"Nostalgically Speaking"

(*long post alert*)

Hey People! Hw's everyone doing? How've u guys been? Thanx everyone that has dropped by to check on us; (hey buttercup, thnx sis, i'm not doin too bad)

Jaybaba is doing good with his dissertation; Thank God for that! I have had so much crazy ass school work. In the last 2-3 weeks, i have had to turn in around 4 essays and i had to do a mock court trial as well. Plus i haven't been feeling very well the last week on top of that aunty flo decided to visit two days ago... Basically it's been crazy for me. All that is about to be history, i get a 2 week break from uni that starts today, (yay!!!) so i'm going home to london. I just need to rest and chill out and not worry about anything for a while.

The other day i was thinking i miss home, by 'home' i mean Lagos. I miss the stuff i saw growing up... like seeing the man hawking puff-puff(1) with his fork in hand... or the cobbler with his tool box walking down my street and hoping someone's shoes needed fixing, naija people call them 'shoemaker' and my ma called them 'so bata' sometimes, lol! (so bata; literally means fix shoes, its also used to describe one that fixes shoes)

I miss hearing stuff like "E ra epo e se be..."(2) from the girl hawking palm oil or "Fine butter bread" from the bread seller in the mornings just as the sun was rising... or "ICe water tutu reee"(3) from the kid hawking water tied in little plastic bags and chilled in the scorching sun. I miss going to the 'mallam'(4) to buy 'go-go' or 'm&k'(our own m&m's/smarties lol!). I also miss the days when, if you had #15(naira) you could buy a 25cl bottle of Coke and 'Okin biscuit'. LOL! I jus randomly remembered the three orange men from the miranda commercial! lol! I miss hearing the horn of the fan ice cream/yogurt man on his bike; i miss fan yogo and super yogo! lol!

I miss gala, la casera, Mr biggs(they still do the best meat pie in my opinion), I miss TFC; especially their 'yamarita'(if you havent tried it please do, its fried yam, fish and one sexy sauce made from tomatoes, onion and pepper), i miss their fried rice too and their salad too, i miss sweet sensation too, i miss 'chopsticks', i miss big treat, i miss buying grocery from 'osata' supermarket(opebi)...

When i was growing up, i loved sundays(now i don't because i know it means the weekend is over!lol). Sundays were nice, we got to spend time together as a family, we got to go church and sometimes we ate out after church. But i think my favourite thing about sundays was going to the market to buy food stuff after church. My mum did this on sundays because the market she bought most of her food from only opened sundays; 'It was called Sunday market', and it was in Ogba(I think its still there, the last time i checked it was sha).

People would probably think that i do not seem like the market type but i love markets; well food markets especially and trust me i have been to and I know quite a number of markets. Oya let us count; (1)(Ogba)Sunday market, (2)Ogba retail market, (3)Alade market, (4)Oke Arin market, (5)Tejuoso market, (6)Ipodo market, (7)Mushin market
Those are the ones i can remember. I know (1)(2) and (3) like the back of my hand, well at least i did then.

Today i will be gisting you about my love affair with Sunday market. So like i said, after church, we'd drive down. Most times we'd go home to change into something more comfortable first but sometimes when church dragged for long, we'd got straight from church. I actually liked going with my ma, it was fun for me. I started going with her just so she'd remeember to buy me pork; i loved pork so much, since she bought it once and made stew with it, i just got hooked. I was still quite young when i started going to the market with her, i was under 10 and i got used to it even before she thought i was old enough to go with her whether i wanted to or not. I'm sure you are wondering if i am normal, but the thing is, it was actually like an adventure especially as i did not have to carry anything apart from my ma's bag, 'the alabaru'(5) carried all the stuff we bought round the market and then to the car.

