To My Unborn Boy

Listen little fella, this is your father writing to you. You are not yet born and we are not yet sure who your mother will be but I am writing to you anyway. Don’t ask why I am not sure who your mother will be; I am still single and the last time I checked it takes two to make a baby. Also, your mother has not yet unveiled herself; if she has, I am too busy being awesome to notice. But hey, let us not lose focus here. You are the subject of this letter; not me.

So then, shall we focus on my intention of writing this letter to you?

Good.

You see, little man, when you enter this world, you are flung into a ruthless and merciless world that will not give you a chance to steal even half a breath without making you pay dearly. Every step you make and every move you make will lead you to a certain point in your life which many people like to call destiny. Walk the right path my boy and make sure you have fewer regrets than satisfaction.

Am I sounding overly sanctimonious? Relax. I will make things easier for you.

Let me give you some insight into a few things I want you to learn from no one but your dad.

The other sex and their things

Women are a very vital part of your life. Your mother, sisters, daughters and aunties will all be female so you should make an attempt to reason with them. They will intentionally hurt you to get your attention; never lose your mind over them – it is how they are wired. Make them happy and you will be the happiest man alive. Rub them the wrong way and you may as well kiss happiness goodbye. Never attempt to get into an argument with women. You’d be more likely (and safer) to bump into a live fire breathing dragon on Kampala Road than to try winning an argument against a female. When she asks you one thing, be sure she means something else. A good chunk of their questions are actually rhetorical so try as much as possible to avoid being a smartass with them. “Do I look good in this?”, “Am I fat?”, “Do you love me?”, “Will you take me shopping?”, “Do you like my new hair?”, “Is the devil female?”; all these are questions with answers already written in stone. Never attempt to be creative and come up with your own answers otherwise that will be your demise right there.

End of the world things

Young man, in my time, we were threatened with the end of the world more times than I can remember. One thing is for certain, as long as you live a life worth remembering, you should never have to worry about the end of the world. Never fall for this end-of-the-world business my boy. If there is anything we as human beings have learned, it is that when someone dies, that is the end of their world. The rest of humanity carries on, often with an indifference that will make you wonder why we even worry about other people’s lives. Just make sure that the people around you are happy with the life you are living and the rest shall be okay. Oh and one other thing – if there is any religion or cult that sets a specific date as the possible end of the world, walk up to their leader and kick him in the nuts – I give you permission. It is mostly men who want to brainwash human beings with ludicrous and bogus ideas of the world’s end so beware who you listen to. Read the Bible, the Quran, the Bhagavad Ghita and whatever other Holy Book you can come across because I have learnt that the best way to indulge in any argument or discussion is to be immensely informed and well read.

When you die, your world stop spinning. Period!

Money and career things

You will have probably heard this a billion times already but I will say it anyway, ‘Money is the root of all evil’ okay not all evil but most evil. As long as you let your life be ruled by money, you are bound to sell your soul to worthless and often inhumane causes. Make sure that you pursue a career that makes you happy while enabling you put food on the table. You don’t want your pretty wife and awesome kids starving now do you? Never ever get into any career solely because of the money. You will get consumed by it and you will end up forgetting who you really are. Stay true to yourself and pursue your personal dreams before thinking of money. I can guarantee that if you pursue your dreams with seriousness and focus, you will get shitloads of money you will not even know what to do with it. And if that ever happens, start a charity in my name. That’s right – not your name but mine. I am your father and I have dictated it. Fathers are always right! Yes – tell that to your son too.

The love of money is the root of all evil

Heritage and Cultural Things

Every decade that passes, culture and heritage receive a blow below the belt from that thing called change. Try as much as possible to stay in touch with your cultural values and never forget your identity. Part of the reason why Africa as a continent is culturally wealthy is because of people like your grandfather, my dad, who swore never to abandon their culture no matter how useless or meaningless it appeared. Your granddad often dragged me to cultural events just so I could appreciate the African culture and heritage a little more. I might have been stubborn once or twice but overall, I now see why he felt like I needed the orientation. Way before I met your mother, when I was much younger, we often went to the countryside to see the old folks. We were involved in pompous and extravagant ceremonies complete with brew, food, song and dance all locally engineered. Make sure you get a wife who understands the value of culture and heritage so that she does not name my grandchildren something silly like Phone, Modem or Bandwidth. Young man, I want traditional names.

Don’t these little ones look cute?

God knows I could go on and on but I’ll stop here because I know people of your time will not be too keen to read. So there; go on and live.

“It’s amazing how a little tomorrow can make up for a whole lot of yesterday.” ― John Guare, Landscape of the Body

Bernard
a.k.a Beewol
The Talkative Rocker
Follow @beewol on Twitter

Secret Guardians

Every human being on this planet has got a bunch of secrets that they would rather go to the grave with. Some have secrets that would rock the world to its very core while others have less interesting secrets that would probably get nothing more than a sigh. At the end of the day, everyone has got little skeletons hidden in a closet, hoping they will not peek or ask for liberation and freedom.

