United States-based Nigerian arts scholar, Professor Emeritus dele jegede of Miami University, Oxford, Ohio, took the audience on a memory lane highlighting Dr. Bruce Onobrakpeya’s peculiar virtues and sterling practices in the art, which stands him out as master of master artists. The event, tagged: Bruce Onobrakpeya @ 90 Conference held last Friday at Onobraks Arts Centre, Agbarha-Otor, Delta State was part of activities marking the iconic artist’s 90th birthday. In his keynote laced with humour and jocular remarks, jegede highlighted the many sides of Baba Bruce that make the legendary artist one of Nigerian most resourceful and documented artists of his generation, Assistant Editor Arts OZOLUA UHAKHEME, reports. Excerpt of the keynote in parts

His research on Bruce

In the summer of 1982, I arrived from Bloomington, Indiana, to commence research that would focus on Dr. Onobrakpeya and his studio practice for my dissertation.

Up till that moment, my relationship with him had been essentialised by an exhilarating admiration that dates to the first time that I attended one of his numerous solo exhibitions and fell under the mesmerising influence of his dazzling prints. This particular exhibition was at the Goethe place then on Broad Street; it was opened by the late Professor J.F. Ade Ajayi.

Buoyed by such spectacular productivity as evinced by the “immediate masters” group, there then was no question what my dissertation would be about.

At Indiana University where I was studying with Dr. Roy Sieber who pioneered African art history in the United States, I knew that the nascent field was yet to come to grips with the conception of African art that deviated from ancient visual expressions in three-dimensional forms, or was associated with African material culture involving consecrated artifacts, propitiation, veneration, adornment or such items as catch the fancy of anthropologist, linguists, or historians. Although the literature on contemporary African art during this period was miserably paltry, the imperative of narrating and historicising contemporary manifestations overrode the obligation to stick with “traditional” topics for my dissertation.

“It was still the summer of 1982 and the first time I had embedded myself in his studio at the famous 39 (now 41) Oloje Street in Papa Ajao which required, at that time, a serious consideration of what outfit you wore during the rainy months as the roads were always in a combative mode.

Onobrakpeya welcomed me to his residence and invited me to follow him to his third-floor studio. Before I could satisfy my visual curiosity trying to admire all the prints and 3-D pieces that dotted the winding stairwell, he had vanished. What just happened? Where did he go? He was 50 and I, a mere 37. Yet, he just turned a simple introductory welcome into something akin to the race between the hare and the tortoise with me as the tortoise of course. At 37!

If you recall Ebenezer Obey’s schemata on life, that was precisely the age at which Dr. Onobrakpeya was supposed to start feeling the gnawing vibrations of oldness while I had supposedly just started chopping life. I beg to differ. The third floor of his studio was an expansive space where piles of paper assumed an assortment of positions—hanging on the line, lying prostrate, flat out on their back, or simply waiting on the queue to be wrung through the press.

Lessons learnt about Bruce

With 20/20 hindsight, my embedment with him revealed certain critical lessons about the person whom we are gathered here celebrating. The first is his work ethics. You have probably heard a popular witticism, ascribed to Albert Einstein, which defines insanity as “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” With apologies, I believe that this aphorism was targeted at Onobrakpeya as it beautifully encapsulates his approach to work. Oh no, I am not implying that he is mad. Please, don’t hear me wrong o! Èmi K¹Ì!

He most certainly has been doing the same thing all his life, which is that he has been rigorously consistent in applying himself to the seemingly simple task of art making. The reason that he has attained different results lies in the ontology of art; he has unquestionably re-defined what art entails, and what making it is comprised of. Indefatigably, he has cultivated a fervid approach to this business, with unforgiving commitment.

