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Thursday, August 12, 2010

Life In Biobaku Hostel, UNILAG

Porter, I wan pour water!

One of the problems of Biobaku, UNILAG, is disposal of waste. A month ago, disposing used water on the quadrangle of Biobaku, brushing one’s teeth on the quadrangle, urinating directly onto the quadrangle at night, dropping wraps on the quadrangle, spitting on the quadrangle, praying on the quadrangle… Sorry, I got carried away. A month ago, these things were commonplace. Every hour spent on the hostel was filled with sounds of water splashing on the quadrangle. That was a month ago. Now we have a new porter.

Now, we have a new porter who hides in specific places waiting for who will pour water onto the quadrangle. He even goes so far as to set traps for students. One funny incident occurred in my room - The new porter, before he was known as the porter, entered my room, with an innocent air, telling us that one of our pots was outside. My roommate (name withheld) went out to retrieve the pot. On finding it filled with water, he disposed of it on the quadrangle. Our porter followed him back into the room, asked for his mattress and confiscated it.

On one occasion, one of my friends (an author on Akokites’ ThoughtPlanet), believing his mattress was wrongly confiscated, stormed into the Porter’s Office and gave him 5 minutes to return his mattress or else… It’s been 5 days. The porter still has the mattress, and our friend, ‘a bona fide’, now sleeps on his bare bunk bed.

Many mattresses were confiscated during the first two weeks of the new porter’s arrival. Our people say that since the hunter has learnt to shoot without missing, the sparrow has learnt to fly without perching. Given the new porter’s infatigable fight against improper disposal of waste (or disposal of waste on quadrangle, really), Baku Men have become wiser. They now keep lookouts, dispose waste on the quadrangle and rush straight back into our rooms. The cowardly ones stick with, “Porter, I wan pour water!”

Porter, pump water!

We are well provided for in Biobaku, UNILAG. We’ve got bunks, beds, sockets that work, cybercafé, barbershop, two butteries and water. Water, H2O, aqua, omi, mmiri, whatever you choose to call it, we just can’t do without it.

In Biobaku, we have water supply 24 hours in a day. It is only made to run in our showers in the mornings and evenings, though. Sometimes, the Baku porter sleeps on duty and forces otherwise gentle Baku Men to step out to their corridors and shout, “Porter, pump water!”

This sacred call to the porter is sometimes abused by Baku Men who wake up late and are too tired to go downstairs and fetch water. I first heard this break in tradition last year. That fateful day of last year, a lone voice was heard in the afternoon, around 2 pm, screaming at the top of his lungs, “Porter, pump water!”

I just got back from lectures. It was a struggle getting in. My skin feels rather clammy. I must go wash up. I will tell you more about Biobaku when next I come online. Bye for now.

Uh! The shower isn’t running. It’s 7 pm for crying out loud. Porter, pump water!

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