The reminiscence: by Chinyere B. Onyeneke
The Reminiscence
In well knitted bewilderment, Chi sat on one of the clipped chairs in the lecture theatre in the Faculty of Law gazing at the shadow of this unseen man as if he were a beautiful dream. Of a truth, the young lady was lost in her illusion. Nothing seems to exist any longer for her. She could feel the cupped tales of helplessness. Her head was spinning; her eyes dilating while her mind wandered round the campus like a ghost afraid of being asleep in its abode.. In her subconscious mind, she strolled from the Lecture Theatre 1 to the popular June 12 market where the Fidelity Bank ATM gallery was located.
Still gazing at her imagined lecturer who seemed not to understand her plight with his overwhelming echo that punched her conscious state as she heard…"Privity of Contract!".
“Oh no!” Chi groaned.
“Why! This topic today?” she exclaimed.
She knew the lecturer as one who employed the Socratic teaching method and hence, it was far better not to have attended the class than attending without reading ahead of him because he must always find a culprit to give answers to his numerous critical questions.
Chi had taken to inaudible prayers that he shouldn't sight or throw questions at her in this dream of hers as she was not prepared for the class.
“Lord, let this class pass over me. In fact, let circulars be passed for a general staff meeting”, she prayed.
“Hallo Miss, can you please stand up”, the lecturer said in his cracked voice.
At this point, she instantaneously lost her grip over the worn-out confidence she earlier borrowed to enter the class. The quote of the father of English laws that, "even the devil knows not the intent of a man's heart" became the truth about her existence. Chi’s shyness denied her the permission to take a leave from the class. She just could tell him she wasn’t fit for his question.
"Hey! Young lady, I mean you. Critically, with aid of decided cases, copiously and smartly analyze the concept of Privity of Contract” he sternly called out to her.
“What?” She soliloquized as the many eyes in the class impulsively turned towards her. She realized the ball had strolled into her court and she must sing the song of tension. Her heart sank, as she wished the earth opened instantly to swallow her. There wasn’t a valid answer to the question. Thoughts of how she would go withdraw some money from the ATM gallery and thereafter visit the Isiukwu Health Center for her medical needs were the only things she could club that moment. Besides, she has been famished and could not concentrate on critical engagements. Imaginations, makes hunger look like a written and impromptu examination. She stood up as if all was well and quickly pretended as though she didn’t hear him well enough.
Chi said, "Please sir, could you repeat the question?"
Prof. Bisi, the slim, fair and tall man in his mid-fifties rephrased the question saying "With the aid of decided cases, critically and judiciously analyze the concept of Privity of Contract". Prof. Bisi
not gaining response showed his academic prowess by commenting that "it is very evident in our academic system that some students ought not to be in the University but in advanced secondary schools. How would infants know the pros and cons of the University educational system where every source of knowledge, I mean, distorted ones are at their beck and call? During my undergraduate days, I taught my lecturers” he angrily said.
Chi was not perturbed by the embarrassment the prof. gave her because she knew opportunities would always come for her to prove her scholastic prowess. But then, she chipped in her calculated excuse that, "Yes prof. I am not feeling alright and I need to visit the health center".
"My dear, you should have informed me before now”, Prof. Bisi replied.
In dreams, sympathy is the nearest escape to gaining relief. Chi was deeply amazed at the response and appreciated the benevolent Prof. She quickly scourged for her school bag and ran out of the lecture hall like a lioness chasing its prey. She checked her wristwatch and it was exactly 1:00pm- there’s still time to get things done. She made out for the Fidelity Bank ATM gallery at the famous June 12 Market. The Market was actually named after the historic Nigerian June 12 1993 election crises.
On reaching the ATM gallery at June 12 Market, the crowd were overwhelming. Chi had to wait on the long queue until it reached her turn to make withdrawal. Still on the queue, a young skinny guy probably a first year fresh man of the school, appeared from nowhere and smartly joined the queue thereby overtaking Chi and other students awaiting their turn. She politely asked the young boy, "bros, please what's happening? I don’t really understand you."
"I was standing in front of the back of one woman that just left", the guy in a fear tucked voice replied.
Chi felt astonished at the response and with a burning anger, she politely told the guy in a colloquial manner saying," Bros, please to avoid problems and long stories, I need to withdraw some cash so as to visit the Health Center for my medicals.” The guy immediately understood and without further ado made way for her to stand in her position.
Unfortunately, Chi's withdrawal wasn’t a success. The ATM machines had all gone out of service.
"Oh no! Not this time", she lamented.
