Countdown To Yuletide
DIALOGUE WITH NIGERIA AKIN OSUNTOKUN
A uniquely memorable aspect of my youth was spending Xmas at Okemesi. There was the harmattan weather whose chill effect sometimes ran to a quale drizzling 17 degrees.
A compact close knit community, it lies between latitude 4.910E to 4.935 0 E and longitude 7.8150N to 7.860N. The borders are contiguous in relative equidistance of about ten kilometres radius with Imesi-Ile to the East, with Ikoro-Ekiti to the West, with Esa-Oke, to to the North East.
The complement of a clement weather all year long, culminating in a social intimacy inducing harmattan chill- in sync with the celebratory mood of Xmas, is a big predisposing incentive to the indigenes fixation with spending the yuletide season at the town.
Across the country, social activities culminated in the December end of year season. The consequential mass retreat to the countryside resulted in a concomitant desertion of the cosmopolitan cities.
It was the time for sparkling and initiating tender love relationships which often get consummated in marriage. Openly conducting the orchestra with a not too subtle (match-making) push were the expectant Dads and Moms in the mission of reproducing their all Okemesiwedlock.
The culture remains in vogue and It happened to me even though I was under no pressure to follow suit.
I left Nigeria in October 1994 for a three months journalism fellowship at the radio voice of Germany, Deutsche Welle, I left a broken hearted girlfriend behind who was looking forward to marriage.
On my return from Germany three months later I equally left a sorrowful German fraulein behind. No way I was going to marry òyìnbó anyway.
I decided that would be the last time I was going to abandon a girlfriend. At the age of 32 years I was already an old bachelor.
To tie my hands, I entered into a solemn covenant with God that whoever next captures my fancy as girlfriend would be God’s choice for me. And so it transpired.
Landing in Nigeria in December I headed for Okemesi to spend the Xmas break. At a random party, my junior sister introduced her friend, whom I had never met before to me. I fell for her and that was it.
The likelihood is that without bringing God into it, I would most likely lapse into cynical bachelorhood all over again.
I hardly swear. By nature I’m a conscientious person and ordinarily I would loathe to renege on any pledge I make. So it is near impossible for me to swear by the name of God and not fulfil my end of the bargain.
My peers and I always looked forward to spending Xmas at Okemesi. It was the occasion for annual family reunion and ours was quite large. My generation alone numbered in the 40s
How we managed to squeeze ourselves in one or two rooms remained a mystery to me. It was not that there was insufficient accommodation. We all just chose to sleep together in one spot.
It was the moment we witnessed our dads, uncles and aunties let down their guards.There regularly ensued a drama orchestrated by one of my uncles. He would summon this elderly relative (Baba Ogidi) who loves the bottle. Don’t we all?.
Ogidi was short of hearing.To have conversation with him you would need to substantially raise your decibels and to respond he would equally constrained to shout even if he didn’t realise he was shouting.
Soon enough the compound would erupt in the contrived shouting match and raucous merry making. It was the occasion to see my father dance to the drumbeat that heralded his grandfather to battle fronts. He was an excellent dancer.
With little to show for it, I sought to emulate him. He would be greatly pleased and amused that I bagged the ultimate warlord title, Balogun, same as the famous Ekitiparapo warrior, Fabunmi, who was the first and I’m the fourth in the line of succession.
My illustrious predecessors include Chief T.A Oni of the Oni&sons fame who was probably the richest Yoruba of his times. Being named Akintola, at the peak of the demonisation of the late Premier of Western region Ladoke Akintola), he took delight in taunting and loudly hailing me Akintola! I would then break down in tears remonstrating he should desist from calling me by that name. He would assuage me with a bottle of mirinda, fanta or Pepsi cola.
One of the futile steps I took as a six year old was the unilateral declaration of change of name to Akinjide.
There was my wise ebullient grandmother(Otoola) who would relentlessly treat us to the chant of our family panegyric (lineage praise poem called Oriki) and regale us with nightly rendition of vintage folklores.
The following morning, she would embark on marathon intercession prayers for all her descendants beginning with my dad who was her first child to the latest grandchild.The hours-long prayers provoked my father’s heckling that his mum was monopolising God’s attention to the detriment of others.
Variants of the same scenario would unfold in several households across the community. But we were particularly aligned with the Oni, Adedeji, Omidiran, Okunlola, Durotoye and Fapohunda families.
