The First Time

Chapter 1      Kelvin was in a commercial transport on his way to a high institution. He was to apply for a place in the institutions’ pre-degree program. This was his first time coming to the institution. He had taken the usual long but treacherous journey due to the poor road network from his domiciliary city of Aba to Onitsha. It was mid-year of 2000. It was a four-hour trip that ended without any spectacular event. Though there were exceptions such as the sight of the usual lush and beautiful landscapes of hills that dotted the roadsides. There were other passing commuter vehicles. Edifying buildings and bridges. The bridges were across well-known rivers that had left their landmarks on the shores of the political history of the country.      The names of some of these rivers had become emboldened and etched in the minds of the people. They had become political identities for some political states in the southeast region. These states are Anambra State, Ebonyi State, and Imo State. These States got their names from their respective and famous rivers after their names. Omambra River, Ebonyi River, and Imo River respectively.      Kelvin noted with keen interest the customary cries of ware hawkers. A good number of them were children, young teenage mothers with clear evidence of motherhood. The other parties are the elderly men and women. These groups of hawkers lined up the length and side of the luxury bus conveying the passengers to their destinations. These have been the usual trends each time the bus enters any major town or city during its many stopovers. This was either for some of the passengers to alert from the bus. To refill its tanks with petrol. To pick up some more passengers, the list goes on. Each of such stopovers had become an atrocious opportunity. Some passengers seized the opportunity to buy items they may need or may not necessarily need. They would stick out their heads through the side windscreen. Soon droves of hawkers will be dangling their wares at them to buy.      He struggled with the urge to join the foray and the usual mad rush to buy one or two things during such brief stopovers. There was no doubt that most passengers who bought things that way did so out of enticement than from necessity. He was yet on his thoughts when someone sitting beside him had perceived the inviting aroma of a freshly peeled banana. The aroma must have come from another passenger sitting in the front seat. His co-passenger inquired of the cost of that particular size of the banana bunch. Moments later, he excused Kelvin to get access to the side windscreen with his head sticking out of the bus window. He was calling out to the banana hawker to himself for his own bunch of bananas of the same size and price as with the other passenger.       Once or twice during such brief stopovers, the shouts of “Driver please wait. Let me collect my balance,”      “Driver please wait, let me pay for what I'd bought.” This was a constant chaos-rhymed song in the air. Most will be airing their objections and opinions with a mouthful of food. These passengers are either seen in a struggle with mouthful chunks of food and at the same time trying to get the attention of the driver who had already pulled the bus into motion. When such cries were not heard or ignored by the driver. A chain reaction of action follows. Other passengers will lend a helping hand to bring the attention of the driver to the need of the particular passenger in support. Others like Kelvin who are not in support of the delays will be against it and would urge the driver not to stop. However, those in support will always win the few. When that fails, there will be loud bangs on the metal door or the glass partition panel of the vehicle. This panel separates the passenger's section from that of the driver section of the bus. The later action usually gets the immediate response of the driver. The driver in most cases would voice out in anger at the passengers blaming them for causing unnecessary delays. When it comes to this, Kelvin will always take the side of the driver within himself. Sometimes too, there will be no such loud verbal offensives.      After each of these episodes of encounter, he will always recoil into his shell of neutrality if the case was not a friendly one. This can happen when heated debates and harsh exchanges ensue with the driver, his conductor, on one hand, pitched against the rest of the passengers on the other hand. Each side will be trying to out-reason the other party with their various points of argument. Kelvin noted that the female passengers of the mid-forties and above are prone to such unusual behaviors. They are of the behavior of either taking too much time bargaining on the price for an item. They are always at this as if it was their convenient time they were buying such commodities especially edible fruits. When a price is finally reached, they would take a longer time fumbling with their bags trying to get the money. When that is not enough, they would squeeze out the money which is usually of high denomination. This is a habitual thing with people. Most prefer to present higher denominations at the point of trade even when they are buying something of lower value that requires a lower denomination to ease the transaction. This no doubt will need the ware hawker to run about among his or her colleagues in the trade for a suitable balance for his/her customer. This would in most cases contribute to more hiccups in the proper continuation of the journey. Such action irritates some passengers like him but he dares not protest. You could never know when you would be in the same situation as them, maybe on an unfortunate day too.      It is with a note of interest too, that the crossfire will end as soon as it started. A mutual and unanimous ceasefire declaration ensues with the end of missiles of words. A blanket amnesty soon overrides any ill feelings that might have arisen. Before long everything becomes calm as if nothing had happened. The journey could be a silent trip devoid of events. In other scenarios, some passengers would continue on with their previous conversations before the outburst. Others would strike up new topics of interest. Most times a whole total political debate could arise and factions would take sides. Especially was the case when no preacher-man or d**g marketer was present. This set of individuals hide under the cloak of religion or comedian. They are only aimed at exhausting their different wares at the expense of the passengers. These are two sets of persons, either selling their goods and services or monetizing their faith.       With d**g marketers, the idea is to have the attention of their listeners locked up in their ludicrous jokes. Nonetheless, they all follow the same set of approaches. They would start with an emotionally charged prayer section called to praise and worship which is a deceptive strategy to take advantage of people's emotional affinity for religion by attaching it to what they sell. It is equally with the sole purpose of gaining the undivided attention of their would-be clients. They would take the process to yet another level that follows a more personal undertone. This additional strategy leverages the perceived passengers’ bottled-up problems. These sets of people are well crafted at using religion as a tool of attention. The phase of capturing the passenger's attention ends the moment the praise and worship session is in progress. Psychological marketing will start with the proper advertisement of their goods and services.  They prey on the negative aspect of people's" health issues; the gloomy fear of dying from your perceived ill health if you do not buy their products.       The mode of the adverts makes the products and services offered look more appealing than they truly were.  The next person is the preacher-man. The faith hawker. The preacher-man is of particular interest. His procedure would start with the usual long spell of emotion-charged praise worship songs. These centers on life and death and the afterlife experience. This is a well-calculated psychological design. It reminds every passenger of the overbearing presence of death. Death is always an unexpected visitor that can come knocking at any given time even on a highway through accident. The preacher-men does not fail to dwell and emphasize on that; it’s their main weapon of thrust. Such thoughts are as usual dispelled with the “Blood of Jesus” chants by the passengers. This line of thoughts forces every passenger riddled with the fear of death to fell in line with the preacher man’s message. At this point, the air would be aural of spiritual charge. And on the fringes of fanaticism; the devil must, without doubt, be in trouble in his kingdom. All his works are cast out on the spot. With his demons bonded as well as every dark force with him defeated in the battlefield of the luxury bus, all by the blood of Jesus! Every evil is seen and unseen sees itself cast out. The devil receives all the blame even when humans’ errors were responsible for most of the fatal accidents on the highway. The self-denial of responsibility is the easy way out of problems. It is always the devil's cup of tea.    The whole frenzy exercise soon climaxes into the sowing of seeds. Offering-giving comes in different ways. It comes either involuntary with the sharing of envelopes. In another way, it comes in the selling of religious wares and articles such as stickers and banners. These items according to the preacher’s claim are divine and could help to deliver every buyer from the works of the flesh and the devil’s attacks. Then follows the prayer merchant session. Money for prayer. The amount of money you offer gets you the number of prayers that will solve your problem. In the preacher man's own voice, "Whatever amount you use in sowing your seed so shall be the solutions to your problems. Sow bountifully be and bless bountifully. Sow sparingly and you will be blessed sparingly,"