The List - Part 1

She came out to greet us. We remembered her from my entrance examination. We now realized that she was the school’s principal. She seemed really excited to see us as she ushered us into her office, instructing us to bring my entire luggage in with us so that she could go through and make sure I had everything on the list. She pulled out the prospectus and began to read the list of items to us. As she read each item, we pulled it out and showed it to her. She inspected, nodded in approval, and then moved on to the next item. It may shock you to realize that as I am writing this, 12 years later, I remember exactly what this all important list looks like. We only had about a month to shop for everything on the list but combine the anal retentiveness and perfectionism of my mother and I and you have one ridiculously detail oriented team.

I was initially going to write out the entire list for your viewing pleasure, but after a bit of thought, I realized that would be incredibly boring for you to read. It’s really too bad that blogs don’t have appendices otherwise this list would be appendix 1.

It started off with food items like garri (fine, ground cassava powder), groundnuts (peanuts), granulated sugar and milk, cereal, a powdered beverage (like Milo or Ovaltine) and biscuits (cookies). Only these 7 items were allowed. There was no access to refrigeration so they all had to be dry. Usually, when you went away to school, you could bring any kind of food item and miniature appliance you liked. Not this school. Anne explained to us that any other item would be considered “contraband” – that was my first time learning that word and its meaning.  Cooking of any kind would not be allowed. Our 3 meals would be prepared and served to us by our onsite cooks. This is where “Legele the famous cook” comes in. But again – let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

After inspecting the food items - “provisions” as we call them in Nigeria, we moved on to clothing: 2 night dresses, 3 white petticoats, 3 pairs of white socks, 3 pairs of brassieres, 6 pairs of underpants, 2 white scarves, 1 towel, 1 pair of running shoes, 1 pair of flat black covered shoes, 2 pairs of rubber slippers and 2 pairs of brown sandals. If I ever see Ann again, I will ask her why everything had to be white. We never got the explanation for that; but I have a feeling it was for the same reasons that hotels have white towels. It denotes a certain standard of class and cleanliness.

Before I move on to the next part of the list; I was going to refrain from telling you this detail, then I remembered that when i decided to write this blog, myself and I had an agreement that it would be no holds barred – nothing would be spared – not even the embarrassing details.  When Ann got to the part of the list where she read out “3 pairs of brassieres”, her and my mother looked at each other, then simultaneously stared at my then flat chest, then chuckled playfully at my non-existent breasts. At that point, I wished the ground would open up and swallow me. The bras were the only thing on the list we did not bring and we were instantly forgiven for that since I clearly did not need them. Thankfully, as the years went by, my boobs decided to appear. They grew to a pretty decent size so I do need a bra now – just in case anyone was wondering!

Chapter 2 - Day 1

It was bright and early when we arrived there on the morning of January 11^th 1998. We were the only vehicle on the premises. We drove down a makeshift “road” and parked in front of the pair of identical buildings which we now knew housed the classrooms – the same place where i wrote my entrance test a few weeks ago. As we parked, a nun emerged from the building to greet us. In Nigeria, the word “nun” was not part of our every day vocabulary. We always referred to them as “Reverend Sisters” and to priests as “Reverent Fathers” – perhaps because that showed more regard for their “reverence” than the monosyllabic alternatives

At this point, I should mention that to protect their identities, I will be changing the names of the people involved in this story. To the people with whom I shared this journey, the characters will by crystal clear. I am telling this story from my perspective and will try my best not to hurt feelings and burn bridges as i do so. Having said that, this happens to be my blog, so I will tell my story the way I want. I welcome any parties who feel they have been misrepresented by my narration of events to write their own blog and reveal their own side of the story.

Her name was Anne. Reverend Sister Anne Taylor. She was from the congregation of the Sisters of St Louis. This congregation of nuns did not wear the traditional habit with the box-like veil and the 20 inch rosary hanging from their waists. They were more “modern” – so to speak. They wore regular, loose-fitting formal clothes in any combination of blue and white, veils with no cardboard embedding, no pants (skirts or dresses only), no make-up and no jewellery.

That day she was wearing a navy blue skirt and short sleeved, collared blouse with white trim. Her veil was also navy blue with white trim. She had on a pair of black, round toe, two inch heels. As I think back to this outfit on the first day I met Anne, I realize that pretty much everything I remember her wearing was the same potato sac-ish combination of navy blue and white. I only saw her in clothes that were remotely feminine in the evenings. In my almost six years there, I saw Anne look “sexy” ONCE. I would like to describe this “sexy” outfit to you but I have to leave it until the right time in the story. I am trying not to get ahead of myself here.

Still chapter 1 - The Journey There

Everything was packed and ready to go. My mother has always been ultra-organized. The driver came to help carry the stuff down the two flights of stairs, out of the gated building and into the car on the street. Christian was always the driver assigned. He passed away suddenly three years later I remember him smoking quite a bit so that might have had something to do with it. I actually remember my father’s secretary calling to give us the news of his death. My mom was driving. I grabbed her cell phone from her purse, answered it and passed it to her. Then I heard her say “Bad news? God forbid!!” I immediately thought they were calling to tell us something had happened to my dad. I felt my throat tighten and my body go momentarily numb. Then she said “Oh my God! Christian? I can’t believe it! SCC what is happening to your staff?” – another one of their drivers had suffered a massive stroke a few weeks prior. I feel really bad for admitting it now, but I was relieved that it wasn’t bad news about my father. At that point in my life, my level of emotional affect was grossly underdeveloped. Unfortunately, it remained that way until very recently.

