My dad worked for the government and my mum was a housewife. When I was little, I used to stay at home most of the time. My sisters who were older than me had little time for me the little kiddo.
My mum made use of me by ordering me to peel potatoes, spliced onions and pruned vegetables. So in a way, I was a kitchen helper. Then she taught me to sew buttoms and other torn seams. Her words of wisdom were "better learn to sew now if you do not want to be bullied by your wife in future."
I must have taken the motherly advice to heart because I did learn how to sew. Nowadays when my wife expressed surprise over my deft handiwork with the needle, I repeat my mother's words. I guess I received the right advice afterall.
Going to school was by bicycle. My house was about three to four miles from school. And I used to take the short-cut, that is, along the river bank. The longer route to school would have been through busy streets in town. Since the tiny path along the river bank is cleaner and doesn't have any traffic, I usually arrived in school on time.
Once or twice when my bicycle wheel scraped the sides of the path, I took a tumble but it was not serious. School days were uneventful. Teachers in general weren't impressed with us lot. They considered most of us as "lost causes". When one of us asked our form teacher how many of us he thought would make it to university.
He paused for a while and then lifted his hand and spread his five fingers. There were a total of about 40 of us in his class. So much for confidence in his dear pupils.
The teacher had it right. There were about that number who managed to make it to the university. I was one of the last to scrape through before the door slammed on all our faces.
Since civil servants' pay wasn't anything to shout about, my shoes and clothes were unspectacular. I wore very ordinary shoes but I didn't go bare-foot. My clothes were very much less than trendy so I looked like a vagabond most of the time.
I had no money to see even cheap movies so I read comics. But most of the time, I had empty pockets so I normally browsed around at newsstands until I was chased away for taken too much liberty with the reading materials.
As I was saying, these are not hardships. Those incidents were part of my education as I was growing up. We didn't even dare to talk about taking vacations because there was none to speak of.
I didn't go on overseas trips until I was well into my 20s, and I went on my own financial means. That made the holiday so much more meaningful. So these days, I advised all those who want to listen that it is much better if you pay for your own vacations.
My parents made us wake up early every Sunday morning for church service. Most of the time, I would rather just continue sleeping but my mother was brought up in a strict Catholic family so there was no means to escape from the Sunday obligation.
Frankly, nothing meaningful as I recall was gotten free. Everything had to be earned, and so we did. If we had nothing much to eat, then we ate whatever was placed on the dining table.
During my varsity days, I was constantly plagued by shortage of money so I survived on as little as I could. Consequently, my weight dropped to a very healthy level. Before, I moved to another town to pursue my tertiary education, I was a chubby guy. Four months after I had enrolled in the university, I returned home literally a new man. My mother nearly didn't recognise me because she could see my jawline.
Life's like that. I am glad I went through those so-called rought patches. Thank God for all that.
Try this if you're are bored
Call all knife knuts
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