She was really embittered and so she quickly boarded a bus to the school's Main Gate to withdraw some money from the ATM machine hoping that she would not be disappointed this time around. While entering the school’s park she realized that there were fewer persons waiting to withdraw- what a good sign that her withdrawal would be successful. The school's park, drivers and conductors were combination of unharmonious concerto. She noticed the different drivers beckoning on passengers who cared to listen to enter their buses. Particularly, she took interest in the grassy beard driver who in a contra tenor voice shouted, "Hall4! Law! Basement!" She could remember how the intra-campus shuttle buses with their nearly knocked engines alighted students at different locations such as Basement, the direct building adjacent the Clinical Students' Hostel, Hall 4; one of the male hostels and finally to the Faculty of Law bus-stop.
"Hall-4-Law-Basement! Hall4-Law-Basement!" The drivers kept shouting.
Chi couldn’t keep her smiles as this brought remembrance of her first day in the University. It was an experience she would never forget all her life time. Yes, like every fresher, she only knew the major places such as the female hostel known as Hall 1; and the Main auditorium which was located at the center of the school, few kilometers from the Main Gate. She curiously on one evening, decided to visit the Faculty of Law. She had no clue that the faculty's location was a stone's throw from the Hall 1 where she had stayed all the while. Chi’s introversive temperament led her to enter a shuttle from Hall 1 to Main Gate. Getting there, she was advised by one of the concerned passengers to enter another "Hall 4-Law-Basement" bus. In summary, Chi’s story had just showed that the "Jonny Just Come (JJC) syndrome was inside her too. "Jonny Just Come" is a colloquial that describes the naivity of a person.
At Isiukwu Health Center, she hurriedly bought some snacks to keep stomach and soul together in one body while trying to make enquiry on how she could see a doctor at the in-patient department. Her desire met with a shock when she approached one of the nurses who was shunned of sympathy. The nurse said, "Eehm, what do you want? Where is your card? If you don’t have your card, don’t bother waiting or expecting any response because we don't look at faces, we look at patients cards". Chi was perplexed. She wondered if she had ever quarreled with the woman before then.
"Had she met me before?" Chi kept on asking herself rhetorically.
"I can't remember hurting anybody to deserve this kind of harsh words", she soliloquized.
Chi being convinced that her arguments wouldn’t fetch her favours, respectfully said to the nurse, "please ma today is my first time of visiting".
The aggressive nurse not allowing her finish her rehearsed speech interrupted saying, "and so, how is that my business? I have told you, if you don't have your card, you had better disappeared from here."
Chi was terribly pissed off. She felt something inside her move. She couldn't resist the urge to explode in anger. But then, she remembered all the stress she had passed through that same day, she saw how nice and lovely her father had always been to her; her beloved mother had never treated her in that manner. She also played back her Pastor's teachings on anger and its destructive consequences. She remained calm and quietly went back to her seat to think straight.
In dreams, hostility puts one at the receiving end.
Some minutes later, voices started echoing from the outpatient department. It was the same nurse and another patient. The patient was a married woman who raised her voice on the nurse, calling her Nurse ELIZA. Nurse ELIZA,is an unpublished title given to quack and amateur nurses who do not really know their onions. The patient felt embarrassed by this same nurse. Chi observed and enjoyed the scenario as the aggrieved patient poured out all her encumbrances on the nurse. She was so glad that she had controlled her anger and had subdued her urge to exchange words with the nurse. The burden of her retaliation had been lifted up her shoulders. Her heart felt a bit relieved. She was glad the nurse had tasted the sweetness of her wonderful character. What an Irony! As she sat there looking intently at the drama, she got bemused and was voraciously lost in thoughts. Chi was brought back to reality when another patient tapped her at the back. Inception! I mean, the movie made me see that one could easily become conscious in a dream.
Surprisingly, the two women were still in their serious argument. Chi had to intervene in the matter to make peace reign. In the process of calming the feud, she observed that the reason behind the nurse’s aggressive and impolite attitudes towards patients was because the nurse hadn’t been paid for three month salaries. She turned widow as a result of her husband's untimely death and had five kids to take care of. In fact, life had not been fair to the nurse. She had been dehumanized and frustrated. Chi could sip the pain in her story. She learnt that one should not be too fast to condemn people's actions because one never can tell the challenges they are passing through which is what humanity termed wrong or out of place behaviours. Dreams are best teachers if collected correctly. Chi dreamily imagined herself being a counselor to this nurse turned friend. She pictured herself telling her to take life easy that things would be fine in no distant time. For her, this nurse had to understand that anger no matter the freedom it offers is a product of inaudible emotional slavery.
In her imagination, the nurse with tears in her eyes embraced and appreciated her for relieving her embittered spirit through the words of encouragement.
