Corper’s Diary: Journey to IB For Convocation And The Service

So i know I was supposed to continue the story from the last episode; I just have to chip this in. I’d continue the previous one in the next one.

So back to today’s episode.
It is only in Nigeria(not like I’ve been to anyother country before) that students (or graduates) would convocate months and years after their graduation.
It is strange to you yeah? I mean I don’t know of any other school that does convocation two years after the graduation of students, that calls back students for the convocation while they are ‘reluctantly serving’ the nation.
But my school does this.
Which school, I’m sure you would think it is one I those ‘stupid underground, under qualified, illegal schools that ought to be scraped out of the Nigeria educational system’ but no. My school isn’t any of those.
My school is the first and the best university in Nigeria. The premier university of Nigeria. And if you are still clueless after this, I should just tell you now.
I attended the prestigious university of Ibadan. Yup. My school is the best. Not Unilag and neither OAU is better than my school. Truth be told, these schools are the best in Nigeria, and if you didn’t attend any of the above, sorry for you. Or unless you went to some school in USA or Britain or else where.
So even with the reputation of my school, they stil could not hold convocation for the students.
Let me try and explain why there’s been no convocation in UI for over two years now.
The last time the convocation service was held in my school was in the year 2011. Yeah, that far.
In the year 2012, we had a little internal strike I think, and by the time the issue was resolved and graduating students were supposed to be sent to NYSC office for mobilization, it was already too late for any type of convocation to be held for the students. So they just had to go for service and it was decided that the convocation service would be held for them alongside the next set of students that would be graduating. This was in year 2012.
Then come 2013, another tragic strike hit the entire universities in the country. And talking about the entire universities, I meant all the public universities in nigeria; federal and state universities in Nigeria.
This one lasted for a long six months, just imagine six months without students of the giant of Africa not going attending classes and being productively busy.
The strike started on the first of June I think. We had just resumed school at this time and most students(I for one) hadn’t even started attending lectures. So on this day, I and my friend Bolanle were getting ready to go to the Faculty of Arts to go and see if the class would hold. We had been hearing rumours about the supposed strike. And on getting to the Faculty, we saw people milling around the quadrangle(not like that is unusualy, people sit there to be seen), we went straight to room 37 where the class would be taught. But no Dr Bisi showed up. The course that was to be taught on that day was governmental public relations. After some minutes, the lecturer who is the sub dean of the faculty of arts came in to tell us that the class would not hold as ASUU(Academic Staff University union) I hope I got that right, had declared a strike. Just wow.
And trust us as students, we were really happy about this. We thought it would just be normal way of things as after aome weeks, or a month it would be resolved. Meanwhile we were happy about the extra days of idleness and anticipated cruising around town and having fun. To cut the long story short, the strike went on for six months. I was supposed to graduate that year. But the strike would not let one be great. I was thinking id graduate at the age of 20. Lol. Okay now you know my age.
The strike was called off towards the end of the year, November or so, as a result no convocation could be done for that year.
Fast forward to 2014, I graduates June, went for camp orientation by august and still no convocation. Only for November to arrive and the school said they would be doing convocation for students from on the 13-17 November 2014.
Just imagine the nerve of the school, there wasn’t even no time for preparation. I mean I’m serving in the east, ebonyi state which was some 12 hours away from Ibadan. Yeah I could as well fly but no money.
I had even told my friends asking never that I wasn’t gonna be at the convocation. But I changed my mind. I saw it as a welcome distraction; at least I would leave that dead place when I’m serving. So I decided to ‘turn up’ for the convocation.
I packed my bags(as usual I overpacked) and took care of some other things. Ezekiel (one of my students who has a bike) came to drop off Sylvester and I for the trip to Abakaliki at Agubia. We only fueled his bike for him for the journey.
As usual I slept off in Abakaliki at my friends’ flat in tycoon hotel.
Then the following day at around 7, I headed for the park at Peace Motors for the long ass journey to Ibadan.
At the park, I got talking with one of the passengers, this was before the bus got full. And I discovered he was a medical doctor. He was posted to the state in 2003 and decided to stay back. I was totally shocked. I mean the guy was a Yoruba man. Like why on earth would a Yoruba man do such a thing? Okay, he also attended my school too. So we got talking about the school and his stay in the state.