It’s no secret, we all have secrets

While on the subject of secrets, it is generally the rule that while everyone has secrets, there are a few who are maestros at the secrets game. They have curved out personalitites and even careers as experts at the secrets trade. Some have all sorts of secrets thrusted at them with or without their consent. Others position themselves to be able to listen to all kinds of secrets while some others simple enjoy the business of secrets. I know a few of these individuals and I shall attempt to identify a few of the experts at the secrets game.

Presenting, secret guardians;

Mothers

It has always been said that no one knows more secrets of children than mothers do. Mothers know tiny little dark secrets of their children so much that they can black mail anyone at anytime if they wanted to. Mothers know all about the time you pooped in your pants at the family gathering. They know about that time you got beaten up at school by a little disabled girl who everyone used to ridicule and bully. They know about the time you accidentally took a sip of your father’s alcohol and ended up speaking gibberish. They know how as a young boy Pink was your favourite colour and you loved playing with little dolls and eating ice cream. Mothers know so many things it is dangerous to want to be on their bad side. They know whether or not your current dad is even your real dad. These blessed people know just too much.

Oh the serets mothers know!

Catholic Priests

For obvious reasons, catholic priests are included on this list. These guys know quite a lot of nasty things about their flock. From what I gather, every catholic is supposed to share their deepest dark secrets with a catholic father prior to receiving forgiveness from God. The whole truth-telling takes place in a tiny little place where the sinner is not exactly in position to see the face of the priest (probably so that he does not see the priest’s facial expression as he supresses shock and disappointment at the son or daughter of the Lord). It has been said over and over again that while Catholic Priests listen in to some of the sickest and nastiest confessions, they are also the most trustworthy people because apparently they would rather be stoned to death than reveal the confessions of a hitherto sinful catholic. This only goes to show that they actually do know quite a bunch of terrible secrets.

Telling it all

Google 

From the time the Internet went live, a lot of information has been shared around the world.  A good chunk of this information has been searched for on various platforms but Google is the number one search engine by far. Pay a random visit to any Computer that is connected to the internet and pull up the Google search History; trouble!. Some of the things human beings search for are really embarassing. We have outdone ourselves in this department so much that I am sure if Google were a person, he/she would literally be crawling on their knees begging for mercy from anyone typing into Google. We are just too brutal! We Google anything and everything from “How to Kill Chuck Norris In Real Life” to things like “What is a Boyfriend and where can I download one”. We are simply dangerous when it comes to searching for things on Google. Gone are the days when all we did was search for “Jennifer Lopez Naked”, “Translate to Nigerian English” or “Kim K sex tape”. Nowadays we search for things like “I hate when Jesus Rides Dinosaurs in My House”, “Am I the Only one who eats my poop because it tastes like lemon”, “How to have sex while dozing” and my personal favourite, “How do I use Google” We elevate the searching game every other day.

Zach speaks the truth 

God

It goes without saying that God knows quite a lot about us. Many a time, when we are in trouble we pray to him and explain that we did not intend to throw the body into the river but we were just scared after the hit and run. We also tell God to help us execute that robbery so that we do not get interrupeted. God is the one person who listens to our secrets and somehow seems not to judge. If the concept of the Holy Trinity is true, we can all agree that the Father, Son and Holy Spirit must be cracking up whenever we offer up our prayers. Many of our prayers are really hilarious and often border on ridiculous but the Holy Trinity never answers back with laughter. God listens to all our secrets and even before we can begin to reveal anything, the big guy seems to know already. Is he not the all-knowing one? Well, he knows everything we do and from what I gather, he knows it even before we do it. Yikes!

God is on a major LOL right about now

The Government 

Few people will believe this but the Government knows quite a lot of things about us. The Government knows almost everything about us. It knows when you are born and when you die. It tracks you all through your education until the time you decide to self jail yourself with marriage. It knows everything! There is an international wave to kind of reduce the involvement of the Governent in personal lives but I am sure that will come to nothing because the Government is the eyes and ears of the Universe. The Government is the Universe’s way of listening to our coversations and following up on us every inch of the way. Right from the time you are born, you begin to give the Government your time, resources, body, soul and spirit. The day you die, the Government returns these things to the universe – intact with all your secrets. The Government usually lies to us by telling us we have freedoms and liberties but really the truth is these liberties and freedoms are simply what the Government says they are.

The Government knows EVERYTHING!