In well knitted bewilderment, Chi sat on one of the clipped chairs in the lecture theatre in the Faculty of Law gazing at the shadow of this unseen man as if he were a beautiful dream. Of a truth, the young lady was lost in her illusion. Nothing seems to exist any longer for her. She could feel the cupped tales of helplessness. Her head was spinning; her eyes dilating while her mind wandered round the campus like a ghost afraid of being asleep in its abode.. In her subconscious mind, she strolled from the Lecture Theatre 1 to the popular June 12 market where the Fidelity Bank ATM gallery was located.
Still gazing at her imagined lecturer who seemed not to understand her plight with his overwhelming echo that punched her conscious state as she heard…"Privity of Contract!".
“Oh no!” Chi groaned.
“Why! This topic today?” she exclaimed.
She knew the lecturer as one who employed the Socratic teaching method and hence, it was far better not to have attended the class than attending without reading ahead of him because he must always find a culprit to give answers to his numerous critical questions.
Chi had taken to inaudible prayers that he shouldn't sight or throw questions at her in this dream of hers as she was not prepared for the class.
“Lord, let this class pass over me. In fact, let circulars be passed for a general staff meeting”, she prayed.
“Hallo Miss, can you please stand up”, the lecturer said in his cracked voice.
At this point, she instantaneously lost her grip over the worn-out confidence she earlier borrowed to enter the class. The quote of the father of English laws that, "even the devil knows not the intent of a man's heart" became the truth about her existence. Chi’s shyness denied her the permission to take a leave from the class. She just could tell him she wasn’t fit for his question.
"Hey! Young lady, I mean you. Critically, with aid of decided cases, copiously and smartly analyze the concept of Privity of Contract” he sternly called out to her.
“What?” She soliloquized as the many eyes in the class impulsively turned towards her. She realized the ball had strolled into her court and she must sing the song of tension. Her heart sank, as she wished the earth opened instantly to swallow her. There wasn’t a valid answer to the question. Thoughts of how she would go withdraw some money from the ATM gallery and thereafter visit the Isiukwu Health Center for her medical needs were the only things she could club that moment. Besides, she has been famished and could not concentrate on critical engagements. Imaginations, makes hunger look like a written and impromptu examination. She stood up as if all was well and quickly pretended as though she didn’t hear him well enough.
Chi said, "Please sir, could you repeat the question?"
Prof. Bisi, the slim, fair and tall man in his mid-fifties rephrased the question saying "With the aid of decided cases, critically and judiciously analyze the concept of Privity of Contract". Prof. Bisi
not gaining response showed his academic prowess by commenting that "it is very evident in our academic system that some students ought not to be in the University but in advanced secondary schools. How would infants know the pros and cons of the University educational system where every source of knowledge, I mean, distorted ones are at their beck and call? During my undergraduate days, I taught my lecturers” he angrily said.
Chi was not perturbed by the embarrassment the prof. gave her because she knew opportunities would always come for her to prove her scholastic prowess. But then, she chipped in her calculated excuse that, "Yes prof. I am not feeling alright and I need to visit the health center".
"My dear, you should have informed me before now”, Prof. Bisi replied.
In dreams, sympathy is the nearest escape to gaining relief. Chi was deeply amazed at the response and appreciated the benevolent Prof. She quickly scourged for her school bag and ran out of the lecture hall like a lioness chasing its prey. She checked her wristwatch and it was exactly 1:00pm- there’s still time to get things done. She made out for the Fidelity Bank ATM gallery at the famous June 12 Market. The Market was actually named after the historic Nigerian June 12 1993 election crises.
On reaching the ATM gallery at June 12 Market, the crowd were overwhelming. Chi had to wait on the long queue until it reached her turn to make withdrawal. Still on the queue, a young skinny guy probably a first year fresh man of the school, appeared from nowhere and smartly joined the queue thereby overtaking Chi and other students awaiting their turn. She politely asked the young boy, "bros, please what's happening? I don’t really understand you."
"I was standing in front of the back of one woman that just left", the guy in a fear tucked voice replied.
Chi felt astonished at the response and with a burning anger, she politely told the guy in a colloquial manner saying," Bros, please to avoid problems and long stories, I need to withdraw some cash so as to visit the Health Center for my medicals.” The guy immediately understood and without further ado made way for her to stand in her position.
Unfortunately, Chi's withdrawal wasn’t a success. The ATM machines had all gone out of service.
"Oh no! Not this time", she lamented.
