In the 18^th Century, the story was told of a PhD student who spent close to 8 years trying to finish his dissertation to be called Dr. something something. He was given a very simple assignment that took him all these years to finish his course.

The question posed to him and his course mates was ‘WHAT LOOKS LIKE HALF AN APPLE?’ and they were to research into it and submit for their dissertation to be called book doctors.

For nearly 8 years, they always got the answers from their research wrong. Please the other thing which looks like half an apple which you are imagining now was also part of the answers. Bud man! Hahaaaa!

Then one day, the oluman student was soliloquizing and his 5 year old daughter heard him. Then he shared his problem with the 5 year old and guess the answer the small girl gave to what looked like half an apple: ‘Daddy, the answer is the other half; in fact there is absolutely nothing on this earth that looks exactly like half an apple other than the other half of the apple’. And that was the correct answer.

The useless moral of this ‘useless’ lie is that we often complicate simple simple things that are so close to us by thinking we can only always solve our problems ‘abroad’. Be simple la ah!

Today is Friday and I just remembered the late Aggogo.

 Ago-goallllllllllllllllll! And the whole country went agog with joy! I still remember vividly how this young, strong and handsome looking guy got all the young Babes on the streets yearning to just meet him for a selfie in 2008. Yakubu Aigbeni of Naija thought he was strong until he met Jnr Aggogo in the CAN 2008 when he jumped to push Aggogo down but the Ghanaian striker stood fast and he, Aigbeni rather fell. Abeg, don’t think this Aigbeni is a nyebro o; this one is Papa Anago! Was he a defender? I don’t even remember but dude had a hard time with Jnr Aggogo in the dying minutes of the game against Nigeria and punished them for the slightest defensive blunder by Dangotey’s pipos! Manuel would forever be missed! He was such a delight on the field of play!

I am not sure but I think it was during that regime that you would hear commentaries like ‘Locomoto headed the ball to Onana. Onana dribbles two Indomitable Lions and fell (why not?) when the ball then tumbled straight into the suulia of Banana. Banana was swallowed in a dribble by Akwedu of Cameroun…and it is a goallllllllll! Banana 1, Akwedu 2’ as ‘Nkati3’ the goalkeeper has just been replaced! Azey, the history of AFCONs? Hmmm!

Do you remember the Naija squad had some very interesting names in their line-up those days. ‘Odeneku passes the ball to Okenedu and he connected the ball straight to Onekedu’s head and he scored! Whether it is Odeneku, Okenedu or Onekedu who scored, at the end of the day, you won’t even know who actually did! African names! Clap for us! Hahahahaaaa!

You remember I sojourned abroad before and used the name ‘Mr Rosemond’ to work. Because it was not my real name, my supervisors would call aaaaaaa right in my face and yet, I won’t hear! I became speech impaired and hearing challenged by force all bcos of nokofio!

While on the streets of abroad one day, I caught the heart of a beautiful white woman whom I helped to carry something into the booth of her car. We fell in love moments after. I was 25 years old then. The age gap was not much; she was only 74! I liked her bcos her looks were similar to those of my mother’s elder sister, Daavi Agbanor. She was pretty with her veins partially exposed with a nice set of ‘manageable’ teeth though I later discovered those teeth were artificial. She said she wanted us to marry. I embraced the idea knowing it was my dream to get married to an obroni. People would be singing for me in my village: ‘Yevu Yevu Bonso3…Nyama Nyama Bonso3! At least that would guarantee a total elimination of my ancestral poverty! She wasn’t as sexy as I expected but this is a fine opportunity to get my papers too. I was physically very lanky then and for somebody like that to agree to marriage with me only tells me her problems may be bigger than mine! The veins in my neck were on display. In Avey Dakpa, it is called ‘gakli meets gakpey’ (scrap metal meets granite stone)! But I have to ‘sacrifice’ as it was a timely intervention to scrap poverty in the family tree!

