The Ibadan Experience: Ohikhuare Isuku

Y

esterday, I saw a young boy for the first time in Ibadan who did not betray his timidity either through excessive veneration or by affecting an unwarranted arrogance just to shield the inferiority complex his or her cultural upbringing has inflicted on him. 

It was evening – at that time the sky took a uniform greyness like the colour of thick billow of smoke – and I had come to the market to shop for groceries. When I was done, I decided to get a carton of noodles from one of the shops which flanked the market at the outskirt. I saw this young boy there inside the only shop opened at the outskirt. He was chubby and dark-complexioned; his height was just perfect for a boy of ten, although I would not know. He asked what I wanted even before I spoke. His voice was firm, yet it lacked this common scorn most children I had seen possessed just to mask the damages a stiff upbringing had caused on them. 

I told the young boy I wanted noodles, half-cartoon. He gave me the price, and once I had agreed to terms, he brought the cartoon of the noodles from where it was piled up, using a stool. Then he did what caught my eyes: he actually joked with me confidently. I can't remember the joke exactly. Maybe the shock that a child brought up in Ibadan had had the gods to make such clever joke, made me forget the content of it. I laughed and I joked with him also. His response was mature and I was truly impressed. But this boy saved his best display for the last. As I was about leaving after the transaction, he said to me, "thank you"; there was no "sir" attached to it. A sugary sensation rose to fill my mouth instantly and I was forced to ask him if he was an Ibadan boy. He shook his head in the affirmative. I smiled and was impressed, and as I walked away that grey evening, I saw in that young boy this privilege his guardians gave him to grow at his pace, not being squeezed with expired cultures of bowing down and prostrating or nodding head like a slave does to a slave-master which are the only ways these people believe respect can be expressed. 

T

o me, most Ibadan people are hypocritical outright, especially those blabbing market women at Orita. Anytime I visit their market, the women bathe me with "uncle", "sir", "brother" and many other annoying prefixes. Even one day, a woman – about my mother's age – dared to call me "daddy". She had gone too far, I thought within myself, and then I summoned the courage to beg her to stop it; that I had not given birth yet; I was still in my twenties. She was obviously embarrassed, but in her weak defense, she said either ways, I would be a daddy someday.  Sadly, what makes this exaggerated veneration annoying is that the same woman who just called you "uncle" might be the one to spill insult on you soonest, at the slightest provocation.

The opinion I strive to buttress here is that excessive veneration – like prostrating or kneeling to greet – is not a true way of showing respect. These acts are slave-like. Because as from early age, if a child is forced to learn these norms against his or her will, the child is driven into the abyss of low self-esteem. This low self-esteem is a problem which to a large extent is directly linked with fear, betrayal, deceit, corruption, manifested by the child as he or she journeys into adulthood. 

Ohikhuare Isuku,
Ibadan,
Nigeria.