Mathew Aminu exposed

”This year Ramadan go sweet rof bcos I want to go to visit my new eyi bi at Kumasi Moshie Zongo! I heard fasting starts on Monday May 6 and Ramadan is likely to fall on June 4or may be June 5! See you, Loratu Bebe! Hahahahahaaaaa!”

‘When you see your neighbour’s beard on fire, you had better put a bucketful of water by your side’ (this is the Ghana version). The Nigerians have their own version and it goes like this: ‘If you see your neighbour’s beard on fire, you had better put your own beard into water immediately’. You would understand this later in this ‘useless’ write-up. Don’t think about it; just give it a try by setting fire around you with some small kerosene in your beard and be walking around with swag. Go on, no problem! ‘You don’ know’, Rastaman would say!  Hahaaaaa!

Last Wednesday the May Day, I saw my neighbor, Mathew Aminu nursing his wounds after some unnecessary fight he’d engaged himself in when we together joined trotro from Lapaz en route to Nungua. For a very long time I hadn’t seen ‘amoxycillin’ type of capsules which we used to call ‘aborm belet’ those days. I think the yellow and red one is what is scientifically called ‘amoxycillin but I have forgotten the surname of the red and black one. They come in different colours depending on the sickness or ailment it is supposed to cure.

The common one was the ‘black and red’ often used to treat open sores on the skin or swallowed with water when there was suspicion of sore in the stomach popularly known as ulcer. I remember how my uncle, Nuworkpor used to send me to buy him akpeteshie whenever he suspected he had a sore in his stomach though at a point he made it a habit; whether there was sore or not, he would still send me to buy him akpeteshie. Uncle Nuwor nearly spoilt me with akpeteshie o.

Whenever he sent me, he made sure it was enough for the two of us. He would drink half and give me the other half glass to drink. Then you would see the two of us walking around ‘by heart’ singing songs only the two of us understood together with some other village boozemen. When mu uncle staggers to the right, I would stagger to the left. Life was cool! Ao!

He often warned the alcohol to behave itself before gulping it down and warned the plain liquid like: ‘when you get in there, be calm as there are others there before you; it’s about time you learnt how to be calm among people’. You know akpeteshie remains unprovoked only when it is in the bottle but the moment it enters your system…ha! I know it when Uncle Nuwor is drinking it for fun and not ulcer and I can also tell if he is drinking it on suspicion of an ulcer. In the case of the latter, he would open the ‘aborm belet’ capsule and pour it into the drink before gulping it down. The Ga boys in the area at Lagos Town (Accra New Town) then gave him the name Onukpa Aborm Belet!

Uncle Aborm Belet, I will be visiting you at Avey Dakpa tomorrow o; it’s been a long time since I ‘sorted you’ out. Or maybe I should wait till month end next week? You no see? Hahaaaaa! Hope your ulcer is gone now or you are still ‘aborm beleting’? Tordia be that o! I heard your liver length now measures 20.7cm instead of the normal upper limit of 15.5cm. Go on and be drinking. Now that your akpeteshie peers Atiso and Amegbletor have died from liver problems from overindulging in alcohol, your funeral may not be far from now.

Me, I have warned you o, yoo! Ei, can I really warn an uncle in our traditional set up? May be advice. The last two decades that I asked my auntie ‘what do you mean’ when my father died exactly 25 years ago yesterday May 2, I was summoned to court for being rude o, hmmm! You simply cannot say ‘what do you mean’ in the village o! yoo!

Sorry I had to digress from MathewAminu’s experience last month when he went fighting a driver’s mate colloquially known as aplankey. He lost two of his front teeth when he went fighting the driver’s mate over a-fifty-pesewa change whichthe aplankey nearly converted into chobo. The aplankey gave it to him well well and I laughed quietly into my stomach pretending to be sympathizing with him. That man is some kan way o, chai.

The mate was supposed to have given him his change of 50 fifty pesewas but apparently he forgot. When MathewAminu now drew his attention to it and demanded his change, the boy didn’t argue but indicated that he had forgotten and immediately gave it to him and apologised. After you have received your change, won’t you just get down quietly at your destination at Trade Fair and go?

Mathew Aminu, out of an unnecessary anger pushed the aplankey boy and he, the aplankey nearly fell down while the vehicle was still in motion, albeit slowly. Come and see the beatings this small boy doled out to an adult for such an unnecessary push just bcos he hates stealing. Kai! I pretended to be whatsapping on my phone and he was calling out my name to come to his rescue. I no mind am sef! Na me send you? To start with, I didn’t even have the energy to save him from the clutches of a boy who appeared to be under the influence of tramol.

Ei, talk of tramadol, has the fight against it stopped? The boys are still using it o, yoo. Ah! I hate the feeble manner in which we fight national troubles o. See how we handled the okada thing ten years ago and it is a big empire now. After losing the fight which was feebly approached, now we want to relax the law by saying they can use it but should close from work at a certain time. Really?

Hmmmm! The rate at which they are knocking down pedestrians er, you have no idea! Check from the Police MTTD and you would be amazed! Nothing annoys me more than when they are riding and still wassaping on their phones and keep knocking down innocent people. Hmmmm! I am personally losing hope o!

See the way we are handling the vigilante thing too. Haaba!

Anyway, I wonder why many of us unnecessarily get angry at drivers’ mates especially if it has to do with change o, no matter how small. Some have lost their lives as a result and some have maimed themselves or found themselves behind bars for something that a little patience could have resolved. Abeg, if you know you are like that, buy your own car and stop disturbing those of us who are shareholders of trotro. Ah!

Unfortunately Mathew Aminu’smouth is now exposed with the loss of two of his headlight teeth in the process. Now, we cannot even find the two teeth. I don’t even know where the man is now even though he is my neighbor and highly respected in the neighbourhood but the loss of his teeth have exposed him la; I heard he is on working leave drinking tea and butter bread which he dips into the tea before eating! Hahahahahaa!

This man would be toothless for long o but he is genuinely rich too so he can do artificial teeth. You remember when we were young and when you lose a tooth, you are told to throw it on top of a roof before it would ‘germinate’ again? Failure to do so would mean you’d never have your tooth back. It’s some kind of magic; if you don’t find your missing tooth, sorry, you are likely to start calling ‘wele’ ‘weywey’ and beef as ‘biwi’ the rest of your life.

Tradition has managed to deceive us small o. I remember the day I accidentally swallowed an orange seed. I couldn’t sleep that night bcos I was told it would germinate on my head the following day. I cried aaaaaaa till day break. I was later told I was lucky bcos ]it was the crying that scared the orange tree, or else  it would have germinated on my head. We believed all of this la!

It was similar to the days when after a fight in which your opponent bites you, all you needed to do was not to revenge by looking for the smelliest toilet of chicken and smear it on the part where you were bitten and the biter’s teeth would all get rotten? Ei, so where are all these ‘values’? I call them ‘values’ bcos this particular one taught us never to assault as it comes with punishment of some sort! If in doubt, try beating your spouse and see where it would end you – behind bars!

Salaries were paid this week, good! Enjoy it while it lasts but don’t forget the girls you have on your personal payroll o, yoo. Just load your mobile money wallet and be sharing so that by the 10^th of this month you will go broke again! After all giving is good. Go ahead and be sharing and be sinning along side!

Have a happy weekend and remember Sin fascinates and assassinates!