CONGRATULATIONS ELEPHANTLY, MUBARAK IDDRISU

I like stories. Stories that uplift. Stories that give hope and stories that make you optimistic even in the eye of an overwhelming storm. Stories that leave you spellbound due to the grip they hold you with. Stories that leave you awestruck with a compelling force that makes you put down a book you are reading, laughing alone and wondering how the mind of the author could conjure that.
The importance of a story can never be overemphasized. How a story is told could always shape the perception of a people about a subject. It could make an angel look a devil. The converse also holds.

In one of his novels, Anthills of the Savannah, Chinua Achebe poignantly captures the need for the telling of the struggle and also the redemptive power of a good story with a fable. I capture it here unedited.                                                         

“The leopard had been looking for the tortoise and hadn’t found him for a long time. On this day, on a lonely road, he suddenly chanced upon Tortoise, and so he said, “Aha! At last, I’ve caught you. Now get ready to die.” Tortoise of course knew that the game was up and so he said, “Okay, but can I ask you a favor?” and Leopard said, “Well, why not?” Tortoise said, “Before you kill me, could you give me a few moments just to reflect on things?” Leopard thought about it — he wasn’t very bright — and he said, “Well, I don’t see anything wrong with that. You can have a little time.” And so Tortoise, instead of standing still and thinking, began to do something very strange: he began to scratch the soil all around him and throw sand around in all directions. Leopard was mystified by this. He said, “What are you doing? Why are you doing that?” Tortoise said: “I’m doing this because when I’m dead, I want anybody who passes by this place to stop and say, ‘Two people struggled here. A man met his match here.”

Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie underscores that in her speech “The Danger of a Single story.” She stated, “Stories matter. Many stories matter. Stories have been used to dispossess and to malign, but stories can also be used to empower and to humanize. Stories can break the dignity of a people, but stories can also repair that broken dignity.”

That explains why my Arabic teacher will not show much vehemence in scolding me when I give a divided attention during an Arabic grammar class as he will do when we are treating Arabic literature. He knew where my interest strongly lies. And that also explains why I love to read more memoirs, biographies and autobiographies. And that seriously explains why as a Christian, I loved the Old Testament more than the New Testament. The Old Testament contains the Pentateuch (first five book of Moses), the history books that tell us the story of the Israelites “from their conquest of Canaan to their defeat and exile in Babylon”, the books of the Prophets of the Bible and other books. As a Muslim also, I love and listen to Chapter 12 being recited more than all other of the 114 chapters of the Quran because it gives us the complete inspirational and motivational story of Yusuf (Joseph in the Bible) at a go unlike others that are given in parts. 

In 2010, I did my Industrial Attachment at Iran Clinic as a student of Accra Polytechnic studying Science Laboratory Technology.  I spent almost the entire duration of my internship reading. The book I was reading then was The Autobiography of Malcolm X as told to Alex Haley. Anyone that reads that book for the first time will attest to the gripping effect of the book. One gets gripped like the dreaded Morbus Comitialis of Julius Caesar. 

Over the years, I have encountered many stories. The story of my father which seriously manifests the never-ending re-invention of a man till his death. The stories of friends and family which give you the real life testament of the things you read in books from the figment of someone’s imagination. The stories I got from the books that I have read which bring me to the realization that “there is nothing new under the sun” and “whatever things common to man that man has done, man can do.” The story of Malcolm X which epitomizes the fact that “how one lives his or her life today stands as a testament to one’s forever after”. The story of Kwame Nkrumah which captures well the Arab poet’s assertion that some dead people are really alive due to their works and others too though alive,  are really dead.  The story of Mubarak Iddrisu which emphasizes the fact that “there is not a situation that is not transformable”.

   

Mubarak Iddrisu is the guy in the orange apparel.

Last two years, I told you the story of a young man who lifted himself from the muck and mire of hopelessness to a life of repute and honor. I recounted to you the story of a young man who realized he had a natural predilection towards learning and nurturing of mind that he lost to life of debauchery and depravity. I narrated to you how he realized his incontinence and therefore went back to pick up the life of honor he lost. He is now a student of the University of Cape Coast. 
     Follow that story here

I never told you how he suddenly grew to become an astute and profound thinker. I never told you how he has transformed into a vociferous reader. Once upon a time, I gave him a book written by Robin Sharma, a Canadian with Indian and Mauritian roots who is one of the most widely read authors in the world and one of the most-sought after leadership advisers in the world. The book is The Greatness Guide. 
  

This book really change my world view of life.

He came back the next day, exhorting me to get him the book two, The Greatness Guide 2.The most baffling aspect of the whole story is how two days later I received a call from him that a female friend of his had fallen profoundly in  love with  the books when she saw them with him that  she gave him  hundred Ghana cedis for us to get her some. So we set up together to find those books (he was also ready to grab some books). The rate at which he reads inspires me now and the profundity of his OAD (Obsessive Attention to Detail) raises one’s hackles.  He will give you details of the book you have read and you wonder if you really read the book.

     

The day we went book-hunting . This is Vidya Bookshop at Osu.

Before I sign out of this internet café, let me tell you the story that brought me here. On 2^nd March, 2016, the main auditorium of the University of Cape Coast shook with indescribable vibration stemming out of a wild ecstatic state of happiness. The School of Physical Sciences was awarding its hardworking students. Among the people taking the awards was a tall, lanky, innocent-faced Nima boy called Mubarak Iddrisu who took the Dean’s Award for Excellent Academic performance. 

The jubilation that spontaneously erupted when his name was mentioned alone manifested the fact that this was the pied-piper of the School of Physical Sciences of University of Cape Coast taking an award.

 His statement after taking the awards left me thinking and smiling at the same time. He stated, “I’ll quote Isaac Newton that “if I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants.” Congratulations elephantly to your “little achievement” as you described it. Remember it is a tour de force and a real possession in this kaleidoscopic world.

To all boys and girls, no one owes us a living. We make our own destinies. You make your own life. You can choose to waste it and you can choose to make the most out of it. I see great potentialities in us that we waste on frivolities, banalities and unproductive ventures. We must persevere. We must persist in the face of turbulences and pestilences. We must persist to put our heads above the troubling waters.  Persistence indeed conquers.

Inusah Mohammed

NB: The writer is a Youth-activist and Student of knowledge.

okoromaazi@gmail.com