I need more male friends

Hola peeps. Y’all good?

 

It’s been nearly 3 weeks in Juba, and I am glad to report no significant drama. Well, not on my end, anyway. Last Friday, I received a call from a pal, Annie, who stayed at mine for a few days. She had always talked about visiting Juba and had planned to arrive on the same day as I did on Monday, February 10^th, but I suggested she wait in case J.S. went through with his threat to arrest me at the airport once more. It wouldn’t be the ideal first visit to a country to have one’s host in jail.

 

After I passed through the immigration desk with no issues, I asked if she’d still wanna visit, and she said yes. She chose to arrive on Friday, February 14th, to Wednesday, February 19th, and even after I alerted her to the significance of traveling to see a member of the opposite sex on Valentine’s Day, she laughed and said it was just a coincidence. Fast forward to the 21st, when she called to ask for a favour. She mentioned she was in a similar situation to W – I had told her about the call from W’s ex. Turns out she’s dating this dude back in Nairobi, and when she agreed to come to Juba, she thought she was done with the relationship. They made up following her return, so she confessed to him that she spent the weekend out of the country with a platonic friend, albeit a male one. As expected, the dude’s pissed, and though she told him we are just friends and nada’s ever happened between us, the dude has requested she call me so he could listen to the tone of our conversation. She asked me to pretend that she had told me all about him - in a subsequent call when he would be listening. I wish I were kidding. Good thang I am reading Al Pacino's autobiography, eh? This is the last I am hosting a platonic female friend at mine. Memo to self: Get more male friends in Juba.

 

Something occurred to me over the Christmas holidays; I was driving my sis Nike and her two sons to the annual family Christmas lunch when Nike and her oldest son Zane started going back and forth about the quality of the Christmas presents Zane got for her. You know how we always say we don’t wanna act like our parents when we grow up, but we end up repeating their actions? Nike’s got major traits from Vicky, though she continues to deny it. Critiquing a gift instead of accepting it in the spirit in which it was offered is classic Vicky. I cracked up at this spat and told Zane and his younger brother Otu to accept that women are never satisfied. They could be your sister, mother, girlfriend, colleague, or wife; it don’t matter. Once one comes to the realization that one will always be not quite there when it comes to pleasing the fairer gender, then one can fret less and take it all in stride.

 

Later that day, while stuck in Lagos traffic and listening to oldies on the radio, it dawned on me that I may not be setting the best examples for my nephews. They love me to bits and are always keen to hang out at my crib, especially Otu, as soon as I arrive in Lagos. Apart from last Christmas, they have met a different woman with me each year since moving into my apartment. Zane asked if I would ever get married again, and I cackled. Yes, they are too young to think of marriage, but shouldn’t I make them less jaded? Goodness knows the world needs more men who will respect and treat women better. I tend to think I am that, but if the young’uns who look up to me see me with a different female “friend” each time, what should they believe? Oh, snap. I just recalled I brought a new friend to my bro Kinzo’s crib on Xmas day. Drats. Here’s hoping their dad has more of an influence on them than I do.

 

I am not quite back to the grind of things in Juba. For instance, I skipped the Hash run and kickboxing class last Saturday ‘cos I needed to catch up on zzz. Plus, I couldn’t dive back into the regular schedule last week ‘cos Annie was visiting. One positive outcome of Annie’s visit was swimming at night. She spent most of her time in the swimming pool at my apartment building, and it got me thinking about why I had never swum at night, especially now that the temperature in the afternoons has been topping 42C. The last time I swam in the pool in the afternoon, I nodded off as I dried off on the lounge and woke up with a sunburnt upper lip.

 

Annie’s visit also brought my unconscious habit of holding my breath to the fore. An ex-girlfriend used to bring it up all the time, and a cousin in the UK did the same some years ago when I visited him. “Wait, you still doing that thang when, as kids, we’d have to remind you to breathe?!” I honestly don’t know how/why I do this. If I learned to breathe correctly, I’d improve my performance during kickboxing sparring and marathons, no?

 

I have run twice since returning to Juba but hope to resume my 4x-a-week regimen from Monday. I need it too ‘cos my pants are getting tighter around the waist. I wish I were kidding. My run last Friday wasn’t too bad as the sun wasn’t at its peak by the time I was done. It was good to see that the neighbourhood stray dogs still recognized me. Oh yes, I haven’t regaled y’all on this fine, quality blog about my Dr. Doolittle moment, have I? O Tunde, you procrastinator you.

 

You might recall these are the same dogs that growl at me when I’d leave my house to run in the morning, causing me to fend them off by feigning to throw stones in their direction. This was an unwelcome start to the morning; I mean, who wants to deal with mangy dogs at the beginning of one’s day? Well, last November, I hosted a BBQ at my place and set aside the bones and other leftovers for the stray dogs. Who cares about the cats loitering about the apartment complex? Screw them.

 

On the first day, the leader, whom I shall refer to as Patches, sees me walking up, resumes his growling pose, and walks toward me. I opened the newspaper I had the fresh bones wrapped in, set it aside, and gestured at Patches to attack the sumptuous meal. As I walked away, Patches kept staring at me while glancing at the food, almost like it suspected it was poisonous. Besides, it musta survived on scavenging food its entire life, and here comes this human offering food on a silver platter newspaper? Nah, there must surely be a catch.

 

Two days later, as I walked towards the main road to run, I noticed Patches had three pals, the regular growling crew, along with him. This time, he darted towards the food as the others partly growled at me and partly followed Patches.