She was really embittered and so she quickly boarded a bus to the school's Main Gate to withdraw some money from the ATM machine hoping that she would not be disappointed this time around. While entering the school’s park she realized that there were fewer persons waiting to withdraw- what a good sign that her withdrawal would be successful. The school's park, drivers and conductors were combination of unharmonious concerto. She noticed the different drivers beckoning on passengers who cared to listen to enter their buses. Particularly, she took interest in the grassy beard driver who in a contra tenor voice shouted, "Hall4! Law! Basement!" She could remember how the intra-campus shuttle buses with their nearly knocked engines alighted students at different locations such as Basement, the direct building adjacent the Clinical Students' Hostel, Hall 4; one of the male hostels and finally to the Faculty of Law bus-stop.
"Hall-4-Law-Basement! Hall4-Law-Basement!" The drivers kept shouting.
Chi couldn’t keep her smiles as this brought remembrance of her first day in the University. It was an experience she would never forget all her life time. Yes, like every fresher, she only knew the major places such as the female hostel known as Hall 1; and the Main auditorium which was located at the center of the school, few kilometers from the Main Gate. She curiously on one evening, decided to visit the Faculty of Law. She had no clue that the faculty's location was a stone's throw from the Hall 1 where she had stayed all the while. Chi’s introversive temperament led her to enter a shuttle from Hall 1 to Main Gate. Getting there, she was advised by one of the concerned passengers to enter another "Hall 4-Law-Basement" bus. In summary, Chi’s story had just showed that the "Jonny Just Come (JJC) syndrome was inside her too. "Jonny Just Come" is a colloquial that describes the naivity of a person.
At Isiukwu Health Center, she hurriedly bought some snacks to keep stomach and soul together in one body while trying to make enquiry on how she could see a doctor at the in-patient department. Her desire met with a shock when she approached one of the nurses who was shunned of sympathy. The nurse said, "Eehm, what do you want? Where is your card? If you don’t have your card, don’t bother waiting or expecting any response because we don't look at faces, we look at patients cards". Chi was perplexed. She wondered if she had ever quarreled with the woman before then.
"Had she met me before?" Chi kept on asking herself rhetorically.
"I can't remember hurting anybody to deserve this kind of harsh words", she soliloquized.
Chi being convinced that her arguments wouldn’t fetch her favours, respectfully said to the nurse, "please ma today is my first time of visiting".
The aggressive nurse not allowing her finish her rehearsed speech interrupted saying, "and so, how is that my business? I have told you, if you don't have your card, you had better disappeared from here."
Chi was terribly pissed off. She felt something inside her move. She couldn't resist the urge to explode in anger. But then, she remembered all the stress she had passed through that same day, she saw how nice and lovely her father had always been to her; her beloved mother had never treated her in that manner. She also played back her Pastor's teachings on anger and its destructive consequences. She remained calm and quietly went back to her seat to think straight.
In dreams, hostility puts one at the receiving end.
Some minutes later, voices started echoing from the outpatient department. It was the same nurse and another patient. The patient was a married woman who raised her voice on the nurse, calling her Nurse ELIZA. Nurse ELIZA,is an unpublished title given to quack and amateur nurses who do not really know their onions. The patient felt embarrassed by this same nurse. Chi observed and enjoyed the scenario as the aggrieved patient poured out all her encumbrances on the nurse. She was so glad that she had controlled her anger and had subdued her urge to exchange words with the nurse. The burden of her retaliation had been lifted up her shoulders. Her heart felt a bit relieved. She was glad the nurse had tasted the sweetness of her wonderful character. What an Irony! As she sat there looking intently at the drama, she got bemused and was voraciously lost in thoughts. Chi was brought back to reality when another patient tapped her at the back. Inception! I mean, the movie made me see that one could easily become conscious in a dream.
Surprisingly, the two women were still in their serious argument. Chi had to intervene in the matter to make peace reign. In the process of calming the feud, she observed that the reason behind the nurse’s aggressive and impolite attitudes towards patients was because the nurse hadn’t been paid for three month salaries. She turned widow as a result of her husband's untimely death and had five kids to take care of. In fact, life had not been fair to the nurse. She had been dehumanized and frustrated. Chi could sip the pain in her story. She learnt that one should not be too fast to condemn people's actions because one never can tell the challenges they are passing through which is what humanity termed wrong or out of place behaviours. Dreams are best teachers if collected correctly. Chi dreamily imagined herself being a counselor to this nurse turned friend. She pictured herself telling her to take life easy that things would be fine in no distant time. For her, this nurse had to understand that anger no matter the freedom it offers is a product of inaudible emotional slavery.
In her imagination, the nurse with tears in her eyes embraced and appreciated her for relieving her embittered spirit through the words of encouragement.
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