It was a sunny day in September, nothing about the day had struck me as exceptional, and nothing could have prepared me for the events of that day. Now when I think back to it, it occurs to me that I am among the lucky few who have been alive to hear the announcement of their own death and fortunate enough to witness what a notable loss and bereavement their demise would be to their family.
The decision…
I had just graduated from the university, with no hope of going to Youth Service anytime soon. I had an extra year on hand before Service, not from any fault of mine; it is no great secret to anyone who knows the "premier University of Science and Technology" that they had a tendency to be slow in the compilation and submission of names to the National Youth Service Corps Commission.
Things were the way they were. The restless energy of youth combined with a lack of finance arising from the fact that I was no longer a student and as such no longer drew sympathies from relatives in that they felt the need to give me money, I set my mind to look for a job and earn a little money for myself.
I had heard that I could get a job in Bonny which needed neither a particular skill, exceptional intelligence, nor qualification, it was a matter of "come as you are" and this appealed to me greatly. My cousin and I made arrangements to depart for Bonny immediately.
Bonny …
As treasure hunting tales go, this was no different. The high hopes with which we got to Bonny quickly dwindled into sour disappointment. We had a couple of aunts and uncles in Bonny but in the quest to be truly independent, and because we wanted to enjoy the town without any interference we decided not to stay with any of them, and chose instead to stay with a distant cousin whose existence we had no knowledge of until a day before the trip.
Tonye stayed in a log cabin (Bacha) on the outskirts of the town in a place called 'one-man village'. When we first beheld our new abode, it was only natural that our bravado should falter, nothing could have prepared us for what we met, our newly found cousin took us around his humble abode (no pun intended). It had a kitchenette and a bathroom, the toilet was in an out-house shared with several other people, the living room which was also the bedroom was utterly devoid of any furniture, on one side of the room was his luggage and a sleeping mat. We had gone on the trip with a terribly large luggage containing both our clothes and we were also hoping to make enough money to get some more. Our present environment was perhaps the first indication that things might not be quite as rosy as we had gone expecting, but we had set out to conquer the world and couldn't let a small thing like sleeping arrangements stop us.
As it is with human nature, we adjusted to the environment, albeit not perfectly, but enough for it to be the least of our worries.
The hunt...
With the stories we had heard, we thought finding a job couldn't take more than a week, we were in for a surprise.
Day after day we went to the Bonny Employment Bureau, and day after day we went home dejected. Not even the fact that we had gone armed with a recommendation letter was doing any magic, we were getting disappointed and discouraged, our purse also felt the impact of our two weeks stay with no additional income.
After about three weeks of mostly the same routine; go to the Employment Bureau, meet other people who we had become familiar with over the weeks, "gist" a little, go out for lunch (at this point we had forfeited the luxury of breakfast), and then return home wondering why people took pleasure in lying (keeping in mind the person who had given us the ludicrous story of an easy job).
The death...
On the Sunday of the fourth week, we decided there was no need to go to church, by then we were totally broke but still too proud to go back to Port-Harcourt without the oil money we had gone seeking.
It was in that broke, dejected and almost hopeless state that we were napping when all of a sudden I heard the insistent ringing of my phone, but because I had slept without food and was quite angry with the world at that moment, I was not in a great hurry to take the call. After it had rung five times I finally picked up the call, it was my uncle, my mother's brother, who before that day had never called me.
‘Hello', I said.
‘Toku’? he responded with a question in his voice. My mind became instantly alert, I knew there was something wrong although I could not tell the nature of it. He asked if I were alright, I answered in the affirmative. Before we could continue further in the conversation my battery went flat...
Ngeri and I played out possible scenarios that could have led to the call, we were still on it when her phone rang.
It was her mother, my aunt, she sounded strange as though she had been crying and could barely speak.
She asked Ngeri how my death had occurred, Ngeri put the phone on loudspeaker and responded 'Mummy, what are you talking about? Toku dey here'
I quickly piped in that I was there, though I was totally at a loss as to why anyone should think I was dead.
Well, after we had reassured her that there was nothing wrong with me except perhaps hunger, she told us how an "anonymous someone" had called 'Sisi' my eldest aunt while the poor woman was attending a Church service to tell her, "Toku is dead."
when she queried "which Toku?" the person had responded, "how many Tokus do you know?" Your niece Tokulanye Ibaningo is dead". And went ahead to end the call brutally, every attempt to put a call through to her was futile.
My aunts and uncle immediately called an emergency meeting and were discussing how to get the corpse back to Port-Harcourt, it eventually occurred to them to call our phones, the network conspired with the bearer of the false tale to make it all seem true, and they were told both our numbers were "not available", they kept at it until my number finally went through, I reluctantly picked up the call and heard the news of my death.