The drive there was what would subsequently mark my countdown to separation from “freedom”. First we had to get out of the city of Lagos and on to the Lagos/Ibadan highway towards Ogun State. We made this journey 44 times and every single time, i would lie on my mother’s lap and take intermittent naps. I don’t remember the last time lying on anyone’s lap felt that good. On the radio the news had just broke about President Bill Clinton admitting to having oral sex nine times with Monica Lewinsky. I couldn’t quite figure out what oral sex meant but I figured having it nine times must have been a really bad thing to do. I drifted back to sleep again and woke up when we arrived at the first of two toll gates. The traffic slowed. While we waited to pay the toll fee, there were tons of kids running from one car to the next hawking every snack and drink you could think of: cookies, chips, doughnuts and “gala” – the very famous Nigerian sausage roll which I never ate for fear that the meat in it was something other than meat. We usually bought digestive cookies and some orange fanta.

Passing the first toll gate meant we had entered Ogun state. After Abeokuta – the city of rocks, we drove down a really long stretch of road that went up, then down, then up, then down again. I fell asleep. The traffic slowed again at the second toll gate; waking me up and reminding me that we were almost there. I never understood why that gate was there. We were not at the border of any two cities. We turned left, went down a series of winding unpaved roads in ijebu-Ife, then a narrow road that led to what is now known as “Louisville Avenue”. We arrived at the red gates of Louisville Girls High School. A little old man opened the gates for us, letting us into the 60 acre piece of land where for the next six years I would build my life and the person that I have become today.

Chapter 1 - The first time

So on this day, exactly 12 years ago. I embarked on the most significant journey of my life to date. Needless to say, at the time, I had not even the slightest clue what I was getting myself into. It didn’t really matter. I was 11 years old. I was leaving home to go to the middle of nowhere and away from my mother and life as I had known it but that really didn’t seem to faze me at the time. I don’t have a lot of childhood memories. I’m not exactly sure why. I didn’t have a terrible childhood by any means so that rules out suppression. But for some reason I don’t seem to remember much about my childhood save for a few “catastrophic” events that stick out in my mind. To a child, every little mishap seems rather catastrophic.

I remember this day though. It was January 11^th 1998. Exactly one week before this day, I had gone to the barbershop to cut off all my hair. Everyone who knew me as a child knows I used to have really long pretty hair. Everyone who knows me now knows I can’t stand long hair. I guess after I cut it off that day it never came back

We left home around 8:00am. Home was my mother’s three bedroom apartment in Surulere, Lagos Nigeria. A driver from my father’s company came to pick us up. My mother did not want to drive long distance in her car. Long distance was an hour and a half. I remember the car. It was a Puegeot 504, painted green and white with the company logo and name: “SCC Nigeria Limited” on each side.

There were no teary goodbyes. There were no goodbyes at all if I remember correctly. The decision to go away to boarding school occurred rather hastily. In retrospect, it was not a well thought out decision by any means. Not for me at least. There were no discussions about what the whole processes entailed or even the consequences – the emotional consequences more than anything else. I just remember being really excited that I was going to get to have my own “stuff”. I was going to be away from home, my mother could not control me anymore and I would have my own “everything”. A few weeks before we set out for Ijebu Ife/Itele, we went shopping for the entire list of things that was given to us in the school’s prospectus. I can’t tell you how excited I was that all this stuff belonged to me! Even more exciting was the fact that we were instructed to put our names on every single item we owned.

I remember my mother painting “Aviram” on my metal bucket, plates bowls, cutlery and garden tools in pastel pink paint. She stitched my last name onto every article of clothing I was taking as well - including underpants. They were not joking when they said they wanted everything clearly marked. They were not joking about anything else either. In the prospectus, there was a list of rules and regulations that all students would have to follow, as well as a daily schedule. Very detailed, down to the quarter hour descriptions of what we would occupy our days with on weekdays, Saturdays and Sundays. I read it all before we set on our journey, but for some reason it did not occur to me, not even remotely what all these rules meant and that I would actually have to follow them. Every single one of them.

The brilliant idea to go to this particular school came from my aunt. I have no idea how she found out about it but she was going to send my cousin there so she told my mother about it. I was in my final year of elementary school known as “Primary six” – the nomenclature for the school system in Nigeria has changed now. Most people left elementary school and went to high school after completing primary five. For some reason I didn’t. We had not really discussed where i was going to go to high school come September.

After my aunt told us about this school, my mom arranged for me to write the entrance examination. On the scheduled day, she came to wake me up and I hesitated more than usual. So she said: “Do you not feel like going to write the exam?” I mumbled something that meant “no” and shook my head so she let me go back to sleep. I assumed that would be the end of that. Two days, later, the idea came up again. I guess my mom spoke to my aunt and there was still room for me to take the entrance test. I remember being very upset about having to miss school that day because our class was taking a field trip. We were going to go on a train. I had never been on a train and had been really excited to go. Now I take the subway to work every day but I still have never been on a train in Nigeria. That’s probably for the best, considering the condition the trains in that part of the world are in. Only worthless cargo should be allowed onto them.

To my surprise, I passed the entrance test. I had begun to doubt my academic ability at the time. In first grade, I was first in my class. Afterwards, I was usually somewhere between 2^nd and 5^th. Probably because I didn’t apply myself enough. At this point I was 3^rd place and my class was the smallest it had been - around 30 students. My mother was not impressed with my performance and I was really nervous to write the test so it was a much welcome relief to find out I passed. Afterwards, I remember arriving at my mother’s store and a friend sticking his head through the car window to ask where we were coming from. I replied out of nowhere “I’m going to boarding school.” So i guess that’s exactly how the decision was made. To this day, I’m not sure where those words came from but I had made the decision. It had to be approved by my father since he would be the one providing the funds. But that was not a difficult task. Tuition was the one thing he never complained about paying for. That was until I came to University in Canada.