Illumination 2010

Each year I look forward to attending the FECAMDS National Annual Convention and chronicling the details for the reading pleasure of those who missed it and those who love to relive their experiences there. Let’s see, I’ve written for 1, 2, 3…this is my 4th chronicle and most likely my last. I pray someone steps in to fill my shoes as soon as I stop. Before I start, I’ll like to state categorically that; I’m an Awka boy. That’s where I grew up and that’s where my family resides till date. I love Nnamdi Azikiwe University (Unizik) like it’s my school. I have a whole lot of friend in FECAMDS NAUTH. Now we’ve cleared the air, let’s proceed. To all those who chronically miss convention and hope to catch up from this column, you don’t really know how much you are missing. Illumination 2010 was different from all the previous conventions I’ve attended. The pre-convention NEC Meeting got me rally psyched and add the fact that the location is Awka-home for all (& me especially)-I just couldn’t miss it. Awka wasn’t so far away and in record time, we were in Awka. It was a reunion of sorts for me because I saw old friends both from secondary school and from previous conventions. The registration this year proceeded rather smoothly because we sent our list beforehand except that we had to pay some extra fees on the spot before registration could be completed. I’m sure I made a scene, giving Opeyemi Towoju the former National Secretary and his Assistant Iyke Mebirim a piece of my mind (sorry Sweeties, you know I love you) but in the end, all was sorted out amicably. After that, I skipped out for a little family reunion while welcome mass commenced. It’s interesting to note that this is the first time UNIPORT is attending Welcome Mass after UNIBEN’s Heart’s like Christ. The bonfire that followed afterward was more colourful than what OAU gave. The fire was blazing brightly (and warming our chilled innards) and the fireworks (which I’m sure cost a fortune) lit up the night sky beautifully. There were igba, udu, ogene, ichaka and even vuvuzela pealing out wonderful melodies in African tempo enlivening the whole arena. As always, there was concomitant budding of new friendships, rekindling of old flames, settling of old flames, settling of old brawls and well, outbreaks of new quarrels. Schools like EBSU, UNIBEN, and OAU to mention a few were actively involved in gingering up the arena with their instruments. But for the gyration around the fire, a big thank you to all schools that came. Also kudos to NAUTH, the school that made it all possible. They gave us a wonderful lodge, didn’t they? LOL! Please don’t start swearing and cursing. You are reading a holy write-up. I’ll make you a deal. You can swear and curse all you want but first, you’ve got to finish this paragraph and then you’ve got to put this magazine down. Deal? Ok! At the pre-convention NEC Meeting, NAUTH promised to accommodate us in lodges like never before with this and that bla bla bla. They did fulfill that promise, just not in the way we expected. I stayed in a room with 8boys but I heard some where as much as 13. Can you beat that? And what about the national executives? They were left to their own devices. Jeez! What an arrangement! Well, somehow we managed to sleep whether on top of each other or on our toes, it was really none of their business. No…they were really sorry, nothing could be done. Thank God they didn’t bother to wake us early. Friday was a lovely day, started on a very wet note. We woke up to enter our buses and zoom off to Nnewi for Opening Mass. I’ll restate here that St Cletus Catholic Church Nnewi is simply beautiful. In the short case, I mentioned a’ Memorable’ breakfast, right? Well let me educate you. I’m not much of a food person, I mean I eat (we all do) but I’m not so particular about what I eat except for a few things like noodles or eba or some other thing. I also like to have my meals on time because I simply cannot fast. So here I was in the middle of nowhere and it was way past my meal time. My migratory motor complexes were in overdrive. A friend of mine was taking a personal tour round Nnewi and I asked him to get me some hot Okpa but he declined on the grounds that he won’t be coming back soon enough. Being observant sure does have its perks or maybe hunger had heightened my senses because I noticed quite a number of ‘FECAMDS Republic’ clad torsos migrating towards a rickety shed outside the gate. My curiosity got the better of me and I went to find which honey was drawing them like bees. (Ok! I know this isn’t the" Memorable" breakfast gist, but I’m getting there) To my greatest surprise, it was an akara joint but more puzzling yet was the size of the queue awaiting the akara. There was even a crowd of people who was in no mood for a queue surrounding the poor woman. I thought my Igbo speaking prowess will get me in the woman’s favour but that was not to be for many people there could speak Igbo well too. Anyway, the good thing was that we were one family and so we all shared the whole akara and bread the woman had on sale. I’m sure the woman prays for another convention each day. We went back inside to have a wonderful breakfast that came in this beautiful ‘take-away’ packs. I’ve heard the term looks can be deceptive and at this point, it couldn’t have been more rightly applied. I thought it was fried rice or something equally exotic. I know the menu said Tummy Tummy so I said to myself, “If it comes in such a pack then it must be wonderful”. I opened the pack and WOW! It was noodles! I hate noodles all types of noodles and here I was being served noodles at a FECAMDS Convention for a breakfast that was more than 2hrs late. Na den I take sabi say wahala dey oh! People ate the noodles without much complaints, after all, beggars are not choosers but I didn’t. I hate noodles. Mass started soon after and the bishop Valerian Okafor was gracious enough to give us N200000 to avoid late meals (and noodles too I suppose). The mass was wonderful, NAUTH choir was at their best (keep it up guys). The thanksgiving was showy as usual, uniforms everywhere. Last convention was EBSU in Swagger T-shirts, this time it was UNIPORT in FECAMDS Republic. Na wa oh! Una