Thinking about my mum...

My mom is wierd. But then again, as her only child, it follows true that I should be like her. Whatever the case, I love the woman; her gray hairs and all-- most of which I put there.

When I was about fifteen, my mother decided that I needed to learn to cook by force and so one day, it was my turn to make stew. For those of you (possibly none of you) who are unfamiliar with Nigerian food, stew is the basis of most of our dishes. It is a mixture of blended peppers, tomatoes, onions, garlic, seasoning, fried in oil and flavored with stock (or not). It should take maximum twenty minutes to prepare. My first time, the entire process took me four hours.

The end result was good but also, I developed an aversion for meat. Having spent an hour cleaning fresh, raw chicken, I could not put it in my mouth without being nauseated. The only kind of meat I could eat was treated cow hide, known as pomo. It has no nutritional value, has a distinct taste that masks anything else and is quite cheap.

So what did my mother do? She would go to the market, wade through the muck and buy me pomo just so I could have something to eat.

Then there was the time when I would not eat freshly baked bread.

What did she do? She would buy two loaves and leave mine in the fridge so that it was a bit "stale" by the time I was ready to eat it.

Since I was little, and till now, I hated the smell you get when you wash a frying pan used to fry eggs. So what I would do would be to fry like six eggs at once and that would be my egg ration for the month; just so I would not have to wash the pan all the time.

My mom's solution: she would make the eggs, season it heavily and then clean up; leaving me with no chores.

I have other things that I have subjected that woman to, out of sheer wierdness or phases. And she would oblige me.

When you are a kid, what is more important than a parent who accepts your skoin skoin.

*sigh* all this , cos I was just thinking about my mum