I don't know what Mother and Father discussed after receiving this call on a particular afternoon and at night,
Mother sat beside father as usual, and others sat around them in the sitting room after dinner, watching television, and mother just called us to attention.
“ We will have a kid that will stay with us till God knows, he is my younger brother's son who lost his mother, which means he is your cousin, and his name is Akin”. Mother announced.
We were all happy because we knew we had never regretted a visit from our relatives, they were fun to be with and full of positive energy, I remembered aunt shade who played football more than forty percent of male in our vicinity then and bros Jimmy who was a clown wanting to put on soccer boots on a native wear to an occasion, all of these I couldn't forget then I looked back at Father who raised his eye brows looking at me and my elder brother as if he want to pick someone which he was and he said “ Oye, Akin is just six years old and he will be staying with you in your room”. He concluded, smirking in my direction.
“No problem, father, I am good and cool with that”, I replied with a laugh, which made my teeth visible, and we continued to watch the television show “The Super Story”, and after the program, everyone left for their room.
I never knew it was soon and I was just coming back from school the second day and I met this young, weird looking kid sleeping right in my room with a Ghana must go bag beside him and I knew it was Akin and It seemed he was tired since he had traveled a long distance and that is how I met a person I could consider as nutty as fruitcake in wild creativity and stubborn as a chewing gum placed on hair.
Akin is a young chap who copes quickly with anything and everything except books. He was below average, who hates reading and calculations, but his sense of creativity is top-notch. Knowing him at a young age gives me a clarity that there is something special about his creativity or creative nature, and why that is a question that goes to your mind right now?
Akin is fond of doing things differently without even knowing. He is too good at crafting things with his hands. So, daily, after helping him go through his homework and letting him go out to play with his friends who are already hanging around for him to escape from my scrutiny. They will all fly kites together, but I noticed something: while others' kites are made of nylon, Akin’s kite is made of paper without a bridle, and his kite will fly higher than the others. I remember that his kite was named “ ko la pa, ko ni ru,” which means no side, no tail, referring to its bridle.
I just observed him and others as they grew, and later, all his friends offered him money to build or teach them how to make such paper kites, and he acquired a business mindset at a very young age.
I once scolded him because of that, and he claimed he never forced any of them, that it was strictly business transactions.
Then growth comes up and he steps into a teenager during the second era when Java application button phones that used memory cards took up the atmosphere in Nigeria.
Akin advanced in his creativity by repairing these phones, fixing phone screens, formatting and flashing the ones that have a virus, customizing a phone that charges using sunlight due to the solar panel he fixed at the back of the phone, he also created an earpiece with multiple earbuds and the most surprising aspect was that he did not learn it from anyone or watch videos online since technology is new to the system that years.
Most people do business with him, such as phone swapping, sales of second-hand memory cards, and most especially phone engineering. I recalled the day business went sour and the phone he swapped with someone crashed a week later, and they came to our house to discuss creating a scene, and immediately the boys saw me and my elder brother stepping out of our rooms, they swallowed the anger like a big handful of garri and left without saying a word.
Normally, mother is a trader who always stays put in the market, while father is a civil servant who always goes to work and comes back in the evening, and we are most of the time the ones at home.
I have warned Akin, times without numbers about his deals, that if he is not careful, it will get him in big trouble one day and his reply is always “ Egbon lori Striiti yi ko si kan kan” which means his business is safe on the street, well he is out of second school now and he want to explore the world so I let him be.
Akin concluded he has no knack for furthering his education and decided to learn and be a metal fabricator, and his wild creativity continues as he later advanced to customizing and rebuilding music players (MP), which can also charge phones like power banks and can last for a week before getting a low battery. During this stage, he added music to his creativity, and the most surprising part is that he goes to shows in customized wear that blinks with different colors of light at night through wired globes and a battery he carefully laid under the wear.
Well, he is now of age, a boss of himself, and an entrepreneur in metal fabrication, and his creativity still shines in his metal designs and structures. The last time we talked on the phone, I asked him about his swapping deals, phone business, and his light clothes, and he laughed and laughed and continued laughing, knowing that I only wanted to pull his leg for being a nutty fruitcake in creativity while he was growing.
Thanks for reading through.