The other time I heard the Vice-President, Osinbajo, on TV saying again and again, “calm down,” I thought that he was addressing  Onobrakpeya. Boy! Was I relieved to learn that the VP was at a political rally, which is something that this artist has learned to distance himself from, at least from the view of outsiders. Besides, it is far too late in the day for any latter-day sexagenarian to demand that his elder, a nonagenarian, should calm down although both are, well, Nigerians. On this score, here’s my direct message to our celebrant: please do not calm down; do not slow down. You are simply too set in your ways to start listening to politicians!

 

Bruce’ssuspicious inquisitiveness

In addition to his work ethics, the second insight that I could intuit looking back now at  Onobrakpeya’s enriched world concerns a proclivity towards suspicious inquisitiveness. This, indeed, is one of the firmest pedestals that have sustained his colossus status as an artist. He has never stood in the way of art. Instead, he has, all his life, offered himself as a tool—a vessel—through which art thrives. Soon after he left Zaria, he mixed and mingled with the art-producing crowd on the streets of Ibadan, those plebians whose lack of exposure to book knowledge tickled Ulli Beier’s imagination no end. Surprisingly, this suspicious inquisitiveness has been a crucial factor in the incredible density and diversity that we now see in his work. For one who majored in painting, he has continued to expose himself to new creative paradigms, which in recent years led to assemblage, bricolage, and installation.

 

His capacity for creative intellection

To these two critical lessons, let me add a third, which is his capacity for creative intellection. For sure one can make the argument that  Onobrakpeya’s dispositive approach to artmaking—mixing and mingling with people, things, and places—is unashamedly sophomoric or even pedestrian, especially given his status as one of the new class of elite Nigerians in post-independent Nigeria, it did take someone of his cerebral capacity to correctly calibrate the end-result, one that would take years in coming to fruition. His foray into printmaking, with all the attendant mistakes, gave birth to new etching methods and lingo. His relentless pursuit of spaces to exhibit his work led to exhibitions at local, national, and global platforms just as it earned him residencies and catapulted his work to an international audience and into major museum collections.

 

His enchanting personality

Undoubtedly, the most enduring quality, which has resulted in the positively influential status of

Onobrakpeya is his enchanting personality. Arguably, he is not only Africa’s treasured persona whose presence at international art circles creates waves, but he is also the one who most consistently has been accorded, on account of the totality of his work and achievements globally and locally, the status of Nigeria’s foremost living art persona. That is what more than six decades of creative exploration, with innumerable accolades and the Nigerian National Order of Merit Award to boot, does.

Devoid of the superciliousness that tends to characterise the personality of many internationally acknowledged artists,  Onobrakpeya’s humility is at once instructive and endearing. His residence, which also doubles as his studio, beacons to all who aspire to learn and thrive under his mastership. All of this was not mere happenstance. Right from the beginning, the innate penchant in him as a story-teller—the same predilection that resulted in the illustration of several books—instructed his penchant for documenting his own work, often in a mélange of poetry, prints, and explanatory narratives. Here, then, in our midst, is a cultural ambassador of the highest order, one who has consistently stood as apostle of all things Nigerian in general, and Urhobo in particular. As I have said in another forum,  Onobrakpeya is one of Africa’s leading culture producers. But deconstructing him cannot be profitably engaged outside of his Urhoboness. His body of work, which is an admixture of poetry, folklore, orature, myths and mythology all expressed in his paintings, prints, plastocasts, and installations: all of this constitutes a compendium of Urhobo culture and, by extension, modern Africa itself.

The artist as an inveterate self-narrator brings up the fifth column of Onobrakpeya’s structure. Those of us in this field know that an important contributory element to an artist’s profile is the narrative that heralds such an artist. The narrative is as important as, or at times even more important than, the artist’s work. All art is local. There is a correlation between an artist’s success and the artist’s patronage base. Oftentimes, we neglect locality at our own expense. But the global art community also plays a significant part in shaping local taste and patronage.  Onobrakpeya’s creative longevity cannot be dissociated from his locale.

