At the coffee shop.
Guys checking out my friend, like “What’s that?”
We are the people of the 22nd century.
There is none like us.
And one by one they will find out who we are, and what we mean to the survival of this planet that they try so hard to destroy with this thing they call “progress,” and “science.”
Queen Elizabeth did not wait for my arrival in 1956 before she returned to England.
She arrived Lagos by air January 28, 1956, and returned February 16, 1956.
I arrived Lagos by birth February 25, 1956.
I was disappointed when I arrived and was told she already returned a week before I landed.
Yesterday, my friend, Femi, called from Maryland and we had a long and beautiful conversation on the art of social distancing.
He wanted to buy a painting.
I told him I was happy to sell a painting and sent him a picture of the work.
I said the painting would look good as a Zoom backgrounder—like when FOX News calls and wants your opinion.
Are you going to panic because the artless interior of your home would suddenly become exposed to hundreds of millions of people on television and social media?
When young women went to the river to fetch water, they would disappear.
The king’s royal beads even went missing.
People were worried. One of the wise men said, “Let’s approach Ọlọ́run to give us a police boss.”
But who could they trust? One of them must be the thief.
They decided unanimously that the only trustworthy person in the entire community was Ijapa.
Ijapa gave them only one condition: “Nobody should visit my house without letting me know in advance that they were coming.”
For the first time in my life, I traveled out of Nigeria in 1983 to visit London for a solo exhibition of my work at the Africa Center.
Rufus Orisayomi had arranged the exhibition for me.
Tunde Fagbenle and his wife, Ally Bedford, offered to host me at their home.
Ally was writing a Master’s thesis on my work, therefore, it was convenient for her to keep me close by to enable her to have access to me for clarifications when needed.
How easy it is to degenerate into a beast when you enter the jungle!
Yesterday I vowed to myself:
1. I will always calm down.
2. Though the okada bike riders are driving me crazy, and all the drivers are treating me like the road belongs to them only, I will refrain from calling anybody names like, “Were (lunatic), olori buruku ( crazy heads); eranko (beasts), etc.”
Thanks to all my friends who reached out yesterday to greet me on my birthday.
It was fun to turn 63.
Do you know this amazing plant called Iginsogba?
I started harvesting it to make an interesting product.