 

The third time I laid out food, there were 6 to 8 dogs, and none bothered growling. After an hour, I returned from the run and saw Patches lead the dogs towards me. Now, it’s daylight, and I am wary as the dogs are usually cowards in that they growl at me in the morning when the sun is not yet out, and people are sparse, but they go into hiding when the road is teeming. As the dogs charged towards me, I picked up a pebble to scare them off while muttering how ungrateful they are to wanna attack me after feeding them. However, I noticed they weren’t growling, so I put down the stone. You won’t believe it, but the dogs surround me and stare. A neighbourhood restauranteur who prepares meals before I set out in the mornings deciphered that the dogs were trying to thank me for feeding them. U what?! He was right. Patches and his fellow Samaritans escorted me home. I felt all warm and fuzzy throughout that workday at the fact that the very dogs who used to bark at me every time now appreciated me enough to wait an hour to see my return from the run before dispersing to their various haunts.

 

The next time I stepped out of my apartment, Patches and his pals charged towards me with tongues wagging. Not one bark was heard. They usually wait until I get to where they hang out, but they now know where I live. I was now confident enough to instruct them to halt and wait patiently until I laid down the food. That’s been our relationship since. It’s so crazy that I now set aside a zip-lock bag when eating so I remember to collect the leftovers for them. I usually freeze this and set it out before bed, so it thaws sufficiently before my morning run. I left them some bones and two slices of pepperoni pizza the other day, you know, to help refine their palette. I am in the field as I type this and have already instructed the chef to set aside bones so I can take them to Juba tomorrow.

 

I spoke to my daughter on Sunday after her week-long school ski trip in Italy. She loved every minute of it. I reckon I insufflated her with my love for adrenaline as I cradled her in my arms on the morning of her birth. She told me she fell only twice during 5 days of skiing and that her roommate held the record of falling 62 times. Who keeps track of stuff like that? She and her friends, apparently. When I mentioned I was getting back to running and that I ran nearly 17km last Friday, she remarked that the distance was nearly thrice as many times as her friend fell. I am sure she didn’t get her competitive trait from me.

 

I asked if she felt homesick during the trip, as it was her first time being away from home for that long, and she confessed that she did a tad. I told her of my own experience in boarding school, where I’d cry from homesickness. I am glad I am more vulnerable with her, and our conversations last longer than they used to. This marks a welcome change from last August when I took her to watch Arsenal against Brighton and Hove at The Emirates Stadium. She was hesitant to pose for pics with me. Still, after meeting an ex – not to worry, she’s married with a kid - during the half-time intermission, she suddenly brightened up, readily posing for pics with her and even made me buy her mementos from the Arsenal merch store so she could gift them to her. Who was this girl, and what had she done with my daughter?

 

That musta been my 2024 pre-teen daughter ‘cos the 2025 version loves spending time with her dad. The weekend before the archery class I mentioned in the last blog entry, we had an uber-packed Saturday. First, we did an Escape Room, then saw the Mufasa movie, and then she beat me at air hockey after a fancy steak lunch before we ended the day with indoor skydiving. When I returned her to her mom, it was past 9 pm, and she was beat. I may have overdone it. I guess I was so chuffed to see her having fun with me that I didn’t want it to end.

 

I am glad I visited my colleagues in the field, but I cannot wait to return to Juba ‘cos my system is outta whack. My body must know I am somewhere unfamiliar ‘cos I get these urges to pee multiple times in the middle of the night. ‘Cos the bathrooms are away from the rooms, I devised a means of peeing in empty plastic bottles and disposing of them in the morning. Don’t judge me. I did worse while at Bradford when I lived on the 5^th floor of University Halls and would pee outta the window instead of groggily walking to the bathroom. These would be the scenes of comic relief when the story of my life is dramatized.

 

Oh yeah, the movie must also include the scene earlier this month when I got upgraded to First Class on the Emirates flight from Heathrow to Dubai. Suddenly, out of nowhere, I developed an attitude I didn’t know I possessed. With my chest out and ten toes down, I proudly farted as I walked past the Business Class passengers and didn’t give a hoot. After all, that might be their only opportunity to experience a taste of First Class. You know what I mean?

 

In my humbler days, when I still flew with the plebs, I saw Girl, You Know It’s True on the flight from LAX to LHR, and I am glad I didn’t pay to see it in the cinema. Apart from the awful title, it was a good trip down memory lane. Kinda like Robbie Williams’s Better Man, which I loved. While boarding that flight, one of my favorite songs as a kid was playing, and I didn’t know who the singer was until I Googled “I Know Corina 80s song”. It turns out it was Quincy Jones’s Ai No Corrida. Ha. Talk about mangled lyrics, eh? Ai No Corrida had always been I Know Corina in my head for over 40 years. I recall a mate who refused to countenance that he got the chorus to Snoop Dogg’s Serial Killer wrong. He would swear it was Snoopy Dogg July, as “Snoop Dogg was born in July”. He’s lucky we didn’t have the internet back then, as a quick check woulda revealed that Mr. Calvin Cordozar Broadus Jr. was born on…hold on…October 20^th.

 

By the way, my search revealed that Ai No Corrida can be roughly translated as the practice of strangulation during intercourse. Yup, we readily danced to that as kids. I sorted, kinda understood what Lisa Lisa’s I Wonder If I Take You Home meant as a kid, but over Xmas, I really listened when Look At Me, I’m Sandra Dee from Grease was playing on a friend’s phone.  The … Look at me, I’m Sandra Dee, Lousy with virginity…. line blindsided me. I might need to rethink my youth. Maybe some, ahem, assistance, as proposed in Michael Pollan's How To Change Your Mind, which I am currently reading, could help.

 

Tot ziens and God bless.