The irrefutable fact is that the values that we place on art, the determinants of aesthetics, and the willingness to invest in a particular artist is governed as much by the quality of the artist’s work as by the values ascribed to, or associated with, the artist. In Dr. Onobrakpeya’s situation, longevity and consistency are critical factors. At this point, there is, theoretically, a body of patrons who will buy whatever he produces. This is because he has earned his stripes, to a point where the appendment of his name on any item instantly transforms such an item into art. If he were to doodle something on a napkin at a restaurant, it is theoretically possible to monetise it.

Bruce’s insightfulness

A sixth pedestal in the Onobrakpeya chronicles concerns insightfulness. The results of the man’s visionary deftness are apparent everywhere today. Perhaps it is in the establishment of the Bruce Onobrakpeya Foundation that we see his determination to entrench and perpetuate his vision. In this vein, the creation of the Harmattan Workshop in 1998, together with the erection of an edifice—the Conference Centre—to actuate the ideals of the workshop, remain an unassailable testament to his immortality.

By now, only a harebrained dolt would contest the evidence that  Onobrakpeya remains his own best chronicler, promoter, and publicist. All you need do is look at the body of literature that he has produced about himself. If an exhibition mattered, there was a catalog. And he never had any exhibition that did not matter. The urge to document himself appears to be a healthy obsessive compulsion, which brings to mind this short anecdote that reveals my private nemesis on this score.

Onobrakeya’s exhibition catalogue for 1992, The Spirit in Ascent, was edited by my colleague, G.G. Darah. While the catalogue must have been confined to the archives now because of the 445-page 2014 magnum opus, Masks of the Flaming Arrows, which I had the privilege to edit, a very visceral development concerning my contribution to the 1992 catalogue remains indelible because of a careless error contained in my essay’s heading.

In those days when every department had a pool of typists, I turned in my piece to one of the ladies in the office. Once I made what I thought were all the corrections to the typed piece, I turned it in to  Darah. Behold, to my eternal mortification, the title of my essay came out in print as “The Humane of Onobrakpeya.” Confounded, I rushed to check the original copy that I sent to the editor. Behold, our elite typist had edited my original title, which was “The Humaneness of Onobrakpeya.”

This blemish on my academic integrity felt so visceral that I shared my anguish with a colleague, Nigel Barley of the British Museum, when we met at a conference in Tokyo two years later. Ah, that’s not such a big deal, he consoled me. He then shared with me a similar faux pas that he had seen at his place of work, where a publication came out titled “Kind Red Spirits” instead of “Kindred Spirits.”

 

Bruce’s generosity

I continually marvel at the generosity and wonderment of the prescient Lord in designing a human being who is as rugged, clairvoyant, blessed, and unperturbed as  Onobrakpeya. At my age, I have finally embraced the idea that I may never … let me change that…that I will never be the same person that I was when, for example, we organised his 60th birthday three decades ago. I have been forced to reconcile myself with the idea that my wife has peddled for so long, an idea which I treated at first as a rumour but which, as recent events have revealed, is probably now a fact. The idea is that I have slowed down, physically at least.

When, as I alluded to earlier,  Onobrakpeya was at my 70th birthday at the University of Lagos (UNILAG), I was stunned at how trim and fit he not only looked, but also felt.

On that occasion, I came to the realisation that something was probably wrong with him. It was not right for a respectable 83-year-old to be that sharp and walk at that fast speed. I knew that he used to extend to me the privilege of sharing his bottle of beer in the comfort of his living space anytime I visited. I know certainly that he does not smoke. Not even cigarettes. Now, don’t go misinterpreting me again. I am not inferring that he smoked anything else! Nobody is implying something sinister.

Onobrakpeya does not smoke, period. So, where does he derive his incredible feistiness from? If he drinks only moderately, and smokes absolutely nothing, where does he derive his vim and vigour from? That’s a question I cannot answer.

