Last weekend I went to the annual event to celebrate the life of a young Nigerian, the son of our family friend, who lost his life trying to break up a fight. I can’t believe it’s been eight years since we received that terrible news.

A local Christian hip hop/R n B group called Prosper and GPM performed at the event last year and I loved their music enough to buy their cd. During the Black History Month activities that took place this February, I got to hear one of their new singles live. They performed the new single (It’s not over) again this past weekend and it couldn’t have come at a better time for me. I hope you’ll find it encouraging too. They dedicated the song to the Haiti earthquake victims so the accompanying images might be hard to watch.

There are two particular areas of my life I can think of right now where I’m tempted to stop trying to get where I want to be or get what I want because of the difficulty involved. I know that challenges are a part of life and I’m no stranger to them but I get tired of the struggle sometimes, and how slow things progress. The song’s chorus was just the reminder I needed:

It’s not over
I’m holding on ’til the end
If I stumble
I’ll rise again and again
It’s not over
I’m holding on ’til the end
Eeeeehhhhhh

For the past week Yinka Ayefele has been crooning to me (on YouTube). I can’t get one of his older albums, New Dawn, out of my head.

The part that has me completely hooked is from 7:04 onwards. I have to get up and dance as soon as I hear it. Needless to say, surviving a car accident that left him paralyzed from the waist down is reason enough for Ayefele to be discouraged and down about his life. No doubt he feels that way at times but I’m encouraged by how’s he’s been able to turn a Bitter Experience to a Sweet Experience (titles of previous albums).

What music do you turn to when you’re in need of encouragement or inspiration?

Filed under: Naija Music, Personal, Thankful Thursdays by goodnaijagirl | 3 Comments »

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I’m attending my first Nigerian wedding in Canada this weekend. Two years ago I attended my cousin’s wedding in Nigeria, which was the first bride-and-groom-are-Nigerian wedding that I had attended. Even among Nigerians in the same city as I am, it’s a bit odd that I haven’t attended many Nigerian weddings but my excuse is a)none of my (few) Nigerian friends have married (yet!) and b)I don’t go to weddings that I am not explicitly invited to. I’ve attended two Yoruba-style engagements and one wedding between a Yoruba girl and an Angolan guy so far but this is the first Nigerian wedding I’ve been invited to. I’m really looking forward to it, especially since the bride and groom met at a Nigerian wedding four years ago this summer (God: please let my life echo this story!)

I was talking to the bride-to-be last weekend and of course her biggest problem is how large the wedding is getting due to all the uninvited guests that will be attending. If you’re not Nigerian or African, this might seem strange to you because most North Americans I know don’t crash weddings, no matter how popular the movie Wedding Crashers was. As of last weekend, the bride-to-be was expecting 500 people, which is more than she had invited. She sent out invitations and what baffled her most wasn’t that Mr. & Mrs. X included the names of their children on the RSVP card that they were returning (even though in some cases the kids weren’t invited), but the fact that Mr. & Mrs. X included the names of Mr. & Mrs. Y, people that the bride and groom do not know at all! And this happened more than once.

Personally, I don’t understand it. Let’s imagine that Mr. & Mrs. X have visitors staying with them and they feel bad leaving them at home to attend a wedding. First of all, Mr. & Mrs. Y don’t even know the bride and groom, so why would they want to attend the wedding? Why can’t Mr. & Mrs. Y spend a quiet evening at their friends’ home, understanding that due to plans that were determined before their arrival, their hosts won’t be available to entertain them for that evening? I think most houseguests would be understanding about that. But in many cases, RSVP or not, Mr. & Mrs. X will bring their houseguests along, not caring if their guests take the seats meant for someone who actually knows the bride and groom and who received an invitation. It’s aggravating for brides especially. Imagine: you invite 200 people to your wedding and you could have 50 extra people show up – or more! Regardless of whether or not you’re serving buffet style food or by the plate, an extra 50 people makes a difference.

