The Girl with the Louding Voice

My mama say education will give me a voice. I want more than just a voice, Ms. Tia. I want a louding voice,” I say. “I want to enter a room and people will hear me even before I open my mouth to be speaking. I want to live in this life and help many people so that when I grow old and die, I will still be living through the people I am helping.

I want to tell her that God is not a cement building of stones and sand. That God is not for all that putting inside a house and locking Him there. I want her to know that the only way to know if a person find God and keep Him in their heart is to check how the person is treating other people, if he treats people like Jesus says--with love, patience, kindness, and forgiveness.

When you get up every day, I want you to remind yourself that tomorrow will be better than today. That you are a person of value. That you are important.

I want to ask, to scream, why are the women in Nigeria seem to be suffering for everything more than the men?

At first I wasn't understanding him, but now it is not too much a problem. Everybody in the whole world be speaking different. Big Madam, Ms. Tia, Kofi, Abu, even me, Adunni. We all be speaking different because we all are having different growing-up life, but we can all be understanding each other if we just take the time to listen well.

Now I know that speaking good English is not the measure of intelligent mind and sharp brain. English is only a language, like Yoruba and Igbo and Hausa. Nothing about it is so special, nothing about it makes anybody have sense.

you must do good for other peoples, even if you are not well, even if the whole world around you is not well.

Not his-story. My own will be called her-story.

That day, I tell myself that even if I am not getting anything in this life, I will go to school. I will finish my primary and secondary and university schooling and become teacher because I don’t just want to be having any kind voice... I want a louding voice.

Who knows what else tomorrow will bring? So, I nod my head yes, because it is true, the future is always working, always busy unfolding better things, and even if it doesn’t seem so sometimes, we have hope of it.

We all be speaking different because we all are having different growing-up life, but we can all be understanding each other if we just take the time to listen well.

Your schooling is your voice, child. It will be speaking for you even if you didn’t open your mouth to talk. It will be speaking till the day God is calling you come.” That day, I tell myself that even if I am not getting anything in this life, I will go to school. I will finish my primary and secondary and university schooling and become teacher because I don’t just want to be having any kind voice . . . I want a louding voice.

If it takes two people to make a baby, why only one person, the woman, is suffering when the baby is not coming? Is it because she is the one with breast and the stomach for being pregnant? Or because of what? I want to ask, to scream, why are the women in Nigeria seem to be suffering for everything more than men?

... I feel a free that I didn't feel in long time. And when I smile, it climb from inside my stomach and spread itself on my teeth.

Write your truth, Ms. Tia say. Your truth. I tear to pieces the paper, ad throw it to the floor. Then I swim deep inside the river of my soul, find the key from where it is sitting full of rust, at the bottom of the river, and open the lock. I kneel down beside my bed, close my eyes, turn myself into a cup, and pour the memory out of me.

Then I swim deep inside the river of my soul, find the key from where it is sitting, full of rust, at the bottom of the river, and open the lock. I kneel down beside my bed, close my eyes, turn myself into a cup, and pour the memory out of me.

Because God is not the church,

Tomorrow will be better than today. I am a somebody of value.

why she is calling her abroad peoples white and black when colours are for crayons and pencils and things. I know that not everybody is having the same colour of skin in Nigeria, even me and Kayus and Born-boy didn’t have same skin colour, but nobody is calling anybody black or white, everybody is just calling us by our name: Adunni. Kayus. Born-boy. That’s all.

It feels good to give Big Madam back her box of fear. To put the key on top of the box and leave it in her compound, in her house, where it belongs.

She open her eyes, give me a sad smile. “I wish I am a man, but I am not, so I do the next thing I can do. I marry a man.

This is your wife now, from today till forever, she is your own. Do her anyhow you want. Use her till she is useless! May she never sleep in her father house again!” and everybody was laughing and saying, “Congra-lations! Amen! Congra-lations!

How will a girl like me born childrens? Why will I fill up the world with sad childrens that are not having a chance to go to school? Why make the world to be one big, sad, silent place because all the childrens are not having a voice?

...who knows what else tomorrow will bring? So, I nod my head yes, because it is true, the future is always working, always busy unfolding better things, and even if it doesn’t seem so sometimes, we have hope of it.

And at first, she struggles, but I hold her two hands tight until she slacks herself and closes her eyes, until she accepts that sometimes even the strongest of people can suffer a weakness.

The wall in the room we shared will remind them that we were here. That we are human. Of value. Important.

Why will I fill up the world with sad childrens that are not having a chance to go to school? Why make the world to be one big, sad, silent place because all the childrens are not having a voice?