Agun Omotorera Oluwafikemi, a 10-year-old and budding author has just begun her journey as a writer by launching her first book, The Marvellous Cat and Other Stories.

The launch, during the author’s end of school session, took place at the D-Orange Place Event Centre and Lounge, Abattoir Road, Agege, Lagos.

The 74-page book was published by Zayzee Limited.

According to the young writer, the book is about a cat that can speak, a sheep that defeated a wolf and a little girl that confronted a bully.

The wisdom and smartness of these animals and the braveness of the young girl in her debut are entertaining and educational.

On what inspired her to write the book, Oluwafikemi said it was after reading Horrible by Kemi Odutayo and Wild Child by Maggie Smart that prompted her to write. She added that her ability to think and dream wide helped her to start the book.

“I love to think, dream and write. I was writing the stories separately before I decided to compile some of the stories to publish for people to read. It took me about a month to write the stories because I still have to go to school and do my chores at home,” she said.

The young writer also said that her parents were excited when she told them about her writings and encouraged her to keep such. “My parents were excited and decided to encourage me to keep writing since they both love reading. They also contacted their friend, Aunty Uzezi Adesite, a writer and publisher, on how she could help publish my book,’’ she said.

Oluwafikemi has just graduated from Grade Five at Apata Montessori School in Agege. She will be resuming Junior Secondary School in September. From a family of five, Oluwafikemi’s hobbies are meditating, listening to music and dreaming of possibilities.

She wants to travel round the world and desires to own a school and a hospital when she grows up. The native of Ekiti State is working on her next book, a novel.

 

To a certain degree, Amapiano has permeated the Nigerian music landscape to become a staple sound on the dancefloor. Originally from South Africa, the music genre, which translates to ‘the pianos’, is a subgenre of house music.

In recent times, Amapiano has influenced the sound of Nigerian artistes like Niniola (the acclaimed Afro-house queen), Falz, and the viral TikTok star, Goya Menor, who rode to fame with a remake of E.R.A.’s ‘Ameno’. In a similar vein, fast rising disc jockey, Akinboboye Victor, famed as DJ Balor, joined the growing music trend with the release of ‘Amapiano ‘Riddim’.

‘Amapiano Riddim’ is a 3:02-minute long instrumental track co-produced with Kryptian Icon. The track is a minimalist production that launches on serene melismatic singing propelled by coordinating synthesisers and piano riffs.

Looped till it fades into the background, this laid-back, simplistic approach reveals Balor’s eye for detail for portions of instrumentation that captivate audiences with contemporary taste.

Perhaps his approach to music production comes from his philosophy that the process should be effortless — one that delivers some level of therapeutic benefits. But make no mistake, the Jimmy’s Jump Off winner knows when to switch the musical gears.

Enter ‘Sere’ – a full-blown Afrobeats track that exudes more energy but maintains the simplistic styling that imprints ‘Amapiano Riddim’. It reveals another layer to the Ondo State-born artiste.

Balor gains an assist from Pasha on the feel-good anthem that sees him singing in pidgin and Yoruba language with a calm demeanour. On the other hand, Pasha races high on adrenaline, delivering his lines in Jamaican patois.

Lyrically, ‘Sere’ relies on sparsely pieced lyrics. However, their carriage coupled with the song’s instrumentation built on a catchy chorus, thumping baseline, and infectious background vocals barely make this noticeable.

As a collaboration, the pair’s different musical backgrounds and influences make them the perfect match to attract an even larger audience from the Afrobeats and dancehall genres. This also confirms Balor’s quest to break musical barriers, as he noted after his performance in Turkey recently that “Music has no language”.

While Balor has yet to amass a high volume of discography to prove his mettle, the course he charts with both tracks substantiates his claims of being a versatile artiste, who notes sounds and glues all of the elements to present a palatable offering.