I have heard of Nigerian brides and grooms who have managed to pull off small, intimate weddings that don’t include their cousin’s university roommate. I’ve heard of some different tricks that worked:

Sending the invitations on very short notice, hoping that people will be busy on the wedding day
I don’t like this idea because sometimes the people you really want at your wedding may not be able to attend. You could tell the people you really want to attend to “save the date”, but I wonder if word of mouth would cause the information about the wedding to spread to people you don’t want to attend anyway.

Insisting that wedding guests bring their wedding invitation to the venue and not admiting anyone to the wedding who does not have the wedding invitation | By invitation only weddings
This one works, especially if you have a list of all the invitees on a checklist for those who will forget their invitation but who are actually invited. Bouncers at the wedding would also be an important component of this plan. How mortifying would it be to show up for a wedding you were not invited to, and be turned away? Yikes.

Having a destination wedding
This is a good way to keep numbers down: don’t get married where most of your family and friends live. If the destination is one of those one or two week vacation package deals you can guarantee that due to time or money restrictions, you won’t have a full house of guests…unless you give them lots of notice so they can save money (and vacation time) for it.

When my turn comes, I intend to keep things small by Nigerian wedding standards at around 150 people (keep in mind how random this number is since I have no idea if my future husband will have a trillion family members, all of whom are very special and dear to him). If I have my way I will get married in Canada (and do my engagement in Nigeria) so that will automatically keep my wedding numbers low. I would love to do the guestlist/bouncer thing, but that’s a bit much for what I expect to be no more than about 150 people. Instead, I will beg my mom on my knees to please not mention my wedding to anybody except the people she asked me to invite.

Then I’ll pray very very hard the only thing I’ll have to worry about is the length of my very long-winded father’s speech!

1. How have you or friends of yours successfully kept the number of wedding guests down?
2. Do you think keeping numbers down is the biggest wedding-related concern after ‘Where do I find my bride/groom in the first place?’

Filed under: Celebration, Culture, Rant by goodnaijagirl | 17 Comments »

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Despite my lack of thankful posts this month, there have been so many family and friend milestones to give thanks for.

1. My parents celebrated their 34 year wedding anniversary yesterday! They are such a remarkable couple, loved by so many people, and loved most of all by my siblings and I. I have praised them many times on this blog and I know I will always have reasons to be thankful for their loving example to us and for their love for each other. They have been through rough times, but their love and committment to each other is never shaken, and it’s such a great example to see. I wish I had my camera with me last night to snap a picture of the happy couple but I didn’t…my mom just lights up whatever space she occupies and my dad…well the best person on this earth to coax a smile on his face is my mom (followed closely by me, might I add!). They really complement each other.
2. My sister celebrated her 29th birthday last week and my dad celebrated a milestone birthday (60 years!) two weeks ago. We held a last minute celebration that was well-attended despite the short notice…people know how good my mom’s cooking is (unlike mine!) and they really love my parents. We got RSVPs from people saying things like “we wouldn’t miss this for the world!”.
3. My bestest friends also celebrate(d) wedding anniversaries in August, on the 20th and 31st respectively.
4. Remember the Filipino couple I mentioned in a thankful post? They are in Canada now, but we still have not met. She has not been feeling well lately, and has asked for prayers. Well guess what? She’s pregnant! I was as excited as a big sister could be…so many positive changes have taken place in their life recently, and now a baby is on the way.

Another lovely thing that fills me with a lot of joy is how much my baby brother, Babatunde, loves asking me for advice and input on decisions he’s contemplating, from whether he should pursue a certain young lady to whether he should delay university for a great job offer. I once found a wonderful birthday or Father’s Day card for my dad. The front said something like I love all the good advice you give me, Dad, and on the inside it says Not because I follow it, but because you have a very pleasant speaking voice. It was the perfect card for my dad because he spends so much time talking to us, trying to help us make the best choices possible, and I know he feels like his words just float over our heads. I feel the same way with Babatunde, but I still love that he is showing me some kind of respect by asking for my two cents, even though he often disregards it.