“A secret’s worth depends on the people from whom it must be kept.” ― Carlos Ruiz Zafón, The Shadow of the Wind 

Bernard
a.k.a Beewol
The Talkative Rocker
Follow @beewol on Twitter

eMANcipation

In February 1966, the duo of James Brown and Betty Jean Newsome co-wrote a song ‘It’s a Man’s Man’s Man’s World’, a song that James Brown later performed in a studio somewhere in New York. The song was a commercial success and even though the Rolling Stone Magazine called it “biblically chauvinistic”, it generally had positive reviews. In the song, Brown attributed most of the successes of the modern world to the man but added that all these would mean nothing without a woman or a girl. Thirty six years later, a one Orville Richard Burrell better known as Shaggy released a hit song ‘Strength of a Woman’. Here, Shaggy heaped praises on, and lauded the woman for her beauty, power and sexiness. Along the way many songs, poems, movies and stories have been released and it has become apparent that women are the new rulers of the world. In the words of a one bodacious female representative Beyonce, women actually ‘run the world’.

Burrofcos

Any sane person will agree that the era when women were underdogs has long gone. This has effectively been replaced by an era where women battle for survival in the same ring with men, women challenge men to street fights and they generally hurl threats, insults and dares to their male counterparts without a fear. Let’s just say there is a lot more competition today between the male and female species. Women are kicking ass all over the world and taking names.

The game has changed

 Competition is healthy, right?

Wrong; very wrong! Unless you are assured of winning, there is no reason why you should be getting into competition. Forget what people say about competition sharpening you or making you work twice as hard. The competition between the male species and female species for dominance is one that can only end with one winner – the female. You see, as much as men like to think that we are in control of things, women actually are in control. Women are way smarter than men; they are more calculative and are certainly inclined to make more progressive decisions. True, they might make an impulsive decision here or a PMS-induced decision there ere but overall, women will keep the world spinning a lot longer than men will.

  The world is probably safer in a woman’s hands

Now what?

Remember when we made so much noise about women emancipation? Remember when people got bonus points prior to joining University by virtue of the fact that they went through monthly bleeding routines? Well, it is about time we did that all over again – but this time for the men. It is time for e-man-cipation of men! Women have consistently proven over the years that they are better at management, policy making, ruthlessness and ambition. And now that every company, organization and entity is backing females over males, it is safe to say that men might as well be sent away from the high table sooner than we think. Gone are the days when wives stayed home to clean and cook for their husbands. Today, the only reason the woman will stay home is because she is enjoying the maternity leave after which she will fly straight back to her office desk to sign cheques. We are seeing more and more stay-home-dads today not because men are suddenly swarmed with oestrogen but because women are actually taking over.  

Women have taken over! 

Is there a problem with women being on top of things?

Not at all; as a matter of fact, the woman-on-top position is a very wonderful position. It gives the woman control and enables her to make the man dance to her tune – never mind the fact that she does most of the twisting and turning. And before people’s minds can go crashing in the gutter, allow me to explain why I have no problem with women being on top. Research has shown that projects that are headed by women tend to achieve a lot more and a lot faster than projects that are headed by men. Did I just make that up? Yes. But surely it does make sense. Women know how to get the most out of the least. Men on the other hand can be quite extravagant and will not hesitate to be boastful along the way – something that is very dangerous and pathetic.

  Imagine having Meagan Good on top of things

What exactly am I saying?

I guess all I am saying is that men will not last to see the end of this battle of the sexes. Women will outlast the men and women will eventually run the show. As already mentioned, this is no problem because it will probably be for the best if women take over. There might be a few glitches here and there with countries going to war over colours of their flags or alliances being made between countries because of similar shopping habits. However, on a whole, women are likely to make the world spin a little faster. My only worry is that along the way, men will be relegated to the role of drone men – purely for sexual satisfaction, unable to sting and utterly useless after sex. You see, the nature of a drone bee is such that should the drone succeed in mating, he will die almost instantly because his penis and all other associated abdominal tissues are suddenly ripped from his body after sexual intercourse. This is what we shall become.

Men will soon need to move around advertising their services

Humble Appeal

As such, on behalf of all men, I would like to appeal to the females to have mercy on us. The competition is getting really hot and you females are totally tearing it (and us) apart. We apologize for any awful things we may have done or said in the past to insinuate or claim that we run the show. We are fully aware that you currently run the show and we only beg that you do not relegate us to the background. Requesting for e-man-cipation might seem too forward but under the circumstances, it is the best we can do. We know that sooner than later you will need us for nothing other than sexual pleasure and as much as this sounds like a good deal for us, we beg that you do not rip off our sexual parts soon as your needs have been covered. We also recognize that outside of sex and conception, there is not much you need us for. The warmth can be gotten from the teddy bears you hug every night, the conversation can be gotten from your fellow females – they converse better than us men. And the companionship can be gotten from the numerous cats, dogs and other strange pets you take up. It is in light of this that I plead on behalf of all men; I beg that women forgive us for our transgressions and allow us to be a part of this race.

Oh Great and merciful females … 

Here is something for you to chew on …

“Women saw everything, and they thought about everything. The result was wisdom. For men, this was a frightening state of affairs, which is why they insist on holding on to power.” ― Tamar Myers, The Witch Doctor’s Wife

Bernard
a.k.a Beewol
The Talkative Rocker
Follow @beewol on Twitter