He said he is okay with the place where he is, like I said he is a doctor, so I guess his salary is quite attractive. As for the dullness and slowness of the state, he said Abakaliki is just like Ibadan. Only that in recent times, Ibadan is becoming or aiming to be like a ‘small Lagos’. The only thing he complained about was that the rent in the state was growing astronomically and skyrocketing by the day. He stays in a 3bedroom flat that cost about 350-400 thousand per year, luckily for him, he has his own house which he built. So house rent was no problem. In some areas, house rent is about 500-600 thousand per year. While duplexes go for about 1million naira. And I wondered how much these people that rent place like these would earn per year. He said most of the really pricey places were being lived in by the politicians, and really top ranking people in the state.
Nothing spectacular happened in the journey to ib, i sat in the back if the bus and an elderly man was beside me. The one thing i remember about the man was that he kept on shouting at his daughter over the phone. The girl apparently was trying to get in A university and she wanted some other course. But the father insisted that she pick mass communication. I wonder when parents would stop being so high handed. The poor girl didn’t want that Course but the father would not hear any of her objections. He angrily cut the call after that. This is the reason why some students flunk or fail school. I’m not saying parents should not have a hand in choosing courses for their children, but they can do it in a better way. I for one have a 19 year old sister who has an OND in business administration, I would like her to read Economics for her direct entry degree, she is refusing. Says she wants some other course like that, I will make sure she reads economics sha.
The man insisted on buying me things anytime we got to any stops. Suya, drinks, water and things like that. And I accepted the offer, people that are so harsh on their children and family but nice to pretty girls(yes, I’m pretty) . When we got to Ibadan, he even requested for my number just imagine the nerve of the man.
I got to Ibadan at around 5pm and went straight to Fred’s place at ile-Baale to drop my bags as I would be staying there. After which I went to the school to hang out with my friends, Tola and Victoria. I had missed them especially Victoria. And we started talking about our PPAs and the state we serve in. Tola is in Enugu while Victoria is in Lagos; which she is indifferent about. I call her Lagos corper, she complains that Lagos is so expensive and all that. One advice that I have her was to be taking the brt buses. God bless the governor of Lagos state, Governor Babatunde Raji Fashola for this initiative.
We complained about Our various places of work till about 9pm after which I and Victoria parted ways to meet the following day to go collect the convocation gowns.
Early the following morning by 8, I and Bolanle went to the Faculty of arts to collect them gowns, but on getting there, the women said that to collect the gowns , we needed the alumni receipts. Mine was in Lagos, after much begging, she relented and said that we would drop a thousand Naira to collect the gown. After that Bola left and i had to wait for Victoria to come so she collects hers too.
After getting the gowns, we hailed a cab and moved straight to the international conference center which was towards the school’s second gate where the ceremony was to be held. Wearing the gown gave us issues as it kept slipping off my shoulders, but thank God for the dressers. There were people waiting at the entrance if the international conference center. So in my beautiful white dress, I was properly dressed up.
The ceremony was totally and absolutely boring. I mean nothing interesting or important. I thought they would give us some certificates or things like that. It was just a bloody service. I felt cheated. I just wasted my transport fare and time to get there.
Truth be told, I went there for just sentimental reasons as that would be like the last time I would see my classmates again.
I didn’t particularly come because of the service at all. No sir. Oh, and I took lots of selfies. I love me some selfies. With my classmates, my friends and all that. Even with my ex-lecturer, Dr Tunde Awosanmi.
I should use the medium to congratulate the first class graduates; the ones I could remember Betty Owa, Linda Ogbonye and Cindy of the faculty of law. She had the best result, like she came first in the recent bar exams. Yup. She’s bad like that. You should see(hear, rather) the standing ovation and applause the girl got. Lol, and my friend Victoria (aka gossip partner) was really miffed at one Indian or Lebanese girl that won lot of awards in her faculty, department of computer science because she came from her own country to cheat Africans out if the awards in their own school. But why would someone from such country come down to Nigeria to do a course in the sciences. I’m really surprised.
Oh and one really annoying thing I remembered from the service was the generator kept tripping off. Imagine a school like UI can not afford to keep the generator for its 65th(I think) convocation service. Too bad. Such a big slap on the faces of the planning committee of the service and the federal government too.
That’s basically all I can remember about the service now.
After this was the ‘eating food’ time, I went to my own department along with my classmates, some brought their own food and drinks and all that.
In all it was a good day, I was excited to be among my school friends and all.
I hope the next time we see, we would be big successes. Amen.
And on Sunday, I left Ibadan to go to Lagos for the next round of cruising.
I don’t know if I should write about the Lagos’s story or not.
That would be in the next episode maybe. Or not.