Diary Of A Deltan Kuffa

Chapter Seven

BENEATH THE THISTLE, PINED TRUNKED TREES. Where dames and damsels frolicked. A baby spoke baby. I sat just before him. one squabble after another he stringed words of playful exuberance, it made no sense but somehow how it made sense to laugh, as though he told a tale old joke. I said hello, and he giggled some more.

"Oh you're adorable," I remarked and his mum replied with a smile, "his name is?" My lips went open, unabridged.

"Shawn"

"Might I add: Corper. Corper Shawn"

"Say thank you, Shawn"

Maybe he understood, maybe not, but at that moment he spoke baby some more. Then followed his cheer-filled squabble. I sat on the third row of what Diana would call, "A Love Garden", but I didn't feel the love. No, wait I did. The baby's.

His cute hands swung in the air, as he laid on mum's legs. Sucking from his water-filled bottle. It appears Shawn might just be a star, as the Lady before him couldn't help but admire in endless gaze. His mum was kitted up like I was- white boots, white socks, green khaki. A colored glass sat on her face, mine was dark, it swung from my neck. Baby Shawn let out a cry; a reminder that this cute fellow in a flick could turn on you; mum begged him to stop and with each cuddle he did.

Someone commanded our attention, a man. His head covered with a hard hat. Your best guesses? Engineer? Well, I would soon find out. Safety was the word that entwined with his every line, one after the other. He beckoned on and on. I half-listened probably because the sun was out. To my not so far right, another mother shared a joke with the lady beside her. I looked around to weigh the attention this man commanded and found naught.

"Corpers wee," he said

"Waa" we replied like we were bullied to

Something else commanded-more rightly put, divided-our attention. A device. One that had evolved into being addressed with the adjective, smart. Whether it made the user smarter was debatable. "Safety first..." And some other words ensued along that line. Might I add the shade of my shadow I now couldn't miss? The sun. It burnt. Even the skin of my phone was heated by this inferno. An exaggeration? Maybe not.

Project management was the next thing he talked about, my ears were now attuned; as I had signed up for one of these so-called professional courses. Perhaps we thought it a gateway to escape the one thing that plighted us all. Not the heat. The fact that no sooner after our P.O.P. (passing out parade). Free to scout the earth we would be left to fend. The service program was the breather, to let us catch our breath before this deep plunge.

Just twelve thousand Naira, he added and a voice from the crowd echoed "e de cheap na." Compared to mine, it was.

"A form will be pass round,.."soon after the row before me had gotten hold of it. It didn't get to me. I later got the flier from Shawn's mum, it had the picture of a lady to the right, and beneath 12,000 was written in bold fonts in a red circle, the top right corner had, "Honest Professionals" and just beneath a picture of corp members during their P.O.P. I wouldn't bore you with more detail except that the bottom row had square sized icons of about six other corporations. "How we wan do all these things with alawi them never increase?" a firm voice said, my face brightened up, the oh so formidable problem that plagued us all. MONEY!

Another now held the mic, no not the man with the hard hat. her voice, high pitched.

"How many of you want to make moneyyyyy with your smartphone" her emphasis on the money you couldn't miss.
"Do you know what JOB means, Just Over Broke,"
She sounded like a mother that had just scolded her child but still had some wisdom to instill.
Then came the "Corpers wee" slogan, a desperate attempt to calm the excited crowd, I mean who wouldn't listen if someone talked about making millions; I fear their excitement was a cocktail of humor and sarcasm.

"I make my own recharge card, I am a producer..." her next lines started with, her words all too familiar, like the SAED lecturers we had back in camp, the ones we didn't want to hear, that promised millions, but the catch was skill acquisition, undoubtedly a necessity. The amens from the crowd seemed to outweigh their attention span one-to-nothing (I might have slightly exaggerated). These promises of huge money seemed unbelievable, fellow
members getting hundreds of thousands, even millions. Some other flier moved round, the Cinema some miles away wouldn't miss an opportunity to advertise. They enlisted the "now showing" movies: FIX US, BAD BOYS, JUMANJI 2... The one flier that held my attention.

I am not one to judge a man's hustle, whatever works for you follow suit. The silence of the seven-meter tall trees bearly covered with leaves reminded me, evey man blooms in his time. Baby Shawn wasn't behind me anymore, like a star, he had shawn his ray of cutely covered hope, it shown even brighter than the scorching sun over head.

"To be poor means, pass over opportunity repeatedly..." Another speaker said. Observing baby Shawn, playing, was the opportunity of a life time.