount to task ourselves; some members informed us that other platoons are contributing N500. It was not just sports and social activity the money will be used for. They are planning on throwing a mini-party few days to end of camp. We agreed to do the same and I appointed two ladies and a guy as the financial crew to collect, record and keep the money.
After assigning duties to many of them to ensure I carried everyone around, I dismissed them and retired to my hostel.
On my way down, I called oge and we talked for sometime. She informed me she was in her platoon's volleyball team and they've commenced training already.
The breakfast served in the kitchen was bread as I saw some corpers returning with bread and tea. After having my bath, I collected my meal card and headed to the kitchen, I wanted to eat bread.
I queued up, when it got to my turn, the girl ticking the meal ticket was suprised that my card was still plain without a single tick.
"You don't eat here regularly?" She asked as she tried to tick the appropriate spot.
"Not all times" I replied her.
"You must be a big boy to be feeding on mami every meal." She smiled at me.
"Well, if I was a big boy I wouldn't be queued up here waiting for a loaf." I replied.
"Where's you cup for tea?" She asked as she handed me back my meal ticket.
"Don't worry, I need just the bread." She smiled as I walked out.
I bought some akara balls, sat in one of the shops and ate my bread and akara. After that, I headed to the accounts department to sign my transport allowance but there was fresh crowd there mostly from my platoon. They all hailed me 'platoon leader'. I stayed back, gisted with few guys I assigned tasks to. They were doing fine. Sani had already bought a football and they've started practise. It was obvious I couldn't sign the money that day so I went to the game centre to play chess.
The biggle for lectures was blown, the game centre closed, the accounts department closed, so did all the joints at mami; everybody headed for the ever boring lectures.
Ms Enoh was one of the officials at the high table inside the lecture hall. The speakers continued their ever boring lectures. One of them was trying to get corpers to join her networking group. She didn't call it that initially; she just painted it with fine colours, describing how you just need to enter with 5k, then receive a monthly payment of close to 80k with other bonuses such as an all expense paid trip to south africa and so on.
The EFCC, NEMA (National Emergency Management Agency) Road Safety and MDG's groups delivered interesting lectures and called for members to join them. You are to join anyone of your choice and will continue it as your CDS during your PPA.
Those where the only interesting lectures worthy to listen to.
As other boring lectures continued, I sent a text message to Ms Enoh and watched her reaction as she reached for her phone to read the text;
"You didn't tell me you are back? Hope the boyfriend treated you nicely" reply.
I could see her smile as her face lightened up. It was obvious she also was bored with the lectures. She typed her reply;
"Stop monitoring me, I'm not your girlfriend. Btw, I went for an official assignment at okene."
I read the text and smiled. She looked around the hall and I knew she was searching for my face. It would be hard for her to see me where I was.
I replied the text;
"You look great, the official assignment must have been refreshing. I hope you came back with my decamping letter" reply
She smiled once more as she typed on her phone;
"I changed my mind. I don't need a decamping letter, what I need is a gun, trust me, I brought back one. Don't come close to me again else I will shoot!
It was a funny text. I didn't reply immediately. I watched her as she glanced at her phone every 10 seconds, anticipating a reply.
Finally, when the reply was not forthcoming, she sent another text;
"Still there?? Reply"
I smiled. She's hooked. I sent a reply;
"You got me scared! A gun!!! You need another platoon leader asap!
The smile grew to a large laugh as she read the text. She tried to control herself as she was visibly disrupting those at the high table with her chuckles.
I saw her hitting her phone keypad once more;
"Don't worry, I won't shoot. Mrs Okhi is still at office, I will send for you when she goes back. Over and out."
Mrs. Okhi was the woman she shared the office and apartment with. I smiled to myself as I read this final text. Let's pray Mrs Okhi doesn't descide to sleep over this night.
Somehow, god decided to answer this sinful prayer of mine. . .
It was a memorable outing. . .
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