Ei but until I travelled abroad, I didn’t know it was that difficult to get young white ladies to marry o, herh! So I managed this ‘grandma’ of mine as my wife but what bothered me was her lack of interest in giving birth again though at 74!

Then the wedding took place in a church with very few people, I had no relatives attending bcos they were refused their visas. I was happy bcos my senior brother Abraham Zogbenu of UG would kill me if he saw me marrying someone as old as my grandmother. The least he would do if he was present would be to laugh at me till I faint; I know him.

But I didn’t mind bcos the oyibo people made me believe age is nothing but a number. That thing is not true o. If in doubt, why aren’t Yegola and Abedi still playing for the Black Stars?

‘You may kiss the bride’ Kai! Hmmm! It was a difficult situation but man must survive; I managed to ‘pass that test’ somehow. My brother, you should be there to see the anger on my face at the time I was compelled by my background in poverty to say ‘I do’ Eiiiii!  

Then we were to sign the marriage certificate and the church had many apartments and the place we signed it was the same place we had our refreshment. It was a kind of apartment called CONDOMINIUM. That was the first time I got to know that the word ‘condom’ could actually be found in some church buildings. However, the short form of condominium is not condom o; it’s condo or in short ‘corn dough’!  

Nothing annoys me more than addressing my grandma as ‘Honey Honey’ in every utterance that came from my mouth.

The wahala after marriage? Ala! Anyway they say ‘for better for worse’! Today she is fine, tomorrow, I had had to deal with one medical condition or the other and the visits to the hospitals, you can’t count! She would often let me carry her at the back from the top floor to the ground floor before driving her to an infirmary. Poverty no good o!  

Every weekend, we had to go out jogging together and she had a walking stick and kissing in public was not frowned upon by their culture. You should see that woman and I as husband and wife walking the streets of abrokyire. Besides, she was extremely jealous and suspicious of every single phone call I made or received from Accra. She often threatened me with extradition and divorce even though by virtue of our marriage I was already a citizen. I recall the day my pastor back in Ghana asked me to send him a picture of myself and my wife. God is good! He saw it and fainted as he covered it up with the excuse that the Holy Spirit was at work! I agreed with him and indeed it was only the Holy Spirit that got me surviving this marriage albeit for a short while. Since then, I vowed never to send any picture to anybody again.

As for bedmatics, I felt I was committing a crime punishable by my conscience and as to how I was going to do it, just imagine. She liked talking and could talk aaaaaaaa till I fall asleep and when I do, she would wake me up to continue talking, talking, talking. Habaa!

Her meals were made of uncooked leaves. Raw garlic and lettuce were in abundance after which I had a daunting task kissing and it was a MUST! Eish!

She’s always upset with one thing or the other and I blame it on cultural differences.

I wanted my own kids but with a 74-year-old ‘grandma’ who has declared her intentions not to born, a plan B was imminent. I needed to come down to Ghana to ‘plant a seed’; she followed me.

She was everywhere I passed and my friends were just laughing at me. She said we should visit the mall. Whaat! Well, I gave in and at the mall, she wanted me to be holding her, arm-in-arm and holding her by the waist. At this point, the Naija song, ‘All I need is your waist’ didn’t appeal to me anymore. The small boys and girls around kept their fone cameras on us, albeit secretly but I saw them since I knew their intentions. We made it back to abroad. I remember the day she forced me to post the pic of the two of us on phasebook and forced me to caption the picture: ‘Me and my Baby”! ‘Baby’ at 74? Ao! What kind of poverty alleviation program is this, I kept asking myself in annoyance!

The day this Mamaga discovered that I was in a serious relationship in Ghana was the day I found myself back at Kotoka in chale worte!

Marriage of convenience? Never again!

Enjoy the weekend and be good even if it has to cost you. My name is Zogbenu and I have ‘too much money in the bank; how to share it with people is my problem. Hahaaaaa!