So usually when we got to the market, we'd get an alabaru and then start buying.
*The yam area was usually first. I would see yams bigger than my head, lol! My mum would pick the ones she thought would be good to eat and also good to pound(for Pounded Yam). She'd price the yams, pay and then we would proceed.
* The Garri(6) sellers were usually next. I loved tasting the garri. The garri people will ask you if you wanted 'garri ijebu' or yellow garri AKA 'bendel garri. Garri ijebu is the sour, fine one, usually cream/off white in colour; this one's is good for 'soaking' with groundnuts. Infact my dad and i judge the 'goodness' of garri by how sour it is, lol! Bendel garri is usually yellowish and more like sweet rather than sour. This one is good for making eba. Though some people will rather 'soak' this and others would rather make eba with garri ijebu. I generally don't really like 'bendel garri'. My mum does though. We usually bought both.
*The next stop would then be the tomatoes, 'tatase'(7) and 'rodo'(8) sellers. We all know how important these ingredients are in making stew and 'efo'(9). My ma would pick fresh juicy tomatoes, rodo and tatase, price the lot and then pay. She usually bought enough to make efo and stew for the week at least and instead of taking the lot home to blend (which would probably take forever) we usually took them to the 'elero'(10) to grind/blend.
*The next stop was the provision area. Where you bought Milk, Indomie, Milo, Maggi, Seasoning, Curry, Thyme at much better prices than the supermarkets would give you.
-Now by this time my mum's alajota(11) onions customer would have found us. This woman literally danced round the market to find her customers, "Ah, Mummy, customer mi, e ti ra alubosa leni..."(12) and then she'd drag you to her stall while singing and dancing for you. If you said you weren't ready to buy onions yet, she would follow you round the market till you were ready. She was quite something, very notorious, very funny, she made me laugh every sunday.
*And next to my fave market woman were the Oil people's corner. Palm oil, Groundnut Oil and Vegetable Oil(p.s. is sunflower oil different from veg oil, what is veg oil made out of?)
*After buying oil, meat was usually next. This used to be the highlight of the whole market trip for me! lol. Which is probably why i don't understand vegetarians, i respect their opinion/decision, i just do not necessarily understand it. Anyways so there was always so much meat... chicken, turkey, beef, goatmeat, pork!(my reason for being in the market, lol!) and whatever else they had. Most times my mum bought chicken(especially cos of us the kids), and some beef, and of course if i was there we couldnt leave the market without pork( i eventually grew out of it... TEMPORARILY though, cos i still love me some pork chops now. lol! Strangely my mum loved ponmo(13)(still does i think) so she bought herself some occasionally, no one ate it with her sha, lol! Infact my dad always told her not to put ponmo in the food when they were eating from the same plate, lol!
*The 'Elero' people were near the meat guys, so we'd give them our tomatoes, tatase, rodo and some of the onions to blend and the alabaru will wait to collect it while we bought the few thing we still had to buy.
*Also near the elero people was my ma's 'Egusi'(14) customer. I love egusi so we never left the market without it. We usually bought egusi and ede gbigbe(15) and then the person selling it would grind it into powder form for us. We bought our efo at the same place too. There are different types of efo that i know, there's Ugwu(16), there's ewuro(17), there's 'ukazi'(18), 'tete'(19), and my favourite 'sokoyokoto'(20).
*Our final stop most times was by the fresh fish sellers. They always had big, veryyyy big, live fish in bowls of water, what was funny was hot the fish would be doing electric slide in the bowls, lol. I enjoyed kicking the bowls just to watch them dance, hehehe! Sometimes we bought fish from them, sometimes we didnt. When we did it was catfish. I love catfish, especially in peppersoup. lol!
*By this time, i'd be tired but i'd feel fulfilled, hehe. My ma would buy fruit just at the exit and i'd opt for fan yogurt most times; we'd walk the alabaru to the car. Pay him, (they were actually always boys) and drive home...


Take care people

Have a great weekend!

Ef Babe

Translation Corner

(1) - nigerian pastry, similar to donuts (without the jam)
(2) - 'yoruba' literally translated as Buy Palm to make stew with
(3) - Ice cold water here
(4) - actually a title, but nigerian children use term to describe every petty trader that happens to be a hausa man
(5) - yoruba; literally means a person that helps to carry stuff; it's actually a job title in nigerian markets for the boys that help carry your shopping round the market
(6) - nigerian staple food made from cassava
(7) - yoruba; big red pepper mild
(8)- yoruba; small red pepper, very hot
(9)- yoruba; vegetable delicacy
(10) - yoruba; people that operate the very loud grinding machines in nigerian markets and are paid to grind your tomatoes, pepper, beans and the likes
(11) - yoruba; a trader that dances whilst selling
(12) - yoruba; 'Ah mummy, my customer, you havent bought onions today o'
(13) - soft hide eaten as meat by nigerians; i just read somewhere that it can actually be used to make shoes
(14) - melon seeds used to make soup
(15) - dry crayfish
(16) - pumpkin leaves; used to make vegatable soup
(17) - bitter leaf; used to make vegetable soup
(18) - a type of vegetable used to make soup
(19)- yoruba; spinach(i think)
(20) - yoruba; literally means 'makes your husband happy/robust'; its a type of vegetable used to make 'efo' and it is believed it keeps your man happy