I grew up hearing negative things about gambling; however, I have also seen people win tempting amounts of money from gambling, and it is kind of confusing which side one should stay on.
There are several reasons why people gamble: addiction, lack, fun, and ignorance; a majority of gamblers fall under one of these categories.
In my place, it's mostly the issue of lack and addiction. Both the young and old gamble like their lives depend on it; in fact, to some of them, it is regarded as a job or source of income.
After I graduated from college, I realized that life isn't as smooth as I thought; one source of income was never sufficient to pay my bills, to talk more of supporting my loved ones, and to spare.
I began seeking ways to multiply my income. Those days, I was clicking on every link and visiting any site that offered digital opportunities.
Unfortunately, most of them were scam sites; I only realized after wasting my time.
While going through the channel section on WhatsApp, I came across a group, “Greats sure odds.”
“Sure odds?” I asked myself silently. A series of memories about sure odds in betting that I used to hear people talk about began hitting me.
Quickly, I opened the channel, and I began seeing receipts of won football bets and some casino games.
My eyes widened as I zoomed in on some of the receipts to confirm their authenticity. “These things are real, o,” I said aloud as I scrolled to the top to see the previous activities.
One of the captivating things about the owner of the group, who chose to be anonymous, is that he asked people to react with certain emotions if they win, and surprisingly, on each of the games he drops, people react positively, showing that they are winning.
A part of me wants to believe what I am seeing, but another part of me keeps contradicting it.
“Don't forget what you know about gambling; you will lose money and probably end up an addict. Respect yourself and walk away, Emreal,” I cautioned myself.
Every day, I come around to check what's happening in the group and keep envying them.
The invitation links he drips for SportyBet and other Bc.game casino games are quite enticing and seem to be beckoning to me each time I open the channel, but I keep resisting.
One of those days, my friend Timothy came to the house and was telling me about his current financial status.
“Emreal, there's money online and in gambling,” he started.
“That's right, I knew this long ago but those are risky; there's no assurance of getting your money back once it's staked,” I answered.
“You are not wrong, but life is about taking risks; if you ignore risk, you may never hit it big,” he defended himself.
“Timothy, I know how many people lost a great amount of money to gambling, and they're still paying off debts. I can mention names if you want me to.”
“Emreal, you're a scared guy. I can also mention names of people winning. In fact, two days ago, Baba Alex won 8 million naira. I was at the betting shop when he came to collect his cash.
He even gave me five thousand naira to drink water. Come and see something,” he said as he pulled his phone from his pocket and logged into his sporty betting account.
I drew near and looked; the sum of one hundred thousand naira was withdrawn some hours ago to an account with his name, “Timothy Gabriel.”
I exclaimed, wow!
“That's my win earlier today. These things pay, brother. You just need to understand how it works,” he concluded.
He spent quite a long time at my house, and we spoke at length before he left.
Seriously, his result moved me, and I began feeling the urge to try it too. “Imagine if I win two hundred thousand or just a hundred thousand Naira in this hard economy, with just two hundred naira, wouldn't that take me far?
Moreover, it's just two hundred naira; there is no big deal in it,” I thought quietly when I returned home after seeing Timothy off.
One of those days, I was desperately in need of money, and the only money I had on me was two hundred naira. I was going to use it to buy data because my data subscription was going to expire that day, and I had no other means to earn.
I took my phone, and I opened that channel, and like magic, a link was dropped for registration, and immediately a booking code for the upcoming matches was dropped.
A part of me was saying, “Just ignore this”; another part of me was saying, “You can become a millionaire from this one decision; don't ruin your chance.”
I gathered courage and quickly registered using my email and funded the account with my two hundred naira.
It was such a hard decision; I struggled with my hands to enter my PIN for the final transfer but I did eventually.
After booking those games, I staked all the money in the account and suddenly became restless. Every minute, I opened the app to check if the matches had turned green or not.
At some point, I was winning; the games were entering, and I was happy. I got the opportunity to cash out my two hundred naira, but it was not the goal.
The game was going to pay out two hundred and fifteen thousand naira. That's quite huge; it would take me a long time, and with the matches already entering, I am certain I would bag that money.
At intervals, I checked, and things were going well. In order to reduce the tension I was having due to how I check what's happening with my matches. I decided to turn off my phone and step out a little.
When I returned and turned on my phone, I went to the channel on WhatsApp to see what was happening before I went to take my money because I was sure everything was going to work well since I had not seen the admin post about any losers.
Unfortunately, that day, when I entered, I saw a message: “Sorry guys, our luck didn't shine on this one; we will go again tomorrow.”
Ha, my heart skipped; a sharp pain passed through my heart like it was divided by a sword.
I refused to believe what I read. I rushed to the sporty bet app and behold, there was a red cancellation sign on two of the matches.
My money was gone on my first attempt to gamble. The pain hit differently because that money was supposed to be for my data subscription, and I had no backup plan.