Mental tickle

Hola peeps. Que haces? Bien? Agradable saber. Man, I got robbed. Yep, was stuck in traffic for over 2 hours on Monday when some punk ass punk pointed a sawed-off shotgun in my face.

Always fancied myself as Nigeria’s answer to Bruce Willis: good-looking, bald and having the foresight to cheat on Demi Moore (aka Botox Queen with xtra white teeth) knowing she’d hang out with Ashton Kutcher. Actually imagined being able to give a wise crack when facing barrel of a gun. Instead, I acted aiight, but if my girlfriend hadn’t been in the car I’da screamed like a bitch.

Was showing my girlfriend the new booty shake I’d worked on over the weekend, and chatting to her about how sure I was that the number of lorries on the road was responsible for the traffic, when I noticed guys in front of me abandon their cars and run like crazy. Looked in my rearview mirror and saw a guy going from car to car robbing peeps. Immediately told my girlfriend what was happening and suggested she hide her phones so I’d give him mine. Instaed, she turned off all phones, including mine, and that was a good thing ‘cos if the guy had seen my phone he’da shot me for having such a, erm, retro phone. Anyways, the guy bangs on my window and I roll it down.

Thief: (with a shotgun cartridge held between his teeth) Pahm mud u bugh!
Tunde: Huh?
Thief: (after smacking me across the face) Ig tug pahm mud u bugh!!
Tunde: (thinking to himself) Damn, that hurt, but I can’t cry as my girlfriend thinks I’m macho. Man, I’dn’t have lied to her that I have a black belt in karate.
Girlfriend: Please give him the bag.
I pass her bag to the punk.
Thief: Urgh thrit, ur thrit!
Tunde: Huh?
Girlfriend: He wants ur shirt!
Tunde: (thinking to himself while taking his shirt off) My shirt? What’s up with this punk? One’d think a shirt would be the least of his problems. It’d help if this guy took the cartridge outta his mouth so I can hear what he’s saying. Hey, maybe he’s a stammerer or has a speech impediment and that’s why he’s got the stuff in his mouth. Hmmm, ever wonder what it’d be like to have a stammerer on a sports talk show? Might be hilarious.

By the time I took my shirt off the guy had moved to a jeep ahead of me, broke the passenger window, stole a laptop and crossed to the other side of the road. Then, he stopped a bus filled with passengers and proceeded to rob everyone. All this time I’m thinking to myself, “one guy, one frigging guy’s holding us all to ransom. I can take this guy”. Anyways, tried to crack jokes to get my girlfriend’s mind off what happened and didn’t notice how the thief escaped. What was going thru my mind? “I need to get this girl home safely. Thank God, nada happened to her. How would I have explained that to her folks?” I learned a few things from this episode:

a. All u see in the movies is crap. Had always imagined doing a Jackie Chan move or a Jedi mind-trick thang when confronted by thieves, but all I learned disappeared as soon as I saw that gun.
b. Girls can decipher outbursts from crazy marauders.
c. The principle of WWJD (What Would Jesus Do?) recedes to the back of ur mind when someone robs u of ur possession, ur dignity, anything. Afterwards, I prayed I’d be able to forgive the guy and to be honest I still haven’t forgiven him. So y’all keep praying for me. Hey, u heard of those One-Chance buses where robbers pretend to be passengers and then rob whoever’s unfortunate enough to hitch a ride? Almost tempted to import suicide bombers from the Middle East for those buses. It’s worth considering, I mean the suicide bombers wanna kill people anyways and we wanna get rid of robbers. Talk about killing 2 birds with one bomb. Okay, okay maybe I need more of those prayers.

After the incident I wanted to vent, I needed an outlet. The slap across the face didn’t hurt, but it stung for all the wrong reasons. After dropping my girlfriend off I drove like a speed demon and didn’t care who I’d run over. I was prepared to take on any policeman that would stop me. I needed to transfer the pain, the hurt to someone else. Contemplated going for a run when I got home, but was too weak to do anything. Spoke to my girlfriend later that evening and we kinda consoled each other. The next day, I still needed to vent, but while driving I heard Sting’s Englishman In New York on the radio. Woah oh I’m an alien, I’m a legal alien, I’m an Englishman in New York….. Man, peeps write songs about anything, don’t they? And they make money off it too! Maybe it’ time I made money off my assault. Thank goodness I’m in Nigeria ‘cos if I was in the US and the song becomes a hit u can bet ur last dollar the robber will come outta his hole and ask for songwriting credits. I haven’t started writing it, but shall let y’all know when I’m done. Goody, an excuse to get back on the weed; smoking a dozen blunts a day aids in the songwriting process, I reckon.

So what else’s been happening? The Paris Club of debtor nations agreed in principle to pardon about $18bn owed them by Nigeria. Now the president’s opponents have lost any leverage they had. If he weren’t in his second term of office this act by the Paris Club woulda guaranteed a victory come election time in 2007. Gotta say I’m chuffed at what he’s done. Had planned to write a paragraph about the number of staff employed by the Presidency, but this news ameliorated my sequence of thoughts. Was gonna write about the vast number of advisers, special advisers, assistants, etc., in charge of issues ranging from human trafficking to groundnut selling, that serve under him; and about the commissions he set up to look at high cost of cement, bread and diesel, but not of frozen birds which he’s reported to have an interest in. Guess I’m a sucker for good news like everyone else.

Virgin Nigeria took off on its maiden voyage during the week. There to witness the ‘historic’ occasion were loadsa passengers, celebrities and some ministers. It was then I discovered that ministerial positions Nigeria mightn’t be decided on merit. Do u know Nigeria has a minister for Transport and another for Aviation? If that’s not stupid then I don’t know what is. Us Nigerians sure do love titles, we’re probably the only country in the world that aligns one’s occupation to a title. One gets assigned the prefix Barrister, Engineer, Architect, Economist, etc or the like b4 one’s name. Still waiting to open a Nigerian daily and see one referred to as Carpenter, Trader, Beggar, Policeman, etc Jim or the like. Hey, it just could happen.

Yeah, 2 weeks ago the US Consulate decided to shut their offices due to a security threat that we haven’t yet been told about. Just like confused kids who decide to copy all the things cool kids do other countries (Britain, etc) shut their embassies as well. I’m not saying one’d not be careful, but isn’t it convenient that these threats are arising only after Nigeria decided to contest a seat on UN Security Council? Kinda reminds me of the last US election where the intelligence community discovered Al-Queda folk suddenly stopped chattering after Bush was declared the winner. Punk ass punks.

Okay peeps. Gotta go entertain my girlfriend with my patented booty shake. Y’all jealous? Good. Tot ziens and God bless.