We packed ourselves in convoys that took us on impromptu excursions around Ekiti. I remember we particularly loved to drop in on Pa Arokodare at Ijero to pick white guava. Our favourite spot was the warm springs resort at Ikogosi.
We embarked on mountain climbing to the scenic hills that completely enveloped Okemesi. It is a scenic beauty to behold.
Until 1973, one notable intervening variable was the tradition of yearly termination of the academic calendar in late December. It is the month in which your academic capability to proceed on the ladder of education is determined.
Your promotion examination results will determine whether you progress to the next class or not. More consequential, it is the month in which graduating secondary students sit for Western African School Examination Council, WASCE. It was the examination that determines your eligibility for higher education.
It was therefore a season for joy or sadness for primary and secondary school students who succeeded or failed in their examinations. The academic stars were pampered while the failures were made to feel like second citizens
On the reports of surpassing blissful celebration in the Igbo heartland, it remains my abiding wish to spend Xmas in the community. The massive movement of the Igbo from all over the country to their homeland is an indication of its unparalleled social significance.
Not even the trauma of being snared in the predictable traffic gridlock on the road for days would dissuade the massive retreat. In this regard, this year is positively unique for them.The celebration is bound to go several notches higher thanks to the completion of the life saving second Niger bridge that eases traffic movements.
This hacks back to the differential incorporation of colonialism in its various manifestations in Nigeria.
At the request of the leaders of the Sokoto caliphate, the British colonialists assured the insulation of the far North against the propagation of Christianity.
In the formation of the culture of the colonial and post colonialWAZOBIA the imperialist religions of Christianity and Islam have exerted varying influence on the cultural language groups.
In the Pan Islamic North, the theocratic rulers successfully negotiated the insulation of the region from Christian proselytization and evangelism. The latter readily granted the concession because it roundly suited the deployment of the indirect rule and his innate bias for the region. This provided the North an ample opportunity to preserve their Pan Arabic culture and language in opposition to Westernization/ Modernisation.
This corresponded to a contrary preponderance of Christian acculturation of the South East. Prior to colonialism and contemporary Nigeria, the Igbo dominated Eastern region had remained impermeable to the jihadist spread of Islam thus ceding the playfield to the monopoly of christian proliferation and acculturation.
The Igbo Christianity trend was also inadvertently prompted by such seemingly unrelated external factors as the massive population dislocations and dispersal occasioned by the implosion of the oyo empire.
Professor Kenneth Dike attributed the phenomenon of the abnormally high population density of the Eastern Nigeria forest belt, in part, to an influx of people from the West and the North, seeking to escape the raids of slave chieftains in the more open country. Jihadist slave trade is almost synonymous with the propagation of Islam.
December 25th is the assumed birthday of Jesus Christ but like most knowledge concerning religion, it is a myth.
Following the perspective of the origins of Xmas in the revelry accompanying the winter solstice festival the Christian world tend to indulge in similar festivities and carnivals.
‘Almost certainly from existing pagan celebrations, the winter solstice (shortest day) had always been celebrated by primitive peoples as the beginning of hope for the arrival of spring. This continued into classical times. The Romans celebrated the festival of Saturnalia between 17th and 25th’
‘Some have stated that, around 350 AD, Julius I declared December 25 as the official date of the birth of Jesus. This is based on a letter quoted only in a 9th-century source, and this letter is spurious. At the time this was one of the commonly believed dates for Jesus’ birth’
‘The actual date of Jesus’s birth is unknown. It has been noted that 25 December is two days after the end of the Roman festival of Saturnalia. Some have speculated that part of the reason this date was chosen may have been because Julius was trying to create a Christian alternative to Saturnalia’.
‘Another reason for the decision may have been because, in 274 AD, the Roman emperor Aurelian had allegedly declared 25 December the birthdate of Sol Invictus and that Julius I allegedly may have thought that he could attract more converts to Christianity by allowing them to continue to celebrate on the same day’
‘He may have also been influenced by the idea that Jesus had died on the anniversary of his conception because Jesus died during Passover and, in the third century AD, Passover was celebrated on 25 March he may have assumed that Jesus’s birthday must have come nine months later, on 25 December’.
Compliments of the Season. See you all in January 2025.
