The Rita Side

Once upon a lifetime, I was God's very own. It was almost like I did not need to go to church to have a conversation  with God. I could just start one while walking, no matter how silly,  but it was a great time of my life. I had never been the pray-before-you-rise or pray-before-bed kind of girl. I was just the girl that talked to God when I was brushing,  having a bath, in-between classes,  etc. Still I showed up in church whenever I could. It was my peaceful place...my escape  from all the madness. I used to call myself lucky and unlucky at the same time. I have to be the clumsiest person  I know (even today). No one else makes tea and spills the beverage/milk/hot water every time. No one has tripped more times than me. No one makes more mistakes or bad decisions than I do.  But on the other hand, I've had the craziest luck too. I fell sick last year for about three days, but before then, my last sickness was menstrual cramps and occasional...

Felicia was her name. He liked to call her a friend. For a man in his line of work, it was not particularly a thing to advertise. Still, as each day passed, he let her suck him into her bubble. Her energy was contagious, her beauty was blinding and he dared not speak of her body, although its perfection always seemed to be the elephant in the room. Amongst his peers, he was quite a bore. They said he was too serious for his age. It was true that his job was not one to meddle with, but one had to laugh sometimes, right? Life was too short after all. If only they knew that a certain female left him in stitches each time they met.  They probably would have advised him to be more devoted to his work and shed off such dangerous distractions. Each time they invited him to come out with them, he turned them down. He could do without their weekly beer and suya meetup. He had his own after all. Maybe it would have helped if he had other friends. Maybe they would have warned ...

You know how girls are completely obsessed with the bathroom? I am not particularly different. My wig feels lopsided, I want to go to the bathroom. It's that time of the month, I want to go to the bathroom. My bladder is threatening to embarrass me (as usual), I want to go to the bathroom. It happened that on the day in question, I had to make my regular trip and the closest bathroom was in a building I used to call my dormitory. The place still seemed very familiar to me, (or so I thought) and I knew where the girl's bathroom was. So without a second thought, I took the stairs two at a time and pushed the bathroom door open like I still had rights to the place. Guess who I saw. You guessed wrong. I don't even know the person. I just know that a complete stranger was standing right there staring at me and wondering if I had lost my mind.  Even  I was wondering the same thing!  What was I doing in a boy's bathroom? Why was I in a staring contest with a stark nak...

Maybe it is disrespectful to call her that, but I do remember that she was blue. I'd never seen anyone turn blue before. I never understood why they would say blue blood when blood was always red. Not until that day. It was one of those boring mornings where we were standing and listening to what we could barely understand. A man walked into the emergency room. He was so tall and looked like he was in his late 30s. I glanced at him passively and let my eyes wander around the slightly crowded room. Mothers were everywhere, hovering over their sick babies. 'Ma I need your help ', I heard someone say and I turned to see. It was then that I saw blue baby in his arms. He wasn't talking to me but my heart skipped at the sight. Blue baby was gasping for air and he was struggling to hold her gently. He looked a bit too composed for a scared father. I watched as the woman he spoke to pointed towards the front desk and then quickly rushed towards it with him. B...

1.  Come early. It is the least you can do:  I had this near-perfect plan of  leaving by 9am for a 10am wedding (I did not sleep at the hotel like the other girls). Well, that would have worked out if all I had to do was throw on a suit and walk in flat shoes. Well, girls have to deal with so much ( and I mean so much) in order to be worthy of attending a wedding. As a bridesmaid, you just have to be extra. Who knew it took four hours to achieve that? Needless to say, I was late. Guess who still got there before the bride?😂😂😂 The church has no chill😂😂😂😂How can the wedding even start before the lady of the occasion?? 2. Know what the bride looks like. It's a basic requirement!   Laugh or doubt all you want but I was recruited as the bridesmaid of a wedding and I knew no one. Not even the bride. How did they find me? My mother must have thought she was doing me a favour by giving me a chance to show myself, you know the manhunt and all. I was so u...

I was late. Being early had never been my strong point, but today was special. I came for the food and we all know when the food comes😂😂 While I walked stealthily to the last row, I took in the small hall and it's occupants. It was half full and everyone had tried to look his best. The little boys wore their best clothes and shades that were too big for their tiny faces. I tried to pretend it was not raining heavily outside and the sun was burning their retinas. The girls wore the prettiest dresses; some were a bit too colourful, while others had more stones than the entire Brazil. The teenagers were there too in their numbers; so were the youths and elderly. I quietly took my seat and pulled out my phone. I was not the typical 'church' girl. I always followed mother to church every Sunday while I was at home, but God called it the 7th day for a reason. It is the day of rest after all, and rest I did, until hunger humbled me. So there I sat pretending I could ...

Dear diary,  This is my third try at writing this post and it had better be my last. Somehow, I feel I'm getting a bit rusty with this writing thing. I've been home all day trying to betray blogger and move to wordpress. Apparently google is serving a living God and I can't seem to understand the wordpress site I am working on. Well... there is still time to learn. So far I have watched four caesarean sections, one manual vacuum aspiration and one delivery and I am bored. I expected so much more from this Obstetrics and Gynaecology posting. My colleagues in other groups have seen more drama in one day than I have in the past two weeks. Each time I hear a new interesting story, I want to weep. Still, I have to tell you something. The manual vacuum aspiration (MVA = evacuating a pregnant uterus) for me has been the weirdest experience so far. You know how abortion is illegal in this country? Apparently, all you have to do to get a safe and legal one is to try the illeg...