Unpopular side with Thomas Oti
Email: thomasoti@qed.ng
2000+ years ago when one man left home as soon as he turned 30 (was 30 their own 18?), he probably had no idea what lay ahead. An obedient carpenter’s son, he didn’t really feel he was cut out for the chiselling, hammering, filing, scraping and romancing wood of all shapes and sizes. I mean, he had obediently helped his father (and mother) for all those 30 years he had been home, but he still didn’t quite feel it. There was something missing. He loved his parents. He liked helping at the workshop and hanging out with the guys he grew up with in the villa but he still felt that there was something missing. He couldn’t quite place his fingers on it but it was there. Or more like, it wasn’t there.
Is it the boys in the hood (who grew up to transform from Boys2Men) that he was hanging out with? I mean he had known these guys all his life and they were really good guys. No evil in them. Some mischief, yes. But no evil. And it couldn’t be the maidens in the village either. I mean he could flirt with the very best of them but while his friends played the keu keu game when some of the maidens walked by on the way to the River Jordan, he was the only one of his friends who made no sound.
Keu keu is a game where young men sat under the Baobab tree and say keu for the number of times they had slept with any maidens that walked daintily by on their way to the stream or on their way back. The maidens knew about this raunchy tell all game but they didn’t care much. Boys would be men.
His friends were worried about him. They sometimes said maybe he preferred lying with men. But he never said keu either when any young boy or old men passed by so he didn’t do men. Or was he an eunuch? They have swum together severally in the River Jordan and judging from the side of his phallus, there was no way it was useless! Besides, they had all slept out in the open all night in the past and they were witnesses to his manhood rising to meet the morning sun just like that of all of them who were proudly active. He was all man. Plus an extra half on top sef! (Man kanat’abo).
His camel’s back broke at the wedding when his mum had randomly set him up. He didn’t know what came over him but he did something he had never done before but that strangely came naturally to him. But he wasn’t a magician. He had to leave. So he did. Besides, he didn’t want to keep going to all those weddings where they’ll be asking him “Jesus, when na?”
Growing up was a battle. He knew only one way to survive then. He had to fight. And not smile. Smiling was a sign of weakness. He can’t be this gangly and breakable and be smiling sheepishly too. Learning to fight to survive started from home. He was number 23 and not last. Getting beat up and bullied by his father’s other sons was a favourite pastime. They were all gangly but he was extra gangly. He couldn’t fight them except he had an advantage. After all, didn’t that guy say all animals are equal but some more equal than others? He couldn’t count on strength. He needed something more. Going into the army was therefore not a difficult decision. Neither was it difficult to be determined to succeed at it.
By his own 30th, he was married, had a pretty daughter and was a high ranking Military Officer. He still smiled little. He advanced far in his career and built a loyal enough following amongst fellow officers that at age 40 when he and others decided they had had enough, he chucked out the reigning civilian president at the time jailing all ousted thieving leaders. He cleansed the land and brought order to the system. He was a no-nonsense kind of guy and the people soon realised what that really meant! But of course he couldn’t last long. He and his even more frowning deputy had to go. And so, out they were thrown via another putsch!
He only had three years to be famous. And he wasn’t going to blow it. The people were looking for a king in royal robes, blazing sword, finest livery and whitest horse. They got a guy in a gown, bushy hair and beards and sandals that did his feet no favours. They expected royal pronouncements that would shake the Roman Empire to its roots and have Caesar peeing his pants. They got this guy pontificating, claiming to be the messiah or something funny and able to practice a kind of magic they hadn’t seen before.
All that wouldn’t have been so bad if he had not compounded it all by calling himself, wait for it, the son of God! How dare he? Their God couldn’t have sex and he had no wife. If they believe God was his father, they would have to stone God to death for committing either adultery, fornication or some other divine hara-kiri! This was preposterous and the guy had to be stopped from poisoning the hearts and minds of their numb, docile and well fleece able followers. Die! Die!! Die!!! But he had a way with the grass and the roots. Everywhere he went, they followed him. They held on to every word he said like their life depended on it. He said things that got them thinking; that they could connect with.
There was something about J. He was wise and he brought hope to their wretchedness. Like that one time when he fed so many of them even though they didn’t see where the horses with bread and fish came from. Around him you couldn’t be hungry. Though that talk of spiritual bread or offering himself as bread didn’t go down well. Still, they were not leaving in a jiffy. They continued to listen and follow even after they saw him nailed up like a common criminal. And to think that all he had was a core team of 12-1, there was something happening here. They followed him then. They follow him now. They will follow him tomorrow.
He didn’t bitch much after he got chased out of the ultimate barracks. He left back to his village quietly and went back to what he had learnt growing up. Rearing cattle, playing with his old classmates and generally faffing around. He kept an eye out for another chance at the cake though. He felt like a man who had plenty unfinished work to do. He had to go back. No matter what. He was growing old year on year. He saw the plundering and wanton destruction and depletion of the locust years. He could do no more than stand and sometimes sit by and watch. But at the earliest whiff of opportunity, he threw his hat back in the ring. It took 16 years but like an idea whose time had come, he had come.
Like a messiah, his followership was unstoppable. He couldn’t be bought. His supporters couldn’t be bought. Actually, some of them were bought but only by mouth. They took the largesse and stuck with him instead. It was unbelievable and incontrovertible. The sitting duck added 2+2 made the call and rode away into the sunset. He left a hole the size of a moon crater in the purse of the land but the “messiah” was not deterred o. He set about cleaning up the mess. He applied the rake systematically and began raking together the rubbish. As painful as rake is on the true grass when you attempt to rake up the weed, that’s how bad the pain was on everyone.
But they followed him. And followed him. And followed him. There’s a promise at the end of the rainbow. Maybe not gold sha. Only fools and horses.
But even then…I will follow him. Follow him wherever he may go… Because, at least, he is different.
