Return to the Source

After a brief spell in Lagos, I left with Uncle Seun, Aunty Bimbo, my cousin Gbebemi, and Kyle to go to Ibadan to take Kyle to the university there. As expected the Lagos-Ibadan “Expressway,” which should only take about an hour and a half to travel took about four or four and a half, which wasn’t too bad all things considered. Like many things in Nigeria I don’t think the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway has been seriously renovated or expanded since the 70s, and since the road conditions are so poor there are always accidents and a whole host of other impediments, but fortunately we made it to Ibadan without too much trouble.

When we got to Ibadan I greeted the family of Mama Ibeji, the lady who takes care of my grandparents’ old house on Agbeja street in Ibadan, and chopped (ate) quite a bit of her food. There is a new man working there that I had never met before, named Mr. Toyin who played some soccer with me and Kyle before we went to sleep. We got up fairly early the next day to go to the University of Ibadan so Kyle could get set up before starting work the next day (Monday). Before we left Idaban, we made the obligatory stop to Papa Odukoya’s house. Papa Odukoya was a very good friend of my grandfather, from the same village who ended up living just a few blocks away from my grandparents’ house on Agbeja Street. We like to call him our other grandfather because he was so close to my real one. This was the first time I had seen Mr. Odukoya since his wife passed away in June, and it was clear that it had affected him since they had been married for almost 56 years! Still he was very happy to see us, even though it was only briefly this time since we had to get to U.I. quickly.

U.I. looks like a great place! I was surprised how many hours of electricity they had, and Kyle’s room in the graduate dorms was really nice too. Uncle Seun had to take off after dropping us on campus so he could head up to Ilesa to move my cousin into school, so Kyle and I explored campus a little bit after we moved his things into his room. We took a taxi to the gate of the university (the universities here are almost like self-contained cities with enormous plots of land and practically everything you could need from restaurants, to banks, to barber shops), and then I picked out a driver who looked like an honest guy who could take us to a market so Kyle could pick our some things he would need. Walking around the market was a bit strange for me, because for the first time everyone wasn’t staring at me! I heard a little boy say, “Ejo, ri oyinbo!” which means, “come see the white person!” and to my surprise he wasn’t pointing at me, it was Kyle!

After getting what Kyle needed at the market, we came back to campus, ate some rice made by a lady with a shack by the gate, and then went to find a place to watch Super Sunday football since Liverpool was playing Manchester United at Old Trafford. We found a room with about 80 other guys packed in front of a TV run by a generator (no power), and sat on the windowsill to watch the match. Unfortunately Man U won, thanks to a hat-trick from Berbatov including a pretty spectacular bicycle kick, but Stevie G made the game really interesting by scoring a PK and a free-kick which both got everyone pretty animated. Afterward we found a little shop run by a woman from Abeokuta who immediately took a liking to us and said she’ll watch out for Kyle while he’s there. Then we went back to Kyle’s room and read a little and eventually fell asleep.

The next morning Uncle Seun came to pick me up and take me to Obafemi Awolowo University in Ife, the mythological birthplace of the Yoruba, and depending on who you ask mankind itself. I was going to be staying in the boy’s quarters (a smaller building for serving boys usually behind a full-size house) of Dr. Ogungbile who had been a DuBois Fellow at Harvard for a few years, but there were some problems with the electricity in his house, so for a few days I am going to be staying in the boy’s quarter’s at Dr. Ajibade’s house. Dr. Ajibade is a professor of African language, culture, and literature who helped me immensely with my thesis last year and has connected me with the first Babalawo with whom I’ll be working.

I met up with Dr. Ajibade at about 10 am, and dropped my things off in his boy’s quarters. It was great seeing him again, and the boy’s quarters are a lot nicer than I had expected! The room has a ceiling fan, power outlet a couple desks, and is about as big as a college dorm room! Dr. Ajibade told me he was going to try to change the toilet there because it is what he calls “colonial” (its just a squat toilet) and there’s an American lady who is coming to stay here in a month or so. Dr. Ajibade has three kids who have made me laugh a little bit because they all speak German at home. He studied in Germany for several years so his children are all fluent in German, but it looks really funny to me seeing Yoruba kids speaking German of all languages, but the world has become a pretty small place I guess.

Yesterday Dr. Ajibade went with me to see the Awise of Modakeke, whom I had interviewed for my thesis and will be helping me again with my project this time around. He told me he was excited about it and was looking forward to getting started in the next few days, which is great for me because he is very knowledgeable about everything pertaining to Ifa and well respected by all the other Babalawo so he can help me find other Babalawo as well. In case I haven’t already explained what a Babalawo is, they are the priests and diviners of the Yoruba god Orunmila or Ifa. They memorize and use all of the myths I hope to record in their divination process, and the oral corpus of these myths addresses every aspect of traditional Yoruba life.

After leaving the Awise a policeman pulled Dr. Ajibade over and asked for his “particulars...” Anyone who has been to Nigeria knows that means there really isn’t anything wrong, the policeman just wants to extort a bribe before he lets you go. Unfortunately for the policeman, Dr. Ajibade got really angry and refused to pay him a single kobo (the Nigerian equivalent of a cent, which is worth less than a hundredth of a penny). Unfortunately for us, the policeman was just as stubborn, so Dr. Ajibade called the Awise, and after the Awise came and talked to the guy for about 2 or 3 minutes he became much more reasonable and let us go.

After I got back I had a lunch that consisted entirely of puff-puff (my favorite food which is basically just dough deep fried in oil...)! The best part wasn't just that each piece was the size of a plum, it was that 6 pieces only cost me about 33 cents! That's all for now, but I'm hoping to start some Yoruba classes and go back to the Awise soon so I can start collecting some Ese Ifa (Ifa verses).

Odaabo (Yoruba for goodbye)