The Soft Issue
August 2017
Stories from Within
Salty
By: Umar-Al-Faruq Ahmed
J
together with the security men in blue uniforms, as a
student, you are expected to comply with the orders of a
fellow student, because he dons a khaki shirt with CADET
written on it, and acts like a furious puppy.
ust when I thought that I had seen it all, I got to the
class area only to find out that the class was filled. I
was furious. How did all of these students magically
transport themselves down here so fast? I had seen
almost half of them at the microfinance bank just minutes
earlier. Eventually I had to stand for remainder of the lecture.
At the end, I was glad that it was all over. I could barely wait
to get out of the school.
As if my day hadn’t been torturous enough, as I stood on
the spot waiting patiently for another Tanke bound cab to
come by, gently keeping my anger to myself and downing
the chilled bottle water I had bought nearby, one young
gentleman crept up my rear. He wore an oversized varsity
jacket, with a cheap dark shade on his ugly fat face that
was almost half covered with a dirty baseball cap. I hadn’t
bothered to look down at the rest of his clothing. When
he came closer and smiled, he unleashed an enormous
amount of odour from his mouth as he spoke.
***
Perhaps it was as a result of the way my day had gone, or
maybe it was just me, but as I walked down to the car park,
the campus environment looked to me nothing like the
serene and beautiful environment I had seen four months
ago when I had made that trip with my mum. I could hardly
wait to get out the campus.
“Excuse me, my name is Wale, can I talk to you for a
minute?” I was beyond mad. I closed my eyes and hoped
that he’d be gone by the time I opened it, but there he
was. All of my anger, frustrations, and disappointments
were folded into one. “Please just shut up and go” I prayed
silently.
At the park, I was met with another shocker. There was just
another heavenly long queue that looked extremely to me
like the one The Israelites must have formed as they tried to
walk through the red sea. There were three long queues. The
whole rowdy scene looked to me like mayhem. I needed
nobody to instruct me to join in the struggle. After moments
of fighting and struggling, I eventually got myself into a small
cab very similar to a matchbox, only for one hungry looking,
overzealous fellow to order me down for entering the vehicle
illegally. Illega-what? I could not believe my ears.
“I’ve been seeing you around, and I…” next thing he heard
was a slap on the cheek.
“Get out of my face!” I yelled, emptying the remaining
content of my bottle water on his miserable face.
The next hour I was standing in front of a stern faced,
security man in deep blue shirt.
For some reason, people explained to me that I had to follow
the order of this young lad who had CADET conspicuously
inscribed on his shirt; whatever that meant. Apparently,
25
the
LENS