Certainly inching toward global acclaim, one built on his commitment to making music since his days at the Federal University of Technology (FUTA), Akure, ‘Sere’ and ‘Amapiano Riddim’ will be remembered as some of the earliest decent works spawned by the up-and-comer in the annals of the Nigerian music industry. But, until he attains global fame, we wait with great anticipation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Nigerian Academy of Letters (NAL) will on Thursday conduct investiture of fellowship on writer Odia Ofeimun and academics across Nigeria as new fellows.

The investiture coincides with its 24th convocation ceremony at the J. F. Ade Ajayi Auditorium, University of Lagos (UNILAG).

Ofeimun will become fellows along with professors of humanities subjects.

The academics include Prof. Roseline Oro Aziza (Linguistics – Regular Fellow); Prof. Godini Gabriel Darah (Literature/English – Regular Fellow); Prof. Oluyemisi Adebowale (Literature/Yoruba- Regular Fellow) and Prof. Alex Chinwuba Asigbo (Theatre Arts – Regular Fellow)

Others include Prof. Yakubu Aboki Ochefu (History- Regular Fellow); Prof. Olumuyiwa Adebanjo Falaiye (Philosophy – Regular Fellow); Prof. Emeritus John Ayotunde Bewaji (Overseas Fellow – Philosophy) and
Chief Olusola Akintola Osuntokun, MFR – (Honorary Fellow)

Prof. Simeon Olusegun Ilesanmi (Overseas Fellow – Religious Studies) and Prof.Justus Obi Joseph Nwachukwu-Agbada (Regular Fellow – Literature) will also be invested as fellows.

The lecture entitled: “The Republic of Dignity: The Nigerian Common Humanity in a Culturally Heterogenous Nigeria” will be delivered by Prof. Simeon Ilesanmi.

Chairman Prof. Duro Oni and secretary Prof. Ayobami Kehinde explained that the ceremony is also open to those who want to join virtually through Zoom.
ENDS

Protest languages are not mere buzz words; they are symbolic of collective struggles and shouldn’t be appropriated, adapted, or exploited for anyone’s economic or personal agenda.

Period!

Recently, Jackie Aina, an American-born and Nigerian descent YouTuber and businesswoman, launched a candle option in her Forvr Mood collection, which she named Sòrò Sókè. Many Nigerians took to social media platforms to express their displeasure about the brand’s insensitivity. This phrase became popular during the pandemic when many Nigerian youths took to the streets to protest police brutality and bad governance.

It’s not the first time a brand has been called out for assuming protest language for profiting. In 2014, the presidential campaign team for President Goodluck Jonathan appropriated the #BringBackOurGirls for his re-election bid.

What about protest language makes them a significant representation of a collective identity of struggle? Why did Nigerians Sòrò Sókè (speak up/ stand up) to defend Sòrò Sókè? I will provide you with two reasons: first, protest languages like Sòrò Sókè have the power to retraumatize those who identify with the inhumane acts that informed its adoption. Second, naming a luxury and ephemeral product like a scented candle after a word that has come to represent the unification of young Nigerians home and abroad is an invalidation of their efforts. It is also a trivialization of their agenda, a dismissal of their suffering, and sheer capitalistic exploitation of their collective struggle.

Aina’s team has issued an apology on her Instagram page to remedy the situation, taking full responsibility and indicating that the candle line will be taken off the shelf and production of the same discontinued. This public relations move is known as apology and restitution on the crisis management contingency continuum. While the team and her PR team might hope this ‘medicine after death’ suffices, there is a need to do more than just recalling and discontinuing a product line. If they are serious about repairing their image, they need to channel more restitution towards the retraumatized community, following their lack of tact.

For Aina and other brands that are quick to affiliate themselves to their ‘roots,’ do your homework before running with a tag that appears cool and ethnic. I also reckon you invest in culture-sensitive and trauma-informed public relations and product positioning strategies. If this is a publicity stunt to increase brand visibility and not an honest mistake, it is utterly distasteful, manipulative, and ultimately counter-productive.

