Growing up in the 80s was tough. Very tough! It was an era that the teenagers had street and football then table tennis as major distractions. It was equally a time that parents both biological and non biological adopted and practised the Biblical injunction in Proverbs 22:15 King : Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child; But the rod of correction shall drive it far from him. It is sweeter in Yoruba ” Aya omode ni were di si, egba tere lo ma le jade.
It was a time of ”igbamu” competing with ”igbaju” i.e. different dimensions of slap. The mothers were “notorious” for this while the fathers were known for “koboko” or pankere. What most of the parents did at that time or let me say that the beatings I got from my mum at that time would land any parent in a police custody today.
All she wanted was a triangular life of home, school plus lesson and then church. Any violation attracts serious beating after the evening prayer when you are ready for sleep or early in the morning. The night beating was always better than that of the morning. Once you are beaten in the morning, everyone will get to know. Such beatings were never without signs that would attarct attention in the school!
Unfortunately, there were always reasons for me to be beaten. It was either for leaving the church to go and play a football match or for staying out late playing table tennis. In retrospect, I wonder how one would suffer that magnitude of pain and still repeat what caused the pain. The devil is terrible! The beatings were so much that my siblings began to complain. At a point, I began to query within me if the woman was my biological mother. Can I blame her? Looking back, I would say NO. Today, I have come to understand that parenting is a serious task and she only adopted the methodology that was in vogue with the fear that she would not want to lose a child to the world.
For the football, I would think that if I did not play, my team would lose and for the table tennis, unknown to my mum I was already getting involved in betting and making lots of money to make me feel comfortable and unbothered whether she gave me food or not. Surprisingly, I was not doing bad academically.
My friends knew that my mum would always beat me and some of them were taking advantage of this. They only needed to let her hear what I did and I don enter am. So, this day towards the end of the term, we had left school to play table tennis and we had involved in table tennis betting. People that grew up around that time will understand better. This is to alert parents that there is no child the devil cannot steal in fulfilment of its tripodal mandate of ” to steal. to kill and to destroy”. We must continually pray and engage them. The child that is well trained can derail let alone the one that is left to waywardness. May God keep all our children
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I had ‘chopped’ all the money of the guys and one of them began to threaten me that he was going to report to my mum. From table tennis betting centre we dragged it to the house and my friend narratted what happened to my mum. I had sentenced myself to merciless beating not knowing that the turning point was waitiing for me. When he finished narrating what happened to my mum, she simply told him that sent me to school and not to the tennis centre and since we decided to leave the school we should go and sort ourselves out. I felt very proud that my mum shamed the guys and since that day, my interaction wih the negative influencers changed. The way the guy dragged himself away from the presence of my mum makes me laugh whenever I remember.
As my Mama celebrated her 82nd birthday on July 14th, I had this reflection and decided to share it hopefully it will be helpful to a parent who needs to change the approach being adopted in order to change the child. It will help a parent to realise that it is a dangerous thing to sacrifice your child for others. It will equally help a parent to wake up to the reality that what the rod may fail to do or even aggravate, love can achieve. It will also help a parent to stop living under the bondsge of what people would say about a disturbing guy/
Wow 🌹. I can definitely relate with this, who knows may be I would have become a great footballer if the beating didn’t stop me, but to God be all the glory.
Happy birthday to grandma. Wish her many more glorious years in good health in Jesus name
Amen
My special Aunty and loving aunty. Happy birthday to her.
Inspiring and very insight-full
God bless momma. Happy birthday to a great mother to an equally great son. May God count mummy worthy
Amino…my own experience was similarly different. I was rascally, nutty and troublesome. I was beaten with all sorts of objects by my mum. I played soccer uptill about two years ago. I was and still addicted to all forms of physical activities. Surprisingly, just like you, I was among the top 5 % in any class I found myself. She stopped beating me the day she broke one of her fingers while beating me for an offence I cannot recall at the moment and said to me in an excruciating pain, “iwo omo yi, mi oni naa e mo, to ba fe parae, kiopa ara e” you this boy, I will never beat you again, if you want to kill yourself, please do.
That moment, I felt two major pains in my heart. One..that my beloved mum felt an unexpected pain trying to correct me over the same misconduct for which she had corrected me a thousand times.
Two…that no one would care about my misconduct again. Something flew out of my body which could easily be described as ‘evil sprit” and I remained indoor throughout that day and several days after. For a whole week, everybody was pondering on what came over me that I would return from school, did my homework, helped in house chore and sleep. My mother became worried that she thought one form of sickness was about striking. She insisted on knowing what was wrong with me but it was so difficult to explain. A week later, I summoned courage to apologise for my misconducts over the years and promised never to stress her again but that I would still play football after the school hours. She agreed.
Interestingly enough, I begged her to promise that she would still beat me anytime I misbehave and to that, she said ” you shall not go back to yiur vomit” The rest is history now. God bless all mothers.
Happy birthday to your triumphant mum. May the rest of her days be peaceful, glorious and fulfilling. Mama ajeun omo pe in excellent health and abundance of blessings. Congratulations to the family.
Wonderful! There is hope for every parent who will believe in God and identify when to change the approach. Sticking to a particular approach may be killing both the child and the mother or father as the case may be.
Prof Sir, now I know why you have remained physically strong, sociable and humble. Your getting to the top has not changed whom you were on your way to the top. We have seen many change drastically but you have moved from Doctor to Professor to Dean and to member of governing Council yet keeping the “you” in you.
Thanks Sir. Hopefully, one day soon, you will share life experiences with us.
Thanks Sir.
As I was reading Dr. Ogunjobi’s story, something flashed to my mind, very divergent from the story line. It flashed again when reading the replies of Atayese M.O. I hope these posts are being read in Britain and other European countries so that they will know that there are Africans that can teach the White men pure English. Reading the superb English in which this stories were rendered made me more angry when they ask our aspiring students to undertake IELTS compulsorily before they could be admitted. Nonsense!!! Thanks guys. Dr. Ogunjobi, Happy Birthday to Grandma. Wishing her longer days in divine health and wealth.
Thanks for your response and for the perspective you brought into it. Let me state that your observation on IELTS is one of the failures of our government. Normally, Nigeria is not supposed to be among countries that wwould have to compulsorisly undertake IELTS before being admitted anywhere. Unfortunately, most countries are not aware that we are taught in English language from elementary to University. They appreciate you when they listen to you or read your content. Some will openly express their surprise at someone from Africa speaking fluently. I can confirm to you that individuals and groups are beginning to take up the issue of IELTS at different levels. The English language that we write and speak in Nigeria is far better than many other countries of the world. The only major challenge that I think that we have is our phonetics. When you see people from countries that require IELTS you identify them easily. You will be surprised when you read some things written by the supposed owners of the language. You will be surprised to see tenses murdered in daylight. This however does not mean that everyone in Nigeria that is educated can speak and write good English.