Thoughts and Encounters Uncategorized: Mum said “igbo will make you mad”

Welcome to this week's episode of Thoughts and Encounters Uncategorized. We hope you enjoyed our previous posts. This week we have a very interesting piece to share with you, relax and enjoy.

It was 100 level 1st semester, 2005. I had left my hostel to another hostel in search of something or someone I can’t really remember now but I know I got distracted by one this never ending football arguments. If you know me, you know I’m not someone to hold my tongue when I hear something illogical. Anyway, the argument somehow moves from the lobby of the dormitory to this room. I knew the occupants of the room in passing it was small school at the time so you kind of knew everyone in passing. 

After the argument had died down one of the occupants of the room offered me hot chocolate. There was something off about that offer. He had no reason to, we were not friends or even close acquaintances. In fact one can say he looked down on me, to him i was just a nerd and he was one of the cool kids. To me he was just a rascal bad boy suffice to say we had mutual disrespect for each other. So i could tell there was a prank in the offer somewhere. You now when you are watching a movie and the coolest kid in school come to invite a nerd to his party. you just know theres going to be a prank.

They (the other occupants of the room) couldn’t even do a good job of hiding their mischief. You could see the devilry in their eyes, shiftiness in their smiles. I could pin point want the prank was at least about. 3 of them at least had been bursted for either smoking weed or trying to smuggle weed into the university. So i kind of guessed they were trying to drug the chocolate drink with weed. but i decided to play along. It wasn’t peer pressure that made play along or any desire to fit it. I despised what they were I never real want to be a cool kid or be caught smoking weed. I played along for one simple reason, Curiosity! 

As a young man I was always infatuated with things like weed, alcohol, and cigarette. I grew up with 2 parents who where reverends. Both of whom taught in my children Sunday school class every week.Ill alway hear those things are not for children of God. I’ll watch the disdain in my father eyes anytime we drove past a beer parlour. My mother once said “igbo (weed in yoruba) will make you mad”.  

Anyway, he hands me the cup and to confirm my suspicion i can see some particles of dried leaf gently floating to the top. Now i knew this people just wanted to use me for their amusement even if was going to drink this. i wasn’t going to give them the pleasure of watching me do whatever they thought i was going to do. So i asked “can i go and have it in my room? i’ll return the cup as soon as I’m done”. In my mind if they couldn’t accept that, i wasn’t going to drink it. However, they did. Someone even said he thought there wasn’t enough milk so he added some more. 

I took it to my room sipping it along the way, it was really hot. i wasn’t thinking about the disdain in my fathers eyes if he saw me or my mothers treat of potential madness. i was drinking it with the most sense of curiosity. By the time got to my room i had already drank it to half. i decided to wait a while for the whatever effect to kick in looking at my watch continuously. After about 5 minutes i decided it was going to be all or nothing.  Went ahead to drink all that was left in the cup including the 3 millimetre tick weed particles that had settled at the bottom. 

After about 30 minutes I became impatient I had waited and waited and waited of the effects of this so called drug to kick in and it hadn’t. I was both pissed off and disappointed. So what was all the fuss about I wondered. I had been lying on my bed waiting for the effects to kick and it hadn’t so I slept. 

It was noise of people laughing that woke me. Some of my room mate had come back from wherever they went in was a Saturday so there was no classes. They were clowning about something and they had woken me. The next joke must have ben funnier than the 1st because i found myself laughing. 

Even though i wasn’t in the mode i couldn’t just stop myself from laughing. i found everything funny and my laughter often exceeded the laughter of the rest of the room. i didn’t notice at first, i had completely forgotten about the cup of weed laced chocolate i drank. Then i started to laugh hard at things i won’t normally find funny, i could be laughing for 4 minutes straight. As soon as i remembered the cup of chocolate i had my merriment immediately gave way to fear. I thought of what my mum told me about madness, i thought of how i have been laughing like someone already insane. i’ll look around the room if anyone was looking at me funny, if someone had noticed something different about me. No! they were still talking to me like I was alright! 

Now i was intent on preventing my on mental demise. First i needed to stop laughing. The best way to do that was to stop listening to whatever my room mates where saying. so i covered my ears with headphones and faced the wall trying to go back to sleep. As i closed my eyes a thought crossed my mind “who says you can’t go insane from your sleep?”. So i open my eyes wide but i still faced the wall. Just then one of my room mate hit me on the leg asking “Are you still planing to sleep? you like sleep”.  I realised at that moment that something else was wrong. He hit me but I’m only feeling the pain almost  seconds later and sensation is lasting much longer than it should. I guess my sensory neurones began to catch fire, my bed stopped being soft and fluffy it started feel like i was laying on something coarse like i laying on fine particles of sand. When turned on my bed the sensation came slower and lasted longer.

I had to get of my room, I just had to! My bed felt different my body felt different. My roommates where desperately trying to drive me insane by saying things that were funny. So that I can laugh myself into insanity. I couldn’t venture to sleep out of fear that I could lose my mind while I slept. I got down from my bed. Said I was going to check on someone and left the room.

It was evening now the sun had set but darkness hadn’t over taken the skies. I didn’t have any company and I didn’t want it. I didn’t want anyone noticing the state i was in. My body felt different i could feel the breeze it was gentle but my body made it feel like i was in a storm. i could here my mothers voice “igbo will make you mad”, i could see the disappointment in my fathers eyes.

I was hungry!! So I worked to the shop in school and bought biscuit and cola. In a matter of minutes I had finished the entire box of McVities digestive biscuit and I still felt like eating. It was time for dinner anyway so I just went into the cafeteria. The menu wasn’t the most encouraging, it was wheat and vegetable soup, I was in no mood for being picky. I got it and in minutes I was done with that too. I knew I had to stop eating! This wasn’t a regular appetite it was like the controllable laughter, as every joke seemed funnier every food tasted sweeter.

Now I had no idea what to do. My curiosity had lead me to the place, now i felt trapped. I couldn’t fast froward the experience, I was scared, I was confused, I couldn’t or didn’t want to tell anybody what i had done because I was ashamed. So I decided the best thing was to go and sleep, It was a silent resignation! It was either the effects wore off or I went insane. I was helpless and I knew it. I left the cafeteria and when straight to my room I didn’t bother to stop for the usual chitchat after dinner. I was going to make my date with destiny.

My room was empty  everyone must have left for dinner. So I laid on my bed closed my eyes and prayed. I told God I was sorry and I would not try this again if he could only get me out of the situation I’m in. My bed still felt like sand, everything still felt different but I closed my eyes counted sheep until I slept.

I didn’t wake you till the next morning. I must have slept for about 11 hours even or me that was record time. I bed didn’t feel as coarse. Everything began to feel normal. Oh I was so glad! If you could hear the excitement in my voice I did a couple of maths problems just to make sure my mind was fine. It was!

Would like to tell you I kept my promise to God but ….…

Author: Ifeoluwa Osho