I will reserve my opinion of Trish Lorenz’s book for another write-up. Not today!

Finally, to those saying that this is not a big deal, Sòrò Sókè has been in existence before the End Sars protest; I have one ‘word’ for you, may Nigeria happen to you.

Olatunde writes from North Carolina, USA.

The University of Michigan has appointed Professor Omolade Adunbi as Director, African Studies Centre.

Professor Adunbi is a political and environmental anthropologist.

The University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, is United States of America’s number one public university and among the top twenty best universities in the world.

Until his appointment, Adunbi served as an Associate Chair for African Studies in the Department of Afromaerican and African Studies at the same university.

Adunbi is a faculty member in the, Programme in the Environment, Donia Human Rights Center and Program in Anthropology and History.

The African Studies Center (ASC) at the University of Michigan provides strategic guidance and coordination for Africa-related education, research, and training activities on campus, and promotes opportunities for collaboration with African partners on the continent.

Adunbi received his MPhil and PhD in Anthropology, an MA in African Studies with concentration in politics and political economy all from Yale University.

He obtained his undergraduate degree in Philosophy from the Ondo State University (now Ekiti State University) in Nigeria.

He is the first African and Nigerian to be named Director of the center.

On being named the Director of the ASC, Professor Adunbi said: “It is an honor to be leading the most vibrant African Studies Center in North America and of course the world. The ASC is unique in many ways because it is the only African Studies Center that incorporates STEM, Social Sciences, and the Humanities into a program that pays serious attention to the continent of Africa. Africa has some of the youngest populations in the world and there are a lot of potentials in the areas of higher education that are yet to be explored. There is growth in the areas of use of technology and engaging with the continent would open a window of opportunity for our faculty and students. My plan is for Michigan to take the lead in showing how to effectively engage with Africa as equal partners in strengthening institutions and alliances”.
Adunbi plans to use his position to showcase the importance of collaboration and cooperation with universities and institutions of higher education in Africa.

Prof. Adunbi is an active and innovative researcher whose experience as a former human rights activist gives him unusual perspective on, and access to, his area of study: the dynamics of power, citizenship, claim-making, and militancy in the oil-rich Niger Delta. Adunbi’s first book, Oil Wealth and Insurgency in Nigeria (Indiana University Press, 2015) won the Royal Anthropological Society of Great Britain and Ireland’s Amaury Talbot book prize for the best book in the Anthropology of Africa in 2017. His second book, Enclaves of Exception: Special Economic Zones and Extractive Practices in Nigeria, published by Indiana University Press, was released in May 2022.

Read Also:Orubebe drums support for Tinubu, Delta APC leaders close rank

He is currently working on a new research project that engages with questions of climate politics and the ways in which environmental groups and activists uses social media to promote their advocacy for the environment. Adunbi is the author of numerous articles in journals such as Cambridge journal of Anthropology, Africa, Journal of the International Institute at Cambridge, African Studies Review, Extractive Industries and Society, Journal of Material Culture, Information and Society and Political and Legal Anthropology Review. He serves on the editorial board of various journals such as Africa, Current Anthropology, Social Analysis, Political and Legal Anthropology Review etc.

Adunbi is the winner 2022 John Dewey Award for Excellence in Teaching and Research. As Dean Anne Curzan of the College of Literature, Science, and the Rats at the University of Michigan states it, “Dewey winners are considered to model the full range of John Dewey’s own considerable talents: scholarly productivity, provision of leadership, and engagement with and care for students.” Also, in 2016, he won the University of Michigan Class of 1923 Excellence in Research and Teaching Awards.
In Nigeria, Professor Adunbi serves on the Advisory Board of Social Action.

The Oxford-based Abibiman Publishing is set to release the United Kingdom edition of the Nigeria Prize for Literature nominee Olukorede S. Yishau’s collection of short stories, Vaults of Secrets.

