Wise Wide and Wild

Hope 2000 will be hazy, like watching only Part 7 of a 10-Part Nollywood movie (watching the whole Parts from 1 – 10 wouldn’t clear the haze anyway), unless I take you down memory lane. Strap yourself up and let’s get ready to roll!!!!!!!!!!!!! Without trying to sound like a Naija artiste, I have always been brilliant from time immemorial; my mum actually told me I used to practically explain to her things that transpired when I was still in the womb. But like Kryptonite to Superman, Mathematics was my one weakness. I cannot remember when the problem actually started but it must have been sometime in JSS2 when Mr Komolafe, that confusionist of a Mathematics teacher, started combining letters and figures and asking us to repeatedly “find x” without telling us what he did with the one we found the day before. How can people spend their whole life “finding x and y” when there is a whole lot of real life waiting to be explored? Sadly, that sums up my problem with Mathematics – I co

Obviously, one of the latest fads is “The Art of Critiquing.” As usual, everybody is claiming to be masters at it, and all thanks to the new media, we are able to show our abilities off to a lot of people. Without sounding like a whiner, I can say this is the same the world over, at least the part of the world I have been able to have access to, most thanks to the new media also. Naturally, we all have different talents, some can write, some can sing, some can critique, and some can criticize. It would be nice if an individual focuses on their area of strength, but if I decided to sing (you will never catch me singing though, not even at a Karaoke) would it be right for anyone to analyse my performance using Asa as a benchmark? It is this blanket criticizing, disguised as critiquing, that is the crux of this post, and I am going to limit the discourse to the art of music in the land called Nigeria. First and foremost, in critiquing an artiste’s work, while I agree

The London 2012 Logo and the Medals at Stake The Olympics have come and gone, at least until 2016, but Nigeria’s dismal showing is one that has called to question once again the thorny issue of patriotism. The Olympics is a quadrennial event that serves as a meeting point for elite athletes (for most sports) to compete and aspire to win. Realistically, with about 11,000 sportsmen and sportswomen competing in 302 events, not all athletes will make it to the podiums, but for most that do not, it would still have been a good show. Let us be honest with ourselves, we did not deserve a medal at the Olympics, and getting one would have been a travesty and a rape on hard work and preparation. But in dissecting this woeful performance, everyone involved must not be lumped together, the wheat and the chaff needs to be separated so to each we give its own.  The roles of Administrators, Sportsmen and Sportswomen, and Sponsors in this national disgrace have to be assessed individually.

Everyone is a genius, but if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.  ~ Albert Einstein Nowadays, verifying the authenticity of the origin of quotes on the internet it is akin to passing a donkey through the eye of a needle, but the above quotation looks like a statement Einstein might say, just like all those gbagauns sound like something Dame might utter, so let us agree for the purpose of this discourse that the great Physicist actually said those “words on the marble”. Suffice to say I absolutely agree with Einstein (of course we all always agree with Einstein), but Einstein totally ignored a scenario where the fish actually sees itself as having the ability to climb a tree, didn’t he? And that was the exact scenario that became a recurring decimal at the auditions for the reality-tv-show “Project Fame” . There are only two explanations for the flotsam and jetsam that swarm up on the auditions: They have au

  L ast week, a guy posted this picture on a BBM Group, I picked it up and decided to dissect it arriving at the conclusion that the only way to follow those Seven Logics is when you live in a cave eating only berries and drinking from a spring, but when you live in a human society you just cannot apply them. Suffice to say I was alone at my corner on this with about 5 other guys pummeling me through their keyboards and the 24 other members providing mute spectatorship. A day later, I got into another discussion (not argument) with my friend and the point of divergence centred on the hallowed issue of “mind” with him positing that the mind (being an intangible entity) cannot and do not grow, but only reacts to accommodate memory and experience, and me postulating that memory, experience and mind are three inextricable elements thus whatever attribute is applicable to one must be applicable to others. Needless to say we could not reach an agreement despite having expended the bette

Last Saturday, there was an election in Edo State and PDP lost despite Mr Fix-It coming from that state. It was an interesting drama that played itself out at “ The Heartbeat of the Nation” what with Comrade Adams Oshiomole coming out to lambast INEC, accuse PDP, and denounce the result, all before 12 noon. Yes, you heard right, 12 noon!!! But then INEC declared him the outright winner, PDP conceded defeat, and the Comrade accepted the victory like he wasn’t comparing the whole process to a madman’s jig just 12 hours before. You have to marvel at our democracy. Personally, when it comes to Nigerian Politics, the difference between The Ruling Party and The Opposition is just like “Twenty” and “One Score”… same Difference. Interestingly, the essence of this post is not to dissect Nigerian politics and depress you the more but to actually impress or depress you, depending on where your allegiance lies, by analysing people’s perception of D’Banj since his messy split from his long-

I work with a Multinational company whose Global Head-Office is in India and Africa Head-Office is in Kenya. If you like, snort and laugh in derision at the two countries I mentioned above, I know I work with a truly multinational company. There are so many perks in working with a truly multinational company in case you do not know: for instance, Guinness full-employees attaching a photocopy of their official identity card makes securing a UK visa something akin to Lionel Messi scoring a goal, too easy; and I bet they don’t detain Multichoice full-employees at Oliver Tambo International Airport, Johannesburg, asking for one nonsense yellow card. Interestingly, what I consider as the major perk in this multinational company is the opportunity it affords me to observe at close range – women and their over-reaching vanities. You see women at different stages of struggles to best not only others but their personal self. You do not need any copyright permission to rename my company’

The Stage was the Olympic Stadium in Kiev; the Duel was between Spain’s La Furia Roja and Italy’s La Azzuris; the Occasion was the Final Match of Euro 2012; the Prize was the Henri Delauney Trophy, and the opportunity to write their names into European football folklore. More than 64,000 people crammed into the stadium to watch the spectacle; thousands more trooped into the streets to watch on Giant Screens; and millions more sat in front of television sets worldwide to savour the delicious dish of football that was about to be served by the top two National Teams in European Football. For the better part of four years, the Spanish Conquistadors have lived up to the appellation by winning both the “2008 Euro Cup” and the “2010 FIFA World Cup.” La Furia Roja did not just win those tournaments, they imposed a playing style which more less make the opponents to chase the game from the beginning to the end. The core of the team is from Barcelona and Real Madrid, two of the most successf

A pile of rocks ceases to be a rock when somebody contemplates it with the idea of a cathedral in mind.  ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupery   The expression “change is the most constant thing in life” ranks up there as one of those expressions that do not have any effect on me whatsoever any longer. Don’t get me wrong, the statement has an indubitable intrinsic value, but the statement has been so much overused in different situations and in varying contexts to the point where you cannot fathom what it actually preaches: A man dumps his wife for no tangible reason        - Change is the most constant thing in life A preacher tries to proselytize to a sinner               - Change is the most constant thing in life A wife wants to change her skin colour                      - Change is the most constant thing in life A company wants to lay-off 1000 employees          - Change is the most constant thing in life A footballer wants to leave a club for another        - Change