My other brother (Babatunde’s older brother) and I have a rocky relationship. We are both very alike, frighteningly so, so of course we clash very often. Most people would be surprised at the kind of fights we have, and only my closest friends know how bad things have been. And of course since I’m the eldest, I’m not supposed to act like I do in these instances. But I do. There have been times when I’ve wondered if we will stop talking to one another entirely, and that makes me sad because family is important to me. I haven’t really prayed about getting closer to him, because for so long I’ve been too angry and hurt to do so, but that is changing and I’m very happy for that. Despite all the anger I’ve felt toward him over the years, despite the times when I’ve wished bad things on him, I’ve always made sure not to let the sun go down on that anger, and I’ve let God know that I didn’t really mean it. So, I am thankful that God continues to not only preserve his life and mine, but that He’s also helped us get closer to one another. It’s a case of one step forward and three steps back most of the time, but there is progress being made. I am very thankful…words cannot express it.

I hope you have something to be thankful for…think on it: you’ll find something!

Filed under: Thankful Thursdays by goodnaijagirl | 10 Comments »

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I’ve confessed before that I can’t cook Nigerian dishes aside from a few staples. To me, the most important thing to master is various stews, from the basic obe ata (basic pepper stew) to the more complicated ogbono or egusi stew. My mother is not to blame (she tried, oh she tried, and for two decades I resisted her efforts and tactics, including the times she would get angry and tell me that since I didn’t help cook the food I could not have any). I was spoiled too because my father also cooks, so I really didn’t feel I had any reason to hang around the kitchen. Now that I’ve been living on my own for over a year, I think of the delicious foods I used to eat regularly and I’m sad that I can’t recreate them (is this what is referred to as “getting what I deserve”?). When bloggers like Ms. O whip up delectable delights I’m jealous and I have to confess that although I’ve requested recipes from her and others (and received them), I’ve never recreated the recipes in my own kitchen.

And I have a beautiful kitchen, one that practically begs me to use it.

(The cutie in the picture is my mom.)

Almost a year ago, I went to my parents’ place for a lesson on cooking obe ata. I think my mother probably made her first obe ata at the age of seven. I’m 31 and I still have not made my own pot of stew all by my self (my mom was directing me that last time). I thought by now I would have graduated to more complex stews but instead, I’m still working on stocking my kitchen to prepare Nigerian food. Winter is coming and I would like to be able to make some delicious stews. Last week I made a first step: I bought myself some Maggi cubes:

I just need a few hundred other ingredients (see the comments on this entry for specifics) and next week I can start the cooking experiment in earnest: my goal is recreate the obe ata and have it taste good.

How do your cooking skills rate?

Filed under: Cooking, Personal by goodnaijagirl | 27 Comments »

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I’ve written a bit about some topics related to traveling to Nigeria. If you regularly visit your homeland and don’t wait 14 years between visits like I did when I finally went two years ago, then the info below is not useful. But if you have never been to Nigeria, or you haven’t been in a long time, here are some entries that you might find helpful as you plan your trip. Don’t focus on the entries as much as the COMMENTS. The readers have so many excellent suggestions and helpful info, and I’m sure you’ll learn a lot from them as I did:

• Vaccinate me
• Gift ideas
• Traveling to Nigeria – bathroom “necessities”
• Traveling to Nigeria – clothing and accessories
• Flying (within Nigeria)
• Thankful and Lagos hotel hunting

You can also read about my frustrations with the N@ija High Commission if you’re so inclined.

But what I wanted to talk about was tourism in Nigeria. As someone who wasn’t born in the country, I don’t really know much about the hotspots, but I just know there are some! There are a couple of key reasons why only a few countries in Africa get enough tourism to consider it a true source of money for the country, and we could talk about that another time (hint: lack of consistent social infrastructure). I can’t wait for the day where world travelers will put more African countries, including Nigeria, on their “trip around the world” itinerary.