The collection is published under the revamped African Writers Series (AWS).

The collection has 14 stories, some of which are intertwined. The stories flirt with the limits of freedom and bondage. They are means through which Yishau examines the nature of man and his ability to choose. They also explores man’s ability to live with the choices he has made.

Read Also: Reviewing Yishau’s Vaults of Secrets

The stories in the collection reveal capacity for tackling difficult subjects within a range of diverse settings. From the miserable confines of a Nigerian prison to Western suburbia, readers are made to come to terms with the universality of the human condition,   the pain and hurt all experienced regardless of the places they inhabit, or the social statuses they bear.

The collection explores themes such as rare gift, doppelganger cum reincarnation, justice dispensation, betrayal, paternity, childhood love, prison life and corruption.

Yishau is the author of In the Name of Our Father, his debut novel was longlisted for the 2021 Nigeria Prize for Literature.

Lola OJ, author and a Vlogger, recently unveiled her book ‘Before you move to Nigeria.’

The book cover is bold and bright. The white, green and black combination and graphics draw your attention.

‘‘Before you move to Nigeria” is a guide that covers the highs and lows of relocating to Nigeria.

Lola OJ paints a vivid picture of what it looks like to move and live in Nigeria, using her personal experiences and the experiences of others who want to move to Nigeria. The book gives a clear picture of what it is like to live in Nigeria.

The layout is also attractive, and as you read through, you get a glimpse of the hustle and bustle of Nigeria’s fine cities and the financial, emotional, physical, and mental demands that anyone living in Nigeria must face daily. Coupled with the fictitious story of Titi, you will understand the culture shock that may occur, the costs of relocating, safety considerations, the challenges of migration, and the steps you must take, all written as if she sits right next to you.

Practical issues such as how to make a successful connection through networking and how to begin as an employee or employer are decisions you make as you migrate to Nigeria.
Contributing to the development of the country exposes you to the vast array of opportunities and exciting and fun experiences that Nigeria has to offer.

The writing style is interesting and easy to follow the storyline and the message.

The writer understands how vital balance is with her informed experiences with varying phases of living in Nigeria, she thought to show you the ropes of managing your experiences with the turbulent times of the country and let you see beyond the buzz of enjoyment and fun in Lagos is colorfully laced with.

The opening chapter heralds you into the real-time experiences of the book’s main character, Titi, a returnee to Nigeria who mistook the glamorous nature of partying in Lagos at night for a general mode of operations in the city. However, the author tried to strike the needed balance between the night’s fun and the busyness of the day.

When the subject of Nigeria is brought up in the presence of Nigerians who were born outside of the country, particularly the Millenials and Generation Z, they immediately think back to their earliest, warlike, ghetto memories of Nigeria—a country with unruly citizens, irate military personnel, and a vengeful government.

Naturally, there are several biases and misconceptions regarding the motherland. Imagine leaving a place in pursuit of greener pastures, and after overcoming a significant portion of the desire for migration, discovering that the only people you were looking for were your children, who were either returning to the place you left or preparing to settle there.

The account of Titi’s parents, and as is to be expected of African, particularly Nigerian parents, they find the strangeness of these thoughts to be overwhelming and worrying. However, there is more to Nigeria than just the accounts of its hardships. However, many young adult Nigerians living overseas hold certain attitudes that have been reinforced by the traditional media.

As a result, these people are adamant about their perception of Nigeria, which is not their fault. Nonetheless, the country’s bright side was highlighted at the start of this book. The balance you need to pursue as you consider moving to Nigeria, the right attitude toward living a fulfilling life back home, and the opportunity to learn from the author’s mistakes, that’s all you’ll find in this promising chapter and details beyond word-of-mouth.

But you won’t know how useful this advice and insights are until you read through the pages for yourself. The best way to do so is to get a copy of the book right away. Lola OJ shares sneak peeks of Before You Move To Nigeria