Our parents and uncles took advantage of being children to trick us when we were little. Although white lies curb some bad behaviour in us, some are so gullible that whenever I think of it, I just laugh and shake my head.
I will mention some of the lies my parents told. I will start with the funniest one that I can't get out of my head.
I was told that one who eats too many fish heads becomes dull.
I used to love fish heads when I was little. That's because it used to be big and that caught my attention.
Another reason is that I used to buy fried fish daily and I always eat the head.
So I think that was why my parents came up with the idea.
I was afraid, I don't want to become dull, so I told my mom that I won't eat fish head anymore, and I will save my money with her to buy something better, lol.
Up to today, I don't like the fish head.
The idea that the police are extremely dangerous is another white lie.
They threatened to call the police on my siblings and me if we misbehaved.
My parents would scream loudly for the cops to come and take us into custody.
Everyone will be scared, now we would stay still to prevent the police from taking us into custody.
I remembered asking my father why the police were so dangerous and he gave two simple examples.
He said they are devils, that's why they wear black uniforms.
Another example he said was how the police used to arrest criminals in Nollywood and they would torture them.
The examples stuck in my head that I don't want to have any problems with the police.
Sometimes when I'm crying about something and they mention they're going to call the police, I just lower my voice and stop crying.
The police used to wear black uniforms in my country then, but there have been some changes in their uniform.
We have a coconut tree in our compound so we harvested a lot of coconuts but here comes another white lie about coconut water.
My uncle lied that if a child drinks coconut water, the kid will bed wet when they are asleep.
So whenever they break the coconut, he would be the only one to enjoy the fresh water.
When I realized this later when I reached the age of 10, I was so furious that I was tricked, lol.
But I wondered why he chose to drink the coconut water alone. Then I came up with the answer that maybe my dad did it to him when he was young so it's revenge time.
This man also warned me against consuming excessive amounts of biscuits. Since my mother runs a grocery store, I frequently ate a lot of biscuits. He informed me that consuming too many biscuits can cause ulcers. He gave me a definition of an ulcer. Since I was a child, I have known about the illness known as ulcer.
In conclusion, some white lies have trained us not to be greedy and to maintain decent behaviour.
Some have trained us to maintain a good savings culture and we have learned many lessons.