no de tire? Pictures were taken after mass, followed by the most boring aspect of every convention. Seriously, symposia should be made more fun. A little fun if you may (and I mean interaction between schools not between us and those Profs. I’m sure each school has their own fair share of those). Launching of the Medicare followed suit. The Medicare was quite nice, thanks to Mary, Charlie and the whole UNILORN Crew and it raked in a handsome sum. We were supposed to take a tour of NAUTH but we were hard pressed for time and so had to set off for Awka. On the way back, something funny happened. It started off as a casual stroll down memory lane. About half a dozen people were singing nursery rhymes in the bus and playing some Primary school games. In the blink of an eye, the whole bus was agog. There were all kinds of singing and dancing and clapping. It was a miracle we got to Awka without any incident or accident. I was dumbfounded at what happened in the bus but what surprised me even more was that other buses had a similar experience. I couldn’t help but wonder, “What was in that tummy tummy?” The Variety Night that followed after the supper was okay. Just that it was in the middle of nowhere and the presentations which were all supposed to have a cultural theme did not. As usual, some schools took time to prepare and rendered a wonderful presentation while others presented just to answer present. A new day broke and truly it was a beautiful day. The skies were clear and the weather perfect. Breakfast was a sumptuous meal of a piece of yam and two spoons of stew. It wasn’t much, but we didn’t complain; dinner was forthcoming. The retreat was spiritually rewarding. Priests are never late for mass, right? Your guess is as good as mine. What I can’t quite understand is the no confession part or were we granted herd immunity…sorry absolution? Nsogbu di o! I missed lunch (sue me, I went home to see alma mater) and the greater part of the retreat (don’t you dare judge me!). but I came back to prepare for dinner only to be conscripted into NEC Meeting. As a chapter secretary, do I have a choice? There was supposed to be a sporting competition but I guess we ran out of time. Maybe Calabar will factor that in. NV meeting proved to be too long, what with election of new executives, bidding for hosting rights and editorial school. I was like, “Helloo! Dinner’s waiting” but no one took notice. Not to mention that NEC wanted to tackle the mess NAU had managed to dish out all through the convention. Well, I can’t quite remember all that happened but the lot of us who went for the meeting was late for dinner. This was partly due to the length of the meeting and largely due to lack of transport to dinner venue. The dinner was truly unforgettable. Due to no fault of mine, I was late for dinner but one NAUTH sister wouldn’t hear of that. I’m going to paraphrase what she said so that this magazine doesn’t go vulgar but you’ll get the meaning anyway, “I told you people to enter but you refused and was rather snapping pictures. You have to wait outside till NAUTH Members finish entering”. I would have been shocked have been shocked by such hostility but I wasn’t. And why, you may ask? Well, ever since we got here it’s been nothing but hostility and rudeness from NAUTH. Haba! We force una to host? As if that was not enough, when I finally got into the matchbox…I mean dining room…hall...Dining Hall, it was parked to the brim. There was neither leg room nor breathing space. Somehow I managed to squeeze into a seat and then hit the drinks. That was the only way I could get through all that awful singing coming from the stage. Gosh! There was singing, singing and more singing that I had to ask, “is this an opera or a dinner?” As the singing subsided, they went into award presentations, bla bla bla bla bla. At this point, I was bored out of my mind and wishing I could get high on water or soft drinks. Thanks to my good friend Charles Ekeh (Now a Doctor) who kept me sane with gists. The time for food came. Pepper soup was served first, it went round. We gulped it amidst laughter and gists. Let me point out here that the crowd on each table was enormous; we were not less than 12 on each table. You can imagine the kind of socializing that can occur on such large tables. The second course came soon afterwards. On my table was mostly Convention Veterans so we decided to pass the food to the Convention Freshers with hopes of ours coming later. And so we waited and waited and waited, ad infintum. All the drinks I had downed was taking a toll on my bladder and so I went to relieve myself . but before I got there, I beheld a shocking sight. Our beloved waiters and waitresses, FECAMDS brethren from NAUTH were busy stuffing themselves with food mean for the diners, their guests. Food we paid for. I was so angry and hungry (thank you very much). That was the height of the hospitality or lack of it. More than half of what came for the dinner were yet to eat. When I came back to share the horrific scene I just saw, I discovered that dinner wa over. People were leaving in anger. It was the middle of the night so there was no option of ok-we’ll-buy-something-else. NAUTH had effectively dealt FECAMDS a dirty slap. On getting back to the Seminary where we’ve been lodging, trouble was brewing. Some schools from the south wanted to riot. Oh yes! They wanted to set things ablaze and destroy some of the seminary property, to vent their anger, a hungry man after all is an angry one. Tension was sky high but after careful and diplomatic deliberations, NAUTH had to forfeit their breakfast to pacify those who were hungry. All this was happening at about 2:00am. Day broke and some schools left, in anger and without a goodbye. I don’t really blame them. I can only pray they keep coming for FECAMDS Conventions. The closing mass was thankfully short and in no time at all, we were on our way back to Port Harcourt. Of course, many people were ill at ease with the events of the dinner. The sad fact is that many Convention Freshers swore never to attend Convention again but the saddest part is that UNICAL has to work extra hard to correct the bad impression NAUTH made. I hope they can, I sincerely hope they can.