When I was in Nigeria last time, I heard about a famous rock (I did some research and it could have been Aso, Zuma or Olumo) as well as the Obudu Cattle Ranch, but we didn’t have time, budget, time, time or time to get to do anything touristy. In fact the closest I got to getting souvenirs was in the hour before boarding the plane back to Canada, when I spent my last nairas on assorted carvings that I paid too much for at the airport because I’m not a good bargainer.

The problem with having family where you’re going is that it’s really hard to tell them that you’re in town but you’re going to take a week or two to explore before coming to see them. That never goes over well. A sneaky solution is to tell them that you arrive in town a week after you actually arrive, and get all that touristy stuff out of the way first. I suggested that to my mother for our next trip and she wasn’t keen on the idea because both of her parents and all of her siblings except one are in Nigeria, so for her, the trip is all about seeing her family and not any “yeye tourist activities”. In fact spending any time in Lagos to explore is a big waste of time in her opinion, since we have no family in Lagos (I know, we’re an anomaly). I just may have to consider a solo trip to Nigeria in the future!

But before that, I’d like you to suggest some places that anyone going to Nigeria should make time to visit. It can be tourist attractions or any place that you think would give people the true flavour of Nigeria’s rich culture.

Filed under: Traveling to Nigeria by goodnaijagirl | 5 Comments »

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I have challenged myself to blog regularly about things that I am thankful for. We all have something in our lives that we can be thankful for, it’s just a matter of thinking on it. Life can be hard and is very stressful, but as long as you’re on this side of the ground and not below it, I think life is good.

Fine, life is good but there are so many challenges, so many things that disappoint us or go wrong, lots of unanswered prayers that cause us to lose hope or overshadow our thankfulness. We all face them. When you see an entry here that is all about thankfulness, don’t think everything in my life is perfect and I’m completely satisfied (in some instances I should be, but I’m a typical flawed human). In many cases I have to think hard before I come up with more than one reason to be thankful. Don’t think I’m writing to brag about my life, or show off that my life is better than anybody else’s. I just know that by taking time each week to focus on the good, I feel better about all aspects of my life, including the things that aren’t going as expected.

Last year, I mentioned that as a result of interacting with more Nigerians, especially family that I had reconnected with on my last trip to Nigeria and also some friends that I have met through blogging, I’ve slightly modified how I speak with them when compared to my non-Nigerian friends. It wasn’t deliberate, but it’s happened nevertheless. I’ve added the following to my repertoire:

I use the word “again” to mean “anymore”
Example: “I went for dinner with that cute guy last Tuesday…or wait, was it the Tuesday before that? I don’t know again” (the old me would have said “anymore” or “I can’t remember” instead of ‘again’).

“Eh ya” and other expressions of emphathy
Honestly the English language is lacking in expressions of empathy. I think the best English expression for empathy would be “Awww”, but it can mean “how cute/sweet/romantic” as well as “oh, what a shame!” (I’m actually a big “aww”-er). I know we’ve all had a situation where a colleague tells you a story about how on their way to work they tripped and ripped their skirt and you say “sorry” and they (especially if they are not Nigerian) say “It’s not your fault!”. If I am telling a fellow Nigerian the same story, you can bet I’m going to pause and give them a chance to say “sorry”, “pele”, “ndo” or “eh ya”, and now if you tell me a tale that merits an “eh ya”, you’ll hear one come from my lips or fingertips. A little empathy goes a long way.

I can’t deny that I like these little changes to my communication, especially because it’s something that’s just happening; I’m not forcing it; I’m just absorbing it from the environment. Even so, I’m resisting adding the word am to my vocabulary, when it’s used in place of “I am” (for example, when I ask someone how they’re doing, and they respond with “Am fine”, or if they want you to know that they are tired, they say “am tired”. Am not ready to go down that road!

Filed under: Miscellaneous, Thankful Thursdays by goodnaijagirl | 17 Comments »

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