A trip I'll never forget

It was a Friday morning, I stayed on a long queue waiting to get a bus ticket to Abia state(my state of origin), here in Nigeria. I hadn't set foot in our village since the death of my father about 14 years ago - I wouldn't even have been on that queue if it weren't for my Mum.

"You're the first son, you have to get acquainted with your origin." She always advised me.

Where I come from, the first son of a family is obligated to visit his village as often as possible, create a rapport with the towns folks, chiefs and elders all around.

This is me(on the extreme left) and my Mum with a prominent chief and his son in our village.

We finally got the bus tickets and hit the road. The driver played a lot of cool songs by artists dear to me. Artists like Usher, Chris brown, Micheal Jackson, and Whitney Houston. Personally, I feel the driver must have been a DJ at some point in his life because... wow! His music taste was top notch.

"Is that your mum?" A passenger asked as soon as I had my seat.

"Yeah, she is" I replied

"She's very young"

"Thank you" my mum replied. I was surprised she heard the little interaction we had. My mum sat in the seat right in front of us.

"You're welcome madam"

"Which village in Abia are you people from?"

"I'm from bende"

Every single passenger began laughing. I looked around, in all direction to understand the reason for the sudden outburst.

"No mind my son en no Sabi im village, na ajebo" My Mum replied in pidgin English, which translated to: "don't mind my son, he doesn't know his village, he's a city boy."

"You remind me of myself, I was just like you when I was still growing up, I couldn't even speak my language"

I laughed in my head — I couldn't speak my language also, but I kept mute.

I slowly got interested in the conversation. I asked him how he learnt how to start speaking.

"I just actively listened and asked questions on things I was confused about."

At this point, I really wanted to get more acclimated with my culture.

At some point, everyone slept off as though someone had cast a sleeping spell. But we were the only 2 that stayed awake. Of course, the driver was also awake so that made us three in total. Imagine if the driver had joined the crowd in the sleeping drama? Hmmm... Only God knows!

He told me of how he danced back in the days. His statement "back in the days" made it seem like he was about 40 years of age, instead of 30 years which I assumed him to be, judging from the facial and body looks.

"How old are you?" I asked out of curiosity.

"50 years" he replied.

I was quite shocked that he was around that age. He had the face of a young man but his composure and confidence was enough reason not to doubt.

He admonished me to take dancing serious when I told him I could dance really well. In his words, "life isn't all about medicine."

We went further went ahead to talk about how politicians were playing with the lives of millions in Nigeria. I suddenly started talking political stuffs as though I were ever interested in politics. Well, I guess that's what happens when a conversation jams! You tend to develop interest in the things you never envisaged yourself talking about.

We eventually got to our destination but he left the bus before us and stopped at a village really close to ours.

My Mum with chief chima

We shaked hands and greeted like men but within me, I somehow wished he had stayed a little bit longer or even followed us to our village. It's a pity we didn't get to exchange phone numbers!

The chief (sir Chima) expressed how glad he was to see us after a long while, so, he set up a drink party so we could merry

I guess that was the first long road trip that kept my eyes open throughout. I'm glad it happened on the same day I went down to acknowledge my roots... To acknowledge my culture!