“INSIDE LIFE” With Buchi. (Episode 4)

Legend of the Shit”

Can I use the toilet? I asked Oputa, I had just gotten admission into one of the prestigious college east of the Niger. I had gone along with my mom to the school and Oputa was assigned as the guide to take us to the dormitories. As I walked into the toilet premises, I was immediately faced with land mines of different shapes, texture and smell. I carefully navigated through those and pushed open a toilet cubicle, I had never seen such amount of shit in one place. The toilet was filled to the brim and pouring. Whatever I was feeling in my bowels retreated and I got out of there as fast as I could. 

The look on my face said it all,  and Oputa struggled to keep a straight face as he already knew what had gone down. I always had dreams of attending “Kings College Lagos” but due to circumstances I couldn’t fathom then I ended up in “Christ The King College Onitsha” at least there’s still “King” in the name. On the bus home, I gave my mom a million reasons why I didn’t want to attend the school. But the only reason in my mind was the toilet, my shit was just too young to compete in that “league of legends”. But my mom was already convinced by the other aspects of the school, the scenery, the academic excellence portrayed, and the standard it set; after all “Primus Interparles”(First among equals) was the motto.

So, two weeks later I was on my way back to onitsha set to be a student. I was resigned to my fate. So I made sure to spend hours in the toilet over the weeks of preparation trying so hard to shit all the shits in my bowels. I also had lied about having a running stomach so I was given drugs to tie my shit down. 

The enemy

I never really liked beans as a child, it wasn’t as exciting and tasty as the party rice, or as sweet as the ‘bread and tea’ but my mom was always insistent. Holding a cane on me to make sure I finished my plate of beans anytime it was cooked. So, imagine my horror when I got to the refectory and was served a plate of “watery beans” for breakfast. I grudgingly navigated through that, managed my lunch of “Eba and watery egusi”and eagerly anticipated dinner. 

Dinner came,  Beans again!!!  This time it wasn’t watery and had about “five grains of rice” that maybe qualified it to be called “rice and beans “. I was heartbroken!  The menu continued like that and although there were little changes; beans was an everyday hustle. 

I lasted about a week without using the toilet and everything else was going fine, I was the fresh student in school that had a week’s worth of “beans oriented shit” nestled in my bowels. 

Eventually, nature won, and soon I started contributing to the growth of the shit dynasty in CKC. I don’t know why, but toilets were the most overused facility, and although the school campus had a toilet at every corner, shit still was to be found everywhere. Lots of pleas were made but the students were ‘beans_determined’ to keep shitting 😂 It was so bad that even the classrooms were not exempted from this “shit pandemic “. 

Shit was used as a means of rivalry, and if someone did you wrong, you would just give him a “locker full of shit”…. 😂

If a senior student punished you, give him a “locker full of shit”… 😂

If you just didn’t like someone, give him a “locker full of shit”… 😂

It became a norm for us to walk into class and spend the first period of classes cleaning a fresh shit left the day before. The matter was getting out of hand and there were calls for diabolical means to be employed to catch culprits. 

Unlucky 🤢

One very unfaithful night, we had just finished dinner and the bell for night prep was rung. I hurriedly dropped my cutlery and picked up my books and lantern. I need not wait for the prefects to come and inflict punishment on us.

I ran all the way to the prep class and was among the first to enter the classroom. I wanted to get a window seat as the classroom tends to get hot when all the lanterns are lit. It was still dark as non of the early birds had lit their lanterns, so I walked through the darkness to a locker at the extreme end of the class with a window situated right on top of it. I smiled happily as I had accomplished my mission and then tried to clean the locker top with my hands before I dropped my things. 

That was a mistake,

… Because as my hand hit the locker top, it was met with something warm and soft…. What could this be I thought? Just then someone lit his lantern and under the dim light, I looked at my hand to see i had a “handful of freshly shat shit” still fresh from the bowels, it wasn’t even cold yet 🤧🤧

For someone disgusted by his own shit, here I was with a handful of another person’s “Bowel goodness”… 

My eyes welled up; I had just been shitted…. Inside Life! 

But as I held the shit in my hand, a plan brewed in my mind….. 😉

…….to be continued…

“INSIDE LIFE With Buchi” is a chronicle of personal life experiences of the writer Abuchi Jonathan Ofoneme. It is entirely the writer’s opinion and does not reflect the view of AMICHI MAGAZINE.